Page 26 of Dax: Gratefully Bonded (Rogue Bonds #2)

Zeke

T he following morning, we were back at the park by seven o’clock. Dax had insisted that I eat some toast and drink some coffee before we left, and I diligently made sure he ate at the same time as I did. He was still not great about making sure he took care of himself, along with me. I suspected that part of his insistence that I eat was to make sure I took my morning pill. We’d forgotten the midday one yesterday, in the midst of the rest of the chaos, and despite the improvements we’d made recently, it was only a little over a week since I’d been drowning in my own misery. Making sure I took the medication was one small step in trying to make sure we kept ourselves on the right track.

At the park there was already an argument in progress, a Halagal mother demanding that a young man give up the food in his hand and give it to her children. He, of course, was flatly refusing. “This was my dinner ration last night. It’s mine! Why should I give it to you?”

“Do you want my children to starve?” the woman shrieked at him. “Don’t you care about them at all?”

“Why should I care?” he shot back. “They’re not my fucking children! I’m trying to survive here, just like anyone else!”

“All right, all right, that’s enough,” I said, loud enough to interrupt them, but stopping short of actually shouting. “Both of you, go back to your tents. There’ll be more food arriving this morning,” I added, shooting a stern look the woman’s way, “so nobody’s going to be starving.”

The man hurried away, looking grateful for the interruption, while the woman stood and glared at me. I ignored her, heading for the office building, intent on checking on the status of the food deliveries I’d ordered last night. The GPS tracker on the first one reported that it was less than ten minutes away, with another truck due to arrive in about an hour. Perfect. Handing out the food would keep the camp’s residents occupied for a while, which would give me time to make some calls about getting a doctor out here, along with some shower stalls. We were also going to need clothing, since many of the refugees hadn’t had the chance to bring much with them, but finding clothes that fit the Halagals was going to be difficult. They had a different body shape to any of the Alliance species, so it wasn’t going to be a simple case of buying pre-made clothing. There was a chance they might fit into child-sized human or Solof clothing, but the Halagals’ legs were shorter, so any pants would need to be rolled up.

Privates Nichols and Denny showed up a few minutes later, so I assigned them to sorting out the food distribution. Denny was a bit older and more experienced than Nichols, but less confident in herself, so getting the two of them to work together balanced things out well. Sergeant Len arrived soon after that, and her size alone made even the most troublesome of the Halagals sit up and take notice, so I sent her and Dax off to do a security sweep of the camp and make sure nothing drastic had happened overnight. Meanwhile, I got started on calling around for a local doctor. I’d just found one – a Solof woman who agreed to come down for three or four hours – when a low rumbling got my attention.

“For fuck’s sake, not another one,” I muttered, jumping up from my chair. I dashed outside, Sergeant Len and Dax rushing to meet me as a shuttle came gliding in over the trees. We’d set aside half of the playing field to be used as a landing site, knowing it was entirely possible more shuttles would be arriving. And once we figured out some more long-term options for accommodating these people, it was likely we’d get one of our own transporters to come and pick them up, ferrying them off to a more permanent location.

But the shuttle hanging in the sky was nothing like the broad, blue ones that had brought so many of the Halagals here yesterday. This one was sleek, streamlined, and bright red, with a silver insignia literally glowing on the underside of the ship.

“Holy fucking hell…” I muttered, feeling my heart shudder in my chest. This was absolutely not what we needed right now.

Beside me, Nichols and Len were both scanning the insignia with their comms. I, on the other hand, didn’t need to. I knew that symbol, would recognise it anywhere. And for the first time since I’d been given this assignment, I found myself sorely wishing that I was allowed to carry a gun.

“What the fuck are the Ranzors doing here?” Len asked, when her comm spat out the result of her search.

“I have no idea,” I replied. Privately, my mind was racing. The Alliance had asked the Ranzors to help in the fight against the Nwandu. So what the hell was one of their ships doing here? Surely it wasn’t possible that anyone on Rendol 4 had managed to insult them to the point of needing a personal visit?

The ship glided down onto the playing field with a smoothness that made the Halagal shuttles look like waste junkers. It landed softly, barely rustling the grass around its wide feet.

The engines powered down with an almost melodic hum, and regardless of my reservations about having the Ranzors here, I couldn’t help but admire their technology. They somehow managed to make everything they designed not only powerful and functional, but also beautiful.

The Ranzors themselves, on the other hand, were fearsome to behold.

The entry ramp lowered with a soft hiss and a tall creature stepped out. Skin-tight clothing revealed a lean and muscular build, displaying every detail of just how lethal this creature was. His feet were wide and bare, with long claws on his toes. He had scales, rather than skin, their colour a muddy green, perfect for blending in with vegetation. And his head was flat and elongated, two long canine teeth displayed on the outside of his mouth, protruding up from his lower jaw. I knew from first-hand experience that there were also plenty more razor-sharp teeth hiding inside that mouth.

He stopped at the bottom of the ramp and looked around. Swallowing my fear, I stepped forward, only moderately reassured at the knowledge that the rest of my team was at my back. “I’m Captain Rhodes, Alliance Military,” I introduced myself. “How can we help you?”

The creature did a slow sweep of the camp, his reptilian eyes narrowing as he took in the sight. Then he swung his gaze back towards me. “You are in charge of this camp?” It took my translator a moment to identify his language, his gravelly voice sounding like the growl of an angry animal.

“Yes, I am,” I replied, without hesitation. Showing any kind of uncertainty in front of a Ranzor was a recipe for disaster.

But instead of introducing himself or giving me any more information, he turned and waved to someone back inside the ship. I could vaguely make out some motion in the dim interior, and then half a dozen more Ranzors came down the ramp, each pair of them carrying a stretcher between them. And on each stretcher was a wounded Halagal.

“We have been aiding in the evacuation of Hazharu,” the leader said. “My name is Goroz. We need medical aid for the wounded.”

The Ranzors carrying the stretchers set them in a neat row on the grass, before returning back inside the ship to bring more out.

“You brought these people all the way from Hazharu?” I asked, stunned at the announcement. “That would have taken nearly a week! They could have died on the way here.”

Goroz lowered his head, staring at me intently. “It took us fifteen hours to get here,” he stated flatly, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Our ships are better than yours. Rendol 4 is accepting refugees. There were no other viable drop-off points that were both closer and safer. The Nwandu are sending many of their fighter-class ships to Hazharu. We needed to avoid running into them on the way.”

I looked down at the Halagals lying on the ground. At a glance, it was clear they were in a bad way, bandages wrapped around various parts of their bodies, blue blood leaking through the fabric. One of them looked to be unconscious. I did a quick mental calculation about what the best thing to do was. We didn’t have the facilities to treat these kinds of injuries here. But turning away injured refugees would be a political disaster on an interstellar level, and turning down a ship full of Ranzors who expected us to do something useful was tantamount to suicide.

I turned to my team, my heart in my throat and my gut churning. “Denny, go and call the local hospital and get them to send a fleet of ambulances out here,” I ordered her. “Len, get these spectators to stand back.” I gestured to the crowd that was slowly gathering, the rest of the camp curious about the unexpected newcomers. “Soll, run over to the office and get the medical kits. Bring as many of them as you can carry. Goroz, I’m going to need these patients moved over to the edge of the field. They’ll have more shade there, and the ambulances will be able to access them far quicker. Dax, grab one end of this stretcher for me,” I ordered, bending down to pick up the nearest one, without waiting for Goroz to agree. “Nichols, take down everyone’s name and any identification details you can. Take photos of them, if they’re not able to talk. We need to keep track of how many patients are going to the hospital, and as much information as possible to be able to report who they are back to HQ.”

Nichols got to work, activating his comm and making rapid notes. Dax helped me with the stretcher, and we set off at a slow pace across the field. I would have liked to move quicker, but my leg wasn’t going to like carrying the extra weight, and if I tried to go too fast, I was just as likely to trip and drop my passenger on the ground.

Behind us, I could hear muttering and stomping, and when we were about halfway across the field, I dared a glance back over my shoulder. To my surprise, Goroz and his people were obeying my orders, getting to work carrying the rest of the stretchers in our direction.

When we finally reached the edge of the field, we set the woman down. She was stiff and breathing fast, clutching a sizable wound on her arm. “We’ll have ambulances here soon,” I assured her. “You’re safe now. We’re going to take good care of you.”

Dax and I headed back over to the ship, moving at a jog. My limp was more noticeable this way, but I could see more Halagal patients being brought out of the ship, and I didn’t have time to dilly-dally about with trying to preserve my pride. And if the Ranzors didn’t like the fact that I was injured, they were just going to have to deal with it.

As we arrived back at the ship, Goroz watched me walk with a quizzical tilt to his head. “How many more are there?” I asked him, ignoring his scrutiny.

“Another fifteen in the ship. And four more ships enroute.”

“Fifteen!” I glanced across the field, where nine stretchers were already laid out. “You can’t bring four more ships here. We don’t have the facilities to treat that many people. There are other camps across the city. They’ll have to find somewhere else to land.”

“You are limping,” Goroz said, apparently ignoring what I’d just told him.

“Yeah, and I have work to do,” I replied, bending down to pick up the next stretcher, while Dax hurried around to the other end. But just before we picked it up, I realised that this one contained a child. “Oh fuck,” I muttered. The Halagal child was clutching a toy of some sort, though I couldn’t quite make out what it was, and he had an expression on his face of frozen panic, like he was so terrified he couldn’t even move anymore.

“Hey, sweetie, you’re going to be okay,” I told him, crouching down beside him. “Is your mum here with you? Or your dad?”

The boy shook his head, a tiny gesture, then buried his face in his toy.

“Do you know where his parents are?” I asked Goroz.

Goroz was still standing there watching me. “We were not able to locate them before we were forced to leave. Large parts of their city are being bombed. In the end, we chose to save the people we could, even if they were unfortunately separated from their families in the process.”

I was a little surprised by the reply – not because of the Ranzors’ actions, but because of the sentiment behind it. That they’d chosen the pragmatic path of saving lives was not unexpected. But Goroz apparently understood the emotional toll this was going to cause. And that was not something I had expected from the harsh and war-like species.

“We gave him the toy droag to try to comfort him,” Goroz added, sounding thoroughly awkward about it as he gestured to the battered yellow toy.

The Ranzors had given him that? A species that expected their own offspring to begin picking up weapons at the age of five? “Okay, well… Thank you,” I said, not quite knowing what to make of that. Goroz was not behaving like any of the Ranzors I’d met before. And he seemed almost diffident when addressing me. That was odd. But I had bigger problems to deal with right now, so I put the issue out of my head and got on with the job in front of me.

Fifteen minutes later, we had all the patients lined up at the edge of the field, and the first of the ambulances had arrived. I spent a few minutes briefing the paramedics on the situation, but all through the conversation, I was aware of Goroz, standing off to the side, watching me intently. Finally, I figured I’d done as much as I usefully could, so I stepped back, letting Soll and Nichols organise the rest of the patients as the ambulances began to ferry them away.

“Is something bothering you?” I asked Goroz, standing up straight and looking him in the eye. The Ranzors had a blunt and direct way of speaking, and I made a conscious choice to match their mannerisms. From what I’d seen in the past, any attempt to fawn or placate them only made them angrier.

Goroz glanced down at my leg. “You have been limping all morning,” he stated.

I waited for him to continue, but he didn’t. “What of it?” I asked, not sure whether I was going to regret this.

“Are you… retired?” he asked, still seeming hesitant about the conversation.

“Semi-retired,” I said. “I can’t fly ships anymore, but I can still organise our rescue efforts on the ground.” And why the fuck is it any of your business? I wanted to ask. But there was a fine line between being direct with the Ranzors, and pissing them off, and I wanted to stay firmly on the right side of that line. Honestly, staring up into Goroz’s yellow eyes, I’d expected to be feeling more fear. I’d faced monsters in the past, and if only half the rumours were true, the Ranzors loved to pick a fight.

But oddly enough, I felt only a mild apprehension. Unlike the other monsters I’d faced, the Ranzors could be reasoned with. They understood pain, and were cognizant of the fact that their actions had consequences. There hadn’t been any evidence at all that that was the case in Ixralia.

I expected Goroz to say something mocking or dismissive about my admission that I couldn’t be a pilot anymore. Ranzors were not known for tolerating weakness. But instead, he did the most unexpected thing. He swung his large tail towards me, slowly and deliberately, so as to make it clear that the gesture wasn’t a threat. And a quick glance revealed what he was trying to show me. A large chunk had been taken out of the side of his tail, the wound old enough to have long ago scarred over. And whatever had caused the injury had also taken with it the row of barbs along the side of his tail. On closer inspection, there was also what appeared to be a large burn mark on the back of his right leg.

“I cannot fight anymore either,” he said, with a sigh. He looked over at the rest of his crew, helping to load the injured patients into the ambulances. “We are all in the same situation. Borl has only one eye. Gatik lost his foot.” My eyes opened wider as I realised that it was true; the Ranzor in question was walking around on a prosthetic boot that filled in the gap where his foot should have been. I’d been so absorbed with sorting out the injured Halagals that I hadn’t even noticed. “It is good to see that the humans are still able to make use of their injured fighters. We had worried that you just went home to sit in a comfortable seat for the rest of your lives.”

There were a multitude of answers to that statement, half a dozen of them sitting right on the tip of my tongue, and more than one of them likely to smash what little good will we had going on here into dust. The pure arrogance of the assumption was galling. Plus the insinuation that anyone who couldn’t fight was useless. Just because someone couldn’t go into battle didn’t mean their brain stopped working, and in many cases, that was more valuable than their ability to point a gun in the right direction and pull the trigger. And finally, there was the ironic fact that until about a week ago, I had, in fact, been ‘sitting in a comfortable seat’ for most of my time. Goroz had just happened to come upon me when I was doing something useful. If this war had started two weeks earlier, he would have made an entirely different judgement about me.

“I guess you’ve learned something new today, then,” I said. It was as polite as I was able to get, gritting my teeth to keep what I really wanted to say locked inside.

“How were you injured?” Goroz asked next.

Oh god, here it was. We were about to have a pissing contest about who had been in the biggest, baddest fight. And given everything else I was having to deal with at the moment, I just wasn’t in the mood.

“I fought space-demons in the Voxel Sector by jumping through the Ixralian wormhole,” I said flatly. “I don’t suppose you’ve heard of it.” The wormhole sat just outside Alliance space, on the far side of the local sector. Any species that didn’t have a reason to travel through that part of the galaxy likely didn’t know it existed. “What about you?” I officially didn’t give a shit where he’d got his injury, but if part of his day needed to include boasting about it to an ‘inferior’ species, then I was willing to let him get his rocks off. So long as it didn’t take up too much of my time.

But instead of replying, Goroz looked absolutely shocked. His shoulders seemed to puff up, his tail lifted, and his mouth opened slightly, displaying the rows of sharp teeth inside. “You have travelled to Ixralia?” he said, in a hushed voice.

Holy fuck, I thought, taking an involuntary step backwards. What the hell was he going to do next?