Ronan: Ziva Payvan Book 3 (9 page)
Read Ronan: Ziva Payvan Book 3 Online
Authors: EJ Fisch
Ziva wasn’t entirely sure what she’d been expecting the Durutians to do, but it certainly hadn’t been
turn left
. She glanced around – the spaceport and anything else of consequence could be found deeper in the city to the right. The only things they’d find to the left were junk yards, more apartments identical to the ones they’d just come from, and…one of the portals.
The desert
.
“Damn it,” she muttered, pulling her car back out onto the road and resuming her tail. There was no reason for the ‘borgs to be taking Skeet and Aroska to the desert – no
good
reason, anyway. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what had happened. They’d been investigating the Durutians’ compound – it could have only been a recon mission for all she knew – and they’d been discovered, captured, and probably interrogated. Now they were being taken to the desert to be disposed of per Ronan’s orders.
Ziva could see the portal ahead, a wide, circular opening at the base of the force field created by a disruptor that could be switched on and off by city officials. There were at least ten throughout the city, one at the end of each of Zylka’s main roads. There was no way she’d be able to follow the truck through without being noticed. If she remembered correctly, there should be another portal just a kilometer to the north.
She swerved around a slow-moving vehicle and pushed her car to its top speed, darting in and out of traffic until she came within sight of the second portal. It was light enough now that she’d be able to see the Durutians’ vehicle without any trouble, but they’d be able to see her just as easily if she got too close. She steered the car through the portal and angled south toward the one the ‘borgs had taken Skeet and Aroska through, catching sight of their truck over the crest of a sand dune. She glanced toward the sun and found, to her surprise, that it wasn’t nearly as bright as she’d expected it to be. It was hardly more than a pale yellow disk, choked out by the roiling brown wall rising up on the horizon. The wall stretched further than she could see from where she sat, and at the speed it was moving, it would be upon them within twenty minutes.
“
Sheyss
.”
Even if Skeet hadn’t been shoved into a kneeling position, he would have fallen to his knees anyway. Whatever the Durutians had used to paralyze him had finally started to wear off, but they’d shot him full of something else just before leaving the compound. His head felt like a boulder resting on his shoulders and his arms and legs were like jelly. It was all infuriating, really – the cyborgs were threatened enough by him and Aroska that they felt the need to take extreme measures in order to subdue them. He would have been flattered if not for the fact that those extreme measures were working splendidly.
Even at such an early hour, the sun’s deadly rays were already excruciating. Without the force field to protect them, they’d be dead within a couple of hours. In that sense, Skeet welcomed the thought of a bullet or plasma bolt through his head. Their Durutian captors wore full armor and helmets, sufficiently shielding them from the sun, but his sensitive Haphezian skin was already starting to burn and itch after the mere minutes he’d been exposed to the light.
After close to ten years in spec ops, he was no stranger to near-death experiences. Sure, he tried his best
not
to die on any given mission, but there was always that knowledge in the back of his mind, that unspoken understanding that it was bound to happen sometime given the gravity of his work. He’d never imagined going out like this, though. He hated to admit he’d accepted his fate, but he’d spent a lot of time contemplating his options – at least when he’d been lucid enough to do so – and he saw no way out. With a useless body and blurry vision, it was impossible for him to defend himself against the Durutians, much less make an offensive move. Even if he was able to move his arms and legs, he would be sluggish at best and he’d still be outnumbered. Either option – holding still and waiting, or trying to fight – would draw the same results: death.
For a moment Skeet felt as though he were falling, though with his current proximity to the ground there was really nowhere to fall to. A rough hand grabbed his shirt and yanked him back into an upright position, and he realized the momentary blackness he’d just experienced had been the result of face-planting in the sand. The coarse grains scraped at his burning skin and he shook his head as best as he could, but the motion only made him dizzier.
Footsteps approached behind him and another person dropped down beside him with a grunt. Aroska was hardly more than a dark shape against the endless yellow backdrop of the desert, even in such close proximity. Skeet blinked several times, but a combination of sand, sweat, and foggy vision rendered him nearly blind. He leaned forward and retched.
“I’m sorry,” he croaked, though he was unsure if the words had even been audible. He didn’t really know who the apology was directed at: Aroska, for dragging him into this mess; Zinni, for allowing her to be taken in the first place and then failing to save her; Ziva, for getting himself killed when there was nothing she could do about it.
He heard a plasma cell being exchanged behind him, followed by a moist
thump
that seemed entirely out of place given the circumstances. The sound seemed familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it. For a moment he thought it might have just been his mind playing tricks on him, but then a split second later he heard the telltale
crack
of a projectile rifle echoing across the desert.
Thump, crack. Thump, crack
. Whoever had been hanging on to Skeet released their grip and crumpled into a heap, and he once again fell facedown into the sand, unable to support himself.
Three shots in succession
, he thought,
and four Durutians
. He had no idea who the shooter could be, but if the gun was anything like the ones he was familiar with, the person would have to stop and reload now. The fourth Durutian knew that too; Skeet could hear the man scrambling for cover somewhere behind him.
The shooter was good, that much was clear. Three bullets…three men…all within a split second of each other. The fourth shot came sooner than Skeet had expected. The last guard must not have been quite concealed because he heard the slug strike flesh just before the rifle cracked again. The man began to scream but was silenced by one last shot.
The knowledge that he was no longer about to be executed at point blank range allowed Skeet to relax, and for a moment he felt himself succumb to the faintness that had been threatening to overtake him for the past few minutes. Rather than the gritty, blistering sand, he was lying in his own bed in his loft in downtown Noro, a far cry from the cots and cheap bunks he’d been forced to use for the past few weeks. The window was open and a cool breeze blew in, though in reality it was probably just the sweltering desert wind meeting the perspiration on his face.
The sound of an approaching vehicle drew him out of his stupor and back to the present. He tried to open his eyes, but the chapped skin on his face restricted the movement of his eyelids to what seemed like only a few millimeters. A shape was moving toward them across the sand, and something on the front of it reflected the sunlight.
That must be the car
. No, it was a bird, flying out over the Tranyi River – he could see it through the open window.
Stay awake
, he told himself.
You’re not in the clear just yet
. By the time the car reached him, there were four – no, five – copies of it, all swaying back and forth and disappearing at intervals behind a veil of black nothingness. A door slammed and he could hear soft footsteps moving through the sand. He pried his eyes open once more and could just make out a figure sprinting toward him. Tall, muscular, head shrouded by brown cloth, huge black eyes. Or were those goggles?
The last thing he remembered was the sensation of floating.
Taran couldn’t help but reach out and brace himself against a stack of supply crates as the massive wall of sand struck the force field. A hush fell over his squad as they stood in the courtyard, watching the cloud rise up and wash over the shimmering dome above them. The sun blinked in and out for a moment until it was obscured completely, leaving the city shrouded in dusky brown shadows. He didn’t fully understand the technology of the force field and how it could allow ships to pass through but not microscopic sand particles, but quite frankly he didn’t care as long as those sand particles remained outside. He wasn’t sure how long the field had been in place – only a few decades, he thought – but whoever had implemented it was a genius; not only did it protect Zylka’s citizens from the unforgiving sun, but it saved city officials from days of cleanup every time a sandstorm came along.
The soldiers around him began to relax and go back to their business, and Taran released the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. Mae moved up beside him and slipped her hand into his as she too watched the cloud.
“It’s done,” she said with a sigh.
“It is,” Taran murmured, envisioning the Haphezian agents’ bodies being engulfed by the sand. “I hope our truck made it back into the city in time. Have we received an update yet?”
Mae shook her head. “Storm could’ve interfered with comms though. We’ll give them a few more minutes. What’s our next course of action?”
“You said it yourself – it’s time to start fresh. Let’s get everything packed up and we’ll get out of here as soon as the storm blows over. See if the Feds have any new leads for us.”
“You got it. I’m ready to get—”
The door of the nearest apartment burst open before she could finish her thought. Cowen appeared in the doorway, wide-eyed and breathless. “Sir! Priority transmission for you!” His face went pale. “It’s from a Haphezian network.”
Taran’s heart thundered in his chest and he cursed under his breath as he and Mae took off at a dead run for the control room. He pulled up short before stepping onto the communication pad, swallowing hard and taking a moment to wipe away the sweat that had gathered on his brow. Was there some way HSP could already know about what he’d done? He cleared his throat. “This is Sergeant Taran Reddic, Durutian Special Forces. To whom am I speaking?”
He had to suppress a gasp as the silvery blue hologram rendered on the console in front of him. There stood Devani, looking as striking and regal as ever in the same diplomat robes she’d been wearing the last time they’d talked. Her long, dark hair hung in straight sheets, framing her similarly dark face. The three-dimensional image was so clear that Taran could see her optical implants adjusting to the light of whatever room she stood in.
“Devani,” he said, overcome by some mixture of joy and confusion.
“Hello, brother,” she replied. “I’m terribly sorry about the delay. Just wanted to check in. How goes the hunt?”
Just wanted to check in?
“What have they done to you? Are you hurt? Do you need help?”
Judging by her outward appearance, the Haphezians had done nothing to her. She appeared unharmed, and her voice was steady. She scowled and tilted her head. “What are you talking about? I’m fine.”
“Five days. It’s been almost
five
days since we’ve heard from you. Where are you now?”
“Just leaving HSP Headquarters. There isn’t anything here. There never has been.”
Taran could feel the lump of dread starting to take form in his stomach. “What?”
“Just let me explain. I went straight to HSP when I got here, just like we planned. But something happened. There was an attack—” she held her hand up for silence when Taran opened his mouth to speak “—on their military base and the entire agency was on Code Red lockdown. It’s exactly what it sounds like – nobody enters or leaves, and nobody communicates with anyone on the outside. They kept me in a comfortable holding room, more for
my
protection than anything else. They took good care of me, okay? Stop worrying.”
“So you didn’t find anything? No sign of the Resistance or Ronan?”
“Nothing,” Devani said, “and according to HSP’s director, their government still has strict laws in place prohibiting any Resistance presence. They’re still trying as hard as possible not to involve themselves in this mess. I’ll stick around for a couple more days though and see if I can find any more information.”
Taran swallowed and glanced to Mae; her face displayed the same anxiety he was feeling. It was exactly as she’d said earlier:
“Why would they be allied with the Resistance now, after all this time?”
“What’s wrong, little brother?” Devani said. “You look like you’re going to be sick.”
“I’m fine,” Taran answered, rubbing a hand over his face. He couldn’t help but smile a bit in response to the childhood nickname. She was a whopping six minutes older than him, and she’d never let him forget it. She’d stepped up after the deaths of their parents, always taking charge and mothering him. Now here she was again, trying to take care of him from halfway across the galaxy. “We just had a little bit of a…rough night here.”
“Still on Aubin, I see.”
He nodded. “We’re getting ready to head out though. We’ve exhausted all our leads.”
“Have a safe trip, then. My car is about ready to leave. I’ll see you soon.”
Devani’s hologram fizzled away, leaving Taran standing alone on the comm pad. For a while, all he could do was stand there staring into empty space as his mind attempted to process everything his sister had just said and compare it to their current situation. “What have we done?” he whispered.
Mae watched him with wide eyes and an expression that read of something between regret and
I-told-you-so
. “You didn’t say anything.”
“You expect me to tell my sister I just killed two HSP agents while she’s
on
Haphez?” he shouted. “Then they’d really take her. Then we’d
really
never hear from her again.”
Somehow the fact that Mae didn’t even flinch made him feel worse about raising his voice. “The agency will eventually realize those men are missing. What do you plan to do?”
“They’ll be buried under three meters of sand by the time the day is over,” Taran said, “and the bodies won’t last long in this heat.” He slumped down in the same chair he’d sat in as he’d puzzled over Devani’s disappearance a couple of days earlier. “And anyhow, I’m still not entirely convinced we’re wrong. Those men were snooping around for a reason. They wanted something. They could be rogue, maybe double agents of some sort.”
“I suppose that’s true,” Mae said, eyebrows furrowed as she checked her wrist unit. “Still no word from the truck. They should have been back by now.”
Taran had almost forgotten about the execution squad – his mind had been focused solely on the men they were supposed to be executing. This was just one more complication in a situation that had already become far
too
complicated for his taste. “Comms can’t be down if Devani’s transmission was able to get through. Maybe they didn’t make it back to the portal in time. Come on.”
He led her out to the nearest parked groundcar and started it up, taking off so fast that the repulsors sprayed sand over all their other vehicles. The majority of the city’s traffic had come to a standstill thanks to the storm; with the portals closed, no ground vehicles could leave, and no space-worthy vessels were permitted to pass through the force field in these conditions. He maneuvered with ease past all the other cars that could do nothing more than sit on the edge of the road and wait.
They arrived at the nearest portal, though with the disruptor deactivated, the only things marking it as such were the two metal pillars on either side of the road and the nearby security shack. The force field now extended down to the ground, sealing what was normally open space. Seeing the billowing cloud of sand up close was surreal; the warm gusts of wind permeated the field, swirling past Taran and Mae as they walked up to the security building, but the sand itself was kept at bay.
“The portal is closed, sir!” one of the officials called when he saw them approaching. “Nobody’s getting through until this thing blows over.”
“Did a heavy-duty groundcar come through here?” Taran asked, glancing around for any signs of their missing truck.
The man shook his head. “One went out this way, but it’s been at least half an hour. No vehicles have entered through this particular gate all morning.”
Taran kept his eyes on the flying sand as he once more attempted to hail his men via comm. And once more, there was no response. Surely the Haphezian agents hadn’t been able to fight back, but he could think of no other reason why the soldiers wouldn’t have been able to return before the storm hit. Angry, confused, and at a loss, all he could do was shake his head. “What the hell is happening out there?”