The settlement was small, and Sarah didn't have to look long to find
Riddick. He was alone in a dark office, going over his weapons and
equipment in preparation for the trip. Just how he had acquired those
weapons, Sarah could only guess.

The blinds of the room were closed, and Riddick had taken off his
goggles, revealing the soft glow of his eyes. Sarah felt almost
hypnotized just seeing them.

Riddick looked up as she walked in, and took in her distress at a
glance. "Hey, what's up?"

Now that she was face to face with him, however, Sarah found it hard
to say the words, to tell him they planned to betray him. What did
she think she was doing anyway? What possible good could be
accomplished? She realized that she had acted instinctively, that she
hadn't thought things out. "It's Johns," she finally murmured, her
mouth feeling as dry as the blowing sand outside.

Riddick didn't seem to be surprised. "Was it his mother's degenerate
sexual tendencies you wanted to discuss, or the fine upstanding
character of a merc who shoots up?"

"He lied to you." Her voice was very small in the big room. "Your
deal is off."

Riddick remained calm, but Sarah sensed an intensity beneath his
casual manner. He stopped his preparations, and, knife in hand, came
to her and leaned in close. "What deal?" His voice was a hot whisper
in her ear.

"He's not going to let you go. He's going to take you back to Slam
City."

Riddick wasn't alarmed at all, only intensely interested. "And how do
you know?" His hands found her waist of their own accord. Sarah
instantly felt giddy, almost dizzy, at his touch.

"I overheard him tell Fry. In the skiff."

He set down the knife, and his hands began to stroke her body,
sliding down her back to her ass, her hips, her thighs. "And what did
Fry say?"

"She told him off. But I don't think she's going to do anything about
it."

Riddick pulled her body against his, then backed her up against the
wall, pinning her legs with his. "Because she thinks he's a marshal."

Sarah couldn't speak any longer, shuddering in both fear and pleasure
as Riddick pressed against her. She managed to nod, since she
couldn't catch her breath enough to reply, and he took that as her
answer. Sarah saw that he seemed to be at least twice as big as she
was. His body encompassed hers, enfolded it into itself.

He lowered his head to kiss her neck. "And you came straight here to
tell me about it, didn't you?" He sounded surprisingly pleased.
Evidently he expected no answer, as he continued to kiss and bite her
softly. "Good girl." Now he ran his tongue around the rim of her ear,
tugged on her earlobe with his teeth. "You're on my team, aren't
you?" He nuzzled the skin of her neck, tasting her sweat. "Aren't
you?" he insisted.

"Yes," she whispered back, and she wasn't sure if she was answering
the question he had asked, or the question his body was asking. Maybe
they were one in the same.

He lifted his face to hers and stared into her eyes. "I haven't
kissed a woman in years," he said to himself. "Whores won't let you
kiss them on the mouth, you know." He lowered his head and began the
kiss gently, but when he felt her response, he became more rough, his
movements more urgent. He surrounded her with his body, covered her
with his mouth.

And finally when her need matched his, he lowered her to the floor
and they came together in the darkness. And for a few minutes,
nothing mattered.

Afterwards, Sarah lay with her head in the crook between his arm and
his chest. She felt body heat coming off of him in waves. She smelled
his skin, heard his blood pumping through his body, felt the
exhalations of his breath on her hair.

His voice was low. "God, I don't think I have *ever* come that hard
before."

She turned her head to rest her lips against his warm brown skin. "I
guess it's been a long time."

"A really long time."

There was a wistful quality in his voice, but she answered him
playfully. "You probably shouldn't go that long without it again. I
heard a man can damage himself if he's without a woman for too long."

He looked down at her speculatively. "You know, I think you're right.
And I've got a lot of lost time to make up for." He wrapped his body
around her again, pulling her beneath him. Oblivion. Ecstasy.

Riddick handed her clothes to her as he pulled on his pants. "So you
think I can get Fry to help me?" No romantic words, no soft
assurances. Practical. Pragmatic.

Sarah dressed slowly, considering the question. She would have
preferred to lie with him a little while longer, putting off dealing
with their situation a few minutes more. But this wasn't the time for
that, and Riddick was not the man. She had known that going in. It
wasn't fair to expect anything else now. "I do think so," she
answered him. "I don't think she liked what he was planning."

Riddick laced up his boots. "Then I guess I should have a little talk
with her. Burst her bubble about her friend Johns."

"Yeah. She doesn't know I heard them talking in the skiff. So if you
tell her casually . . . "

"She won't know I have an ulterior motive." He smiled in
amusement. "I think we're going back to the ship to spend the night
and get some sleep before we leave. Shazza's got that Sand Cat up and
running, so we'll probably use that. "If you sit up front with her,
you'll be out of the worst of the dust." He gathered his equipment
back together as she put on her boots.

So, now he was going to withdraw, now that he'd gotten what he
wanted. She shouldn't have thought any different. She should have
been glad, actually. He was doing her a favor by not letting her get
involved with him.

Then to Sarah's surprise -- and relief -- he kissed her quickly and
brutally on the way out the door and said, "Come help me after we get
over there." And -- quick as that -- she knew they would stay
together after all.

Sarah and Riddick stashed their meager belongings in the trashed
cargo hold where Sarah had first brought him water. No one else
seemed inclined to join them, which suited both of them very well.

Fry was insisting that they start loading the Sand Cat now before
getting some sleep. Sarah, who pretty much thought it was a good
idea, worked with Riddick, as he'd told her too. She couldn't even
move the heavy power cells that he shouldered out to the vehicle two
at a time, but she helped him remove them from their housings and
secure them on the Sand Cat. Fry finally declared a sleep period of
eight hours, and, despite the disorientation of continual daylight,
the survivors were glad for a chance to rest.

Sarah and Riddick returned to the cargo hold to sleep. Sarah couldn't
believe that people wouldn't comment on the two of them being
together, so she had to assume no one had noticed. She guessed that
each one of them was in the middle of his or her own private hell,
and everyone else were just supporting characters.

They made love again before they went to sleep. The hold was dark,
and Riddick had been able to set aside his goggles. Sarah thought he
had the most beautiful eyes she'd ever seen, but she hated the fact
that they were unreadable. So instead she focused on what the rest of
his body told her. She read each raised scar, every small round burn
mark, every place that he had been broken, and that he himself had
healed. How had he been able to survive the life that had hurt him so
much and so often? His light brown body bore too many marks to have
come from fighting or accidents alone. And the burns looked
suspiciously like they had come from cigarettes, and they looked very
old. When had Riddick ever learned how to love? How to be merciful?
And yet he had been gentle with her, and shown mercy to the others --
Johns for example. Sarah wondered why he hadn't actually become the
animal that everyone thought he was. These were her thoughts as she
loved every part of him, and was loved in return.

Afterward, Riddick placed her between himself and the wall to sleep,
and carefully put the hunting knife within easy grasp. He had his
little bone shiv, of course, in the pocket of his pants, which he
slept in, as well as a sharpened piece of steel in his waistband, but
nothing else on him. This was about as relaxed as Riddick ever got.
Still, he slept better than he had for a long time, and no nightmares
disturbed his sleep. He woke once, briefly, and lay smelling Sarah's
hair and skin for a long time. He luxuriated in being with a woman
again, especially this one. Just being this close to her gave him a
faint, shimmery thrill. It had been a long time since he had had
anything like a partner, anything like a friend. But now he trusted
her the way she had trusted him, even when he had been chained up
like a fucking beast.

But it was more than that too. He couldn't explain his feelings. He
wanted to take her at least a thousand times more. He wanted to brand
his name into her skin. He wanted to mark her flesh with his teeth.
He wanted to bind them together physically in a way that couldn't be
broken, so that they would be like one person. He just didn't know
how. He lazily considered the possibilities until eventually his
thoughts drifted away into sleep again, as he unconsciously moved
himself closer to her.

Neither was aware of it, but as they spooned together in their sleep,
they created a living Tao symbol: each curving into the other
perfectly, a little piece of each in the other's heart -- Ying and
Yang, male and female, dark and light, unified in an eternal circle.
Surely it was too good to last.