The Chronicles of Riddick - Alan Dean Foster [102]
Vaako only half heard her. Perfectionist to a fault, rather than enjoying his moment of triumph, he was still obsessing over what he had not done. Of course the breeder Riddick was dead. Vaako had left him dead following the peculiar and still unexplained incident that had also killed a number of his troops. Even if some small flicker of life had remained in the man, a few moments exposed to the raw sunshine of Crematoria would have been more than enough to reduce to ashes anything that remained. There was no reason to be second-guessing his actions. He’d been forced to move, and move fast, to save his own life and that of his surviving soldiers from the full force of the rising sun. It would not do for them to perish before due time.
Still . . .
“Should’ve brought back the head.”
Dame Vaako sighed wearily. No matter how hard she tried to bolster this man, it seemed he would be forever reconsidering his labors. She resigned herself to having to, once more, reassure him.
“You told me everything that transpired. I see no reason for your anxiety. You saw him go down. You saw him unbreathing. You saw him dead on the ground. You may not be able to explain everything that happened, but that does not matter. All that matters is the result, not the mechanism by which it was achieved. What is important is that he is dead, not how it came to pass.”
Vaako was shaking his head in remembered bewilderment, refusing to be so easily reassured. “I don’t like what I can’t understand.” He turned to her. “This Riddick, he was no common breeder. Something happened out there the like of which I have never encountered before, nor heard reported. As he himself went down, he dropped twenty of my team without raising a finger. No weapons, no gas; nothing. One moment they were advancing on him, and the next . . .” His voice trailed off, unable to find words to explain what he had seen.
Entirely prosaic, Dame Vaako shrugged off his confusion. “All mysteries are not miracles. Not even in this religion. I was not there, but I am sure there is a perfectly sound scientific explanation for what you witnessed. Provide the details to our analysts, and I have no doubt that they will supply one that satisfies even you, my worrying love.”
When he still did not appear convinced, she struggled to contain her frustration. “Come, come, Vaako; this doubt does not become the fleet’s newest commander general. You say that you saw him die, and left him dead. That is what matters. If you say you’re certain about it, then it is certain. And we’ve already said it, haven’t we?”
He nodded slowly, taking the full import of her words. “That we have.”
“And who would dare to contradict the word of a commander general recently anointed by Lord Marshal himself?” She turned coquettish, seeking to draw him away from depressing thoughts and back to the more festive present. “Now you must come with me, so that I can bestow upon you a promotion of my own devising.” Slipping her arm into his and smiling suggestively, she led him away from the chamber and toward their private quarters.
The special bonds were forged of much more than mere metal. Designed to hold a being who had the unnerving ability to move through the air without seeming to set foot to ground, they had been built to restrain anything short of sheer aether.
Certainly they seemed to be doing an efficient job of holding in one place the Elemental known as Aereon. Like overlapping spiderwebs, the overkill of restraints kept her unceremoniously staked to the floor. Despite this, her bearing was of one patiently waiting for something rather than that of an individual in fear for her life.
She didn’t even bother to turn when the door to the holding room opened. She knew who it