Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
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
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Other Titles
A Fistful of Cyborg
Cyborgs on Mars
Honey Phillips
Copyright © 2020 by Honey Phillips
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author.
Disclaimer
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Cover Design by Pro Book Covers Studio
Edited by Lindsay York at LY Publishing
Chapter One
Major Sam Wilson tested his chains again. Forged from titanium, they were strong enough to hold him in place even with his new enhanced strength but that didn’t stop him from trying to break them. He was sure they were beginning to weaken, but it was a long and tedious process.
The overhead light came on, turning the room from pitch dark to blinding white. The nanites coursing through his body automatically adjusted his vision.
“I have a little surprise for you today, S-756.” The cold voice came from behind the glass screen at one end of his cell.
“My name is Major Sam Wilson.”
“That was your name when you were human. You are no longer human. You are just a machine. And you no longer have a name, just a designation. You are S-756.”
Sam shook his head the limited amount permitted by the chains. He was human, no matter what they had done to him.
“Perhaps today’s test will make you a little less stubborn.” Dr. Mingol chuckled, the sound sending a chill down Sam’s spine. “It certainly ought to convince you that you’re no longer human.”
A soft gurgle filled the chamber. A minute later, he heard the water entering.
“There is no water on Mars,” he hissed, trying not to panic.
“But there will be one day. And we wouldn’t want to find an unexpected weakness, would we?”
The water continued to flow, rushing into the cell with astonishing speed. He felt it begin to cover the lab table and flinched instinctively, despite his determination not to react. Of course, Mingol noticed and laughed again.
“Why S-756, does water bother you? What a shame. You should really slow your breathing. Your nanites are working much too hard.”
He gritted his teeth and forced his face to remain calm. He could feel the nanites rushing through his body, trying to slow his heart rate and even his breathing, but panic still flared from deep within. On an overcrowded and polluted Earth, open water was a rarity, but when he was a boy, you could still find an occasional exception. He and his friends had discovered a small underground reservoir and he had foolishly taken a dare to enter the pool. What none of them had known was that it was much deeper than it appeared. He had slipped and gone under, the dark water closing over his head. Unable to swim, he had panicked, flailing wildly, and somehow made it back to the surface. His companions had managed to pull him out. But he had never forgotten that sensation—the dark water, the inability to breathe, the certainty that he was going to drown.
The water was lapping around his head now, splashing over his face in little ripples that covered first his mouth, then his nose. He couldn’t prevent himself from thrashing, trying to raise his head above the level of the water, but it just kept rising. Despite his nanites, his heart pounded, terror racing through his system.
“My, my. Your readings are certainly dramatic. This will be an excellent test, excellent.” The small part of Sam’s mind not consumed by terror envisioned the scientist rubbing his hands together gleefully. “I will be back to check on you once the test is completed.”
And the room was plunged into darkness just as the water covered his head completely.
“Hush, Sam. It’s all right. You’re safe.”
The soft voice seemed to come from far away, but he focused on it desperately. He was alive. Of course he was alive. The changes the military had made to his body made him almost impervious to harm. But not to pain or suffering.
He shuddered, his whole body shaking. The water had drained away, leaving him wet and cold, but a warm, soft hand was sluicing away the last drops from his head and shoulders.
“Addie?”
“Yes. I’m here.”
“Please. Turn on the lights.” He’d never heard his voice so weak.
She hesitated. “It’s dangerous. What if someone sees it?”
Most of the walls of the cell were glass so he could be studied from every angle like the trapped animal he had become. When she snuck in to see him, she never turned on the light.
“Please.”
“Okay. But just a little.”
She moved away and a moment later, a faint glow spread through the room. Even with his enhanced eyesight, it was barely enough to let him see the shadow of her body as she returned, but it helped pull him out of the drowning pit of memories that had held him captive.
“How long?” he gasped.
“T-two hours.”
Two hours? Was that all it had been? It had felt like an eternity. He didn’t drown, couldn’t drown, but the physical reaction of his body to the water made him feel like he was drowning over and over again.
“He didn’t need to do that,” she added fiercely. “He knew after ten minutes that you would survive.”
“He didn’t need to do it at all. There’s no water on Mars. He’s a fucking sadist.”
His eyes had adjusted even more to the dimness and he saw her bite down on a plump lower lip. An unexpected reaction surged through his body. She was so pretty—pretty and soft and delicate—and she didn’t belong in this horrible place.
“You need to leave GenCon. Get away from here,” he told her, as he’d been telling her since the first night when she let herself into his cell to comfort him after he had been subjected to another one of Dr. Mingol’s experimental tortures.
“I told you it’s not that simple. And besides,” her soft hand stroked across his face, “I would never see you again if I left.”
A sound came from somewhere in the building and they both went still.
“I have to go,” she whispered urgently. “And I’m sorry, but I’ll have to turn the light back off.”
“It’s all right. I’m fine now.” He wasn’t lying. The brief interlude of light and the comfort of her presence had enabled him to regain control, to remember who and where he was.
“Until tomorrow night.”
“Only if it’s safe,” he cautioned, even though the thought of not seeing her made his chest ache.
“Tomorrow night,” she said firmly and bent down to brush her lips across his.
Her sweet taste flooded his senses and he couldn’t resist flicking his tongue along the soft curve of her lower lip. He expected her to pull away, but she lingered a second longer, shyly returning the caress. His body instantly sprang into full, aching hardness but he prayed the lights were too dim for her to notice. She seemed reluctant to leave, her tentative response beginning to deepen. He instinctively tried to reach for her but his chains arrested the movement and the quiet clang of the metal made them both freeze.
“I have to go,” she said again, raising her head. It took all of his self-control not to protest.
One last touch of her hand and she was gone, leaving only her delicate fragrance behind as the room plunged back into darkness.
How the hell had he wound up here, he wondered, not for the first time. He had known that the unified Earth Government was working on a top-secret experimental program to terraform Mars. He had even known that soldiers would be involved and had given his consent to the program. What he hadn’t known, until after he fell on the battlefield and woken up in a body that was no longer entirely human, was that the soldiers were being turned into cyborgs. He had struggled with the knowledge, but it wasn’t until he had been sent to the GenCon Corporation, to Dr. Mingol and his “experiments,” that he realized the full extent of what had been done to him.
As a cyborg, he had no rights. All he could do was endure.
Alone in the dark, the sleep he no longer needed refused to come. All he had to escape his surroundings was the memory of Addie and the touch of her lips.
She didn’t come the next night, or the next, and he was frantic with worry by the time she appeared on the third night. His days had been filled with the usual round of experiments but he’d been almost relieved. They gave him something to concentrate on other than his concern for her.
“Where have you been?” he demanded the second he heard the door open and caught her fragrance.
“I’ve been busy,” she said, her voice filled with excitement. “I think I know how I can get you out of here.”
“What?” Hope pulsed through his veins, despite his attempt to suppress it. “You said all of the entrances were guarded.”
“They are, but after the… incident the other night, I realized that there must be a holding tank for the water. It’s too precious to waste.”
He knew that—the lack of clean water on Earth had meant tight water rationing for many years.
“So I went looking. When I found the holding tank, I also found a small access tunnel. It leads out behind the labs. There’s a paved yard surrounded by old storage buildings. It’s right at the edge of GenCon property and it appears to be deserted.” She hesitated. “The only thing is, the grounds are enclosed by an electric fence. I don’t think I can turn it off without setting off every alarm in the place.”
“I can take care of it,” he said grimly. One of Mingol’s more creative ideas had been testing his resistance to electrocution.
“Do you think we could really do it?” she asked tentatively. “Leave this place and… be together?”
“Yes.” He didn’t hesitate. It would mean abandoning his commitment to the military which had dominated his entire life, throwing in their lot with the millions of undocumented individuals trying to escape the government’s notice, fighting for food and shelter, but it would be worth it if they could be together. And he could protect her. His transformation had left him bigger, stronger.
“I will need clothes.” Fortunately, the only sign that he was a cyborg was the panel on his chest where they had replaced his heart. It would be easy enough to conceal.
“Yes,” she agreed, but her voice had dropped to a husky whisper that sent illicit ideas surging through his blood.
He forced his thoughts back to the practical. “When?”
“I thought tomorrow night. Dr. Mingol will be away for the next two days.”
His heart pounded with excitement despite the efforts of his nanites to regulate its beat.
“Then you should go,” he said reluctantly. “It would be foolish to risk getting caught when the end is so near.”
“I know. It’s just… May I kiss you again?”
“You can always kiss me, Addie.”
She bent her head and this time, she wasn’t tentative. Her soft tongue swept across his lips, demanding entry. He groaned and obeyed. Despite her urgency, she was a little clumsy, obviously inexperienced, and yet he had never been as hard in his life. His hands wrestled with the chains, wanting to touch her, to pull her against him, but he couldn’t free himself. When she slowly, reluctantly, lifted her head, he had to bite back the instinct to demand that she kiss him again.
“Until tomorrow,” she whispered.
The next day dragged interminably. With Dr. Mingol absent, the tests were of a more routine nature—strength, speed, agility—and did nothing to distract his mind. After they chained him to the table again and turned off the lights, the time passed with agonizing slowness, but at last the door slid open.
“Addie?”
“Yes, I’m here.” She didn’t sound like herself, her voice low and shaky.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Just a little scared, I guess.”
“I promise I’ll never let anything happen to you.”
“Oh, Sam.” She gave a choked sob. “I’m going to turn the lights up a little so I can see to undo the chains.”
“Where did you get the keys?’
“They… they’re stored in the lab. No one would be crazy enough to let you loose,” she said bitterly.
“It’s all right, Addie,” he said soothingly.
The lights brightened, higher than she’d ever turned them before, and he got his first clear look at her. Long blond hair framed a heart-shaped face with wide-set eyes of an unusual purple shade. Beneath a pert little nose, that perfect rosebud of a mouth trembled.
“It’s all right, angel,” he said softly. “We’re going to be fine.”
“Yes. Yes, of course we are.”
She nodded and stepped towards him, coming to an abrupt halt. Her mouth dropped open as her gaze traveled from his head to his chest to his stomach to his extremely erect cock.
The little pink circle of her open mouth did nothing to help him control himself, but he did his best to speak reassuringly.
“It’s all right, Addie. I’m not going to hurt you.”
She finally dragged her eyes away from his erection, her cheeks a brilliant shade of pink. “No, of course not. I’ve just never—Never mind. Let me get these off.”
She’d never seen a naked man before? His cock jerked automatically, and he saw her eyes drop to it again. This time she managed to regain her composure and hurried to release his shackles, her teeth sinking into her lower lip. As soon as he was free, she stepped back, rushing over to retrieve a small bag which she shoved at him, her eyes averted.
“Here.”
Opening the bag, he realized that all it contained was a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. As he pulled them on, the fabric threatening to tear as it stretched across his muscles, he frowned at her.
“You didn’t bring anything else? There’s nothing you wanted to bring?”
“I… I couldn’t…” Her voice failed and she appeared to be on the verge of tears again.
“Don’t worry, angel. I’ll take care of you.”
He pulled her gently against his side and she nestled into him with a choked sob. He suspected she was of average height, but tucked against him like this, she felt impossibly small. Despite her short stature, her body, all soft curves, was entirely too tempting.
“I want to kiss you,” he growled.
She swayed against him. “Yes.”
“No. Not until we’re free and I don’t have to stop.” Her mouth trembled as she nodded, and he reluctantly let her go. “Lead the way, angel.”
He saw her hand tighten into a fis
t, but then she nodded.
“This way.”
As she led him through a maze of hallways, she grabbed on to his hand, her small fingers clinging to his. They passed more cells, none of them occupied, then turned into an even smaller warren of corridors, obviously devoted to storage and utilities, before finally coming to a halt beside a large metal tank.
“Up there.” She pointed at a metal ladder that led up the wall next to the tank.
“You first,” he insisted.
“But…”
“I won’t let you fall.”
Her eyes closed briefly before giving him a strained smile. “Okay, Sam.”
He boosted her onto the first rung, then followed behind her. The ladder climbed up into the shadows and as they grew higher, her pace slowed. He moved up so that his body was behind hers, enclosing her in the safety of his arms.
“You’re doing great, angel. We’re almost there.”
“Yes, I know.”
“My brave girl.”
A shudder ran over her, then she began climbing again, her soft ass brushing against him with every rung, her delicate fragrance surrounding him. He couldn’t wait until they were free and he could kiss her properly.
The ladder ended at a round metal hatch in the ceiling. Reaching over Addie, he twisted the handle. For once, he appreciated his enhancements as he forced the rusted bars to turn and then pushed open the heavy door. Air rushed through the opening, the familiar stink of Earth’s polluted atmosphere a relief after the antiseptic environment of the lab.
“Up you go, angel.”
“Sam, I just want you to know…”
“Know what?”
“I love you,” she said in a rush, then disappeared through the hatch.
Triumph roared through his veins. She loved him! She wasn’t going to regret this, he swore. No matter what he had to do, he would make sure she was safe and happy. A foolish grin split his face as he followed her up the last few rungs and stepped out onto a cement parking area.
The net caught him by surprise, appearing out of the darkness to wrap around his body, entangling his feet so that he fell heavily onto the hard surface.
A Fistful 0f Cyborg (Cyborgs On Mars Book 2) Page 1