by Milana Jacks
Because the man who shall not be named stood at my doorstep. He was a tall dirty-blond with green eyes, an easy smile, and diamond studs in his ears. Since he’d been hanging out with the cyborgs for reasons unknown to me, he’d cleaned up nicely. Today, he wore a dark gray suit, the collar of his shirt unbuttoned for me to see his corded neck. Meanwhile, I wore sweatpants, a gray shirt with holes in it, and sported a mouth full of food. I chewed my food and stood there, awkward, speechless, and stupid. That was nothing unusual. When it came to Arthur, I was certifiably stupid, as in my IQ immediately dropped all the way to my pussy.
My heart flipped, and my breath caught when he smiled. I hated him. “What are you doing here?”
His eyes widened. “Hi, Rose. How have you been?”
I gave him my best eye roll. “Okay, fine. Come in.” See? Dumbass. I rushed to my kitchen and stuffed the rest of the food into my mouth while Arthur closed the door behind us. His polished shoes clicked against the floors. He walked around the apartment and finally settled at the wall-to-wall glass window. He tucked his hands into his pockets…and my gaze found his ass. Fine, firm, and bitable. I counted down from ten to zero before I reached for my daily protein drink. I uncapped the plastic holder and poured the thing down my throat. My eyes crossed from the nasty taste, but I gulped the kale-like thing down anyway. Because health, you know?
“Nice place,” Arthur said.
I made my way to the bathroom and grabbed a white robe. I slung it on, and because it was made for guys, it covered my implant nicely. I stared at the mirror. At least I didn’t have bruises today. When I returned to the main area, I found Arthur seated, his jacket folded over the back of the couch. He fiddled with his cuff links, unsnapped them, and slid them into his pocket.
I sat on the other side of the couch and crossed my arms over my chest. “Did my brother send you?”
“Yes.”
Of course. Arthur wouldn’t come to check on me because he wanted to. He did whatever Knight told him to do. They were brothers through and through, and Arthur would never touch me with a ten-foot pole. Which was why I was getting over him and going out with Brian. Green eyes locked with mine, and my heart flipped again. On reflex, because my heart and implant worked as a team in my body, my fingers flexed, a loud snapping sound, seeing as my joints were metal.
Arthur flinched. “How’s the implant holding up?”
“No problems.” Yet.
He averted his gaze. “Let’s pray there won’t be.”
“I don’t pray.”
His jaw ticked. “What would you have had me do, hm?”
Ah. I had been preparing for this convo ever since I woke up as a cyborg. In Pittsburg, I’d caught the flu and couldn’t recover from it, mainly because it affected my breathing and went undetected for too long. I still didn’t know exactly what had happened the day my brother destroyed the Pittsburgh habitat, only that I awoke as a cyborg later on. “My dad said a yellow dragon ripped open the roof of my transport pod and snatched me from the bed, then carried me out of the habitat while my brother, the white dragon, destroyed the habitat.”
“That is true.”
“Then my dad spins a tale where the yellow dragon falls and my father’s new BFF, Craig—that’s you, Arthur, by the way—snatched his precious daughter and transported her to Detroit. Thereupon Craig suggested another attempt at an implant to save my life.”
Arthur made a sour face. “When you put it like that—”
“Oh, honey, I’m not done. Seeing as I was still seventeen at the time, my dad consented. With your support!”
Arthur leaned in. “And I don’t regret it.”
I leaned in too. “You’re an asshole. Like my dad. No wonder you get along. What about Knight, hm? What does he think about his sister now?”
Tears threatened to come, and I blinked to stop them. I cleared my throat and looked away. “What if I didn’t want to be a cyborg? Ever thought about that?”
“It wasn’t an option for you, Rose. I couldn’t let you die.”
I snorted. When I was ten years old, I’d proposed to Arthur with a plastic ring I bought with my own money. Everyone had a great laugh. But I’d been dead serious. I’d sworn I would marry him. And now I was a cyborg. From experience, I knew what Arthur and Knight thought about cyborg women and that Arthur couldn’t even look at them without flinching. “I doubt you even considered other options. I hear you walked into the surgeon’s home and demanded he”—I lifted my arms to air-quote—“fix me or die.”
Arthur threw an arm over the couch’s back and angled his body toward me. “But I didn’t enroll you in the military.”
I smiled like a hyena. “Might as well get on climbing my cyborg ladder. By twenty, I’ll be a level four. By twenty-one, I’ll own this fucking habitat. Maybe several more.” Before becoming a cyborg, all I’d wanted was to marry Arthur. Now, there were two options for me. Either become a cyborg wife and run along with the rest of the elite, or make use of Dad’s military connections and rise to power on my own.
Arthur’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s ambitious.”
“Mm-hm. Do you doubt it?”
Arthur smiled. “Not in the slightest. Everything you want, you’ll find a way to get.”
Not everything. Only the things that didn’t matter. “That’s right, buddy.” I cracked a smile because his was infectious. I couldn’t stay mad at him, but, God, I wanted to be mad at him forever. “Are you hungry?”
“What’s for dinner?”
“Something like meat loaf.”
“I’ll pass. Got any beer?”
“Nah. I don’t drink.”
“That’s new.”
Heat covered my face. The last time I had drunk, I crawled in bed with him and stuck my tongue into his mouth, demanding he make love to me. I was sixteen, and I’d never forget the look on Arthur’s face when my brother walked in.
“Here.” I flexed my mechatronic fingers and thought of my Nano bot. The robot buzzed to life and rolled out of my bedroom, one eye projecting onto the wall, already anticipating I’d want to watch TV. “Got all the stations. I keep waiting for reports on Knight, but nothing so far. At least I know he’s alive.” I stood.
“Where you going?”
“Shower.”
“Right.” Arthur threw his feet up on the table and put his hand on the robot’s head. He examined the red circular bot. “These things creep me out.”
“You are a dragon,” I said. “You creep most people out.” I would carry Arthur’s secret to the grave. My dad didn’t know, and he wouldn't find out from me. Oh, he’d asked me about Arthur plenty of times, but I always said I’d never met my brother’s other dragon friends in their human form and couldn’t identify them. A partial truth. I’d only ever seen Arthur turn into a dragon once sometime when I was fifteen. Seeing his body and the fact he packed two big dicks only strengthened my resolve to marry him. Eh, I was such a dumb little kid. Not that I was any smarter now, only more determined to stay away.
Arthur smirked and tapped Nano’s head. “Dragonism is overrated.”
And he was funny. Gah. I spun on my heel and headed for the shower, where I shamelessly masturbated so that my hormones would settle down. Feeling better, I emerged to find Arthur sprawled on the couch and sleeping, my Nano blinking red emergency lights. I crouched next to the robot and opened his panel. I shut off his health check monitoring. Arthur was not exactly human, and Nano had picked up on the subtle purr in Arthur’s chest when he slept deeply. I sat beside him. His hair fell over his face, and I reached to move it, but then snatched my implanted hand back.
I sighed at the unfairness of my life and walked to the kitchen, Nano rolling behind me. From my duffel, I got my wallet and turned around. Nano peeped a warning. Too late. I tripped over the bot, stumbled, and face-planted on the kitchen floor, my implant banging against the tile.
Men’s shoes slammed on the floor, and Arthur rounded the corner in record time. He helped me up and ex
amined my body. I snatched my hand from his and tucked it behind my back.
“Are you okay?” he asked, voice deep and with concern in those bedroom eyes I imagined one day waking next to me.
“I fell.” Stupid was taking over my brain again. He did not have bedroom eyes. Nope.
Arthur thrust a hand through his hair. “Check your implant.”
“I did. It’s fine.”
“Check it again.”
“It’s fine,” I bit out.
He scrubbed his face. “Fuck. I fell asleep.” He frowned. “You going out?”
“Need to buy a dress. I have a date tomorrow.”
If Arthur gave a shit about my date, he didn’t show it. Not that I expected him to show it, but still. He treated me as he would a sister, and I would get over him. One day. Maybe even with Brian tomorrow.
“I see. What kind of a dress?”
“A nice short one.”
A tic in his jaw. “I’ll give you a ride. I live by the shops anyway, and it’s on my way home.”
I’d have walked, but a ride was quicker. “Let’s go.”
3
Arthur
Seeing as my dragon no longer clawed at me when I was around Rose, I wondered if I had failed to recognize my spirit. Rose should have a normal life. Rose should date boys and one day become an influential cyborg female. I should be out there searching high and low for my spirit so that we might end the Ice Age, end the impending tyranny the colonel planned for cyborgs and humans alike. I should simply wring his neck and be done with it.
Instead, I glanced at the passenger seat of my cramped Cy mobile. Rose inherited her features from her Native American father, although the colonel and Rose’s mother argued she was his biological child. She was not. She was Knight in a female body. Whereas Knight was an ugly bastard—if you asked me—Rose was stunning, with smooth skin, full lips, high cheekbones, and an edge to her jaw. If she hadn’t grown up in the Ice Age, she would have been on billboards, in magazines, modeling lingerie, and wearing wings on her back on the runway.
We arrived at the shops. I hovered over the platform, my apartment building in front of me. Rose opened the door, bid me a half-assed goodbye, and stepped out. I cursed Mother Nature because I was only interested in Rose, and I cursed her more for not gifting this lovely girl with a spirit, while at the same time thanking God, Rose wouldn’t get herself involved in the middle of the silent war that I felt in my very bones would blow up into an all-out conflict before I could find my spirit.
I’d never looked for my spirit.
I’d always presumed Rose was mine.
It hadn’t ever occurred to me she wasn’t the one, until she awoke as a cyborg and my dragon went into slumber state, where he remained. I barely felt his presence, and I lost most of the elemental power I had gained in Pittsburg.
“Fuck it.” I landed on the platform, paid for parking, and jogged into the store Rose had entered. As I marched inside, Rose turned away from the counter and lifted an eyebrow.
I pretended like I belonged in a woman’s dress shop and smiled at the…human saleslady. “I’m here with my sister,” I said as if I needed an excuse. “She’s picking out a dress for a date. Make it nice, and make sure it covers all her body. I’m thinking something a nun would wear.” I held up a wad of roges. People didn’t come here with cash. It was too much to carry around, but I didn’t have cards or chips or implants to scan for my bank account. Besides, having roges in my pocket reminded me I was no longer poor.
The saleslady stared at me.
“Breathe,” Rose told the woman. “He’s been recently castrated.”
The woman’s eyes widened. “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that, mister. How unfortunate.”
“Yes,” Rose said. “And if he’s not careful, he might end up sightless too.”
Rose wouldn’t forgive me for allowing her dad to implant the Cy arm on her, let alone for being the one who’d insisted on it. Our relationship was utterly complicated. It made me fucking crazy that she planned to go out with someone else, and I’d be damned if I didn’t buy her a dress so she’d think of me while on her date.
Rose walked around the shop, yanking dresses off the hangers while the woman stood there, unsure what to do, her eyeballs ping-ponging between Rose and me. Rose marched into the dressing room. I sat on the comfortable chair and crossed my legs, a right ankle over the left knee.
“Would you like something to drink?” she asked.
“Tequila.”
She stared at me again. I swatted at the air. “Nothing. Thank you.”
I drummed my fingers on my shoe. Rose was taking forever. I hated shopping. A small plant in the corner of the shop drew my attention. Its leaves sagged. I probed the sad thing with my element and ignored the sweat that broke out over my brow. This used to be easier, almost effortless. Now it was a fucking problem for me. I didn’t know what had happened with my element other than the fact that, somehow, I’d come into partial control of it before finding my spirit.
I had believed it was Rose. She wasn’t my spirit, but I’d be damned if I let anyone else have her. I breathed deeply and concentrated on the plant. The leaves lifted, looking much healthier now. I was a flower boy with an elemental power that depleted more every time I used it. I could barely revive a plant when I should be able to revive the entire planet.
Rose emerged from the dressing room, and I understood why she took forever. It took a year to fucking squeeze her body into the thing she was wearing. I wanted her to wear a nun’s habit complete with a head wrap. Beneath my pants, my dicks turned into stones. “No fucking way.” Tequila, please. The shimmering tight gold dress started at her pussy and barely covered the sweet thing.
Barefoot, Rose padded to the large mirror. I caught her gaze. Rose was five ten with mile-long legs, and her Native American ancestry gave her high cheekbones. Her dark brown slanted almond eyes were striking. Her breasts were gorgeous. This was so fucking complicated. “It’s too short,” I told her.
The short, shimmery golden dress wrapped around Rose’s body like a glove, making her look like a million roges.
“I think it’s made for you, honey.” The lady placed a hand over her heart. “I really do. And I have shoes and a purse to match.” She grabbed those things while I glared at Rose, whose jaw was set and nose tilted upward. She damn well knew she looked good. Then she pushed up her tits and lowered the dress so that her fine full breasts half showed. Her nipples might pop out.
“Who are you going out with?” came out of my mouth. I’d eat him, mechatronic arms and all.
“Brian Valden. He’s a boy from my class. We spar together. All the time.”
Now images of Rose rolling around with another guy, all sweaty and determined to win the wrestling match, assaulted my brain. Tequila now! “Valden? That last name sounds familiar.”
“It should.” Rose stepped into six-inch black leather heels. As if she needed to extend her legs even more. “That’s Igor Valden’s son, heir to Valden Enterprise.”
“The Cy-mobile makers?”
“Mm-hm.”
I whistled.
Rose double-checked her dress once more, then hooked her thumb behind her shoulder. “He’ll pay for the shoes too.”
God, I wanted to spank her.
“Cash?” the lady asked, but offered me a thin card. “No more cash. Sorry.” I pressed my thumb on the fingerprint reader, and a big green checkmark appeared, followed by an advertisement. “We deliver! No-hassle Cy-approved meals, ready for your consumption. Can we take your order?”
“I eat dirt,” I told the stupid ad.
The lady removed the card and thanked me politely, probably a little wary of my dirt-eating response, and Rose and I were off. I dropped her back home and walked her to her door. She opened it, thinking I was gonna follow her inside, but I couldn’t hold back anymore, so I didn’t dare come in. I wanted to spank her ass and fuck her senseless. “Where is the kid taking you?” I asked from the door
way.
Rose put the dress on the table, followed by the shoes and a purse. No bags allowed in this reuse-and-recycle-or-carry-your-shit-by-hand kind of place.
“It’s a birthday party, okay?” Rose said with a bit of attitude. “It’s his birthday.”
“You didn’t buy a gift.”
Rose smirked and strode to the door, stopping right before her tits connected with my chest. She lifted her beautiful face, and if I bent my head even slightly, I could kiss her. Her lips parted. I stared at them.
“I will give him my virginity,” she said and slammed the door in my face.
4
Arthur
The moment I arrived at my sterile one-bedroom apartment overlooking the shopping plaza of my doom, I stood in front of the white wall and called up the habitat resource guide, courtesy of the colonel, who’d given me access to all kinds of shit on a need-to-know basis. Seeing as the colonel needed to know everything about everybody, Brian’s records were impeccable. All the more reason for me to exercise caution when dealing with Rose’s dad.
Brian was a handsome kid, about Rose’s age, turning nineteen tomorrow. His father, Igor, hung out with the colonel. I moved my finger over the screen, sorting through my invitations for lunches, dinners, baby showers, etc., etc. The cyborgs’ social agenda was loaded with crap. A navy-blue invite with golden embroidery popped up under a search for Valden. I read through it.
Fuck, yes. I’d gotten an invitation.
Usually, I only went where it mattered, and a nineteen-year-old’s birthday party hadn’t mattered until now. I stepped closer and read the fine print at the bottom. The colonel would attend and give a speech. I scrubbed my jaw, thinking this wasn’t just any birthday party. Wise cyborgs would use the opportunity to mingle with the right people. Colonel Strain was a wise cyborg and currently recruiting support for his election campaign. He aimed to replace the current major scheduled for retirement, and take complete control of this habitat as he’d done in Pittsburg. I aimed to help the colonel do whatever he needed. I’d make a move when he least expected it.