Riddik's Story: Escape

Riddik knew Gara hadn't been sleeping, given Gray's confused and exhausted sendings, himself-- if Gara couldn't sleep, neither could Gray, after all. The stupid beast had wound up throwing up most of what he ate, unable to properly digest it while fluttering around in the shadows on Gara's tail. Quite honestly, Riddik wasn't surprised-- by either thing, actually.

Riddik, however, had gotten plenty of sleep, and amused himself afterwards while he waited for the next attack on the boy by being in the general vicinity but not close enough to actually be noticed. He always found reasons to be there, of course-- on his usual exploration flights, even though he had long since learned the tunnels by heart; following and irritating Twenty-Eight, who was not a happy cat at this point; exercising with Big Girl and Brown; or keeping well out of the way of trouble, in the form of the Red Demon or security or even Chosen he didn't feel like tangling with. So he wasn't going to arouse suspicion in anyone, by loitering around in the boy's company.

Big Girl didn't necessarily approve of the exercise, but she apparently saw the use in learning his methodology, anyway, because she didn't complain, either. Or maybe she hoped it was a sign he was getting weak so she could eat him.

Regardless, he happened to be down a hall and around a couple corners when Gara was attacked. He didn't have time to get there before the boy was overpowered-- especially not since Gray had actually flown back to get him, rather than simply calling for him, chattering with stupid alarm. Riddik smacked him aside and leapt into flight, while Big Girl ran along the wall beside him, leaping doorways and skittering around the evenly-spaced torches but otherwise keeping her wings furled. It was easier to not use her voice to augment the echo-sight she worked with when she was running as opposed to flying, Riddik had learned, so he didn't bully her about it. The quieter she could be, the better.

When the little group was in sight, Riddik coming up behind them, they obviously thought the excitement was over. Gara was slung over the shoulders of an enormous equine anthromorph who looked a few inches taller than Riddik himself, a short tycharis was leading the way, and a third, human-looking woman carrying his sand-container like it weighed nothing brought up the rear. Only the tycharis was Rune-branded, with things Riddik recognized only vaguely as something for communication-- it was simple, though, which meant "not powerful". Apparently they knew just as well as Riddik that Gara was exhausted and unable to fight back: the party was much smaller and less well-armed than the last.

Three targets. Two priorities-- the human woman could wait. After giving Big Girl her marching orders mentally, Riddik grinned, shiv unsheathed, and dove for the equine anthromorph from far above, a silent, wing-folded dive that hit him full-force on the shoulder not bearing Gara. Big Girl leaped out of shadows to tackle the tycharis head-on, rolling together with him over and over on the ground, completely without a sound.

Riddik's target dropped Gara in an attempt to grab and simply out-grapple Riddik, but he was faster and had a knife in-hand. He chopped off one of the guy's meaty hands before it could try to break something, ignoring the hot splatter of blood, then headbutted the long muzzle, breaking off shards of skull and driving them upwards. One nice thing about muzzled sentients: they were so easy to get right in the brainpan with a good headbutt. The anthro went rigid, then limp. One down.

Big Girl let out a screech as the tycharis fired some kind of spell at her, but apparently the thing was sensitive, for right after he clapped his tiny little foot-hands over his head, wherever what pretended to be ears might have been. She bit right through his long skull, and he was down, too.

"Okay, there?" Riddik asked. She made a sound like a rattle of stones in a can when he took a step towards her, snapping her wings at him, so he backed off and let her eat. Or whatever. She looked all right, anyway.

Which left Gara, on the ground and potentially unconscious still, and the human woman, rubbing at her eyes and gagging on sand and swatting blindly at Brown and Gray, who had turned her hands and arms into a mess of red marks. Riddik put her out of her misery with a quick throat-slice, then used her shirt to clean off his knife and face.

In the near-quiet-- the little guys and Big Girl were eating, and they tended to be kind of noisy about it; if he wasn't careful, they'd develop some kind of attachment to tycharis meat, and then where would he be?-- Riddik heard a hoarse whisper of, "Riddik?"

"Were you expectin' somebody else?" he asked without looking up from wiping blood from his face, figuring his voice would give him away. He had yet to meet anybody on this floating rock that sounded like him.

There was a pause as Gara registered and tried to process that. Riddik finished cleaning up-- he'd need a shower to get any cleaner, but that could wait-- and came over to him just as he asked blankly, "Why?"

"Felt like it?" Riddik suggested with a shrug, offering him a hand up again. "This place gets old, fast, and you're interesting." He was sure Gara could put two and two together to realize that this was why he'd set Gray on him. He wasn't stupid.

Gara took his hand with less hesitation this time, but the hurried step away didn't change. Riddik was amused, and he watched the boy steady himself, trudge across the corridor to collect his giant bottle-- which he treated as if it weighed nothing, too; definitely enchanted somehow-- nearly fall over in the process of getting the cap, and then staring narrowly at the grues.

Then he looked up at Riddik with a confused, exhausted expression on his face, an uncertain frown that, if Riddik had possessed any heartstrings, would have been tugging on them relentlessly.

"You wanna nap, kid?" he asked. "My room's safe enough."

Okay, so maybe he did have heartstrings. They just happened to be very small and taught, so they didn't tug often.

At first, Riddik was sure Gara would say no. His frown deepened, and it could have been confusion or denial, or even offense at the thought that he might need help. Riddik's shined eyes didn't read expression as well as he might like, sometimes, and right now the goggles wouldn't help. Gara finally nodded, though, a silent and apparently reluctant acceptance, his free hand coming up to press against the Rune branded on his forehead, as if it pained him.

Well, an answer was an answer. "C'mon, then," Riddik said, not about to linger here. He knew there was some kind of tracking mechanism, some kind of surveillance on this ship to keep track of the guests-cum-prisoners, and now that he'd killed twice in one day like this, in defense of the ship's "property", he didn't know whether there'd be repercussions.

Besides, Gara looked dead on his feet, and Riddik would really rather not carry him through the halls, if he passed out, so the sooner they could get to their destination, the better. He started off, beckoning Gara after him, and giving Big Girl and the little guys a firm mental summons. ::You've had enough. Move it. Now.:: When they resisted, he literally gave them a mental lash of thought-- not something he could do with most people, given he didn't have that powerful of a psionic, but since they were bonded, he could manage with them. They really needed to learn some discipline, and he was going to drill it into them.

All four of them followed, in the end. Gara made it into a walking rhythm again after a few stumbling steps to get his momentum going, Brown and Gray fluttering after him immediately when "scolded", and Big Girl after fighting his pull for at least a token show of resistance. Riddik mapped out the quickest and easiest way to his room in his head-- remapped it when the quickest way was not the easiest way, passing through a few fairly large caverns within which they would be vulnerable-- then made a turn that'd lead them there. The pace was ridiculously slow, compared to his usual speed, but he couldn't ask Gara to fly it. The kid would probably fall out of the air after a few beats-- if he could even fly properly with that great thing strapped across his back like that.

He didn't speak the whole way, but when he came into the hallway with his own room, he rolled his eyes at the sight of Twenty-Eight outside their rooms, eyes narrowed and tails flicking. This was not a good time for a lecture-- which was what was sure to come. Riddik had been playing test-and-stretch with their geas lately, getting used to ignoring the discomfort from it and expanding the range he could actually make use of. It seemed like their forced separation, while not breaking the geas, had... loosened it a bit, and with practice-- now that he had the freedom to do so-- it continued to stretch.

Twenty-Eight did not approve, given it hurt him to "practice", too.

He tried just nodding a silent greeting, hoping to get a now-wary Gara inside unscathed, but such was not to be.

"And where, exactly, have you been?" Twenty-Eight asked-- in Nexiian common, as well. What a polite beast he was.

"Killing things," Riddik said blandly, both grues hissing at the cat from under his gloves and Big Girl crowding up against his legs, hiding in his shadow from the nearest dim torchlight. "Wanna get out of my way?"

"Who's the boy?" Twenty-Eight asked, ignoring the question and turning his gaze on Gara. All Gara did in response to being scrutinized was to frown more, and then frown at Riddik.

"Just a stray," Riddik shrugged, and made a silent suggestion to Big Girl, who quite readily made a brief lunge out of her safe shadow in Twenty-Eight's direction. The cat growled, but skittered back-- freeing up the door. Riddik flashed him a bright smile and then swept into the room, door opening for him. "C'mon in, kiddo," he called over his shoulder cheerfully.

Big Girl nipped at Gara's heels, as if herding him in-- the kid actually swatted at her, to her irritation-- and he heard Twenty-Eight mutter as he gave up and padded to his own room next door, "You and your cursed strays...."

The door slid shut, leaving the room in near-total darkness. "No biting," Riddik warned Big Girl, because she was definitely considering it. "Bathroom." He pointed, and she sensed the movement, but didn't budge, still angry at Gara and at him for forcing her to leave her prey and at Twenty-Eight for being stupid and-- apparently at life in general. "Suit yourself," Riddik shrugged.

All it took was a flick of the light-switch-- light-spell? he wasn't entirely sure what ran on what, around here-- to send her fleeing where he'd told her to go. "I warned you," he told her, and motioned towards the bed for Gara. "Go on, knock yourself out," he suggested, pulling his goggles down over his eyes in the now-bright light.

Gara took a few unsteady steps towards the bed, the obvious longing for a bed and sleeping on said bed tempered by that lingering frown. He tested the mattress-- for traps, probably, or something-- set down the giant bottle of sand, and climbed up as Riddik watched, arms folded and grue-lings still hiding under the gloves on them, and sat there staring at his sandals for a long moment. He looked about ready to keel over right there, but he also didn't seem ready to do so yet.

Finally he looked up and said, " ... thanks?"

Riddik hitched a shoulder in answer and inclined his head again, a kind of wordless "no problem", and started for the bathroom. He had a shower to take and grues to clean, and he expected the kid would sleep through a spaceship crash, at this point, so he wasn't too concerned about keeping him up. He did, however, set the locking mechanism on the door as he passed, and then flicked out the light.