Bishop stood just outside of the ship and leaned against the massive trunk where there was protection from the rain. He hadn’t wanted to leave the area at all and would have preferred to take the village right then and there, but Duncan had insisted that they wait for the cover of night to besiege them. That the mercs had started to head back to the ship the moment Duncan had said it had pissed him off and he quietly seethed the more he thought about it. The men hadn’t turned to him to ask what they were to do; they simply listened to Duncan and then dismissed him out of hand.
Dark fell fast in the half light of the forest and he peered outward through the broken trees as the full force of the storm fell on the open grassland beyond. The sky ripped open with a deep roar and Bishop looked again at the shell of the ship buried half in the earth of the forest floor. Duncan filed out of the belly of the ship, with the rest of the mercs behind him, laden down with weaponry and supplies.
The men split into three teams; one with explosives, one with heavier weaponry and the third team with small arms designed for closer combat. It was to this third team that Duncan was attached. He stepped away from the other men to walk towards Bishop and brief him on how they would take the village.
Duncan had wanted the tech officer to stay behind, but Bishop had insisted. “I want that call made, Duncan. If there’s one village there are probably more and we’ll need more men. He stays with us.”
Duncan nodded at the suggestion. Bishop had inflated his reasoning for the call somewhat, perhaps to hide that he had needed it so much but it didn’t change anything. The tech walked beside Duncan and kept the radio covered against the rain that lashed against them when they left the cover of the forest. The last attempt had failed, and it would be another twenty four minutes before he could attempt again. Duncan didn’t know what effect the storm would have on the signal. Under normal circumstances he wouldn’t even have bothered with the attempt but for all he knew, here in this place, the storm could very well increase their chances.
The path became slick and treacherous as the explosives and heavy weapons teams churned through the thickening muck ahead of them. Duncan reached out to catch the tech officer before he slipped and fell into the swollen river; he could feel Bishop’s eyes on him as he turned his back and knew that it would be soon. Not before that signal went out though which gave him at the very least another twenty four minutes and they would be at the village before then and the assault would have begun.
The explosives team broke off first and vanished across the tall grass, their path easily obscured as the wind whipped the grass at their backs. The heavy weaponry team took a different path through the grass but the effect was the same. Duncan, Bishop, the tech and two other mercs remained, with their small weapons, to approach the village from the path by the river. Duncan had chosen the two mercs that remained with them and there was no doubt as to their allegiance. Bishop’s face hardened and he concentrated the full weight of his glare on the tech officer. That signal was all that he had left.
Duncan crouched lower as they neared the village and pulled his knife from its place at his back. He didn’t have to look at Bishop to know the effect this had on him; the quick intake of breath and the tiniest of steps that he took to put distance between them made it clear enough. Fear and fascination. It always came down to that first moment. They remained at the foot of the path and looked out across the darkened buildings of the village. The windows, shuttered against the rain, hid the light and the square in the middle was dark and empty.
No one had said a word since they had left the ship; they couldn’t be heard above the storm and what was there to be said that hadn’t been already? Bishop fought the urge to see how much time he had left before a signal could be sent; he knew that Duncan would instantly read it as weakness. All there was left to do was wait.
Duncan felt the first tremble of the explosion before anyone else; he had waited for it, and that’s why they stood hidden at the foot of the path. Anyone that tried to flee the village would be driven towards them. A building on the other side of the square seemed to mushroom outward at first before it exploded in a fireball, the flames turned quickly to a black oily smoke in the downpour. The screams and shouts of the villagers increased, only to be drowned out once more by another explosion.
Duncan raced between two buildings, low to the ground, as one of the villagers darted in front of him towards the area where he had seen the dog kennels before. A large man slid in the mud that had formed in the square when Duncan hit him but didn’t go down right away. His shout as the blade entered was drowned in the next clap of thunder and he went down in a heap, without ever having seen his attacker. The blood washed out quickly in the deluge and one of the mercs helped Duncan pull the dead man against the side of one of the buildings.
Shapes of the villagers flitted across the square back lit by flames from the burning buildings. They had run off to one side until the bursts of heavy fire erupted from that direction and drove them back towards the river, to where Duncan’s team waited for them. A quick burst of gunfire from Bishop cut down several villagers as they fled the explosions and heavy fire.
Duncan cast a sidelong glance at him and eased back even further into the relative shadow of the eave of a building, the tech officer held behind him. Bishop’s lips were pulled back in a rictus of hate as he cut down a family as they fled towards the path. He stood in full view of the square now, his weapon barked again and again. His bottled rage was let loose and what he couldn’t take out on Duncan, and to a lesser extent the tech officer, he took out on everyone that crossed his path.
One of the mercs stood across from Duncan, on the other side of Bishop, his weapon raised. He looked at Duncan, his face unsure and the muzzle of his weapon hesitant. Bishop had stepped so far from tolerable action that he had lost whatever sense of balance and control he had once had. Duncan shook his head slightly and watched as the merc lowered his weapon; he didn’t like any part of this, but Bishop’s voice was still essential if they were to get off the planet.
The planet. Duncan eyed Bishop carefully and thought about everything that had happened since they had been pulled down to the planet surface. There had always been a subtle tension between them but it had been just that, subtle. Something had happened to Bishop since they had landed here. Duncan thought back to the electromagnetic fields that they had stood in and remembered what he had felt. Connected to everything, he felt an incredible surge of power. He knew that what Bishop had felt had been very different and he wondered if that was part of what had driven him near mad now. Neither of them was the same man anymore and if Duncan was honest with himself, which he always was, he would have to say that the planet itself was a cause.
Bishop dropped a spent clip and switched to a handgun as he stepped back from the open space he had stood in. He let out a satisfied sigh and spun on his heel to face Duncan and the tech officer. “Are you going to kill me now, Duncan?” His voice sounded almost festive as he walked towards Duncan and the other man. Duncan had his own weapon drawn and aimed at Bishop, one shot and Bishop would be dead. Of course, without Bishop, the only one who had the authority to call for an airlift, he would be stuck on the planet. Duncan wondered whether that was such a bad idea but he was a creature of habit and wouldn’t leave himself without a way out, it wasn’t in his nature.
Time drew out in a fine wire between them; it made the fractions of seconds feel like ages. Bishop arced the muzzle of his weapon to put the tech officer in the crosshairs. “Time’s up. I want that signal out now….I don’t want to hear any more of that shit that you can’t get through. I know that isn’t true. Isn’t that right, Duncan?”
Bishop’s gaze bored a hole through Duncan this time and Duncan almost smiled. The tech officer looked at Duncan quickly to confirm before he tried for another signal; he probably could have gotten the signal out before, when they were at the ship, but Duncan had said to wait. For what he didn’t know but he had put his faith in Duncan and would do as he asked even if he didn’t really understand it.
There was the burst of static; he checked the time again and knew that in another few seconds the signal would be clear. He said nothing but extended the handset to Bishop and then stood out of his way to stand beside Duncan again.
Duncan closed his eyes as he listened to the call. He grew still and quiet as he listened. Bishop asked for more than a simple airlift or a few extra men. He asked for an invasion. A Company troop ship stationed at another large Trieste system planet would arrive in three days with over a thousand men and enough armaments to devastate the planet completely. A ship that size would be nuclear, and would have the capability to destroy the planet from orbit, provided the ship didn’t fall victim to the same electromagnetic fields. In Bishop’s haste he neglected to mention that.
They stood in absolute silence as Bishop disconnected. It was one thing to take a target; it was something else altogether to destroy a world. And for what, because Theopoulis had dared to escape? Because they had crashed here? Because Bishop wasn’t as in control as he had always believed himself to be? Because he wanted Duncan to fuck him and could never admit it even to himself? He would kill everyone and wipe out an entire planet for that? This crossed a line that Duncan found he could no longer tolerate.
“Drop it.” Both Duncan and Bishop turned towards the merc, who now stood in the open between the two buildings. Bishop grinned maniacally at him and turned back to face Duncan, in the mistaken belief that the merc had spoken to Duncan. The merc raised his weapon and was dropped by a burst of small arms fire. Duncan had said the villagers were armed; it appeared some of them had started to fight back. The second merc looked from one man to the other before he took up a position and began to fire back into the square.
Bishop bared his teeth in the mockery of a smile and raised his weapon towards Duncan. “It ends here, old friend.”
Duncan felt all of his muscles coil in anticipation; he looked forward to this, the culmination of years of hunting and killing in the other man’s shadow, of being witness to his petty cruelties, and now it was almost at an end. He snorted in derision as he flipped the knife over in his hands. “You don’t want it to end this way, in a simple gunfight, Bishop. You want to get up close and personal. It’ll be like the first time, isn’t that what you want?”
Bishop listened to Duncan’s silken voice; a voice that promised death, but so much more. He looked down at the weapon in his hand and shuddered as he thought about that first time, and the image it had summoned while he had stood in the electric field. He wanted to fight him, and he didn’t at the same time. His eyes turned to slits and he raised the weapon against Duncan again.
Johns had pushed himself back under the eave of the building and tried to disappear. The pounding rain, the dull whump of explosions and sharper burst of gunfire had terrified him. He wasn’t cut out for this, he was a tech officer and all of this was beyond his twenty three years. He was just a tech officer. He tore his eyes away from Duncan and Bishop as they slowly circled each other in the rain and mud and pulled himself closer to the radio. The low hum was the only warning as he switched from the handset to the speaker on the side, for hands free calls. One twist of the dial and the screech of feedback pulled Bishop from his course.
Bishop spun at the sudden sound and that was when Duncan made his move.
—
Riddick struggled with Joanne as she tried to run back to the village. She had pulled at his arm and had expected him to follow her to get her daughter back and now she fought and screamed at him, when he tried to stop her. He pinned her arms as gently as he could, given the circumstances, just as Shazza and Theo appeared at the railing of the ship, followed shortly by Jack. Joanne dissolved into horrible heart rending sobs as her body gave out and she could no longer fight Riddick.
Theo jumped down from the ship and ran the few steps towards her. When she saw someone else that would help her she renewed her struggles and pulled at Theo to go back and help her get her daughter. Her pleas with Theo dissolved into the same screams when he wouldn’t turn and go back to the village with her. Riddick slipped behind her and pinned her arms before she could flail at Theo again and for a moment the two men stood face to face, with Joanne broken with sobs between them.
Theo held Joanne still and just looked at his friend. There was a terrible resolve there; he had no doubt that Riddick would find the girl, no matter the cost, but there was something else that in that fleeting moment as they held her. Sorrow, guilt and shame were laid bare there, briefly. Joanne pulled an arm free and flailed at Riddick in her fury; he took the blow and pinned her again. His voice was quiet and barely rose above a whisper as he pressed Joanne into Theo’s arms. “Take care of her. I’ll get her daughter back.” The unspoken ending, ‘if she’s alive to bring back’ hung in the air between them as Joanne sank to her knees beside Theo, her wails broken to a low strangled moan that ripped at the two men. Theo watched Riddick and knew it hurt him more.
Shazza dropped to the grass beside them and went to Joanne’s side but the woman could no longer move. “We need to get her back on the ship.” She looked to Theo, as he leaned down to pull Joanne up from the small puddle she sat in, mindless in her grief, and then up to Riddick, who looked so hurt that it shook her to her soul. She had never thought that she would see so much emotion in him at once; not in his face, which remained an expressionless mask, but in his eyes, which couldn’t hide what he felt. He looked at her for what felt like forever and then looked up at Jack as she stood at the railing and helped Joanne over. It was when he looked at Jack that his mask broke and his sorrow showed deeper there momentarily before he turned away and looked back towards the village.
Riddick closed his eyes; it was so much easier when he didn’t feel, when he didn’t care, when he was so cold that nothing mattered. He had walked out of that tavern and turned his back on the people there, including that little girl, and now she was gone. He felt responsible and it hurt like hell and no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t wipe the memory of her away. Every time he saw her in his mind he thought of Jack; his little Jack, who knew more than she should ever have to about things she had no business knowing.
He listened as Theo and Shazza helped Joanne up onto the deck of the ship, and without another word, set off for the village to bring her daughter back. He could feel Shazza before he heard her and he spun on his heel to face her, to tell her to get back to the ship where it was safe, that he would take care of it.
“Don’t. Don’t you dare tell me to turn around and go back.” Her voice was hard and cold and something dangerous smoldered in her eyes. She had pulled her hair into a knot at the back, and had picked up another weapon off the deck before she had jumped down to join him. She held the bone shiv he had made for her and it only took one look at her for him to know that not only would she use it, but she would enjoy doing so.
He wanted to send her back anyway but knew nothing he could say would make her do that; she would fight him rather than be sent away from him. He thought back to the first day he had ever set eyes on her, when she chased him across the desert and would have beaten him to death if given half a chance. Shazza would never give up. He took a step towards her and growled but she didn’t move, she stood her ground, and he found his admiration for her grow a little more. ‘My kind of woman’.
They turned and set off for the village without another word.
Copyright © November 2006 xxxevilgrinxxx