Ronan: Ziva Payvan Book 3 (34 page)

To her surprise and relief, most of the homes in the vicinity had already been blanketed in blue foam retardant. A fire car hovered half a kilometer away, working to put out some of the major structural fires as it moved into a more populated area. An emergency transport, likely from one of the small depots in this sector, was already parked on the front lawn. She wondered if perhaps Emeri had called ahead and sent someone out, though it seemed unlikely considering he was busy coordinating with the military and running HSP remotely. She swept her gaze over the scene again and fixated on a single point. No, they’d been there for a while already. Had probably just been in the area. The two occupied gurneys draped in black cloth confirmed it.

The same adrenaline and slow-motion effect she felt in the heat of combat overtook her as the shuttle touched down, but now it felt wrong, out of place. She stepped out of the ship and strode toward the emergency transport without hesitation, unnerved by how little she was feeling at the moment. The tactic worked – was useful, even – when she had a job to do, but this situation by no means fit that criteria.

One of the medics saw her and jogged over. “Is this your place, ma’am?”

“It is,” Ziva replied. The response had been louder in her head. “How long have you been here?”

“Since that frigate got clear,” he answered. “We were just finishing up the night shift and were on our way back to the depot when it showed up. We took cover and then headed for the nearest house to see what we could do to help. Had to wait for the fire car to get here before we could do anything.”

Ziva struggled to swallow against the lump that was forming in her throat and glanced past him to where his partner was pushing the floating gurneys onto the transport. “You found two people.”

He nodded and his collected demeanor vanished for a moment, replaced with a look of sympathy. “Male subject was dead on arrival. Female subject only lasted a couple of minutes after we pulled her out. She had burns covering ninety percent of her bod—”

“I understand,” Ziva said before he could continue. There was no point in spelling it out for her. “Where are you taking them?”

“The nearest med center we get cleared for. Every clinic and hospital in the region is going to have their hands full. Will you claim the bodies?”

She managed an affirmative nod.

“Thank you. I hate to be curt, but we’ve got a lot more people to help, so we should be going.” He dipped his head and rushed away.

Ziva got one more look at the gurneys as the shield doors closed, and she realized she didn’t even know which body was which. Perhaps it didn’t really matter. Her eyes followed the transport until it disappeared behind a veil of smoke, then she shifted her attention to the damage that lay before her.

She shuffled forward a couple of steps until her feet reached the edge of the crater that had swallowed the front of her house. Based on the shape, it appeared the bomb had hit the ground just meters from the front door. The kitchen and living room walls had been disintegrated along with all the furniture – and people, she realized – the rooms had contained. Marshay and Ryon were always in the kitchen at this time of morning.

The majority of the house’s frame remained intact, though all the windows had been blown out and the walls that were still standing had been blackened by fire. Small patches of flames continued to creep through the ashes despite the retardant, and wisps of smoke swirled by in front of her, turning the morning sunlight an eerie orange.

On the bright side, the
Zenith
appeared unharmed; the landing bay was far enough from the house that it had escaped the brunt of the attack. On the other hand, one of the
Vigilance’s
thick plasma bolts had cut straight down the center of her beloved sarmi tree’s trunk, sending branches and limbs flying across the yard. Part of it had even caught fire and the pile sat there smoldering, adding more thick smoke to the cloud that already hovered above the house.

This is what you get
, that voice inside her head whispered.
The more you get attached to something, the more painful it will be to lose it.

It was exactly what she’d been trying to explain to Aroska, the reason she worked so hard to keep the list of things and people she cared about short. The last thing she needed was to be completely debilitated by emotion when she needed to focus. But this went so far beyond that.
This
– she gave the scene another long look – was what Emeri wanted her to stop. This was the work of a single ship and wasn’t even a direct result of the crew being Nosti. Somewhere out there, a whole fleet of Nosti-controlled ships was ready to do
this
to anything that got in its way, and people expected her to know how to deal with that.

Ziva’s legs finally gave out and she fell to her knees at the edge of the crater. She was certain part of it was sheer exhaustion – the thought occurred to her that she’d only slept a couple of hours in the past two days – but it also felt like she was being crushed by the weight of everything that had happened that morning and the previous night. She sat still with her arms at her sides for a moment, suffocated by the sight before her. The ability to breathe, to speak, to even think…they all eluded her. She couldn’t even bring herself to shed tears, though the smoke made her eyes smart, and when she opened her mouth to release the scream she felt building inside her, no sound emerged.

Somewhere behind her, she could hear Skeet speaking quietly into his communicator, reporting the situation to someone back at the med center. She was aware of his voice, aware of the way his boots crunched in the grass but didn’t come any closer. Little by little, the scents, the sounds, every visual detail – they began to register with her, bringing order to the jumbled mess in her mind. As they all came together to form one fluid image, she felt something else brewing in the pit of her stomach: sheer anger. None of the people in Noro or Salex deserved what had just happened to them. She pictured Marshay and Ryon going about their morning routine, preparing for the day and oblivious to their impending fate. She should have called them, gotten them out of the house. She should have
known
.

Ziva’s hands curled into fists and a fresh surge of adrenaline allowed her to get back to her feet. Her legs were still wobbly as she moved down into the crater and entered what was left of the house. Skeet called after her and she heard him wrapping up his conversation, but she didn’t break stride

With any luck, the rooms below ground hadn’t sustained much damage, but the rest of the upper floor hadn’t fared so well. The fireball from the explosion had consumed most of the furniture and décor, leaving the space empty except for intermittent piles of charred refuse.

She passed through a gaping hole that had been her bedroom door the previous morning, and her thoughts drifted once more to Marshay and Ryon and how she’d only seen them for a couple of minutes before sending them out of the room. Her own room was still empty; if there was a silver lining to all this, it was that all of her important possessions remained outside aboard the
Zenith
. There was one last item she wanted, however, one last item that might have just become the most significant thing she owned.

Most of the decorative tiles had shattered and fallen from the charred wall across the room, exposing the hidden compartment that housed her strongbox. Aside from being just as black as everything else, it appeared to be in prime condition, good considering she’d paid a hefty sum for it. The merchant on Quothia had assured her it was the best-quality strongbox credits could buy on the Fringe. Supposedly, it could withstand anything short of a direct hit from a large explosive device, in which case the contents would be destroyed anyway. Even so, she held her breath as she opened it, hoping it had lived up to her expectations.

The kytara sat inside untouched along with a few credits, a plasma pistol, and several other small items she’d been carrying in her backpack on the way to Argall. She had to admire Aroska for being so thoughtful, but the idea of him so much as looking at the strongbox reminded her of the syringe and data pad he’d taken from it. The syringe and data pad that had started all of this. The syringe and data pad she should have hidden somewhere else.

“I don’t even know what to say, Z.”

Ziva turned and found Skeet standing where the door had been, surveying all the damage for himself. He’d grown up an orphan, so her house had become a second home for him. Marshay and Ryon were just as much his family as they were hers.

“Me either,” she said quietly, reaching in to remove the items from the strongbox. She pocketed the credits and tucked the gun into her waistband, then paused to examine the kytara.

“What is that?”

In response, she flicked her wrist upward, engaging the blades. They were as sharp and polished as ever, despite the fact that the weapon spent nearly all of its time hidden away in a dark hole. She flicked again and the blades retracted with a soft metallic click.

The look on Skeet’s face told her he needed no further explanation. “What are you going to do with it?”

Ziva looked down at it and shrugged. “I guess I’m going to stop Ronan.”

-47-

HSP Medical Center

Noro, Haphez

There were a number of reasons Aroska found himself standing in Zinni’s room. Perhaps the most obvious reason was that as of about twenty seconds ago, it was now his room as well. The influx of wounded people following the attack and crash had come as no surprise, and between the frantic medical personnel, HSP, and the Grand Army officials who continued arriving on the scene, the place had been transformed into a warzone. They’d moved him into Zinni’s room, partly because they were colleagues, but mostly to open up space for victims who needed more immediate attention.

Maston hadn’t survived the trip to Noro, they’d told him. He was still having trouble comprehending exactly what that meant. Surely his brother couldn’t actually be dead, not after all the trouble he’d gone through to keep him alive there on the warehouse floor. It didn’t even make sense.
Maston is dead
. He could repeat those words all he wanted, but they did little more than echo through his head for a moment before fading away. Meaningless.
What is even happening right now?

In the event that he forgot to remind himself, Sedna had been quick to do it for him. He could still hear her wailing somewhere further down the hall, another reason he’d opted to stay within the safety of the room. This was
his
fault, she’d cried while they stood outside the operating room where his brother had officially been pronounced dead.
He
was the one who had asked Maston to follow that ship. He’d wanted to argue, but he’d frozen up upon realizing she was right. He’d only been able to stand there listening to her scream at him. The kids had been crying too, though it was probably more out of fear and confusion than anything else. A nurse had finally escorted him to Zinni’s room while Sedna was wrestled away by Aura Stannist and one of the Salex agents.

Aroska had yet to receive any real treatment for the wound on his arm, a third reason he remained in the room. The medic had done a decent job patching him up outside the warehouse; the gash wasn’t deep, but he’d been told there was damaged muscle tissue that would require a full caura treatment unless he wanted to lose mobility in his arm. Still, the injury was rather insignificant compared to nostium exposure, and he’d opted to give the children aboard his transport priority on the trip back to Noro. He’d managed to get most of Maston’s blood off of him, though he imagined he still looked like
sheyss
. The only thing he could do now was wait for someone who could spare the time necessary to begin his treatment. All he wanted was to go home.

At least, that was all he’d wanted until the frigate had crashed into Headquarters. It had been on their tail since leaving the distribution center, though they’d thankfully gotten enough of a head start to make it safely to the city without incident. People were calling it the
Vigilance
; apparently there’d been intel aboard the wrecked ship in Salex. The word was it had dropped a series of bombs on the resort town before turning its sights on Noro. He vaguely remembered seeing Skeet leave on a transport with Zinni, but he wondered for the first time if Ziva had made it out. No, now that he thought about it, Skeet’s warning about the
Vigilance
chasing them had come from Ziva, so she had to have avoided the attack. Regardless, the crash was another good reason to stay. The nurse had advised him to remain seated, so he’d moved his chair over to the window, where he had a perfect view of the
Vigilance
, the GA’s ships, and all the goings-on over at HSP Headquarters.

Agent Stannist hadn’t given him details, but she’d stopped by long enough to give him a quick rundown of the situation. Headquarters – what remained of it, anyway – was on lockdown. Those who were still inside stayed inside and nobody could get in short of Emeri himself and anyone he authorized personally. The GA was claiming jurisdiction over the crash site and the agency had relinquished control to them, at least until the situation was contained.

From Aroska’s place at the window, the
Vigilance
was still hardly more than a dark shape beneath a veil of thick smoke. He couldn’t actually see the ground, but he imagined any GA entry teams would have difficulty approaching the wreck until some of the rubble and debris had been cleared away. And then what? Based on its firepower capabilities, this was a military-grade ship, no doubt full of trained Resistance soldiers. Trying to infiltrate it would be like trying to infiltrate the police station in Argall, and they’d be picked off before they made it five steps inside. There was always the option of destroying it from above, though he wasn’t sure if Emeri would want to risk an explosion that would damage the rest of Headquarters.

And so he watched and waited. It felt like he’d been there for hours already, though it had only been fifteen, maybe twenty minutes. The sound of Sedna’s sobbing eventually died away; he wondered where she would go, what she would tell his parents when they arrived home from Gehiri. They’d already been a bit perturbed by the way he’d distanced himself after Soren’s death, so he didn’t have high hopes for the way they’d handle this situation.

At least the room was quiet now. The noise of all the medical staff rushing about had morphed into a dull roar in the back of his mind. The machine providing oxygen for Zinni beeped quietly, but the sound was steady and soothing. He turned to look at her lying in the bed behind him and wasn’t sure if she was unconscious or just sleeping. According to the nurse who had brought him in, she’d hit her head when the ship crashed, resulting in a mild concussion. She was malnourished and her captors had drawn a significant amount of blood over the past five weeks, leaving her in a weakened state, but once she received some nutrients and her blood cells had a chance to regenerate, she was expected to recover nicely. There were still traces of some sort of sedative in her system, the nurse had said, explaining why she was still so lethargic.

The relative silence of the room was broken by a louder and more urgent beeping, and for a moment Aroska was unable to locate the source. He’d forgotten he was even still carrying his communicator. It began to vibrate after several more seconds of beeping and he reached down to remove it from his belt, wincing at the pain that shot through his injured arm. A single glance at the incoming code allowed him to break the rest of the way out of his stupor.

“Skeet?”

“Hey.”

Even after one word, Aroska could tell there was something wrong. Skeet’s voice wasn’t frantic or gruff, not like the voices of all the other agents responding to the crash. Rather, he sounded subdued, at a loss. Maybe even grief-stricken.

“I couldn’t get through to Emeri,” the lieutenant continued. “I just wanted to let someone know…”

“Let someone know what?”

“It’s Ziva’s house. It’s been hit and there’s…there’s not much left.”

Aroska swallowed, unsure what exactly Skeet was saying. Surely he didn’t mean Ziva had been
in
the house. “What?”

“It was right in the
Vigilance’s
path. Most of the houses along the river have been completely destroyed.”

“Marshay and Ryon?”

There was nothing but silence for a moment. “Both gone.”

It was just like with Maston. Aroska could hear the words – the statement, the fact – but he still couldn’t comprehend it. It meant nothing.
What is even happening right now?
All he could do was ask himself the same question over and over.

He was glad he’d obeyed the nurse and was already sitting down. At that moment, he felt the full gravity of the situation coming down on him. He’d lost his brother, but other people in the city had lost their homes, their entire families. And one of those people was someone he’d come to care a great deal about.

“And Ziva?” he managed.

“She’s…just sitting there,” Skeet said. His breathing quickened. “She talked to the medics like nothing was even wrong and then she just…. Her back’s to me, I can’t see—”

A long silence followed. Aroska was beginning to wonder if they were still connected, but he realized he could hear the whistle of the wind coming up off of the river. If the scene was bad enough to shut Skeet down, he couldn’t even imagine what it must look like.

No, he took that back. He could picture everything perfectly. In his mind, he saw the vulnerable, broken Ziva he’d met on the hill the night before staring into the remains of her home, where two of the only people in the galaxy she actually allowed herself to care about had just been blown away. For a moment, his own loss seemed rather trivial in comparison. Maston’s death had been his fault, after all. It was all his fault.

The realization that there were now hundreds – maybe even thousands – of people currently experiencing what Ziva was experiencing made him feel small in the grand scheme of things. As a veteran HSP agent, he should be focused on the Resistance and all the victims, not his own problems. A quiet voice, the same one that had once urged him to take his own life, whispered in the back of his mind, reminding him that he could never do anything right.
You’re wrong again
.
Now’s not the time to be selfish
.

“Skeet?” he said, hoping to drown out that voice with his own.

“She’s going inside,” Skeet replied quickly as if he’d been jolted awake from a dream. He shouted for Ziva to wait up. “I’d better catch up with her. You might just fill Emeri in if you see him.”

“I will,” Aroska said. There was another long silence before the transmission went dead.

He returned the communicator to his belt and stole another glance at Zinni before turning back to the window. The smoke shrouding the
Vigilance
was finally starting to clear and the GA gunships were moving in closer.

For the first time, he wanted to be down there, fighting alongside the GA’s soldiers, cutting down these cowardly Resistance dogs. His arm was stiff and sore, but the overwhelming grief he’d been feeling had been replaced with an anger that trumped the pain. But regardless of how the injury felt, it would slow him down in a battle, whether he realized it or not. And with the emotional turmoil he’d suffered through since bringing Ziva to Salex, he knew his body and mind were in no condition to fight. He thought back to the way Ziva had tried to go after Dasaro on Chaiavis. Mindset had been her biggest problem; she’d claimed she’d thought things through, but he knew she hadn’t. He refused to make the same mistake now. He’d take action – there was no question about it – but first he would rest, allow his arm to be treated, and take that time to come up with a plan. Then, Ronan and the Resistance would pay for what they’d done. To him, to Ziva, to Zinni, to Kat, to everyone.

He settled back in the chair, content with his decision, and stared out at the
Vigilance
in hopes of keeping his mind off of the events of the morning and shutting those awful whispers out of his head. A couple of nurses rushed in and out periodically to make sure Zinni was still stable, each taking the time to apologize for how long it was taking to get him some help.

“It’s fine,” he assured them both, leaving out the fact that a longer wait gave him more time to come up with a plan. “Help the people who need it.”

He sat quietly, watching as crews began clearing out the rubble around the
Vigilance
while the gunships provided aerial protection. GA troops had been dropped in and currently surrounded the vessel with their weapons up and ready. There was still no indication of how they expected to breach the ship, but it appeared the time to do so was drawing near.

Aroska had been sitting there for close to two hours before he heard heavy footsteps enter the room and stop. He turned to find Ziva standing in the doorway. She was looking at Zinni but shifted her gaze to him when he stood up.

“What are you doing here?” The shock he felt upon seeing her had given his tone a nasty bite he instantly regretted.

She produced a data pad and extended it toward him. “Debrief about what went down in Salex. I already compiled all of my information. Add yours and make sure this gets to Emeri.”

For a moment he wasn’t sure if he’d heard her correctly. Surely she had to be joking; this was not the same Ziva he’d been picturing what seemed like only minutes before. She’d just lost her home and all her possessions, he’d just had another brother die before his eyes, and here she was worried about paperwork.

“You don’t waste any time, do you?” This time, the tone wasn’t an accident.

“Yeah, well, I had nothing better to do,” she muttered, offering him the pad again.

He reluctantly reached for it. “You’re insane. You just lost everything! You should be grieving right now!”

She tightened her grip on the pad and stepped closer, eyes burning. “Do
not
tell me what I should or shouldn’t be doing,” she said through her teeth. Her voice wavered and the tears appeared for a split second. Then she blinked and they were gone.

The display of emotion, however brief, gave him a flicker of hope. She was feeling something, but as usual, she was working hard to keep it buried. With everything that was going on and with everything that still needed to be done, maybe that was for the best. Aroska found himself wishing he was capable of doing the same.