***
Four days and dozens of fruitless stops later, the squad gathered at the collapsible table with Riddick seated among them. They all felt worn down and haggard after getting short bursts of sleep between flights. It’d been necessary for the sake of fuel use. Riddick was the only one who didn’t look worse for wear. The perks of youth... Or being a Furyan, perhaps.
“That was our last stop,” Waters said. “Our last attempt. Riddick is the only Furyan we have to take back.”
Pond said, “I remember what you said to Aquarion but is he really worth it?” He stood behind Riddick’s chair. “I mean we’re taking him from his home and simple life, and he seemed happy enough without our intervention. Is it morally right for us to kidnap him like this?”
“Those are valid questions, Pond. They’ve been on my mind as well.”
“I think it’d be cruel to leave him alone like that,” Kenner said from behind Waters. “It would’ve been different if we’d found others, but the reality is we’d be leaving him to sleep in trees and worry about getting eaten, and wondering where and when he’d get his next meal.”
“Right,” Markham said. He was seated next to Riddick as he studied Waters’ report on the tablet. “But morally right or not, we have to take him. We’d be stupid not to. Besides, the Necromongers are still out there, crusading from world to world. It’s inevitable that they’ll discover Earth one day. Bringing Riddick will better prepare us for that.”
“I agree,” Waters said. “Even if it’s just this morsel of intel, it’s better than nothing. Furya’s the only world that hasn’t gone down like the others. We’ve only begun trying to answer why and how that happened. We have to find a way to stop them.” The rest of the squad voiced their agreement. Waters folded her hands on the table and took a deep breath. She tried to put herself in the kid’s place and guess how it’d feel to leave your home planet and everything you knew. Frightening. Daunting. Maybe even a little exciting. “Riddick,” she said formally.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Your life is about to get very interesting.”
7.
Waters jolted awake, overwhelmed with nausea, as her cryo capsule roused her from slumber. The glass door parted like a beast opening its jaws with a hiss. Her face mask lifted away and her vitals reader beeped in time with her racing heart. An oblong bowl swiveled before her chin but she clamped her jaw and pinched her lips as she looked at the ceiling, taking one deep, slow breath after another. She pushed the bowl aside, making her nausea to let up with sheer force of will.
Once her stomach was a minor discomfort, she began to relax. The capsule emitted a gentle ding, signaling for Waters to brace herself as the machine detached all the tubes and wires that’d kept her alive and healthy. The removal of so much equipment felt so relieving that she sagged against the harness holding her upright. The vitals reader shut itself off and an overhead light came to life, basking her in a dim white glow. Low as the setting was, she squinted, then rubbed the sleepiness from her eyes.
Waters hit the button by her ear, releasing herself from the harness wrapped around her legs and torso. She stumbled all the way to the passenger chairs lining the middle of the space ship, and gave her legs a moment to get used to bearing her full weight. The cryo capsules protected her and the rest of her squad from atrophy, but the technology couldn’t substitute brain usage.
She slowly let go of the black chair, then straightened out her smock as she took in the rest of the occupied capsules. Riddick and her four squad members were sound asleep and wreathed in green glows, signaling that they were all alive and well. She crossed to the control panel splayed out along the head of the ship and it lit up when she sat in the cockpit chair. She pressed a choice button and the metal shields covering the wall-sized windshield retracted with a series of thunks, revealing a view of Earth from space that took up the whole window. They would enter Earth’s atmosphere within an hour.
The sight brought relief and comfort. As thrilling as intergalactic travel was, there was no place like home.
Waters headed to Riddick’s capsule. His vitals were solid, yet the respirator sounded slightly fast for someone in deep sleep. She took a step closer and scrutinized the mask covering his nose and mouth. Maybe there was a leak in it.
Riddick opened his eyes.
Waters jumped back with a scream lodged in her throat, and she placed a hand over her sternum. Riddick’s eyelids drooped, but he forced them open a few times before closing altogether. Seconds later, they popped back open and he met Waters’ gaze with his usual intense curiosity.
She double-checked his vitals, which were still in the green, then drew closer once more. “What are you doing awake, Riddick?”
Unable to talk due to the stomach tube stuck down his throat, he shrugged.
“Oh, good, you still remember some English after spending three months in cryosleep--or lack of sleep.”
He nodded.
“If I let you out, can I trust you not to touch anything while I shower?” She’d rather leave him in there than out and about, unsupervised, but she couldn’t just leave him in such an uncomfortable position while awake. God, how much of the last three months had he been awake?
He nodded again.
Waters reached to the side of the capsule, then paused with her palm over the release button, studying the kid. “This means just pick a spot and wait. If you’re hungry, you can eat and drink. If there’s anything else you want, you wait for me.” It would be a while before she herself felt hungry after waking from cryosleep, but Riddick? Who knew? “Got it?” He nodded a third time and Waters slapped the palm-sized button.
Vents sucked out the treated air, and the straps over Riddick’s arms popped off. His throat tube pulled out, he coughed and gagged, then began tearing at the wires and tubes attached to his arms and torso.
“Riddick, no!”
Gasping for breath, he paused with one hand down his smock and gave Waters a confused look. He tentatively reached deeper as the needles in his arms pulled out.
“Stop. The machine will remove them for you. Don’t hurt yourself or break the machine.” She was sure he understood less than half of what she said but she felt better speaking in full sentences. At least her words got the kid to stop tearing things up.
Riddick held himself stock still as the cryo capsule’s computer methodically detached the rest of its equipment, lifting away the face mask last as the capsule’s doors parted. Riddick sped through unlatching all the buckles, then fell into Waters as his legs failed to hold him up. She locked her arms around him as they both stumbled towards the chairs. He reached for a chair, pulled himself upright, and stood so the chair sat between them. Waters reached for him but he gave her a look like a wounded animal about to lash out, the whites around his dark irises far too prominent. She lowered her arms and backed up a step.
Riddick doubled over and threw up all over the floor.
Poor kid. Waters gave him a sympathetic smile. “Yeah, cryosleep is rough.”
“I don’t like cryosleep,” he said between gasps, then started dry heaving.
“No one does. Take a seat.”
He slowly got his stomach and breathing under control, and the whites around his eyes disappeared. He slid into a chair and clenched his fists in his lap.
Using her toes, Waters lifted a floor flap and pressed a button, raising a collapsible table from under the floor. A vertical slab of stainless steel rose to eye level with her, then unfolded and snapped into place. Riddick gripped its edge and stared at it, yet his attention was on Waters.
“Are you hungry?” she said.
“No, ma’am.”
“Did you wake up a lot in there?” She pointed to his open capsule and she retrieved a box from a supplies cabinet next to one of the dormant cryo capsules.
“I don’t know. Ship always dark. Everyone always sleeping.”
“As you were supposed to be as well, but let’s worry about that when we all
go see the doctors.” She popped open the mouth of the box and sprinkled the absorbent powder all over the beige-colored vomit. “Just stay seated and don’t touch anything until I come back. Got it?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Waters finished cleaning up the vomit with a handheld vacuum, then check on her squad members individually before heading for the showers, giving Riddick, who was watching her every move, one more glance before stepping inside. Hopefully he’d obey orders and stay put. He knew the stay command. Sure, she could wake Kenner, the biggest and strongest of her squad, but she didn’t want him or any of her soldiers to see her in just a smock. She had to keep appearances at all times. She’d been the last one to enter cryosleep, and she wouldn’t wake the others until she was back in uniform and presentable. Riddick would be given the same professional front at all times once he was able to speak fluent English and was comfortable in his new surroundings.