Three Suns

by S King

  Orrie and Emric appeared beside me with their hands shoved in their pockets; without a word the three of us headed for the civilization of the blue sun.

  “What the hell are those?” Emric whispered while he looked at cars coming and going in all directions.

  “Vehicles,” Orrie said proudly as we continued to walk toward Theodora's apartment.

  Emric grunted before turning his attention to people holding cellphones to their ears and talking happily, “what about those?”

  “Phones,” I said, narrowing my eyes on a familiar body that was scurrying through the streets away from us. I didn’t give either of them warning before taking off at a dead run through the crowd blocking the sidewalk.

  “Ostana!” Emric and Orrie’s voice formed as one behind me in a rush to catch up to my retreating back. Still, I didn't slow my speed, nor did I turn back to look at them. Unfortunately, the all too familiar body heard their shouts and looked behind him to see what the commotion was.

  Somsang’s light pink eyes narrowed before recognition rolled across his facial features and shock formed in his eyes. He didn’t waste any time to hightail his squirrelly ass into high gear and took off running away from his original direction.

  “Damn it,” I skidded to a stop, quickly thinking back to the holographic map that was in Orrie’s office. Thankful that I was able to memorize all of the side streets in the blue sun, I cut down a narrow street to my left in the hopes that I was going to cut the horrible assistant off at the intersection that he was headed toward. I had one chance to get Somsang backed into a corner long enough to tell me where my sister was. That’s all I wanted. Anything after that was in the marshals of the territory’s hands.

  As expected, I met Somsang in the center of the sidewalk with the traffic blocking the road being the only other exit.

  “Where is Theodora?” I made my steps lethal as I slowly began to close the distance between us.

  He panted, trying to get his breathing together and smirked at me, “why couldn’t you just let me kill Eikko? Why was that so hard for you to do?”

  I grounded my teeth together and nearly growled at him, “just tell me where my sister is.”

  “She’s safe as long as you hand over Eikko. It’s that simple, Ostana,” he spread his arms as he backed up dangerously close to the edge of the sidewalk as the cars continued to whiz by at unforgiving speeds.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of Orrie and Emric creeping up in Somsang’s blind spot. All I needed to do was keep his attention on me and then my two friends would be able to subdue him and let me get the answers that I needed from him.

  “Why not just find another cash cow?” I countered. There was no way in hell that I was going to play tit-for-tat with either Eikko or Theodora.

  He barked out a laugh, “look around you, Ostana!” He spread his arms wide to emphasize his point, “Eikko is the hottest thing that’s hit this society since its creation! I can’t let him go without something of a cushion—”

  Emric speared the arrogant assistant through his stomach and rolled both of their bodies away from the intersection and closer to me. I let a sigh of relief leave me while Orrie grabbed Somsang's arms and stood him up as I helped Emric stand to his full height.

  “Let’s go,” Orrie jerked Somsang to attention as he dragged him by the arm into the narrow street that I had come out from.

  When Somsang was against the brick wall I pinned him with a warning glare and a fire angel dancing in my hand, “where is Theodora?” I asked slowly as the fire angel’s dance picked up in speed.

  He stared at the white flame in my hand for a moment before leveling his gaze on me, “why don’t you and your sister switch places? Think about it you can get Eikko and your sister stays safe.”

  Orrie slammed the assistant into the brick wall, “Theo will be dead within a sati of being in Padrieg and you know it. Just tell us where she is.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” Somsang shook his head to clear the obvious dizziness that the impact had caused.

  “All of this for what?” I couldn’t begin to piece the puzzle together as I looked at him.

  “Money!” He snapped, looking between the three of us, “in Parlan, money makes the society go around. Without it, you are nothing and can get nothing! Eikko has more than enough to get through this lifetime and the next ten-times over. What’s wrong with me taking some of that off his hands? Huh? Am I the bad guy because I want to live a better life?”

  “I don’t care about what you do with Eikko’s money but you’re going to tell me where my sister is or so help me,” I held the fire angel closer to his face and almost smiled at his squirm, “I’ll cook you like an Eyno. For the last time, where is my sister?”

  For once it seemed like the jackass was using both sides of his brain; with a heavy sigh he snapped out the exact location of my sister and slumped against the wall as if I were the bad guy in this situation.

  “Stay with him until I get ahold of you and confirm that she’s ok,” I ordered Emric and Orrie.

  “Shouldn’t you at least take one of us?” Emric’s sandstone eyes held something that resembled worry as he looked down on me from his massive height.

  Knowing that neither man was going to let me go wandering around Parlan without some sort of manly muscle beside me, I rolled my eyes and pointed to Orrie, “come on. Emric can break his neck faster than you can.”

  Panic soared into Somsang's eyes as he frantically looked from me to Emric’s maliciously smiling face. “Wh-what! I told you where she was! Just let me go!”

  I didn’t think twice as I allowed the fire angel to double in size and shoved it an inch away from his face, “and if you’re lying, I’ll make sure you never tell another lie as long as you live.”

  I knew that my blazing garnet eyes were enough to put the fear of God into the good assistant, but I always believed that a promise of death and pain needed to be backed with an example.

  After Orrie passed off his grip to Emric, I let the flames die down enough to slap Somsang and whisper, “be good while we’re gone.”

  The searing flesh and his muffled scream were enough to settle the fear that I had about not seeing my sister again.

  We nodded to Emric before taking off in the direction that Somsang had told us to go to and fell into step with the foot traffic lining the sidewalk.

  “Did you really have to scar him up?” Orrie asked softly as we nodded to smiling citizens as we passed them.

  “What was I supposed to do? Just take his word about Theodora?” I shook my head and twisted my mouth, “I can’t do that. Besides, he’s needs to know who he’s dealing with. Taking my sister hostage to protect his interest with Eikko’s money is uncalled for and quite frankly,” I glanced both ways before crossing the street and remembering the next direction. “He could’ve just asked Eikko for more money if he was that hard up. It’s not like he would’ve denied him.”

  “You think Eikko makes that much?”

  I pointed to my clothes, “he told Somsang to pick up these and a whole closet worth just because he wanted me to be comfortable when I wasn’t on duty.”

  “But you’re a Major. You’re always on duty.”

  “That’s beside the point,” I pushed my hair out of my face, looking into the sky at the fading sun, “the point is, given their former relationship. I think Eikko would’ve paid more if asked.”

  “You have a lot of faith in someone that you’ve only known for a mjesec.”

  I fell silent. If Orrie, who paid more attention to diagnostic reports and holographic maps could tell that I had feelings for the Parlan Playboy then my secret was out. The earlier worry from Fauve’s words came back to me and made my mind turn in on itself as I mentally prepared my ego for the blow that it was going to take whenever we went back to Padrieg.

  Fauve never made false promises or idle threats; that wasn’t his M.O. nor was it in his nature, especially when it came to me. After all, he
was the one that recommended me for the promotion from Captain to Major. Now here I was basically spitting in his face and shitting on his orders. I knew that if I were a commanding official, I’d want nothing less than my head on a silver plater just to make an example to the next overachieving officer that wanted a spot at the voting table.

  “Major?” At the sound of Orrie’s voice, I pulled my thoughts and attention away from my foreboding demise and focused on what we were facing.

  “Why does this look familiar?” I asked, stopping in front of a glass door with lettering that spelled out words that I couldn’t decipher.

  Orrie tilted his head, “wasn’t Eikko standing in this building in that projection or whatever it was on Theodora's phone?”

  “Only one way to find out,” I pushed through the glass doors of the building and felt my nerves become on edge.

  White marble flooring with dark silver base boards provided a nice illumination to the black counters and silver walling. People of all calibers coming and going from different entry points within the waiting area smiled and waved politely to those that they passed.

  “Where do we go?” Orrie smiled and nodded to men in suits as we scanned the people from head to toe.

  “I have no idea,” I said through gritted teeth as I walked up to the counter.

  “Hello!” A woman with short dark brown hair and shining fuchsia pink eyes looked up at me from her shorter height. I still wasn’t used to the females and some males being shorter than me, but at least they were always smiling.

  “Hi, can you tell me if a…” I looked to Orrie for help.

  “Theodora…” he trailed off, not sure whether he should give the girl Theodora's name based off the information we found on her or if he should try something else.

  “Theodora Shaye?” The woman helped out smiling at us.

  I was shocked to find out that my sister actually went by our last name. Sure, the file had said that she went by Theodora Elysian, but in the blue sun my sister and I shared the same last name. I’d worry about why she had two different names later. Right now, I just needed to know that she was ok.

  “Yeah,” I nodded.

  The woman handed me and Orrie passes before pointing to a door further into the building, “go through that door and show the security that you’re here to see Ms. Shaye.” Her smile amped up in wattage as she looked between the two of us.

  “Thanks,” we said slowly and took the passes, following the girl’s directions and fell into step beside each other.

  “She must be ok if that girl freely gave us passes to see her,” Orrie mumbled, staring at the pass in his hand.

  I nodded a thanks to a man coming out of the room where Theo was hiding in and glanced at my friend as I handed the pass to the guard.

  “Maybe,” I mumbled as we got waved through to a second door until finally the interior room was revealed to show an office that was similar to my own.

  Windows filled the back wall while pictures of fields of grass and ocean scenes littered the remaining three walls. Comfortable looking chairs sat in front of a wide, glossy desk while a high-backed office chair was turned away from us.

  “Theo?” I asked cautiously, preparing a fire angel just in case this was some sort of sick set up.

  The chair spun around quickly with a healthy-looking Theodora cushioned to the seat; she looked exactly the same as she had the last time, I saw her.

  “Ostana!” Bolting from the chair, she came around the desk and wrapped me in her arms.

  I opened my mouth to say something when Orrie decided to take the lead on the questioning.

  “What the fuck Theodora!”

  She pulled away from me and looked at him, confused, “what?”

  “You send me a fucking text that was basically saying goodbye. Don’t you what us!”

  I had never seen Orrie so enraged as he was in this moment. Something rustled the papers on the desk and wisps of our hair blew around our heads. Someone found their wind ability, I thought to myself.

  “No…no I didn’t,” she frowned looking from me to him.

  “Yes, you did,” he accused, “we thought Somsang got ahold of you and did something.”

  She raised a brow at him, “what’re you talking about? I’ve come out of hiding, knowing that if he should do anything then someone was going to stop it. I’m next to an icon here. I wouldn’t text you goodbye and not call Ostana.”

  I couldn’t help but agree with her reasoning. But something wasn’t adding up as I started trying to figure out this rat maze, “so Somsang didn’t kidnap you?” She shook her head.

  “You didn’t send the text?” Orrie asked as the wind in the room slowly became nothing more than a slight breeze.

  “No, what’re you guys talking about? I haven’t seen Somsang since,” she blew a raspberry, “I don’t even know when.”

  “Then what the hell happened when we were talking? Someone came into your condo, right?” I asked.

  She waved her hand and rolled her eyes, “that was for my birthday party. Some friends thought it’d be cute to pretend a kidnapping and deliver me to my party. I meant to get another phone, but I had to come back to work and I just haven’t had time.” She covered her mouth as realization dawned on her, “you guys didn’t think something happened to me and that’s why you’re here, right?”

  Orrie threw his hands up before turning away from us and pinched the bridge of his nose, “if you didn’t send the text and no one was really after you, then what the fuck is going on?”

  If that wasn’t the question of the dwirnod; we sat down trying to figure out what Somsang was playing at. We knew that he was trying to get to Theodora because of Eikko.

  My communicator beeping in my ear, made me get out of the chair and walk out of the room while they tried to figure out what the hell was going on.

  “Yeah?”

  “Bring your asses back here now or Eikko is going to be facing the gallows now,” Fauve growled before disconnecting the communication.

  Panic roared through my veins like acid as I burst back into the office to retrieve Orrie. But when I went into the office the last thing that I was expecting to see was Orrie pressed to my sister in an unmistakable embrace with their lips fused together as if each were on oxygen and the other one was the only form of lifeline that they needed.

  “Oh great,” I breathed looking between the two of them. Another problem that would have to wait for another dwirnod.

  “Let’s go,” I ordered Orrie before pointing to Theodora, “get another phone and call me when you get home.”

  A blush redder than either of our eyes covered both Theodora's and Orrie’s faces before I rolled my eyes and walked out of the office, pressing my communicator to fetch Emric.

  Chapter 19 Sedation Darts and Broken Hearts

  I lowered the aircraft into the airbase of the Padrieg military and frowned at the scene that was currently playing out.

  Eikko had his chest puffed out in defiance as he stabbed a finger in Fauve's face and yelled something while everyone else stared at him like held lost his damn mind.

  “Ostana, you might want to get your boyfriend before Fauve ignites his ass,” Emric said, undoing his safety belting.

  Size wise both Eikko and Fauve were the same height, but Fauve had bulk muscle, even with his advanced age, while Eikko had lean muscle. Where Fauve could burn any and everything to a smoldering pile of ash, Eikko could douse the flames in the same amount of time. Fire and water didn't go together and that was something that I was going to have to remember when I faced Fauve.

  I got out of the aircraft, taking careful steps to hear just what they were arguing about.

  “…you listen to me old man!” Eikko snapped, “your job is to protect the men and women of your military and sending off Ostana, Emric and that kid that is always looking at that…that,” he waved his hands behind Fauve toward a holographic map of the battlefield. “That thing! To Pya! The fucking red sun, old man!”
>
  Fauve clenched his jaw and stepped toe-to-toe with the Parlan Playboy, “you are in no position to tell me what my job is, Mr. Kangho. Before you find yourself in the execution arena, I’d suggest that you back up and lower your tone.”

  Eikko smirked in Fauve’s face in defiance, “then I’ll go down smiling, Old Man Fauve. But let me suggest something to you,” he poked the five-star general in the chest, “you’re going to bring Ostana and the others back before I face the firing squad or you and I.” He laughed. Eikko actually laughed as if someone had just told him the funniest joke he’d ever heard, “we’re going to have our own little battle.”