Page 23 of Dax: Gratefully Bonded (Rogue Bonds #2)
Zeke
W hen we arrived at the Hon military base, the place was in complete chaos. There was a queue about twenty people long waiting to get through the security checkpoint – an unheard of number on a base that usually ran like clockwork – and beyond the gate, I could see dozens of people rushing about, some carrying equipment, others barking orders.
In the air above the base, there was a constant buzz of engines, as bulky shuttles vied for air space with the tiny hill-jumpers that were designed to fit just one or two people inside, along with a cloud of drones all following automated orders to collect deliveries of various items and fly them off to remote locations across the city. As I took in the thrum of activity, I started doubting Aiden’s covert assurances that we weren’t at war. I’d never seen this much activity on any base that wasn’t involved in either an active conflict or a natural disaster.
Acting on a hunch, I’d chosen to wear my uniform – standard military fatigues rather than any kind of dress uniform – and when it finally came to be our turn to check in with security, I pressed my palm to the access pad by the entrance. Even though I was on permanent disability, I’d never officially been discharged, so theoretically, at least, I still had access to the base. The guard watched as my ID details flashed up onto the screen, then he glanced at Dax.
“He’s with me,” I said, jumping in before he could start asking questions. “He’s my bonded dimari.”
The guard scrolled quickly through my file, then nodded when he came to the part that said I had a registered dimari dependant. “Go on through,” he said. “But make sure he stays with you. We’ve got a whole bunch of active manoeuvres going on today. I don’t need him getting in anyone’s way.”
“Yes, sir,” I said, nodding for Dax to follow me through the gate. “Stay close,” I told him, not because he hadn’t already figured that out, but to make it an official order – both for his protection and to cover my own ass, in case anything went sideways.
I knew this place like the back of my hand, and it was because of that familiarity that it felt surreal to be walking down the hallways and through the canteen. It was the same green walls, the same brown floor, the same smell of cleaning chemicals combined with a hundred different flavours of sweat. Nothing had changed in the year I’d been away. Nothing but me.
“Captain Rhodes?” a loud, enthusiastic voice got my attention. “Flaming heck, Zeke, is that really you?” I turned, and then suddenly, Dax was forcefully stepping in front of me as a burly man with a beard attempted to come to me. He made a couple of confused attempts to get around Dax, before giving up.
“What gives?” he asked, peering over Dax’s shoulder. By that point, I’d gotten over my shock and was no longer at risk of punching the man in the face if he touched me unexpectedly. I put a gentle hand on Dax’s waist.
“Thank you,” I murmured to him, guiding him to the side. “It’s okay now. He’s a friend.” Then, to the soldier, I said, “This is Dax. He’s my support worker. PTSD and all that. Dax, this is Lieutenant Luca Morris. He saved my life once or twice, back in the day.” I offered my hand, and Luca shook it firmly.
“Sorry, my bad,” he apologised, as he realised what had just happened. “I shouldn’t startle you. Sorry. It’s just so fucking good to see you up and about,” he went on, enthusiasm returning quickly. “What are you doing at the base?”
“Looking for Henderson. We had some blue visitors in our neighbourhood this morning and… well, let’s say I’m acting on various unconfirmed rumours that both the military and the Parliament might have bitten off more than they could chew.” I deliberately avoided mentioning Aiden’s name. I had no intention of getting him into any trouble, even if he hadn’t technically broken any regulations.
Luca said nothing for a moment, his lips pressing together into a thin line. Then he nodded. “You should talk to Henderson,” he agreed. “But he’s up to his ass in a shitstorm at the moment, so… I’ll tell you what. Come with me. I can probably at least get you in the door. Whether or not he kicks you straight back out of it is up to him.”
“Fair enough,” I agreed. “I appreciate the help.”
He took off towards Henderson’s office, moving with surprising speed and agility for a man his size, and with my injured leg, I had trouble keeping up. But Dax stuck to my side like glue, protecting me from anyone who might have bumped into me, and letting me steady myself with a hand on his shoulder to keep my balance.
“So how are you doing?” Luca asked, as we wove between harried-looking soldiers and grim-faced officers.
I had to think about how to respond. “Taking it one day at a time,” I told him. “Some days are better than others. But I think a year off is about long enough. Truth be told, I would have ended up coming down here in the near future even if the current crisis wasn’t happening. I’m starting to get bored. Wanted to find out what else was going on.” Well, that put a nicely optimistic spin on things, didn’t it?
We stopped at the end of a long corridor, outside Henderson’s office. The door was firmly closed. “I heard they put warning buoys around the wormhole,” Luca said softly. “About fucking time.”
“Couldn’t agree more,” I said. Then I nodded at Henderson’s closed door, not wanting to get dragged into a conversation about Ixralia. “Shall we?”
Luca nodded, but before he could move, the door was flung open and three officers came tumbling out, tripping over each other in their haste to exit the room. Dax pressed me against the wall, shielding me with his body until the others were gone, then he stepped back, both of us peering apprehensively into Henderson’s office.
According to literally everyone on the base, our caution would have been justified. Henderson was a Denzogal, eight feet tall and build like a brick shithouse. He was also covered by a thick coat of chestnut brown fur, which only made him look bigger. And while he was generally considered to be a fair and reasonable man, on a bad day, his temper could strip paint off walls. Right now, there was a dark scowl on his face… but strangely, when he caught sight of me, his expression softened. Holy crap, was I really such a basket case that the biggest badass on the base felt the need to feel sorry for me?
“Captain Rhodes?” he said, half-standing from his desk. “Goodness gracious, man… Come in!”
I sent a nod and a grateful smile to Luca – for all that I hadn’t actually needed his help, in the end – and stepped into Henderson’s office. Dax followed me inside and helpfully closed the door behind us. “Good to see you, sir,” I said, offering my hand. Henderson shook it, then settled himself back into his seat, landing surprisingly gently for a Denzogal. They were not known for being a particularly graceful species. “I can see you’re busy,” I began, as I took a seat, “so I’ll jump straight to the point. I’m here about whatever’s going on with the Halagals. A whole contingent of them are in the process of setting up camp in a park near my house. A couple of hundred, at the very least. And given the lack of either police or military supervision, I’m guessing that things are spilling a little out of your control.”
“Good news travels fast,” Henderson muttered, rolling his eyes. He closed the half a dozen or so open holographic screens on his desk, then rubbed his eyes. But rather than telling me anything about the latest crisis, he instead glanced at Dax, sitting patiently beside me, then pulled up another screen. This one was set to privacy mode, so I was unable to see any of the information on the page. He spent a couple of minutes reading over it, then sighed. “All right. I’m going to level with you here. Your latest psychiatric evaluation was… a significant improvement on previous reports,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “And I’m led to believe that a lot of that improvement is thanks to Dax, here.”
“A lot of it is also due to Aiden Hill,” I said, wanting to give credit where it was due. “Dax is fantastic, and honestly, I’d be lost without him. But it was Aiden who got the two of us communicating in a way that actually works. The man has been an absolute godsend.” Even if he’d also been an absolute pain in the ass.
“He’s one of a kind,” Henderson agreed. “Now, to be clear, this report does not approve you for active duty. You’ve seen your new psychologist a grand total of once, and you have a long way to go before we start letting you anywhere near anything dangerous. But ,” he went on, when I opened my mouth to object, “the current situation is, as you put it, spilling out of control. And if the Halagals have taken over your local park, then if you’re willing, I could certainly use a bit of extra help in getting things organised over there.”
I was rather proud of the fact that I actually stopped to consider what getting involved with this crisis was going to entail. Arguments with the Halagals and the local residents. Late nights. Early mornings. Having to liaise with other military staff. Coordinating food and medical supplies. Ensuring there were adequate basic amenities. It would be a lot of pressure. Was I really up for that?
But on the other hand, it was the perfect opportunity to test out how I was going to react to stepping back into any kind of role in the military. This was a non-combat situation. It was local, so it didn’t require me to be away from home. And Dax would be right there beside me, ready to step in if anything got too overwhelming.
“What did you have in mind?” I asked Henderson. “I’d like to help, but if you want me to organise the camp in the park, I’m going to need an absolute minimum of three other people, plus the authority to order supplies from the local vendors. And a proper briefing on what’s going on.”
Henderson nodded slowly. “I can authorise you for a temporary assignment. Two weeks. Then we reassess. Hopefully by that point, I’ll have had enough time to get at least a preliminary handle on this shitshow.” He tapped a few buttons on his console, then closed the screen and sat back. “Okay, so here it is. Do you remember all the fuss with the Nwandu, about six months ago?”
I wracked my brain for the relevant information. I knew there had been a bit of an uproar back then, but I hadn’t been in a great frame of mind at the time to give it much consideration. But… wait, hadn’t Aiden mentioned the Nwandu a few days ago? “They were going to join the Alliance, but ended up wanting to enslave us all?” Was that what Aiden had said?
“That’s them,” Henderson confirmed. “They use highly advanced mind control technology to take over entire cities. Entire planets. Alliance HQ received a distress signal from the Halagal homeworld of Hazharu a couple of days ago. They’ve been attacked by the Nwandu.
“The Culrads have already responded. They’ve sent a fleet of eighty-three destroyers to tackle the Nwandu mothership. Ironically enough, I think this is all going to strengthen the likelihood of them joining the Alliance. Both they and we are seeing first hand evidence of the need to form strong political bonds with other species who can jointly stand against the Nwandu.”
“Are we sending ships to fight them?” I asked.
“Rendol 4 isn’t, but the Alliance as a larger organisation certainly is. Hazzap 2 and Idrion 12 are heading up our military response, but they’re also asking for reinforcements from at least a dozen other planets. Rendol doesn’t have the numbers or the firepower to be terribly useful to them, so we’re going to be pulling our weight by taking in refugees instead. The problem is, it’s all happened so fast that no one’s made any plans for exactly how many people we’re expecting to arrive, or where we’re supposed to put them.
“We set up some preliminary camps on some farmland on the western edge of the city. Thankfully, we’ve at least got the local Geshtoch tribes cooperating now, so we don’t have to worry about them attacking the camps. But the areas we set aside were full within twenty-four hours, and now the shuttles are just landing wherever they can find space. It’s happening all over Rendol 4. Hazharu is home to three billion people and literally anyone who can get themselves onto a ship is evacuating the planet. The battle with the Nwandu is serious enough that we’ve also asked for help from the Basuba, the Polvrons and… I can’t believe I’m saying this, but the Ranzors.”
That pulled me up short. “The Ranzors? Is the Parliament insane?”
The Ranzors were a species that I’d had very brief dealings with early on in my career. I hadn’t personally experienced any conflict with them, but I knew plenty of soldiers who hadn’t been so lucky. They were tall, powerfully built creatures with thick scales and razor-sharp barbs at the end of their long, muscular tails. To a human eye, they looked much like large lizards, walking on their hind legs, with somewhat crocodilian heads. Their culture expected every single individual to train for battle, beginning from the age of five. By the time they were adults, a single warrior was capable of taking down a Vaskian Swamp Snake – a vicious creature that was eight metres long and could weigh as much as seven hundred kilograms. The larger problem, though, was that they were extremely hot-tempered, and more than one species had found themselves finding out just how good the Ranzors were at fighting, after having inadvertently insulted them somehow.
“The Parliament was reluctant to call on them,” Henderson admitted. “They’re violent, destructive and far more powerful than anything we could ever hope to control. But on the flip side, they also have the physical strength and the fire power to take out a Nwandu battle cruiser. Not many species in the galaxy could manage that without taking heavy damage in the process.”
I grimaced. “And afterwards, when the Ranzors decide they want to eat us for breakfast?”
“Assuming we all survive this war, I believe the Alliance Parliament is planning on offering them a planet as a thank you gift. They’ve been looking at terraforming Salasha 3. It’s on the edge of Alliance space, so it’s close enough for us to claim it as our own, but far enough away that if the Ranzors settle there, they’re not right in our faces the whole time. I believe they’re also hoping to wrestle some kind of peace treaty out of this, but that’s very much a wait and see at this point. And that’s all classified information, at the moment. As far as any civilian is concerned, we’re taking in refugees from Hazharu due to an attack by the Nwandu. That’s it. That’s all anyone gets to know.”
“Understood, sir,” I said. Then, as a precaution, I turned to Dax. “You hear that, Dax? You are to follow Henderson’s orders both regarding discussing this with civilians, and in any actions to help organise the refugees.”
“Yes, sir,” Dax replied seriously.
That did raise a few questions in my own mind, though. “You don’t see Dax as a security threat?” I asked Henderson.
“I’ve worked with Kade enough to have learned that any dimari is largely an extension of their owner, as far as security risks are concerned. But on that note, any breach of regulations by Dax will be held as your responsibility. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir,” I said, making a few mental notes about what orders I was going to have to give Dax, to make sure he behaved appropriately. It shouldn’t be too hard, though. He was going to be with me the vast majority of the time, and as far as missions went, this was a relatively low risk one.
“All right. Let’s get you a team. Let me see who’s available…”
Half an hour later, I was standing at parade rest alongside four eager faces as Henderson completed his briefing. It was a diverse team; Private Soll was a Wasop, only four feet tall with a starburst pattern of black stripes across his face. Private Denny was a Solof, her skin such a dark shade of purple it looked almost burgundy. Private Nichols was human, the youngest of the group, having only recently completed his training. And Sergeant Len was a Denzogal woman, eight feet tall and as muscular as any of the men of her species, with fur of a smoky brown colour.
“The Halagal council is very concerned about tracking where their citizens have ended up,” Henderson was saying, “so compiling a list of the residents of the camp is going to be one of your first priorities – after ensuring the refugees have access to basic food and medical supplies, of course. A delivery of all-weather tents will be arriving this afternoon, but I’ll leave the exact arrangement of the camp up to you, depending on the topography of the park. Any other supplies, you’re going to have to organise yourselves. I simply don’t have the resources to be making any other arrangements for you. Captain Rhodes, I want a report on your progress once a day, at a minimum. And finally…” He paused, glancing apologetically at me, and then turning a stern expression on the rest of the team. “I’m saying this in front of all of you because it’s very important that you’re all on the same page on this issue. And furthermore, what I’m about to say is highly confidential information which is not to be discussed with anyone outside your team. Is that clear?”
He waited until a chorus of ‘Yes sir’s echoed back at him.
“Very good. My final order is this; under no circumstances whatsoever is Captain Rhodes to be in possession of a firearm. Everyone understand that?”
“Yes, sir,” everyone replied – including Dax, I noted with interest. Under different circumstances, I might have bothered to be offended. But given how much Henderson knew about my situation, I quickly decided that he was correct in giving the order. The rest of the team had been given a brief rundown on my service history and the fact that I was suffering from PTSD, and I couldn’t even claim that the idea of killing myself that way hadn’t occurred to me.
“All right, then. Best of luck. Now get the hell out of my office,” Henderson finished with a scowl. “I have work to do.”