Red bled over his vision when images from last night flashed in his mind. Jax had seen that type of scene a hundred times before. It was nothing new to him. Where there were slums, there was crime. And that’s exactly what the Etzee was becoming. But to see it happen to Talla … damn, he wanted to see the bastards suffer for hurting her. He wanted to pull their fingernails out one by one, and feed them to them.
Instead, he’d killed them quickly and stashed the bodies in the dumpster so conveniently located in the alley. The same dumpster where the men had likely planned to dump Talla’s body when they’d finished with her.
With the confusion of the evac, Jax was counting on the three amigos’ CO assuming the fuck-ups had gotten mixed up and loaded onto another truck. It could take them hours, if not days, to figure out the three never left the Etzee, and by then, it would be too late. Not that anyone would care. The important thing was that no one would ever know the truth.
Jax tried to convince himself he was only there to protect her but that would be a lie. She was beautiful.
Beautiful
in the Etzee wasn’t a good thing. She was tall for a female; at six foot she was nearly his height, with glistening silver hair. Even with her wings banded tight against her back, he could recall every tattoo that covered them. Every fucking day he imagined tasting each intoxicating inch of that smooth skin with his tongue.
A rock formed deep in his gut. Jax took another swig. There wasn’t much time. He had to get his head back into the game. He was a soldier, for fuck’s sake. He should be focusing on his job instead of things he wanted to do to her. Even though Talla was nothing like
her
— fuck, he didn’t even want to think the name — he’d learned his lesson all too well.
Don’t ever get close.
It was fine to be attracted to a woman. Hell, he was just a man. But it would never go any further than “casual.”
He downed the rest of the flask, the whiskey burn followed by a pleasant, numbing buzz. Then he grabbed his keys and headed back to the Etzee.
Time to play hero, traitor, and bastard.
0600 hours
“Your timing is impeccable,” Roden commented drily after dropping his feet — which had been casually propped up on the desk — none too gently onto the floor with a thud. Despite his words, he didn’t sound the least bit pleased.
The idea of adding her problems onto Roden’s already heaping plate of Etzee woes grated on Talla’s nerves. But if Laze and she hadn’t come forward, if Roden learned what happened the night before from the humans, he’d have no chance at helping them.
Roden sighed. “I’d already heard about last night’s fiasco. Fortunately, since no one’s raised any alarms yet, we can only assume that the event has gone unnoticed. If nothing happens in the next two hours — and I suspect that’s the case — there’s nothing to worry about. Neither of you will be reprimanded.”
“You heard?” Laze asked.
Roden shot a glance at each of them. “Of course.”
“The humans are already restless with that blasted Omega toxin in circulation,” Talla said. “And now they have one of their own dead in an alley within Etzee’s walls. Whatever happens, I assume full responsibility for what happened,” she said in a rush. “I won’t let this become another mark against our people.”
“The hell you will,” Laze said. “I killed the bastard. My only regret is that I didn’t kill the other two. The humans want their scapegoat, they should come for me.”
“You have a family to take care of,” she snapped at her brother.
“Neither of you are speaking a word of this to anyone. As I said before, it hasn’t been brought to anyone’s attention yet, and I plan to keep it that way. The other two soldiers who assaulted you last night are already dead, and I’m glad. The matter is closed,” Roden said. “Besides, there are bigger matters to deal with right now.”
Talla’s jaw dropped. “How — ”
Roden cut her off with a wave of his hand. “We’re getting you and everyone else here onto the
Striga
.”
Talla shook her head, her eyes wide. “It’s too great a risk. If we tried to leave the Etzee, the humans — ”
“They no longer matter,” Roden muttered. “Besides, this isn’t the first time I’ve had to get my own off Earthside.”
At that moment, Nalea and Jax stepped through the door. Even with her golden Sephian skin, Nalea looked pale.
“Grand Lord,” Talla and Laze said in unison. Already on their feet, they showed respect with a slight bow of their heads.
Nalea had replaced her father, Grand Lord Hillas Puftan, a year earlier, during peace treaty negotiations. The fact that her mother had been Sephian didn’t matter. As the last living member of the Puftan bloodline, Nalea was the natural heir. Surprisingly, given her illegitimate birth, Nalea had done an impressive job. She’d left Roden to manage the Etzee and coordinate logistics with the core ships, while she’d worked on building Draeken-Sephian-human relations. Without her, the Sephians and Draeken cooped up together on the Etzee would’ve killed off one another a year ago.
Nalea walked past them, to be pulled into Roden’s arms. “It will be all right, my love,” Roden murmured.
She clutched onto him. “How can you say that? They’re blaming us for the toxin. They’re going to kill everyone in the Etzee.”
Talla’s heart lurched. “What are you talking about?” she asked, stepping forward.
“They’re idiots,” Roden hissed, ignoring her. His eyes narrowed upon Jax. “Has the Sephian leadership been fully apprised of everything we’ve discussed last night?”
His lips tight, Jax nodded, looking downright pissed. It was one of the few times Talla recalled being able to read his emotions. Not making eye contact, he took a spot by the wall furthest from her. “All U.N. troops evac in just over two hours,” he replied, his tone hard. “That leaves us a narrow fifteen-minute window before the bombs hit to smuggle you out under the notice of spotters stationed three miles out in every direction.”
His words swept through Talla’s mind, entangling with her thoughts as conversations from last night and this morning took on new meaning. Her eyes widened. “The fools.” She glared at Jax. “How can we slip nearly seven hundred out of the Etzee in only fifteen minutes?” she asked incredulously.
Jax slipped a quick glance at her. “We can’t. I have only one truck. My orders are to get out the Triad and key leaders. I’m taking everyone in this room along with the Sephian trinity and a few others.”
But I’m not one of the leaders,
Talla thought to herself.
“I will not leave my family behind,” Laze said from Nalea’s side, clearly agitated.
“They can have my seat,” Talla said.
“No,” Jax said harshly. “I’ve already made room for anyone with children on the truck,” Jax said. “But I can’t take more than forty without running the risk of being spotted. Everyone’s going to be packed like sardines the way it is.”
“As I told you before, I refuse to leave my people behind to be slaughtered,” Roden said. “There are far too few Draeken remaining. Every loss brings us one step closer to being erased. I can have the
Striga
here within three hours, but when it breaks through the atmosphere, the world will know. There’s nothing stealth about ten square miles of Draeken technology coming in for a landing. Humans don’t have anything to damage a core ship, but there’s nothing to prevent them from shooting at innocents on the ground. We’ve got to find another way to protect the Etzee until everyone can be relocated to the
Striga
.”
“That would take all day.” Jax shook his head. “I have no control over the time table. They’ll send everything they’ve got if they see anyone trying to escape.” His lips tightened. “I wish there was another way, but the Etzee is not in a defensible position, and we can’t get everyone off the Etzee before the bombing.” He paused, then turned to Roden. “What if you promise a cure for Omega? They’d have to delay the attack if they believed the cure was on the Etzee.”
Roden glared. “You think I released Omega?
Fyet!
I’ve been playing nice for the past year, despite the transgressions against both the Draeken and the Sephians. The last thing I would do is something stupid like release a toxin that could just as easily mutate and kill my own people.”
He ran a hand through his long hair. “It was Otas. The sniveling imposter is stupid enough to try something like that. And he has my people’s two best scientists on board the
Grax
. Though toxins themselves are easy enough to build, creating antidotes without the initial formula are nearly impossible,” he said with a grimace, rubbing the stump of his arm where he’d lost his hand over a year ago, courtesy of the Draeken traitor, Otas Olnek.
“But if Draeken technology is behind it, can’t you recreate the formula for Omega?” Jax asked.
Roden sighed. “I’ve had people working on it, but there are far too many variations built into the design to hack it. Otas has likely spent an entire year planning this little game. He’s using the toxin to clear the board, without losing a single guardsman in the process. But he’s playing with fire. That toxin could mutate and target Sephians or Draeken just as easily as it does humans. Our DNAs are far too similar.”
“It was poor planning on his part. He didn’t plan on the humans coming after the Etzee and killing his fellow kinsman Earthside,” Nalea said.
“I suspect he did,” Roden said. “It would be a rather easy way to get rid of me, assuming he’s willing to waste a few hundred brethren to see it done.”
Nalea frowned. “It’s safe to say the peace treaty we’d made with the humans no longer matters.”
Jax scowled. “If there’s still a chance at peace, I’ll take it. I don’t want an intergalactic war here. Dealing with Omega is serious enough. We can’t handle a war with the Draeken. Your people respect you. As long as you’re alive, there’s still a chance at peace. But I need to get you off the base.”
The realization of the impending attack hit Talla. Her people had fought so hard for so long. There was no way they’d allow themselves to be wiped out like irritating pests. “What if we escape
en masse
? There are too many of us for the troops to contain. And the bombs are targeting the Etzee, not us.”
“Don’t forget the tracers in your necks. Any survivors after Etzee is bombed are going to be tracked down and neutralized.” Jax then muttered a string of cuss words before continuing. “The tracers make it impossible to do a mass escape. The chips monitor your pulse, so there’s no way we can cut out all tracers at nearly the same time and not raise suspicion.”
“Not acceptable,” Roden said. “I can make sure my people are ready to cut out their tracers at the right time. What we need is a diversion to buy time and to camouflage the escape.”
“Listen,” Jax said. “I’m against this as much as you, but if I can’t get you out of here, then everyone here dies. At least this way, you will live and have a chance to make Earth a home for your people tomorrow.”
“Even if we can cut out the tracers, Roden,” Talla said. “The tracers won’t matter if the spotters see us escape.”
“The spotters won’t be an issue,” Roden snapped.
Jax snapped his gaze to Roden’s. “What’d you do?”
Roden lifted his chin. “I sent out four of our best this morning. Two Draeken, two Sephian, to take out the spotters at precisely eight thirty.”
“Fuck,” Jax said, running a hand through his hair. “I didn’t want any — ”
“Any what? Casualties?” Roden stepped forward. “Yet you’re willing to leave over six hundred innocents behind to get slaughtered in hopes that I will feel like preventing my people from decimating your world.”
No one spoke. When Jax opened his mouth, a glaring Roden held up a finger before opening his desk drawer and pulling out a small device and fastening it around his forearm.
“I thought all wrist-coms had been seized,” Jax said.
A glaring Roden held up a finger before tapping several buttons on his wrist-com. “Can you get tools to remove our wing restraints?” he asked while continuing to type.
“They weren’t designed to be removed,” Jax replied, and then quickly added, “but heavy-duty cable cutters should do the job, no problem. I’ll see what I can round up.”
“It won’t do much good,” Talla said. “Our wings have been banded long enough that we’d lack the muscle to fly far.”
“But many of us could glide a mile if we had to, which could make the difference between life and death,” Roden countered. Then he finally looked up from his wrist-com. “We’d better get moving. We have six hundred eighty-five people to plan for an escape.”
Jax raised his brows. “And exactly how do you plan to make this mass exodus work without getting everyone slaughtered?”
Roden smiled, cold and hard. “A diversion is on its way.”
0730 hours
Draeken and Sephians were absolute soldiers. War had flowed in their veins for over twenty years. Their homes were wherever they closed their eyes, be it bunks, ships, or trenches. They were ever ready to pack up and leave in a moment’s notice. Without the oversight of their Leashes, they needed no time at all to pack.
Talla, like her kinsmen, had grown up on battlefields. But she was still scared even though she’d seen enough battles to know that her instincts and training would take over when things turned dire. Hands steady, she slid a small shiv into her cargo pocket and walked out of the simple trailer where she’d slept for the past year.
On her way to Laze’s trailer, she noticed the humans looked plenty distracted with their work. She was relieved not to see any of the men from last night. Even though Roden said they were dead, a part of her dreaded seeing them, not sure she could hide her murderous fear if she came across one.
Even though it was clear the troops were trying to be nondescript about their evacuation, it was hard not to notice the soldiers packing up and moving out. Good thing that they were distracted, because the information relay system was already well underway, right under their noses.
Within weeks after their move to the Etzee, Roden had worked with Sienna’s trinity to develop a simple, yet fail-safe, relay network to communicate news and orders across the Etzee. Everything was relayed in three-fold. Each officer relayed information to two of their troops and one of another’s troops. This relay continued through the ranks until each person, regardless of race, received the same information three times. This was the only way to ensure information hadn’t been tampered with anywhere through the relay. If information had been found faulty, it would be easy enough to trace back to the source.