Ravyn's Flight Read online

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  EPILOGUE

  About the Author

  Dedication and Acknowledgements

  More Futuristic Romance From Patti O’Shea

  Excerpt from Eternal Nights

  Paranormal Romance by Patti O'Shea

  Ravyn’s Flight

  Copyright © 2002, 2013 by Patti O’Shea

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The clock blinked 12:00.

  The blue light from the numbers illuminated the otherwise dark room. Ravyn sat on the floor staring at the flashing digits, concentrating on them to keep from thinking.

  She didn’t want to remember what existed outside her door. Didn’t want to recall what she’d seen. She couldn’t let herself think of the bodies beyond her room, the bodies of people who’d been her friends. Ravyn didn’t know why she’d been spared and she didn’t want to think about that either. A shudder coursed through her and she focused again on the numbers, pushing aside the smoky fingers of comprehension trying to seep into her brain.

  Even as she sought oblivion, she knew she wouldn’t be able to maintain this state of numbness indefinitely. Pulling her knees tighter to her chest, she linked her fingers around them and rested her head on her legs. She focused on the clock.

  Coward, coward, it seemed to accuse with each flash.

  Ravyn knew she should do something, but she didn’t know what. Never before had she been so aware of the isolation. The Colonization Assessment Team lived and worked light years from Earth. It had taken a month of space travel for the twenty members of the team to journey to Jarved Nine. The idea of being alone on an alien planet left her paralyzed.

  She couldn’t have said how long she sat, huddled in the corner, before a noise brought her back to full awareness. She held her breath. Maybe she’d made a mistake. Maybe she’d missed a pulse and one of her friends still lived. Reality intruded in a merciless wave. She’d seen what remained of the bodies. No one could survive the trauma, the blood loss. The mutilation. She swallowed back her nausea.

  It must be the killer, she decided. There was no one else on this planet. Every cell in her body froze as she waited to be found, waited to die. Then she shook her head, ridding it of her fatalistic thoughts. She had to live; she had to seek justice.

  Her heart pounded loudly and she placed her hand over it to muffle the noise. Sound would carry in the dead silence of the facility, she reminded herself, and winced at her unintentional choice of words. Soft sounds, sounds that barely carried to her ears, continued to come from the other room.

  Did the murderer know the number of people assigned here? Would he look for her? Frantically she scanned her quarters, searching for somewhere, anywhere to hide. The spartan room left few choices. There was a small wardrobe that held her clothes, but with built-in drawers narrowing the space, she doubted she’d fit. Maybe she could stay unseen beneath the small, metal-framed cot. The room was dark and the stand that held the flashing clock was next to the bed, deepening the shadows. She heard a muted thump near the door and jumped to her feet.

  Her legs gave out and she landed in a graceless heap back on the floor. She stopped herself from crying out as sensation rushed ruthlessly back into her limbs, but she couldn’t prevent the thud her body made as it hit the ground. Frozen in place, she listened fearfully for any sound, no matter how slight. She detected nothing but the low hum of electricity flowing into the clock and the raggedness of her breathing.

  He’d heard her. She knew it. If he hadn’t, she would still hear movement in the other room.

  Terror more acute than anything she’d ever imagined held her in its thrall. The faint sound of footsteps had Ravyn scurrying on her hands and knees for shelter. She crawled under the bunk and didn’t stop moving until she reached the corner. Rolling into a ball, she could do nothing but hope the dim lighting concealed her. She heard the soft swoosh of the door and bit her bottom lip. He was in the room now. Prayers learned in childhood, prayers she’d thought long forgotten, rushed into her mind. Silently, she repeated them over and over and over.

  He moved around the room, not trying to hide his presence, but not making much noise either. Ravyn closed her eyes as he neared the bunk. Foolishly, she hoped that if she couldn’t see him, he wouldn’t see her.

  A hand, a big hand, closed around her ankle. Ravyn let out a startled squeak, too scared to even scream. The hand pulled and she could feel herself sliding out from safety. She tried to kick out with her other leg, but with most of her body still under the bunk, it lacked power. Then another hand imprisoned her free leg and she opened her eyes. She refused to die without looking her murderer in the face, without fighting till her last breath. As she cleared the bunk, Ravyn raised her fists, prepared to pummel her captor. The faint glow of the clock silhouetted a very large man and she recognized she didn’t have a chance, but she pulled back her arm anyway, ready to strike.

  He moved fast, so fast she didn’t know how it happened. The next thing she knew, he had imprisoned both her wrists over her head and thrown a heavy thigh across her legs. She couldn’t do more than wiggle against his superior strength. She’d been wrong if she thought she’d known the height of terror earlier. This shot off the scale.

  *** *** ***

  The room held enough light for Damon to see the absolute panic in the eyes of the woman he had pinned to the floor. Considering what he and his men had found in the other room, he didn’t blame her. Terror rendered her incapable of making a sound, and for that, he gave thanks. He would hate to muzzle her, it would only add to her fear, but he didn’t need a scream to bring all his men running. Six heavily armed soldiers bursting into the room would do little to calm the woman he held.

  He pitched his voice so she could hear him over her labored breathing and muttered soothing noises. Words would be wasted at this point. It was difficult to hold on to her level of fright and gradually her breathing slowed, her body relaxed.

  “It’s okay,” he said gently. “I’m not going to hurt you. You’re okay.” He repeated this until he saw the blind panic leave her eyes. He didn’t loosen his hold. Now that her fear began to abate, the odds said she would go one of two ways. She would either start swinging or become hysterical. Right now, he figured it was a toss up which way she’d pick.

  Damon kept his focus on the woman, but he remained aware of the coming and going of his men as they carried out his orders. The bodies had to be taken care of and the scene in the other room had to be documented, evidence collected. He trusted them to carry it out efficiently and meticulously.

  He ran his free hand across her cheekbone, brushing her hair away from her eyes. He hoped the gentle touch would help her regain her senses. It did. She went l
imp under him and he released her. Crouching next to her, he helped her sit. She needed the side of the bunk to hold her up, but she had made progress. “Who—” her voice cracked. He could hear her swallow, try again. “Who are you?”

  “My name’s Damon,” he told her. He knew that didn’t really answer her question, but he doubted she could take in more information than that right now. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  She nodded. The pale blue light fell across her face.

  “What’s your name?” They had nineteen bodies. It would be easier to identify the survivor than the remains.

  “Ravyn,” she whispered.

  He nodded once. Ravyn Verdier was the team’s communications specialist. Her job was, had been, to transmit and receive data from Earth as well as keep the comm equipment up and running. She must have been the one to activate the emergency beacon. From the position and condition of the victims, it was unlikely any of them had been responsible. It didn’t appear as if they’d had time to do much of anything before dying.

  Military maneuvers didn’t often take place off Earth and never before on a yet-to-be-colonized world. It was sheer luck he and his men had been on the other side of the planet. They’d responded immediately to the call for help, but they’d been too late despite their rapid reaction.

  Damon closed his eyes briefly, trying to rid himself of the feeling that he’d known these people. He hadn’t. Reading some abbreviated files on the Colonization Assessment Team did not qualify as acquaintance. It had seemed so easy when they’d landed. Train for six weeks on Jarved Nine, spend two weeks evaluating the CAT team and report on their progress to his superiors.

  He had a different kind of report to make now.

  She shed no tears. Not yet. Shock still held her tightly in its grip. He took her hand and offered her the only comfort he had, the presence of another human.

  A loud hum preceded the return of the lights. He watched Ravyn blink owlishly as she adjusted to the sudden brightness. Her eyes, a rare shade of light brown, appeared gold in color. With her dark hair and fair complexion, it made for a striking combination. It took him an unusually long time to shift his attention from her face. When he took in the rest of her, he realized blood covered her and saturated her clothes. Damon’s gaze sharpened and he quickly, but thoroughly, checked her for injury. She appeared unharmed, but he asked, “Are you hurt?”

  Her brow furrowed as she looked at him in confusion. Then she glanced down and saw the blood. As he watched what little color she had leave her face, Damon dropped her hand and slid his arm around her shoulders. “Breathe,” he ordered harshly.

  She obeyed, and although she sounded shaky, it kept her from keeling over. Damon let out a relieved sigh as the color crept back in her cheeks. He needed answers. Fast. He did not need his only witness to faint

  His relief did not last long.

  “I need to shower,” she announced and leapt to her feet

  She swayed precariously and Damon caught her before she fell. “You can’t even stand unassisted,” he told her, careful to keep his tone neutral. He knew she was hanging on by a thread.

  “I have to shower!”

  The hysteria he’d been hoping to avoid came through in every word. After weighing the options, Damon swung her up into his arms and carried her into the bathroom. He put her on her feet, briefly letting go of her to start the water, and then stripped her down to her underwear. Blood had seeped through the fabric of her clothes and dried on her skin. She broke his hold and stepped under the flowing water, but not before he made sure she had not been hurt. Damon turned away to give her what privacy he could. Her sob had him looking quickly back at her.

  Ravyn had her gaze focused on the drain. When he saw the rusty-colored water, he understood her distress. His hands knotted at his impotence. There was nothing he could do to help her. He heard her take a wheezy breath and watched her tilt her head back. His eyes traced the arch of her throat, the curve of her waist and the sweet length of her legs before settling on the nearly transparent material of her bra.

  When he realized he was staring at her, Damon closed the door to the shower sharply. It amazed and troubled him that he’d noticed Ravyn as a woman after what he’d seen in the other room. Damn, he thought, this wasn’t the time or place to lose his edge. He couldn’t allow this weakness, not with a killer running loose.

  He returned to the other room and found clean, dry clothes for her to wear. Placing them on the counter in the bathing chamber, he rubbed the bridge of his nose with his left hand. They had a problem, a big problem.

  Ravyn had not been responsible for the death of her team. She didn’t have the physical strength needed to commit the mutilations. He and his men had only been on the planet six hours and had been together the whole time. No one had gone off alone. And there wasn’t supposed to be another soul on Jarved Nine.

  Who, then, had killed nineteen people?

  Damon needed to check on his men and discover what they’d found, but he loathed the idea of leaving her alone. Someone or something had killed with inhuman strength

  He had to keep Ravyn safe.

  He refused to fail. Not this time.

  *** *** ***

  Ravyn brought the mug to her lips and sipped the hot, strong tea. Her hands shook a bit and her eyes felt swollen and sore from the tears she’d succumbed to in the shower, but she had herself under control. She watched Damon pour a cup of coffee and sit across from her. He moved easily, silently for such a big man. His presence soothed her. Something about him conveyed he could handle anything that arose.

  With her training, she’d felt sure she could protect herself until she’d seen the carnage in the communal room. Until Damon had grabbed her and all knowledge of self-defense had fled her brain. She’d flailed, not fought. Ravyn let out a shuddering sigh and struggled to hang on to her control. She wouldn’t cry again, she vowed. But she set the mug on the table before the hot liquid sloshed onto her fingers.

  “Can you tell me what happened?” Damon asked.

  Ravyn nodded and gathered herself. Captain Damon Brody, Western Alliance Spec Ops, had been remarkably gentle with her. Now the time had come to give him the answers he’d patiently waited for. “After dinner,” she paused, swallowed hard and continued, “we all gathered in the communal room, but I left.”

  “Why?” he prompted quietly after several moments of silence.

  She looked up at him, found understanding in his eyes and kept her gaze fastened there. “Sondra is, was, from Chicago and it...was...her birthday. I wanted to see if I could pick up the World Series broadcast. She was pretty excited that the Cubs had finally made it.” Ravyn reached for her tea, but her hands trembled too badly to allow her to lift the mug. Instead, she fisted them on the table. “It took a while, but I thought I had the game. Then came this distortion.”

  “What kind of distortion?”

  “I don’t know.” Ravyn shook her head. “I’d never heard anything like it before. I thought there might be something wrong with the equipment, so I shut it all down and ran a diagnostic. Everything in the comm room checked out.”

  She felt the warmth of his callused hand on hers and she unclenched her fist, linking her fingers with his. He may not have meant to do more than pat her hand, but she needed to hold on to something, someone.

  “Everything checked out, so what did you do next?”

  “I, uh, turned the receiver back on, but the distortion remained. I decided I needed to find the problem and fix it right away. This is our scheduled morning to transmit to Earth.”

  Again, Ravyn stopped. She frowned as she tried to figure out what time it was, even what day. At some point, she had lost track. She considered asking Damon, sure he knew precisely, but decided she didn’t care.

  “The communications base systems are in the sub-basement. I went down there to check out that equipment. I ran tests on every component I could think of, but nothing seemed out of kilter.” That bothered Ravyn. She should
have been able to locate what had caused the trouble.

  “You couldn’t find anything wrong?” the captain asked.

  Ravyn shook her head. “I decided to ask Pyle, our electronics expert, to help me, but when I came back up, it was silent. I thought everyone had retired for the night. It was eerie because the lights in the corridors and the communal room are always on, but they weren’t tonight, last night, whenever. I thought we’d lost power since only the emergency lights were working, but I could see other electrical appliances running. I didn’t understand how that was possible.”

  She tightened her grip on his hand and he returned the pressure. The steadiness she could see in his green eyes anchored her, and after taking a shuddery breath, Ravyn said, “I fell over the first body. I couldn’t figure out what had tripped me at first, not with the poor lighting. Then my eyes adjusted and I could see... I could see...”

  “Shhh, it’s okay.”

  Ravyn blinked rapidly, trying to keep the tears from falling, trying to hide her weakness. He took her other hand and she looked down in surprise, but she could only see the bloodbath she had stumbled across. She talked fast, wanting this over. “Part of me, part of me knew they were dead. I mean, how could there be so much blood everywhere if they weren’t? But I couldn’t believe it. I went to their bodies, what remained of their bodies, and tried to find some sign of life, you know?”

  “Did you see anything else?”

  “Like the fiend who did it? No. I didn’t hear any movement either, but I was scared whoever did this was still around. I wasn’t thinking clearly,” Ravyn admitted. The contempt she felt for her fainthearted behavior seeped into her voice. “I went into my quarters and cowered in the corner.”

  “Did anyone know you had gone to the sub-basement?”

  “No. I didn’t leave the facility, so I didn’t have to report my movement.”

  “Do you know what time you went down?”

  “A little past twenty-one thirty.” Ravyn anticipated the next questions and answered them. “I had to walk through the communal room. Everyone was still there and fine.”