Read Ronan: Ziva Payvan Book 3 Online
Authors: EJ Fisch
“Would you want to stay in ops if you had the opportunity? Permanently, I mean.”
He appeared pensive for a moment. “I think so. Working with your team has been a life-changing experience, to say the least. I’m finally starting to feel like I belong again. But if we don’t find Zinni, or if she can’t come back….”
He didn’t need to continue for Ziva to know what he meant. She was safe in her cozy new position as unit captain, but if Zinni couldn’t return to work for one reason or another, they’d find themselves in the very same situation that had prompted Aroska to join the team in the first place. With just two members, the Alpha team would be disbanded and he and Skeet would most likely be reassigned to a different division or even a different office.
They were quiet as they each finished eating. He’d been right; the stew here was just a little on the spicy side, but it was warm and satisfying and the familiarity brought Ziva some comfort after an entire day of being
un
comfortable. The freshly-pressed govino juice was a bit of a treat as well, more flavorful than the processed stuff she was used to drinking at home and in the employee canteen at work. Despite the rather awkward conversation and interaction, she had to admit she was glad he’d brought her here.
She downed the last of the juice and set the glass down with a
thud
, guiding it around in a slow circle until she felt Aroska’s gaze come to rest on her hand just as it had in the transport café. “You know the chances are slim that any of those kids are still alive,” she murmured without looking up.
He took a breath but hesitated before speaking, telling her that he did indeed know. “I’m trying not to think about it,” he said. “I just try to remember Kat and Corey – they both survived their encounters with Ronan, and now that we have scans from both you and that agent, we might be able to come up with some sort of countermeasure. But…you’re right. I just thought we’d find more clues here. To be honest, I wanted to get out of the house tonight, too. It’s hard to stay positive around hopeful family members when you know the news probably isn’t going to be very good.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t be the miracle-working hunter you thought I could be,” Ziva said, wincing at the slight edge she hadn’t meant to include in her tone.
If Aroska noticed or cared, he gave no indication. “Don’t be. I had no idea what – if anything – we’d find here. Now all we can do is wait and see what happens. I figure we’ll stay the night here, and if we get the all-clear from Emeri, we can head back to the city first thing in the morning.”
Although Ziva wasn’t sure she liked the idea of him dictating what they would do, she nodded in agreement. The thought of spending the night in his family’s house was unnerving, but if she was lucky she wouldn’t have to interact with anyone.
“Now,” Aroska continued as he fished out his credit chip and waved it over the table’s scanner, successfully paying for their meal, “why don’t we go at least do a fly-by of ground zero just to be on the safe side? That way I won’t have completely lied to my family.”
Ziva dipped her head and they returned to the car.
The interior of the FTL tunnel flew by in shades of blue and silver as the ship rushed forward, still on course for Chaiavis. Taran sat in the pilot’s chair with his feet up on the control board, hypnotized by the view outside, trying as hard as possible not to think about anything. There were plenty of things he
should
be thinking about, but he feared his head would explode if he didn’t allow himself a few minutes of peace.
The transmission from Ziva Payvan had shaken him; the only thing that kept him from trembling was the fact that his implants had kicked in and were working hard to regulate his heart rate and blood pressure.
“Hello, Taran.”
There was something about her voice that unnerved him. It probably had much to do with the fact that every time he heard it, something terrible was happening. He couldn’t shake away the images of his soldiers in the desert, their bodies torn open by her weapon. Memories of his own injury came creeping back to the front of his mind as well. The worst part was that her shot hadn’t fully detached his arm; it had dangled by a few measly strands of flesh and muscle tissue and he’d been forced to lie there staring at it until he’d blacked out. The memory still sometimes kept him up at night, and the sight of detached limbs bothered him to this day.
Taran’s cochlear implant picked up the sound of Mae’s footsteps approaching before she even made it into the cockpit. He heard her stop just inside but he didn’t turn around. Her presence lingered there for a moment, and he could feel her gaze boring into his back.
Finally, she sighed. “Are you ready to talk to me yet?”
Just like that, all the things he’d been trying to shut out of his mind came flooding back. The Haphezians. Ronan. The missing Delta Patrol. This warehouse on Chaiavis. Matney’s warnings about the Federation getting involved. The re-birth of nostium…
what the hell?
Taran pulled his feet down and swiveled in the chair to face Mae, who stood against the cockpit’s back wall with her arms crossed. Her hair was untied so her red curls had free rein of all the space within, it seemed, half a meter of her head. That combined with the way her optics were focused in on him gave her a very wild look. This was an exhausted, irritable woman who was not to be trifled with.
“What is there to talk about?”
“Damn it, Taran. Listen to yourself. I seem to recall you asking me if I wanted to go save the galaxy when we left Edean.
That’s
what this is about, okay? You heard Payvan on comm – we’d be doing ourselves a favor. I understand why you don’t want anything to do with her, and believe me, I don’t either. But this is a lot bigger than some petty race to find Ronan. Ronan found
us
.”
Taran knew she was right, but he wasn’t ready to admit such a thing yet. They’d just spent weeks and countless manpower hours searching for Ronan and any signs of the Delta Patrol, and he had half a mind to just leave the Haphezians to their own devices. Payvan had vowed to find Ronan first after all, and she’d gone and done exactly that. But he knew she was right, too. If the Resistance was allowed to rise to power – especially if this business about the nostium was accurate – they’d destroy the galactic structure the Federation had spent so long creating.
“What did Payvan mean when she said Ronan was ‘testing’ the nostium on the Haphezians?” he finally asked.
Mae shrugged. “No idea. They’ve had over twenty years to develop a new formula. Matney even mentioned that small lab the Feds found, so they’ve had to have something brewing behind the scenes. But I don’t know why they’d need to be testing anything on anyone at this point.”
Taran looked down and studied his cybernetic hand as he opened and closed the fingers, a motion that had helped him focus in recent months. “If the Haphezians were exposed to nostium, the Federation wouldn’t hesitate to retaliate, especially since Haphez has always claimed to have nothing to do with the Resistance.”
Mae’s eyes widened and she straightened, clearly stricken by what he’d just said. “Do we know of any other Fringe civilizations that have reported disappearances or kidnappings?”
“Not that I’ve heard. Devani and the other Representatives might know of something. Why?”
“The Haphezians have had people taken by Ronan.
We’ve
had people taken by Ronan. What if we’re not the only ones? We already established that the Resistance has operations running out in the Fringe where the Feds can’t reach them. Like you said in Matney’s office, they could be hitting
all
the independent systems.”
Taran sat up a little straighter. “They could be targeting us specifically because we’re not part of the Federation,” he murmured, repeating what Mae herself had said during the meeting on Edean.
“You just said the Federation wouldn’t hesitate to retaliate if an independent world showed signs of Resistance activity. What if that’s the goal? Infuse Fringe civilizations with nostium, make it look like there have been dormant Resistance cells hiding there the whole time.” She began pacing back and forth across the cockpit and her voice rose in volume the longer she spoke. “You heard Matney – the Feds are already having trouble controlling the Resistance presence within the Core. If you tacked a bunch of Fringe worlds onto their current workload, they’d be spread too thin to be effective. Ronan could come up from behind and completely blindside them while they were focused on fighting people like us and the Haphezians.”
The thought prompted Taran to stand up. He’d always been impressed by how Mae’s mind worked. She saw moves and countermoves in every aspect of life, just one more thing that made her one of the best soldiers in the Durutian Special Forces. Her analytical way of thinking had helped save the day on numerous occasions, and it was exactly what made her – as Payvan had put it – the voice of reason.
“That still doesn’t explain what Payvan meant by ‘testing’ a formula,” he said.
“I know,” Mae said, stopping mid-stride and turning to face him, “but if this theory is anywhere close to being right, we have a huge problem on our hands, and probably not a lot of time to solve it.”
“I’ll contact Devani and see if she can gather information from any of the other Representatives. If we can determine whether other Fringe civilizations are involved, it may help us nail down Ronan’s strategy.”
“And I’ll contact Matney,” she said. “Warn him about the nostium and this endgame.”
“He said the Federation can’t get involved.”
“No, he said they can’t offer assistance to independent worlds. What they
can
do is keep the Resistance under control within the Core while we deal with Ronan out in the Fringe.”
The way she said the word “we” sealed the deal for Taran. “If we’re going to get involved in this, we’re going to need all the firepower we’ve got. We may not have a formal fleet, but we have plenty of ships. Payvan was right; it’s time to fight for ourselves for once.” It almost made him sick to say the words, but he knew it was true.
That sharp, focused look had returned to Mae’s face and she made herself comfortable in the co-pilot’s chair. “I’ll get in touch with as many of our Special Tasks Units as possible and bring them up to speed.”
Taran cut in the sub-light engines and the view outside faded from swirling silver and blue to the black void of space. “Good. I’ll have Devani address the politicians, and I’ll see what can be done about mobilizing Durutian forces.” He calculated a trajectory to a new FTL lane and guided the ship in that direction. It was still close to a two-day journey to Haphez from their current location – they would need to move fast. “Setting course for the Noro system.”
Mae reached over and took his hand. “Are
you
ready to go save the galaxy?”
Despite the fact that it had been days since they’d been on Aubin, Ziva’s eyes felt like they were full of sand. She blinked several times and tried to rub the scratchiness away, but it was no use. Her body was so tired, but her mind simply refused to sleep. When it had become clear that they’d have to stay the night in Salex, she’d vowed to not let her eyes shut lest she somehow leave herself vulnerable to the Tarbics. She’d finally caved and given sleep a shot, much to her own surprise, but the sofa in the parlor wasn’t very comfortable. After a couple of hours of restlessness, she’d returned to the table to stare half-heartedly at the HSP materials they’d spent all afternoon studying.
Even if she wasn’t actually sleeping, closing her eyes at least made her feel like she was resting, and it helped subdue the scratchy sensation. She sat there in silence for a few minutes, listening to the creaking in the ceiling above her. She wasn’t sure who else was awake at this hour; she doubted Maston or Sedna would be able to sleep while Chyler and the rest of the kids were still missing, but the sheer emotion and exhaustion the day had brought could have very well overtaken them. Whoever it was, they were pacing back and forth in the room directly above the parlor.
Driven by curiosity and maybe a little by boredom, Ziva stood and made her way out into the darkened house, hesitating for a minute or two at the bottom of the staircase. She could still hear the creaking somewhere above her, but nobody else stirred. Taking one last look around, she began to ascend the stairs, moving as she might if she were approaching a target on the second floor.
At the top of the steps, she found what appeared to be the master bedroom with the door slightly ajar, something she’d found to be a common occurrence whenever she infiltrated households with small children. If both Maston and Sedna were in their room, it could only mean Aroska was the one doing the pacing. Ziva turned to her right and moved toward the three other bedrooms. Dim light seeped out from under the door of the one at the far end of the hallway. It must have been the guest room the Tarbics had offered her. For all they knew, she was still using it, but once they’d retired she had demanded that Aroska take it and let her sleep alone in the parlor. She wondered what he was doing awake, or more specifically, why he wasn’t downstairs pestering her if he couldn’t sleep either.
Two other bedroom doors separated her from Aroska’s. Both were standing open, and she could hear quiet snoring within the nearest room. She softened her steps even further and risked a peek inside. Both Sam and Kasey were sleeping soundly in their tiny beds, and a nanny bot stood against the far wall in standby mode. Ziva wondered if either of them were old enough to remember their uncle Soren. Most likely not. They would only hear stories about how HSP had killed an innocent man…how
she’d
killed an innocent man.
She moved on to the next room. Even if she hadn’t already seen Sam and Kasey, she wouldn’t have had to guess whether it was Chyler’s. No one had gone into detail about what exactly his handicap consisted of, but his bed frame was surrounded by guard rails and a viewscreen for monitoring vital signs was mounted on the wall above the headboard. A second nanny bot, this one dormant, stood in the corner. If the boy’s condition was serious enough that he needed his own bot to watch him in the night, Ziva couldn’t even imagine how he was faring in the hands of the Resistance.
The pacing within the guest room stopped, and she sensed Aroska watching the door. She doubted he could have heard her approaching, but he could most likely smell her. She took a step back when she heard him come to the door. The light that poured out into the hall when it opened made her wince, but despite the glare she could see he was already wearing his jacket.
“Let me show you something,” he whispered. It was difficult to tell since he’d spoken so quietly, but his voice might have been a bit gruff.
He was already halfway to the stairs before Ziva made any move to follow. Just as they began to descend, Maston appeared in the master bedroom doorway, groggy but still dressed in the same clothes he’d been wearing all day.
“Do you have news?” he asked, not making much of an effort to remain quiet.
To anyone else, it probably looked like they were heading out to respond to new intel from the agency. “No, sorry,” Aroska replied. “We’ll be back in a bit.”
Ziva followed him down the stairs and out the front door. “And where exactly are we going?” she said, stopping on the front step. He was antsy, agitated, and somehow she got the feeling that whatever he wanted to show her was worse than just staying at the house…if such a thing were possible. The fact that he seemed to be losing sleep over it and was willing to take her out in the middle of the night didn’t help, either.
“Ever heard of the Night Sky of Salex?”
“I’ve seen pictures,” she said as her eyebrows dropped into a scowl. The phenomenon that had come to be known as the Night Sky of Salex was in fact the migration of the aeromids, bioluminescent insects about the size of a grown person’s thumbnail. They had become quite the tourist attraction in Salex over the years, putting on a light show every evening during the summer months as millions of them moved from the govino orchards back into the forest. Rather than the govino pods, they feasted on other pests that were actually a threat to the crops, so they were both beautiful and useful to the farmers. But as impressive as they were, Ziva knew they wouldn’t be out at this hour, and she hadn’t the foggiest clue why Aroska would bring them up now.
“Don’t tell me you’re dragging me out in the middle of the night to look at some bugs,” she added.
“Just let me show you something,” Aroska said again, gesturing for her to calm down. He waved her toward the car. “Come on.”
Ziva could think of way too many times in recent months when she’d allowed curiosity to get the better of her. She took several hesitant steps forward before striding the remaining distance to the car and sitting down hard in the passenger seat with her arms crossed.
Aroska got in as well and piloted the vehicle out to the main road for the second time that evening. Rather than turn toward the plaza and the restaurant where they’d eaten, he guided them out of the town and toward the hills surrounding the valley. Two of Haphez’s five moons – Et and Lo – lit up the night sky, but the forest was still shrouded in shadows.
They glided along in total silence for a good fifteen minutes before Aroska set the car down in a clear spot on the side of the road and took a small handheld spotlight out of the storage compartment. “We walk from here.”
Traipsing through the forest in the dark wasn’t exactly what Ziva had had in mind when she’d followed him out of the house. She got out and stood still for a moment, listening. There wasn’t a sound to be heard in the immediate vicinity – no birds, no insects, not even the trees rustling in the wind. No matter how quietly they walked, their movements broke the silence.
Ziva hung back several strides, partially because she had no idea where they were going but mostly because Aroska was sending off a strange, defensive vibe that made her entirely uncomfortable. She continued listening to the forest around her so she wouldn’t have to remove her eyes from him, and she felt the rest of her senses come alive as her body subconsciously prepared for the unknown. She shook her head and stuck her hand in her jacket pocket when she realized it had been resting on the butt of her pistol. Surely Aroska wouldn’t give her any reason to shoot him, but self-preservation instincts weren’t something that could just be shut off.
Calm down. Take a deep breath.
She bristled and froze when Aroska stopped and turned around. So far he hadn’t even bothered to check and see if she was following; he just
knew
she would, and it drove her mad. He shone the light on her for a moment without saying anything, then he sighed.
“There’s not much farther to go,” he said, all signs of his restless behavior suddenly absent. Unless Ziva was mistaken, he almost sounded excited. “You’ll probably hate me for this, but will you close your eyes?”
She crossed her arms, staring straight ahead and refusing to blink against the glare of the light. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
He lowered the beam and took a couple of tentative steps toward her. “At the risk of sounding clichéd, this is kind of a surprise.”
“I don’t care.” Confusion rendered her numb. First he’d been uptight, pacing around his room in the middle of the night. Then he’d asked her about the aeromids out of the blue. Now he was almost giddy, as if he were just as excited for this surprise as he wanted her to be. It was impossible to read him at the moment, and not just because it was dark. “I’m not closing my eyes. I don’t even want to be here.”
“I don’t think that’s true.”
“Why?”
He only laughed. “Because you
are
here. If you didn’t want to come, you could have just refused. It’s kind of like telling me you don’t trust me even while you’re standing in my house asking me for help.” He took another step toward her and extended a hand. “Come on. Trust me now.”
Don’t you dare take his hand; he’s still hiding something from you.
But he’s right. You do trust him.
You let your guard down and you’ll have to face the consequences.
Ziva slapped her hand into his open palm and heaved a dramatic sigh in hopes of concealing the slight tremor in her breathing. She shut her eyes, immediately diverting all her energy toward smelling, hearing, feeling. The forest was still silent and the air was warm and sweet. She followed a heel-toe pattern with each methodical step, searching the ground in front of her for obstacles and hoping Aroska wouldn’t lead her straight into a tree. If he let her run into anything, she’d kill him.
His hand shifted around hers and she sensed a change in his position. “Log.”
Ziva paused, sliding her foot forward until the toe of her boot met rotting tree bark. She poked at it, testing its height, and then stepped gingerly over it, teetering for a moment while she regained her balance.
“We’re almost there,” Aroska said, reestablishing his grip on her hand as he dragged her along. “Watch out for this thorny bush on your left.”
Ziva sidestepped to avoid the bush and used her free hand to probe the space around her. It was one thing to go hiking through the forest in the middle of the night – guided by Aroska of all people – but it was something else entirely to do it all blind. It felt like some sort of sensory deprivation.
“Where exactly is ‘there’?”
“Almost there,” he repeated, nearly whispering. It was hardly the response she’d wanted.
Ziva felt a sudden change in the air, almost like they’d emerged from the trees and were standing in a clearing of some sort. The moonlight now seemed to reach them uncontested, casting a bright glow she could sense even through her closed eyelids. She stopped short, not the least bit comfortable with waltzing out into an open area while she couldn’t see.
He moved around behind her and placed a hand over her eyes. With the other, he pushed and prodded until she took a couple of steps to the left.
“I’m going to cut off your arms and have them mounted in my office,” she muttered.
Aroska removed his hands. “Oh, shut up.”
She opened her eyes and blinked several times. As she’d suspected, Et and Lo hung in the sky to the south, washing the landscape in silvery hues. They stood on the edge of the tree line, looking out over a large patch of some of the thickest grass Ziva had ever seen. The ground sloped gently downward for fifty meters or so before dropping off abruptly. Below them lay several large govino orchards, and beyond those, the Tranyi River sparkled in the moonlight.
“It’s beautiful,” Ziva said, lifting an eyebrow. She meant it – it was one of the best views of the river she’d ever seen – but she still wasn’t sure why Aroska had felt compelled to bring her here.
“Move forward,” he suggested, “slowly.”
She complied after only a slight hesitation, shifting her attention down to the grass. As soon as the sole of her boot came in contact with it, she realized what was different about it. The hum of a thousand tiny wings filled her ears. The grass wasn’t actually that thick; it was occupied. For a moment it looked like the very ground was crawling, and then, one by one, each blade of grass began to light up in shades of blue and green. The first lights appeared in the area surrounding her feet, spreading outward like a wave until the entire hillside was aglow.
The feeling of Aroska’s hand at the small of her back prompted her to take another step forward. The moment she did, every single aeromid on the hill took flight. Hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of the tiny insects came together in mid air to form a single massive, swirling pillar that stretched hundreds of meters into the sky. Their glowing green and blue abdomens – determined by what Ziva could only guess was gender – cast the field and surrounding forest in varying shades of turquoise as the pillar undulated, constricted, and expanded.
“Ever wondered where they go after they fly over town?” Aroska said, grinning.
The thought had never even crossed Ziva’s mind. She stared upward, mouth slightly open, and assumed her speechlessness would be an adequate answer. She’d seen pictures of the Night Sky of Salex, heard people go on and on about what a spectacle it was, but never in her life had she even given it a second thought, much less expected to see it in person. This could hardly be considered the regular show, either. This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience presented to her by someone with a backstage pass.