53. Jack

Jack's life had been a series of memories too horrible to contemplate, yet she remembered every single moment with crystal clarity. Her memories haunted her even in cryo-sleep.

Years of running with her mother, always hiding and always scared. Then her mother found dead… that moment seemed to go on for an eternity and her unusual brain could not let go of any second of it. It replayed for her every time she was forced to get into a sleep tube. Every second of her life was available to her, and sometimes even seemed to crowd into her waking life as one thing or another reminded her of her past. It could be a smell or the slant of the light or a sound similar to one in her past and the visions would start to unroll in her mind's eye without her bidding. Moments of time with Hypatia were the worst. Months of time in prison were the least painful.

She'd seen prison before she'd met Riddick, she'd killed a man before she fell in love with the ultimate killer. Of course, it had been quite by accident the first time. She'd been running from Hypatia for the third time in half a year, and the devil had again tracked her with unholy accuracy. Jack, desperate to get onboard any ship leaving the planet, had knocked over a stack of cargo to cause a distraction. She hadn't seen the man, hadn't meant for him to die. His screams had frozen her in place. The backwater planet hadn't cared about her age when sentencing her a only few hours later. Prison had been a surcease of the anxiety she felt every moment in Hypatia's company. It soothed her.

And, oddly, Hypatia hadn't broken down the walls to get her back! Waiting for it to happen had been Jack's only disquiet. Had Hypatia left her to her fate or was she prowling outside, planning to break her out? Eventually, the stress of wondering pushed Jack to escape the low security prison and seek out Hypatia on her own. Hypatia had taken it as proof of Jack's love. Jack had taken it as proof she was crazy enough to only be loved by something as mad as Hypatia. It was a pattern that would be repeated through the rest of Jack's life with only her time with Riddick and the Holy Man to give her a taste of what might be. Then she'd gone looking for Riddick rather than Hypatia.

Eight years broken into months of Hypatia, prison and cryo-sleep.

And every moment of those years as clear as if they'd only just occurred, running through her mind like wildfires: painfully hot and out of control. Jack closed her eyes and tried to focus her mind's eye on something pleasant. Oddly it was Zemma who came to mind, not Riddick. She tapped the back of her head against the bars she leaned against and tried again to focus on Riddick's face, his eyes… Don's face floated forward from the darkness. Jack sighed in frustration. Those faces brought feelings of guilt along with strong emotions that went beyond what she thought was her love for Riddick. She tried to push them away. Her mind rebelled against her.

She opened her eyes and looked around the room. It was clean, weirdly clean, actually. The cage she sat in was in the center of the room, brightly lit with freestanding lights. The walls were adorned with elaborate chains. The whole thing had an artificial feel to it that made Jack think of trashy movies. All wardens had a sideline business, maybe this one made sex flicks.

She smiled, thinking she'd have to explain the whole concept to Zemma, who might not believe her at first. That would make an interesting conversation with Riddick later on if she decided to confirm Jack's story. Jack would love to be a fly on the wall… her runaway brain looked ahead to the next logical step of Riddick's explanation to Zemma and Jack bit her lip. It wasn't fair…

It wasn't fair that she actually LIKED Zemma. She should hate the woman who shared the bed of the only man Jack would have admitted her love to. Don's face swam up out of the dark again and her whole body shook with shame as she pounded her head against the bars. She didn't understand until afterwards as she was running away what a terrible thing she'd done. It hadn't occurred to her that Don would want anything other than a sexual relationship once she'd pleased him enough. 'Father' had always been an ugly word to her. Men had always been ugly to her. She thought Don was making her good enough to be his lover.

His anger at her was as bright and painful as the moment he'd thrown her off him. Her shame was as deep as that very next moment when she had realized how he really saw her, and what she had ruined. Tears slid down her face as she cursed her runaway brain that would not let her forget any single moment in her life.

Would they leave her here now? Would Hypatia and the warden come to terms and would she be led away in chains into that horrible golden ship that was like being swallowed by Hypatia herself. She didn't deserve any better. She wasn't sure she had the energy to make enough trouble to inspire the warden to stave off that inevitable end. Only Hypatia could love her. In her life there was only death and Hypatia.

Alone, under bright lights, plagued by bright images, Jack cried. She cried for the first man she killed by accident, she cried for Carolyn Fry, she cried for Riddick and Zemma and Don…but mostly she cried for herself, lost and utterly unable to find herself or even picture a future that would be any different than what she'd already gone through. She cried until she was sick and hysterical. She pounded at the bars until she was bruised and scratched at her face and arms mindlessly, only wanting to obliterate the internal pain with physical pain. Sleep stole up on her but it gave her no relief. Her dreams were clear memories. She woke exhausted.

The warden stood a few feet away, backlit by the improbable freestanding lights, her face a mask of shadows. "Little girl, I need to know your name," the woman's voice was cold. If she thought anything about the scratches on Jack's face she didn't indicate it.

"You seem pretty sure of my name already…" Jack's voice was raspy, painful in her throat from all the crying she'd done.

"There's been a change in circumstance," the warden went on. "Another attack on my people. Another woman in custody." She paused there to gage Jack's reaction to the news.

Jack didn't have a Furyan's tight self control. She didn't realize she had reacted until the warden narrowed her eyes. Jack had given something away. Another woman in custody could not be Hypatia, it could only be Zemma! Trying to follow Jack into prison? All she could do now was play it to the hilt and maybe confuse the issue.

"Your guardian hasn't checked back in with me about your… bail…." The warden went on musingly. "And this new woman in my cells, do tell, who is she?"

Jack decided, for once, to keep her mouth shut. The warden turned and walked slowly from the room.

"I think I'll impound that captain's ship while I'm at it…" she goaded, and watched Jack closely.

Jack held her tongue between her teeth wondering what else could go wrong. The warden walked around her, the click of her heels sounding loud in the cavernous room. Jack followed her with only her eyes.

"Verify your name and I'll send you back to the Protective Custody Unit until…arrangements… can be made for your transfer."

"Yah, that will be a step up," Jack sneered. "Punk City for me! Wooo!"

Jack sat in her little cell for a few more days; the door opened twice a day for food and twice more to be led to the strange little bathroom with the long wall mirror and lots of lights. She spent the rest time alone and tormented over every decision she'd made and every one that was made for her. She worried about Zemma and fretted about Don. She wished Riddick would come for her: would save her from her own childish reactions. And though it was months away she thought about her impending birthday, and wondered, 'was she it?'

Hypatia must have her sister already, Jack thought.

She seldom thought about that but there wasn't much else to do. She didn't like to think about the fate of that other girl. It had been enough to worry about herself, and Hypatia's next game. If Hypatia had jack's sister already it meant the girl was locked away, unlike Jack, somewhat safely out of Hypatia's clutches. But what would happen if the other girl was the 'bomb'? How would it be if the girl's roles were reversed? Would Jack find herself locked up somewhere while Hypatia played her death games with her sister? Was half her life traveling in cryo just practice for the inescapable prison she'd have to endure for the rest of her life if Hypatia had her way? Or would Hypatia put them both in cryo till they were needed? Was that where her sister was now?

She wished she had told Riddick the truth years ago.

She'd told Kyra the truth. Pain and love flared simultaneously in Jack's chest. The connection between them had been instant… passionate…and doomed. But at the time it had seemed to Jack that she'd met her soul mate, her one true love: that they would always be inseparable, bound by passion and dreams. When Kyra had broken her leg in Creamatoria, Jack had waited on her hand and foot. She'd kept Kyra safe at feeding time, and amused her with stories of Riddick, gleaned over the years. She thought maybe Hypatia would let her rot in Creamatoria this time. Then word had come from a guard. SHE was waiting. Jack was to do this….

Jack would have stayed, knowing that Hypatia wouldn't enter the prison complex to fetch her… Would have stayed and spent her whole life with Kyra… But while Creamatoria was an amusement park to Jack compared to life with Hypatia, Kyra hated it more than life itself. Kyra WANTED Jack to get out… and then to break Kyra out later, when her healing leg would be able to take the grind, make the run across the sulfur fields…

But shortly after escaping Hypatia again, Jack had been picked up by the strange bounty hunter and thrown into cryo-sleep.

When she'd pushed Zemma over the rail back on the Monger ship her only thoughts had been of Kyra, and her death there. Zemma had somehow been at fault, and had been entirely too understanding. It had to be fake, some kind of trap, a mind game to make Jack… she didn't know what. She just knew she couldn't think straight so close to Riddick.

He'd become mythical in her mind, so many fantasies about him had dulled the nuances of even her remarkable memory. Then, years later, in the presence of this other woman, Riddick had been so different than Jack imagined him to be. And he still treated her like a child! She hadn't really been a child when she'd first met him, and now that her body had caught up with her intellect he couldn't see it! The pain had consumed her, not just his rejection of her, but guilt for Kyra, and for wanting him so badly. She wanted him to understand how she felt before it burned her up from the inside. Zemma stood in the way, Zemma represented all that had gone wrong.

Pushing Zemma off the catwalk had cooled the hot coal inside her brain almost instantly but not as she imagined it would. Some young and innocent voice had screamed 'No!' and cold guilt had washed over her the very next instant. Riddick would hate her the way she hated Hypatia. At that moment it had seemed as if her body was operating without her consent. She felt tiny, afraid and powerless in a black cloud lost deep inside her body, unable to work the controls of her own limbs. She went on autopilot and she'd run.

When Riddick had caught her she'd been flooded with so many contrary and confusing feelings. She wanted him to know how much she loved him, how badly she felt for killing his woman, how much she wanted to die. All she could do was move woodenly at his command and hope he would kill her, finally kill her and stop the mad cycle of her life.

In her little cage, the mad cycle of her memories started over.

"Someone has got to pay, I will see justice for my men."

Jack considered shrugging and decided it would be just the right amount of irritation for the warden. She had come to a decision and had to play every card just right. Some wardens were just in it for the money. A few actually had the delusion they were making a difference in the universe. Each had to be played carefully.

"Fuck your men. Get on with your negotiations. I'm bored here. I'm ready to try the next dirtball and see if they have any more challenge."

The warden stopped and glared, her face going cold. Jack had hit it right on the nose.

"You think you can just walk away from all responsibilities because you come from a mega rich family?"

Jack shrugged again as if to say that was exactly what she thought. The warden hissed between her teeth. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. The warden was entirely too shrewd. Jack would have to be very careful, she would have to let her real feelings out to play a part.

"Get me out of here, bitch."

The warden laughed.

Play into her expectations, Jack thought: play into her emotions. Jack hit the bars of her little golden cage hard, with the palms of her hands. The warden's eyes glittered. Jack thought there was one thing that united all prison custodians, the one thing that brought them all into the game: the need to be powerful, the need to inflict pain. The woman's reaction confirmed it. She got off on pain, even her higher calling actually came in second to her baser need.

It was a delicate dance but Jack knew the steps. She had to focus on her pain, let it out in little drips and drabs because the warden would see if it was fake. She had to not let those feelings get out of control. Jack slammed the bars with her hands again, wincing a little at the hurt it caused just to be sure she had the warden's attention. "You aint nothing! I can buy a dozen like you and have you replaced here."

Jack tapped into her anger at all authority figures. The madder Jack got the more self satisfied the warden got. "You're a pretty petty tyrant running a backwater place like this. You think you're making a difference in the universe? You can't hold someone like me!"

The last bit hit home. The warden's eyes flashed with anger. She thought herself better than the average slag keeper.

"I can hold a spoiled brat like you, even in gen-pop if I choose. Think you'd like that, princess? No special treatment, no security, just you and the unwashed masses." She waited for jack's reaction. Jack called up all of her fears and frustrations: Riddick, Don, Zemma, all the things she'd done to hurt them. She dredged up all her anxiety about Hypatia. It had been building for days. She let it all out. She shrieked and tears finally leaked out. She pounded the bars with her hands and leaned her head against them, her eyes closed, picturing Hypatia, and crying, "I hate you. I hate you."

The performance was real but not in reaction to the warden. She read it that way, though, and she bought its veracity. She smiled at Jack. The bribe could wait. The girl needed to learn she couldn't push her weight around everywhere in the universe.

"You can't hold me here," she sobbed, cured in the bottom of the little birdcage.

"We'll see," the warden smirked and stalked out, her sadistic quota filled for the day.

Jack continued to sob uncontrollably, the floodgates opened but not broken. She needed to purge all the pent up fear and self loathing she had been withholding. The warden left her in her misery for another day and Jack began to lose hope that the ploy had worked when finally two slags came in and escorted her out. She was seen by the doctor and brutally deloused, and finally given her prison orange. They took her to a holding cell and gave her the prison bible. Jack flipped through it absently hoping she'd see Zemma soon.

She had a lot to make up for. She would look after Zemma, and maybe break them both out before Hypatia upped the stakes so high the warden couldn't pass it up. She had to. She owed them.