Ronan: Ziva Payvan Book 3 (23 page)

-33-

City Center

Salex, Haphez

“You’ve got to be bloody kidding me!”

Aroska risked a glance over to where Maston waited by the car. “Will you keep your voice down?” he hissed in Ziva’s ear.

“My orders, Payvan,” Emeri’s voice crackled in the background. “It’s for your own protection.”

“Protection!” she exclaimed. “From what?”

“Our Nosti friend here says the Resistance will come finish him off if they hear he wasn’t able to take that suicide pill,” Skeet said. “He could be bluffing, but we wouldn’t put it past them. Emeri doesn’t want you here if there’s any sort of attack on Headquarters. Says you’re the only person who can stop this thing and that we can’t risk losing you right now.”

Ziva let loose a string of expletives and stormed away to brood, leaving Aroska standing there alone with the communicator. He sighed. “You said twelve hours?”

“Just to be on the safe side,” Skeet answered. “We’ll get a story out to the news networks and let you know when you’re clear to come back. What’s got her in such a twist? With all she’s been through, I’d think she’d be okay with laying low for a bit.”

Aroska was tempted to comment on how little effort it actually took to get Ziva in a twist, but he decided now was not the time for sarcasm. “My older brother’s son is one of the kids who was abducted. My family is here and she’s pissed.”

There was a long hesitation before Skeet spoke. “Well, yeah.”

“I’d like to have a word with you when you return, Sergeant,” Emeri said. His voice was clearer now as if he were speaking directly into the comm unit this time. “Meanwhile, do your best to not aggravate the situation. Is Ziva still there?”

Ziva approached upon hearing her name, her eyes like crimson flames as she stared Aroska down. “I’m here,” she growled.

“Go ahead and get in touch with your contacts. Have them on standby. Maybe even get them moving in this direction. If Ronan tries anything, we’ll have no choice but to retaliate, and we’ll need help.”

“Yes, sir.” She kept her fiery gaze focused on Aroska.

“We’ll be in touch,” Emeri said. The transmission went dead.

Aroska pocketed the device, trying as hard as possible not to break eye contact. “You can’t blame me for this.”

“Oh, I think I can. You’re the one who dragged me out here in the first place.”

“To do your job! Even if we were still in Noro, Emeri’s concerned enough that he’d probably send you away anyway.”

The way she crossed her arms told him she understood his point but still didn’t like it. “Okay, fine, we’re stuck here. But don’t think for one second that being my ‘security detail’ puts you in charge. You want me to do my job? Let me do my job.” She slipped her shades back on as she turned and strode toward one of the Salex agents who remained in the plaza taking measurements.

“Fair enough,” he muttered. He wanted to be disgusted with her attitude, but part of him was beginning to feel bad for bringing her here. It was true that he thought she could employ her tracking skills and increase their chances of rescuing the children, but he hadn’t planned on her reacting quite like this. Her behavior reminded him a lot of the way she’d acted while running from Dasaro. She was lashing out in an attempt to conceal another emotion: fear. He wasn’t sure what she could possibly be so afraid of, but being introduced to his family had driven her anxiety levels higher than ever. On top of that, both Emeri and Skeet had seemed like they’d expected such a reaction. They all still knew something he didn’t, and he was almost afraid to find out what it was.

“You don’t know the half of it! If you believe she killed him just for the hell of it, you’re wrong. Think what you will about her, but she would never do something like that.”

Aroska let out another sigh in the form of a quiet growl and wandered over to where his brother was waiting.
I’ve been wrong about so many things. I don’t want to be wrong again.

He saw Ziva flash her credentials at one of the Salex agents and ask him something. She stood with her hands on her hips, listening intently and studying the ground where the landing gear had left dark marks on the stone. At least she could pretend to be professional, though Aroska was sure Maston could sense there was an issue.

He’d never been as close to his older brother as he had to Soren. It had much to do with the age difference – Maston was five years older, while Soren had been three years younger – but they also lacked common interests and goals. Maston had always been the enterprising family man, and it certainly showed now. With his work at HSP, Aroska had estranged himself to a degree, especially after the family’s move to Salex following Soren’s death. But in light of the mess he’d found himself in after Dakiti, he’d opted to reconcile with his loved ones over the past couple of months. Their support had made all the difference in his quest to clean up his act. Temptation was still an issue, but thanks to Maston and a friend with a rehab connection, Aroska had been both clean and sober for over a month.

In the end, dealing with such sensitive subject matter had given Maston plenty of practice telling when something was wrong or even when Aroska was lying. The man’s current facial expression indicated that he knew good and well both he and Ziva were upset about something.

“Everything good?” he asked.

“Fine,” Aroska lied.

Maston lifted an eyebrow. “You look like you want to kill someone.”

“This is all just a lot more complicated than I ever thought it would be. There’s an issue at Headquarters and we’ve been ordered to stay out here for the night. Do you mind?”

“No, of course you’re welcome here. Are you in danger?”

Aroska shook his head. “This is actually the safest place we can be right now. And if that ship comes back, we can respond all the more quickly.” He forced an innocent smile.

They both turned and watched Ziva for a moment as she broke away from the agent and began her examination of the plaza. One second, she was stooped down, running her hand along the skid marks, sniffing her fingers. Then she was on her feet, gaze directed upward, with the light from the sun reflected in her shades. Watching her work now, Aroska was certain she would have found them on Aubin even without Tobias Niio’s help.

“Is she always like this?” Maston asked quietly. His eyebrow remained arched as he watched Ziva go about her work with her face contorted in a perpetual scowl.

“Like what? A sociopathic
shouka
? Not always, if you can believe it.” Aroska thought back to their conversation on Kat’s balcony, to the things Ziva had said to him in the hospital before leaving for Na, to their exchange at the med center the previous night – all times when she’d actually seemed like a real person. “Is she always damn good at what she does? Yes. Always.”

He may not have agreed with the majority of her methods, but he couldn’t deny that she produced results. She was right; he had to just let her do her job.

He made his way over to where she stood in the center of the plaza, turning in a slow circle as she studied the sky. “Any ideas?” he asked.

She jerked her head toward the man she’d been talking to. “Probably nothing they haven’t found already. Six-skid landing system—” she sniffed her fingers again “—and pyranil oil. Means it’s manufactured somewhere in the Core. Maybe some type of freighter. Let’s see if these people have any footage.”

The two of them set off toward the nearest Salex agent, leaving Maston to wait behind the police barricade. They skirted around a large puddle of what appeared to be dried blood on the ground, no doubt the place where the children’s teacher had been shot. Aroska paused a moment, attempting to gather his bearings as he examined the scene from the new angle. If the instructor had been shot at the base of the boarding ramp, comparing the puddle’s location to the distance between the skid marks might give them more clues about the design of the ship. Having photographic evidence, surveillance footage, or even hearing an eyewitness testimony would certainly be more efficient, but he imagined it wouldn’t be difficult to measure the vessel’s dimensions by hand if the need arose.

“Hey!” Ziva barked at the agent who appeared to be in charge. She displayed her credentials again. “Captain Payvan, Sergeant Tarbic, operations. What do you have?”

The man sighed and wiped his brow, directing a look of relief toward Aroska. “Sergeant Tarbic. We spoke on comm. Thanks for coming.” He shifted his attention back to Ziva. “That ship has been gone for four hours now. We’ve been working nonstop since then, but there were only so many leads. To tell you the truth, we don’t really have anything more than we did after the first hour. Eleven children are missing. Their instructor is dead. The ship in question made an out-of-lane FTL jump and Port Control lost it. We’ve already reported all of this to Noro Headquarters.”

Aroska nodded as Ziva swore under her breath. “Is there any surveillance footage from the area?” he asked. “Any image of the ship at all?”

“Nothing from here in the plaza,” the agent said. “We did send out a bulletin asking any pilots who may have crossed paths with this vessel to send in any available front cam footage. Let’s see if we’ve received anything.”

They followed him over to the small staging area the other agents had set up. “Any eyewitnesses?” Ziva asked.

“There were over twenty people in the vicinity at the time of the abduction, but most ran when those men opened fire. My people finished interviewing everyone a little while ago; they’re probably all back home by now. We do have recordings of each interview though and would be happy to forward them to you.”

“Please do,” Aroska said.

The man went to work at one of the mobile computer consoles and brought up stream after stream of footage provided by hundreds of pilots. Someone had already started sifting through them and had marked several as relevant. These he displayed on the screen, pausing on the frames that gave them the best view of the runaway vessel.

“These visuals match the descriptions some of the witnesses gave us,” he said, perking up a bit. “Many of them panicked so we didn’t get clear stories, but this is…something.”

“Looks like a
Legacy
-class transport,” Ziva said, removing her shades to get a better look. “Doesn’t Solea Technologies manufacture those? They’re based on Kovis, aren’t they?” The glance she shot at Aroska silently completed her thought:
a former Federation world currently controlled by the Resistance
.

The sight of the ship made Aroska’s throat tighten and he balled his hands up. Neither he nor Skeet had gotten a good look at it on Niio, so they were really only familiar with its emissions signature. It was maddening enough to know that its crew had managed to grab Zinni. Now here it was again, five weeks later, still wreaking havoc. The idea that they hadn’t been able to stop it yet sent rage boiling up inside him.

“Port Control never could get any readings from it,” the agent said. “No name, no origin code. Couldn’t get any crew to respond to our hails, either. By the time we scrambled HSP ships for a pursuit, it had disappeared in traffic and, well, you know the rest. We picked up one last emissions sig in an area just past Na before we lost it.”

“I’d like a copy of all of this footage too,” Ziva said, holding out her data pad to receive the files. “Forward it to Director Arion as well.”

“Of course.”

“Thank you,” Aroska said. “We’ll sit down and take another look at everything, and we’ll let you know what we find.” He wasn’t entirely sure what else they
could
find at this point, but trying was better than sitting idly by.

He and Ziva turned and began to make their way back across the square. Maston stood just on the other side of the barricade, arms crossed but face twisted with worry. Telling him they hadn’t found anything new was the last thing Aroska wanted to do at the moment.

“You know
Legacy
-class ships are designed to be medical transports,” Ziva murmured.

“I know,” Aroska replied, trying in vain to maintain a positive countenance for Maston’s sake. After hearing Kat’s story and seeing firsthand what kinds of things Ronan was doing and producing, he dreaded to think of the implications.

“We’ll find it.” In her tone he could hear the same apprehension he was feeling.

His attention remained on Maston until they reached the barricade. He had no idea what the Resistance hoped to accomplish by kidnapping children, but involving innocent civilians in this mess was the final straw. At least the military and Royal House were powerful enough to fight back to an extent, and at least they knew who or what they were fighting against. These people here in Salex didn’t even know what had hit them.

Maston’s eyes glistened as they approached but he continued to stand tall. “Now what?”

Aroska didn’t want to tell him they had nothing, nor did he want to lie. He settled on a happy medium and gestured down at Ziva’s data pad. “Now, we get to work.”

-34-

Patrol Frigate
Vigilance

Fringe Space

The shimmering figure standing on the projection pad was indeed impressive. Full Nosti armor with polished kytara firmly attached to the belt. Glossy black hair. Average stature but strong, just like the rest of them. Tav Ronan embodied the perfection all Resistance fighters should strive for, in Sadey’s opinion.

“You’ve got to stop contacting me like this. Voice communication is too risky with all the people we’ve got looking for us.”

Sadey dipped her head and shifted her feet on the comm pad. “With all due respect, we’re too short on time to keep up this encryption game. Yes, there’s a greater risk of a voice transmission being detected, but the slower we move, the more time someone has to catch up to us.
Anything
is risky at this point.”

Ronan sighed. “Point taken. I assume you have a specific reason for calling?”

“All eleven subjects have successfully received direct infusions of the updated formula,” Sadey answered. “Samples of blood from the
Titania’s
prisoner were studied and we believe direct infusion may still work best after all. The gas works well for mass exposure, but it’s absorbed differently by the body, faulty formula notwithstanding. A direct injection into the bloodstream is more efficient.”

“And just how do you plan to subject that many Haphezian individuals to a direct infusion?”

“We don’t, although I’d certainly like to. I know we’re running out of time; that’s why we started targeting larger groups in the first place. But I propose reverting to our old methods, at least for a little while longer. We’ll focus on individuals and small demographic groups, and when we find the correct formula, we can try the gas again.”

It was difficult to tell thanks to the flickering of the hologram, but Ronan may have looked chagrined. “And exactly
how
long do you propose we do this?”

“We’re getting close,” Sadey answered. “The last test proved successful from a latency standpoint. The symptoms still manifested, but it was almost immediate.”

“Those symptoms are still the issue.”

“I know, but we’ve made minute changes to the formula since yesterday and none of the current subjects are having any problems yet. They look promising.”

“You think it has to do with level of brain development?”

“Possibly. That’s what we were hoping.”

Ronan nodded. “What about the captive Haphezian agent? Has she been exposed?”

“No,” Sadey said. “I was able to go in and see her, and her brain is still healthy. The
Titania
has been using her strictly for blood analysis. She has proven quite useful thus far. The data they’ve compiled on her blood composition and circulatory system has helped us design the most efficient formulas.”

“Except none of those formulas have worked yet.”

Sadey did her best to keep her shoulders straight even as her gaze drifted to the floor. They’d already managed to create successful formulas for the rest of the major Fringe civilizations. The Elsara were docile enough creatures that it had required almost no effort whatsoever to swoop down to Lathia and test the nostium on them. The Durutians could just be infused with the same formula the rest of the human-dominated worlds were using; brief experimentation had proved that their cybernetic implants made no difference. They’d even designed formulas for the Sardons and the pointy-eared Rama way out on Xater Prime. The Haphezians had been put on the list first due to anticipated difficulty, but there they remained after all these months. In hopes of challenging herself, Sadey had volunteered to oversee all Haphezian-related operations, but she was beginning to wonder if she’d bitten off more than she could chew. They had a schedule to keep, and she dreaded the thought of being the person responsible for throwing that schedule off.

“Any word from Lieutenant Gero?” Ronan asked.

Sadey shook her head. “We don’t know any more than we did the last time you and I spoke. Last we heard, he was alive and in HSP custody. He’s a good agent, well-trained. I doubt he’ll give us away, but there’s always a remote chance. The Haphezians are known for their ruthless torture tactics and should not be underestimated. It worries me, but there’s nothing we can do about it without exposing ourselves.”

“We can start by giving them something else to focus on,” Ronan said. “Divert their attention away from Jalen. Take the subjects back.”

“But the plan was to keep them—”

“Plans change, Commander. You should know that as well as anyone. At this point, we need to focus on strategy, and right now our best strategy is to keep them stunned, confused. Is the
Titania
still traveling with you
?
”

“It is.”

“Have it take them back. Wait until dark and employ stealth measures. The Haphezians won’t know what hit them.”

The hologram fizzled away, leaving Sadey standing alone on the comm pad. Classic Ronan…always so terse and to-the-point. It wasn’t the first time one of their conversations had ended like that. The leader of the Resistance and restorer of the Nosti culture had more important things to worry about.

Shrugging the behavior off, Sadey picked up the comm receiver and opened a transmission to the bridge. “Change of plans. Reroute course back to the Noro system.”