Ice Baron (Ice Chronicles, Book One (science fiction romance)) (16 page)

The idea appealed to Anya more by
the minute. How could she find a piloting manual?

Joshua’s voice interrupted her
thoughts. “It’ll probably be a few hours before Onred contacts us,” he told
her. “How would you like to explore Tash while we wait?”

The offer took her by surprise. “Would
you come, too?”

“I need to speak to Michael about
a couple of matters. I could call one of my sisters to come meet you.”

Anya eyed him. For the first time,
suspicion entered her mind. Was he trying to get rid of her? If so, what would
he try to accomplish while she was gone? What if he flew out of ZCA? He had
never actually
promised
to put her on the mission, she realized now. He
had just promised to think about it. Probably that thought had lasted one
second. Hurt and anger arose. It wasn’t like Joshua to be deceitful, but his decision
to skate the thin line of truth gave a clue to his deep determination to keep
her out of the mission.

What would be the best way to play
this? Pretend she still blindly trusted him? Or confront him outright? She
wanted to confront him. Outspoken directness was in her nature. However, if she
did so, his guard would go back up. He just might lock her up before the
mission, like he had threatened.

So Anya managed a fair semblance
of a smile. “Ordinarily, I would love to meet your sister and learn more about
where you grew up. But I was thinking more about the communications assignment
you mentioned. Maybe I could be helpful if I learned ZCA’s communications
systems. Do you think one of Del’s men would be willing to show me how they
work?”

Now it was his turn to eye her.
Unknown thoughts flickered behind the brown gaze. She kept her expression
expectant and open.

A faint frown drew his brows
together. He wasn’t pleased. Likely, he didn’t trust her, either. But if Joshua
attempted to throw her out of ZCA again, she would blandly smile and hang on by
her fingernails.

“These computers are taken,” he
said abruptly. “I’ll set you up in another room.”

“Where?” she asked warily.

“It’s a back up command center. It’s
cold,” he warned, “because it’s right off the airbay.”

Anya smiled. “Sounds perfect.” She
pulled on fiber thin black gloves and followed him back into the airbay. They
walked to the far end of the hangar, where an open door led to a small,
brightly lit room. A burly man with a shaved head and his back to them typed
with lightning speed at the glass console. Five computers took up the room, and
a mini version of the wrap around screen in the Command Center took up two
vertical meters of wall space.

“Slovic,” Joshua said. “Meet Anya.”

The burly man turned, revealing
ordinary features but intelligent, pale green eyes. “Nice to meet you.” His
hand engulfed hers. “You here to learn the system?”

She smiled. “I’d appreciate
whatever you’re willing to teach me.”

“We’ve got a tutorial. I’ll start
you on that. Take the computer down there. I need lots of elbow room,” he explained
with a grin.

This suited Anya just fine.
Hopefully, it meant he wouldn’t be looking over her shoulder every minute.
While she did want to learn the communications system, and she wanted to hear
Onred when he came on the air, she also planned to find the pilot manual and
open it up in the lower left quarter of her screen. That way she could learn
two things at once.

After Anya was set up, Joshua
hovered in the doorway for a long moment, probably wondering if he could trust
her to behave after he left. She didn’t bother to give him a reassuring smile.
That would only encourage his suspicions. Instead, she settled down to speed
through Slovic’s tutorial. On the subscreen keypad, however, she sent a search
for the pilot’s manual.

*  *  *  *  *

Anya had memorized the main
airbird controls by nineteen hundred hours, and she had also learned that the
aircraft possessed a sophisticated autopilot program. That was great news,
since she didn’t have much confidence in her ability to fly an airbird by herself
tonight. She spent a good deal of time learning the requirements necessary to
run the autopilot program. She had also applied more medication to her wound
with the medical kit Richert had given her, and had eaten military rations for
dinner.

By her calculations, Onred could
call anytime in the next two hours. …If he hadn’t called yet. She couldn’t
access any communication channels, which frustrated her. The interface was
fairly straightforward, but she had discovered that every level required
security access codes.

Heavy footsteps approached, so she
minimized the pilot manual and resumed her investigation of the communications
system.

“How’s it going?” Slovic asked.

“I think I understand it. But it’s
hard to tell, since I can’t access the communication channels. They’re locked.”

“I know.” Slovic straddled a chair
beside her. His thick fingers moved with surprising speed over the pad. “We’re
only working three lines, plus the ZCA channel. ZCA’s a security level you don’t
have.”

“Why not?” Anya watched him enter
passwords into the three channels. “If I’m going to help, I’ll need access to
all the channels.”

“I’ll talk to Joshua about it
later. Look here. We’ve got one open channel. We call it Alpha. Anyone can
speak on it. It’s blocked, though, so we can’t send a return message. If we do,
Onred could trace it and find us.”

“Onred will send his message on
this one?” she guessed. “Or has he already?”

“Not yet.” Anya relaxed. “The
other channels feed through the housekeeping network. One is a text channel. One
is voice. We’ve just hooked the military commanders into it. We won’t say much
on those channels, because they could be compromised at any time.”

“Is the virus still replicating?”

Jaw tightening, he said, “It’s a
mess. It’s like a blow torch melted the satellite’s circuits. Whoever made that
virus is a genius. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Anya wondered how he could sound
so awed by malignant software.

Slovic said, “Use these buttons to
send and receive. These codes are yours.” He shoved a slip of paper across the
console. “Use it when you access the computer. It gives you access to the
system and tells the recipients who’s sending the message.”

“Thank you. Can I practice sending
messages to you?”

“The internal server should be
open.” When Slovic clicked a button, her pilot manual screen blew up, filling
the entire screen. “What’s this?” He turned a wide, surprised smile upon her.

“Nothing.” She hastily minimized
it again. “I was just curious. Joshua showed me his airbird, and I wondered
what all the different buttons were for.”

“Uh huh.” Slovic’s gaze appeared
entirely too intelligent. “In any case, here’s the internal system. “I’m Sl1.
Practice sending me text and video messages.”

Anya waited until he had returned
to his seat before she opened a new window in the bottom corner of her screen
and accessed the Alpha channel. Now she would see Onred the instant he sent his
message. She also memorized the access codes Slovic had given her. For the next
half hour, she practiced sending messages to Slovic. He shot back speed tests,
measuring her response time to questions he put to her.

“Good,” he said, from across the
room. “You’re improving. I’m sending you an old report. Read the information,
then send me a message stating the main points. Speed counts. If the system
cuts down to one channel, life and death could depend on how fast you relay
messages.”

Anya worked so hard at accurately
speeding through Slovic’s assignments that the flicker of static, and then the
empty white image on Alpha channel didn’t register for a second.

“Good evening.” Onred’s nasally
voice stilled her fingers. His headshot filled the screen. She pushed “send” to
Slovic, then maximized the Alpha channel, her gaze glued to the computer
screen. Onred looked meaner than she remembered. His black beard appeared more
menacing, and his dark eyes were as black as a demon’s.

His lips thinned into a false
smile. “Citizens of Donetsk, I propose peace. I am not an unreasonable man. I
would be pleased to spare your lives and your homes. I need workers. If you
serve me, you will live long and prosperous lives. Under one condition, of
course. Joshua Van Heisman and Anya Dubrovnyk must surrender. If they sacrifice
their lives, you will keep yours.”

All pretence of a smile fled. “Surrender,
Joshua and Anya. Meet me at the wreckage of Astana in sixty minutes. Both of
you must come, or in sixty-one minutes I will annihilate Omsk. Next, I’ll order
my pilots to hunt the hills and exterminate your people like rodents. Count
starts now.” The screen turned black

One
hour?
Anya choked on a
breath. It would take at least fifty minutes to fly to Astana—unless the
fighters chose to break the sound barrier. Possible, but unlikely, when dealing
with an enemy that could crop up anywhere, at any time. She had to speak to
Joshua, and now. Punching a countdown timer into her watch, she bolted for the Command Center.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

When Anya burst
through the door into the Command Center, Joshua gripped her arm and hauled her none too gently into the elevator.

“What are you
doing?
” she
gasped aloud, taken too unawares to do more than give a token struggle.

He punched numbers into the
elevator keypad. “We’re taking a trip.”

“Where?” She didn’t appreciate
being manhandled, and wrenched her arm free. All the same, at least he was with
her, so he couldn’t meet Onred…yet.

She eyed him while her heart rate
settled. It disturbed her that Joshua had appeared to be waiting for her. As if
he’d known she’d come running in, full of fire and brimstone and demands to
take her on the mission.

He had succeeded in removing her
from Zebra Charlie Alpha.

Anya crossed her arms. “Tell me
your plan.”

Topaz fire burned in that dark
gaze, but he did not answer.

“Tell me!”

He still did not answer. The
elevator slowed, and stopped with a jerk. Joshua took her arm again, firmly,
and pulled her into Michael’s shabby living room. Anya struggled. “What are you
doing?
”

“Keeping my promise to you. And
your father.”

Finally, she understood his plan.
She felt foolish it had taken this long.

Joshua shoved her down the hall
and into a narrow bedroom. Inside, she jerked free and faced him across the
small space. A snarl thinned her lips.

“He’ll kill everyone, Joshua. He’ll
kill them
all
if I don’t surrender, too.”

“He’ll kill them anyway.”

“What? He said…”

“Do
you
trust him now?”
Joshua’s lips curled back in a humorless smile. “Surrender will never satisfy
Onred. He can’t gain full power over Donetsk unless he’s killed both of us, and
your family, too.”

Anya gasped. “He wouldn’t! If he’d
wanted my family dead, he’d have killed them already.”

“They’re bait. If he captures you,
then you’ll be bait for me. I can’t allow that.”

“So you’ll surrender to him?”

“No. I’ll meet him. I’ll tell him
that you’ll surrender in a second location. He’ll fly there to get you. My men
will ambush him, and we’ll fly for Bogd to help the extraction team.”

“That’s crazy! Why would Onred go
to your location? He’ll suspect a trap.”

“I’ll fly with him. If he doesn’t
follow instructions, my men have orders to shoot down his bird.” His face was
grim.

“With
you
inside? No!” she
cried out.

“Don’t worry.”

“Don’t
worry?
” she gasped
aloud. “You’re insane. It’s a suicide mission. I won’t let you do it!” She
launched herself across the room, intent on getting out first and locking
him
in, instead. His solid body blocked her. She fought him with every ounce of
strength she possessed, pummeling him, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Stop it.” He gripped her wrists
hard. She twisted, burning her skin in the process, and struggled, kicking him,
fighting like a mad woman.

“I won’t let you,” she gasped. “I
won’t let you
die
like that. …No!” He forced her backward, and she didn’t
realize his intent until the bed hit her knees and she toppled backward onto
it. His full weight fell on top of her. Now his sheer size subdued her every
movement.

“Get
off.
Get off!” Their
hands were caught between them, and it hurt horribly. “Ow,” she panted,
grimacing.

Joshua forced her arms overhead,
onto the bed, relieving the pain. Anya struggled again, futilely, against the
unyielding bands on her wrists. Her breaths heaved, and she glared up at him.
He was so close now that the hard planes of his body intimately imprinted into
every soft place of hers. She had dreamed of being this close to him, but never
like this. “You stiff-necked dictator,” she spat. “Get off me.”