Torn Sky (Rebel Wing Trilogy, Book 3) (Rebel Wing Series) (18 page)

Within the Panthea Capitol building, Galena watched Aris’s panicked face in horror, while the chaos of scrambling advisors and techies whirled around her.

On the streets, people were trying to evacuate, but there wasn’t time to be organized about it. Civilians violated the no-fly rules in droves. Terrans were abandoned in the middle of the road. The city’s protectors struggled to keep things under control. Pyralis’s advisors kept urging the wards to leave, but they insisted on staying at their posts. There wasn’t time, really, to get them far enough away.

Commanders Freni and Quin were beside themselves, and the techies they’d brought in to help oversee the rescue mission were wide-eyed with fear.

“Can we shoot Lieutenant Haan down?”

“Where’s the signal coming from?”

“Is there a way to disarm the bomb remotely?”

Galena herself stood frozen before the monitor, watching Aris scramble. And then something happened. Aris got her hands on some wires. The grainy glow of the nav against her face changed. Her expression changed.

A voice cut through the frantic crowd. “She just popped up on radar. She’s changing course. She’s turning around.”

Come on, Aris. Come on, dear.

“How close is our recon team?” she asked in the sudden silence. Every single person in the room was standing, staring at the unauthorized vid.

One of the techies dropped into his chair, his hands flying across his monitor. “Just about to land at the prison,” he reported, his gaze flicking back to the main screen.

“Tell them what’s happening. She might need an escort . . .” Galena’s voice trailed off. She never took her gaze from Aris’s face. The vid was blurry, interrupted by blasts of static, but she recognized the look in the soldier’s eyes.

All around Galena, people began shouting orders and sending comms to Jax and his team, but when the vid flashed white, everyone froze.

A minute later, just as Commander Freni turned and opened his mouth to speak, the office rocked. Galena dropped to her knees, and someone grabbed her hand. A monitor fell off the wall with a crash. All the lights went out, and someone screamed in the darkness.

Galena didn’t need to see to know who held her hand. She and Pyralis said nothing, just rode out the aftershocks with their fingers tightly joined.

The strategic team landed their invisible wingjets at various points around the prison. Dysis’s jet, with Lieutenant Santos as flyer and Otto as retriever, was one of three to land on the actual landing pad, which extended out over the ocean.

Moments after they touched down, a comm blasted through the small cabin.

“Lieutenant Haan has gained control of the wingjet carrying the flaming scorpion. Flyers en route, look for her and assess whether she needs an escort. The weapon is—”

Santos was already powering back up when a giant undulating light unfurled from the ocean at a frightening speed, like it was ripping the sky in half.

Seconds later, the power went out. Everything. The nav screen blinked off, the spotlights that framed the landing pad disappeared into darkness. A great, rolling earthquake followed, as if some terrible monster rumbled under the ground, crumbling the earth in its wake. Dysis held on to the straps crisscrossing her chest and closed her eyes, the glow of the flaming scorpion turning her lids pink.

She thought of Calix and how they were supposed to be together when the bomb was dropped.

And she waited to die.

Eventually the earth stilled. The lights blinked back on. And Dysis kept breathing.

“We’re not dead,” she muttered. Was there some kind of delay with the bomb’s effects? Or were they truly safe?

“You noticed that, too? I thought it was just me,” Otto quipped, but his voice shook a little.

Santos didn’t say anything. He slipped a diatous veil off the back of his neck, briefly transforming into a stranger—a female stranger—before replacing it with another, and becoming Aris.

Aris.

They were here to rescue her, but if she’d been the one flying the jet with the weapon . . .

“Aris . . . she dropped the bomb in the ocean. She survived, right?” The question was swallowed by the silence of the wingjet.

“Sure, sure,” Otto said, a frantic edge to his voice. “Probably.”

“If she didn’t, what about our disguises? The misdirection?” They’d still need to rescue Major Vadim. Dysis couldn’t be thinking about . . . worrying that Aris was . . .

Lieutenant Santos said in Aris’s voice, “We follow the command. If Haan is dead, let the soldiers chase ghosts.” He opened the glass dome. “Time to go.”

At the other edge of the tarmac, another prong of the strategic assault engaged with the enemy, lighting the night with solagun fire. Dysis and her team were able to slip into the building that hulked at the edge of the pad with limited engagement.

She hoped Jax was okay. He was in one of the wingjets that landed at the rear side of the prison. He’d be sneaking in on a subfloor and working his way up. He was in charge of retrieving the weapon. But now . . .

She wondered if he’d still call for the full contingent, now that their parameters had changed. There would be no flaming scorpion to retrieve. Just Major Vadim.

And Aris
, the more hopeful part of her brain added.

Still, defenses were high. The sounds of battle echoed around them as they ran down the hallway. The earthquake had been strong, but the prison was apparently built to withstand such threats, because Dysis saw no signs of structural damage.

When the intel had come through about the prison, Jax had obtained schematics from one of his Safaran contacts; according to the blueprints, most of the cells were underground, on the bottom level of the compound.

The bulk of the disguised soldiers would split up and move along the upper floors, drawing as many guards as they could. While they provided a distraction, Dysis and her team were supposed to find their way to the cells and retrieve Major Vadim. Of her crew, only Santos was disguised.

“Lift!” Santos-as-Aris shouted, pointing to a chrome door at the end of the hall.

Just then, several Safaran troops rounded a corner and stopped dead, shocked, in front of Dysis and her team. Dysis and Santos raised their weapons and plowed them down. Dysis grabbed their passcards and key rings and kept moving.

They reached the lift just as someone shouted behind them. Otto took out one of the newcomers before the doors closed, and then they were plunging down into the bowels of the building. There was an ominous groan, and Dysis thought again of how the earth had rolled beneath them.

With a jarring bounce, the lift stopped. Dysis, Santos, and Otto readied their solaguns as the door slid open.

Water flowed in around their feet. “That’s not a good sign,” Dysis muttered as she splashed into the hallway.

The corridor was lined with steel doors. One by one, they used the passcards and keys to open the doors, but the rooms were empty. No prisoners. No guards. Just more water, pouring in from somewhere.

In the distance, Dysis picked up the sound of shouts.

“This way.” She sprinted toward the end of the hall. Santos and Otto followed, their feet splashing in the water. Already, Dysis was wet to her knees.

At the end of the hall, a heavy door led to what they’d been looking for: the cells.

As soon as Otto pried the door open, screaming and cries for help washed over them in a headache-inducing wave.

Here, the water was deeper and swirling. Rising fast. The ocean would soon claim this room. Maybe the whole building.

“We need to get everyone out or they’ll drown!” Dysis shouted to Santos and Otto.

They split up, using their utility knives and the butts of their solaguns to break the electronic lock panels. Luckily, the ceiling lights still worked.

“Major Vadim!” Dysis called, staying focused on her mission and hoping against hope that he was being held here. The building was huge, with interrogation chambers scattered on every floor. If he was being held somewhere else—

Up ahead, an Aris look-alike dragged a prostrate form from one of the cells. She—he—was struggling to keep the unconscious person’s head above water. Dysis splashed forward to help.

The body was bruised, with deep gashes that still bled, coloring the water pink. His swollen face was nearly unrecognizable, but the blue Ruslanan pants were not. Major Vadim.

“Good work!” she shouted over the sound of rushing water. “Let’s get him out of here.” She bent to thread her arm under Major Vadim’s shoulders, but the soldier holding him grabbed her in a sudden, tight embrace.

“Oh holy, Dysis! You’re here. Gods, I’m so relieved. I thought for sure . . . that explosion, was it the bomb? What did Pallas do? I thought we were dead for sure, but now—”

The babbling continued, but Dysis stood frozen, half of Major Vadim’s body draped over her arm. She studied the Aris before her. Same dark hair. The eyes were right. What if . . .

“What do you mean about Pallas?” Dysis asked abruptly.

The Aris look-alike smoothed back Major Vadim’s hair. “Pallas showed up and killed my guards. They were going to make me fly the wingjet with the flaming scorpion, but Pallas had a diatous veil. She looked like
me.
She fooled them . . . I don’t know why.”

Dysis took a deep breath, the first in what felt like hours. “You’re
Aris.
The real one.”

Aris raised a brow. “Of course I am.”

Dysis couldn’t help it; she laughed. “You need to stop pseudo-dying on me. It’s getting to be a bad habit.”

Aris gave her an odd look. She shifted Major Vadim into a more secure position. “Milek needs serious care. He’s been unconscious for at least an hour. I’m worried he’s got internal bleeding.”

Dysis cleaved through the water with renewed energy. “Right. Let’s get out of here.”

Inside, her heart did tiny cartwheels of joy. Aris was alive. And by Gods, if Dysis had anything to do with it, she was going to stay that way.

“What’s it look like out there?” Aris asked, as she and Dysis hauled Milek out of the cell. Aris wasn’t sure why they were still alive, but she said a prayer of thanks anyway. When Pallas had run for the wingjet carrying the bomb, she assumed that would be the end.

But the danger wasn’t over. Milek’s heavy body dragged against her sore arms, and the water in the lower level was rising fast. She tried to see the fact that he was still breathing as evidence that he’d be okay, but the alternative kept niggling at her, sapping her hope.

No.
She wouldn’t let him die.

Dysis adjusted her grip on Milek so she was carrying more of his weight. “The only structural damage I’ve seen is on this level. But there are a lot of Safaran soldiers here. Jax has reinforcements on the way.”

All around them, other prisoners were splashing toward the door. The roar of water got louder. The lights flashed, and part of the long room plunged into darkness.

Cold water licked at Aris’s waist.

“That’s everyone,” Otto said as he approached.

“Otto!” If her arms hadn’t been full of Milek’s unconscious body, she would have hugged him.

He gave her a strange look. “Yeah, Santos. What’s so exciting about me?”

At that moment, another figure wearing her face approached them. “This floor’s about to go. We need to get out of here before the whole building collapses.”

Otto looked between the two of them in confusion for a second, but there wasn’t time to sort it all out. Aris and Dysis handed Milek off to the taller soldiers and pushed toward the door. Most of the prisoners had made it into the hall.

“Is the lift safe?” Aris asked. Even as the words left her mouth, the end of the next hallway came into view. People were crowding into it, jostling for position. A man slipped and fell, his head dipping below the water.

Aris pointed to a door halfway down. The stairwell.

Dysis led the way.

As far as Aris could tell, the lowest level of the prison had been left unguarded. No one accosted them as they slowly made their way out of the water and up the iron stairs. The building shivered, wounded in some deep, unseen way by the quake. She hoped the prisoners crowding into the lift made it to safety.

Otto grunted under the weight of Milek’s legs. The other soldier, still wearing Aris’s face, kept moving slowly but steadily up the stairs, hands under Milek’s arms.

Milek’s head lolled with every step, his skin pale. She walked beside him, her hand drifting along his bare shoulder. She was afraid to take his pulse.

Dysis led them up four levels, and by the time they reached the door, they were all panting. Aris’s broken ribs screamed now that she wasn’t so focused on keeping Milek’s head above the water. She hadn’t eaten or drunk anything in at least a day, and the shakiness in her knees was ceding to an ominous rubbery feeling.

“Otto, give Aris your solagun,” Dysis said, pausing at last outside a solid metal door. “Your hands are full with Major Vadim.”

Aris took the gun and reluctantly moved away from her post at Milek’s shoulder.

Behind her, a faint groan.

“He’s waking up,” Otto said. “We’ve got to hurry. I need to secure him and assess his wounds. I don’t want him wiggling!”

He’s alive.
The knowledge strengthened Aris’s resolve. She nodded at Dysis. With a grunt, Dysis forced open the heavy door.

Immediately, the air filled with the hiss of solagun fire. To the right, the air was murky with smoke. A group of Atalantan soldiers had taken cover behind a heavy metal table someone had dragged into the hall. All of them looked exactly like Aris.

Beyond the table, at the far end of the corridor, an endless parade of Safaran black pushed ever, inexorably, forward. In the space between the two armies, the humps of fallen soldiers dotted the floor. Immediately, the Safarans adjusted their aim, targeting Aris and the others in the doorway. Aris and Dysis ducked back into the stairwell. As Aris snuck another glance, two of the Safarans collapsed, taken down by the soldiers behind the table.

She glanced back at Otto and the other soldier. “We’ll help the others cover you. The landing pad’s to the left, a hundred yards down the hall. We’re aiming for the nearest wingjet, Safaran or Atalantan. Doesn’t matter. I can fly it. Just get Milek inside safely, no matter what.”

Her own face nodded back at her. Otto shifted his grip on Milek’s legs. “We’re ready.”

Aris shot a look at Dysis. “This isn’t going to be fun.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I’ve been stuck in the sick bay for weeks.” She had the nerve to grin, though her eyes held the weight of what they were about to do.

With a last deep breath, and a fervent prayer, Aris led them into the fray.

They made it the first few feet before the Safarans got lucky. Aris bit back a scream as a shot sliced her arm. Dysis took down three soldiers before they had time to re-aim their weapons.

The Atalantan fighters behind the table shifted backward with them, to help protect Milek. Slowly, so slowly, they made it down the hall.

At some point, if they survived this, Aris was going to ask why there so many people with her face running around, but for the moment she focused on making her shots count.

When they finally reached the landing pad, the sight was dizzying. A full-scale air fight raged above them, with black and silver wingjets diving and spinning, filling the dawn sky with flashes of fire and the caustic smell of smoke. As Aris watched, a Safaran jet exploded before plunging into the ocean.

“Look!” Dysis pointed. “Do you see that?”

Big red wingjets flitted around the fiery scene above. Aris couldn’t believe it. “Castalia reinforcements!”

There wasn’t time to celebrate. Beneath them, the building heaved, and a giant crack appeared where the tarmac extended over the water. Aris searched for the nearest wingjet; so many were already engulfed in flames. But there, teetering along the rim of the pad, just over the crashing waves . . .

She pointed. “That’s where we’re heading!”

Most of the Safaran fighters were inside the building, far above in wingjets, or dead. There was little resistance on their route to the wingjet, but the building continued to groan and shake. The tarmac cracked and crumbled, huge chunks falling to the ocean.

Aris and Dysis led the way, with Santos and Otto carrying Milek in the middle, and the surviving Atalantan soldiers who’d covered them in the hall bringing up the rear.

Halfway to the jet, a flash of movement caught Aris’s attention. It took her a moment to process what she was seeing.

Ward Balias was sprinting across the tarmac. He was a good runner, fast, his sandy hair and tan skin lit by the fires of dead wingjets and the flashing weaponry above. He was flanked by a handful of soldiers, and his destination was clear: the only wingjet still intact.

The wingjet
Aris
was aiming for.

Behind her, even amid the noise and confusion, she heard Milek groan.

The world slowed, and sounds faded as Aris skidded to a halt, straightened her stance, and raised her weapon. Through the chaos, the only thing static—the only thing clear—was Balias’s face. He saw her an instant before she fired. He didn’t have time to evade her. No time to hide behind his entourage. Only enough time to know who pulled the trigger.

It took three shots for him to fall, but each one struck its target. In as few seconds as it took him to kill Alistar, Aris took Ward Balias down.