ANY ASYLUM IN A STORM (ADDED 01/08/23)

As Riddick sank into the water, a thousand blinding stars exploded behind his slowly closing eyelids. The steadily increasing pressure nearing the bottom of the pool squeezed the stale oxygen out of his lungs and tiny bubbles escaped his partially open mouth and raced upward. His time in the pool's safety had all but come to its end.

"Hey," an oddly familiar, yet strangely childlike voice said as Riddick sank deeper. "Hey, hero." the voice spoke up again, only this time louder. "Snap out of it," the voice commanded. "We don't have all night. I need to talk to you."

Riddick's eyes parted slowly. He was dazed and more than a little confused by what he saw in the near distance. He was no longer sinking in water. Riddick sat on a high steel platform, arms folded over the lowest safety rail with his legs hanging out over a 350 foot drop. The blinding lights erasing his vision had coalesced, and now they were in focus. The lights were no longer a series of dying neurons releasing energy behind a drowning man's eyelids. They were nothing less than astounding. He blinked in disbelief.

Riddick looked down at the MegaCorp refinery on Asylum, although he didn't know how he found himself there. He knew it couldn't be true. Not Furya was 10,000 light years away from Asylum. Maybe more. But there he was, and there was no mistaking what he was seeing. Because he could now smell the metallic ore of freshly mined turbidium wafting through the air. The smell was familiar. It smelled like Asylum. It smelled like his youth, and he hated the memories the smell recalled.

The acrid stench reminded him of the life his ranger brothers had stolen long ago. It brought with it the image of his dead wife. An image He had buried years earlier. He had not returned to Asylum since her murder. And he was not happy about being here now. Asylum was the last place he ever wanted to see again.

"This shit can't be real," he assured himself and flinched at the boyish voice coming out of his own mouth. He grabbed his throat, messaged his vocal cords and spent the next few minutes wondering why his neck felt like a spindly sapling. That, and why his voice had suddenly risen 2 to 3 octaves. He thought he sounded like a boy yet to enter puberty. Then jammed his hands in his pants, felt no pubic hair and blurted, "What the fuck?" He didn't hear the laughter from behind.

He pulled his hand out of his pants, held it up, staring in utter disbelief at the hand of a child. For some reason he could not explain, he had transformed into a kid again. He flexed his scrawny fingers disbelievingly, staring wide-eyed at them as if they belonged on someone else's hand. That's when a sudden bolt of realization struck him and he knew exactly when he was.

He remembered the first night he snuck away from the orphanage. He had climbed the tallest smokestack on the horizon and sat there staring up at the stars, wondering where he came from. Why his mother abandoned a baby and why the nuns had raised him for all these years. In all the years He had lived there, he had never felt like he belonged. Not until Breanne came. When she had arrived, he felt they were destined to meet. And back then, he had been right. But he hadn't known how their love would play out.

And now, here he was again, sitting in his old hiding spot a kilometer to the west of the Sisters of Saint Mary's Orphanage in First City, looking at the stars and still wondering where he came from. In all the years since He left, he had learned zilch about his homework, parents or people. He was a ghost.

He saw the old church steeple sticking up over the houses in the distance and remembered why he ran away. He was sure the Sisters had lied to him about his mother and how he got there. They had no proof that anything they told him was true and the Reverend Mother refused to answer any of his questions, and he had had many.

He wondered if Breanna Fry was at the orphanage. Maybe she was there now. Maybe he could see her again. And if he could, perhaps he could warn her about the future. Could he change the future? Hers and his. But that was foolhardy. If this was the first night he climbed the tower, he knew Breanna wouldn't be there. He knew there would be no chance of changing their fates because both Breanne and Martin were still far away. Their mother was still very much alive. But that would change soon.

After the siblings arrived, Martin quickly became his best friend- his only friend- and Breanna became the girl he fell in love with. They had married and, for that reason alone, he believed that's why they killed her. If she had never met him, she would still be alive.

He considered running to the orphanage anyhow and then laughed at the absurdity of thinking any of this hallucination might actually be real. It couldn't be, but as he looked out at the old familiar sights, it felt real. It felt too real.

"I'm dying." Riddick said, staring out at the turbidium mine and the six refineries in the distance. "That's all this is. They were right about what happens when you're near death. This is just my life flashing before my eyes. It's just a hallucination. It has to be." But a little voice in his head spoke up and asked, "Does it really?"

A hundred blazing neon lights lit up the belching refineries he knew so well. A million stars twinkled in the pitch black sky overhead and two red moons hung over the horizon. He felt a pang of déjà vu and the unexpected confusion of its coming masked the sound of small footsteps approaching from behind.

In the next instant, a boy slipped his hands around the lower safety rail, lowered his legs out over the edge of the steel platform and sat down beside him. The boy said nothing. He just leaned forward and stared out at the dazzling light show as if he'd seen it a thousand times before.

The boy turned to Riddick and said, "As a kid, I used to come up here to get away from sister Beatrice. She never left me alone. She was always such a-"

"I wouldn't," Riddick warned, cutting him off before he could say something he might regret. He remembered Sister Beatrice's eerie ability to be in 10 places at once. "She might hear you." he added and laughed.

"Yeah. She heard everything." the boy admitted and shrugged. "I hated that about her. God, I couldn't wait to get away from her. Now here I am, wishing she was still out there. I miss her. I miss all of them."

Riddick didn't look at the boy sitting beside him. He didn't see the boy as a threat. If he was a danger, he would have already attacked him. But he hadn't attacked when he had the chance. Riddick didn't know why he hadn't, and strangely enough, felt more at peace now that the boy sat beside him. He had felt alone and now he didn't. In addition, he thought he knew the boy. "If you miss them so much, they're right over there." Riddick said, gesturing at the tall steeple in the distance.

"There's no one over there." the boy said, turning to Riddick with a sad expression. "There's no one here but you and me."

Every time the boy spoke, Riddick became more certain he knew him. Or at least, the adult version of him. He supposed if he had transformed into a boy on arrival, then the boy beside him must have transformed, too. "And just where are we?" Riddick asked, thinking he already knew.

"You're in my prison." the boy said, gesturing out at the lights. "As soon as you left the armada with Krone, I-" But the boy never got the chance to say anymore because Riddick backhanded him in the cheek.

"Vaako," he said, cutting him off. "You motherfucker. You did this to me."

"Christ," Vaako said, grabbing his cheek. "Does that always have to be your first instinct? I mean, look at yourself. You're barely a hundred pounds soaking wet. And you want to come out swinging." He turned to Riddick with a grin and laughed.

"I can still kick your ass."

"No doubt you'd enjoy trying." Vaako replied, turning back to the lights and resting his chin on the lower safety rail. He didn't want to fight anymore. As he looked back over the events of his life, it became clear they had arranged everything. Someone had played Vaako and Riddick could see that plain enough. But he wanted a fight. Even one he'd most likely lose. "I didn't do this to you. I didn't bring you here. Not that you're really here." When Riddick scowled at him, he added, "But I know who set this little meeting up, and I'm pretty sure she's wanted to get us together for a while."

"In case you haven't been paying attention, this isn't exactly the first time we've met."

"Wrong," Vaako replied. "You've met my body, but the thing inside it was never me."

"Bullshit."

"Do you wanna know what the real bullshit is? You constantly play the angry victim." Vaako blurted, "But at least you got to be in the real world while I've been trapped in here. Do you have any idea how long I've had to watch everyone live their lives not knowing I was stuck here? You say you want answers. Well, I can tell you from experience, knowing those answers doesn't make life any better. Because I'm telling you, it doesn't."

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Really," Riddick replied. "Then why don't you explain who brought me here?"

"The person you prayed to?" he replied matter-of-factly. "Our mother."

Riddick grabbed him by the shirtsleeve, yanked him closer and seethed, "What did you just say?"

"Which part, little brother?" Vaako said, peeling his hand away with a grin. "The part about you already knowing who your mother is, or the part about not knowing who your brother is?"

"You're a liar."

"And you have deep-seated trust issues, little brother."

"Call me that again and I'll pitch your ass off this platform."

"It wouldn't amount to shit, hero. You can't hurt me."

"No," Riddick said, punching him in the shoulder. "But ut would fucking make me feel better."

"Would it? Has any of your violent behavior ever made you feel better? Has any of it erased the guilt you feel?"

"Fuck you." Riddick blurted, scowling at him as if wanting to punch him in the face. "I never wanted to come back here and I sure as fuck never wanted to see you again. At least not until I was healthy enough to tear out your goddamn spleen."

"And you don't listen for shit. Because you are not seeing me again and I never hurt you. I would never hurt you." When Riddick refused to look at him, he continued, "Don't you get it? He didn't just steal your mother, your family and your life. He stole mine too. The bastard cursed us both. The only difference is I can't fight back without your help. And if anyone is going to save me, it has to be you."

"Do you actually believe I'd ever consider saving you?"

"No, I don't. And that scares the shit out of me, little brother. Because without your help, I'm trapped here forever. So, if you want to know why our mother sent you here, it's simple. I'll save you, but only if you promise to get me the fuck out of here first."

Riddick laughed and said, "And if I say no?"

"Simple, smart ass. Then you'll drown in a pool of sulfur and I'm trapped here. Or you could choose to stay here with me."

"Is that so?"

"Unfortunately, for both of us, it is." Vaako answered. "As long as you're here, you're outside the time stream. But as soon as you go back, you'll only have a few seconds to get out of the pool. If you don't get out, you'll drown. If you get out and the dogs are still there, then you're kibble."

"Even if I can get out, I'm a mess."

"One thing at a time, little brother. First, let's get you to safety. Then we'll deal with your injuries."

Riddick turned to him with a suspicious look and asked, "if you're trapped here, how do you know about my injuries?"

"I see a lot from my prison."

"I don't have a lot of choices here, do I?"

"There are always choices."

"So, how do I get you out?"

"I can't breach the barrier in this form. You need to take me out inside you."

"Inside me." Riddick said and grinned.

"Don't make it weird."

"Fine," Riddick said, shaking his head with a frown. "How do we do this?"

"No idea," Vaako replied. "For that info, we'll have to defer to mother."

"She's here?" Riddick asked in surprise.

"No," he answered. "But it sounds like you're beginning to believe."

Riddick rolled his eyes at him and said, "I don't believe her, you or any of this."

"Sorry. I forgot who I was talking to, little brother."

"Please," Riddick said, taking Vaako by surprise. He never said please. "Stop calling me that or we're never going to get out of here."

"Close your eyes and take my hand."

"Why? Are you taking me to prom?"

"You had to make it weird."