by Tamsin Ley
Rust’s eyes bulged as he choked. “I didn’t mean nothing.”
The saluqan made a calming motion with both hands. “Take it easy.”
The new cyborg opened his fist, allowing Rust to drop to the floor with a thud. In a rough voice, he said, “The new Consort is mine.”
Grabbing Attie by one arm, he dragged her toward the door the cyborgs had entered through. It swished open at his approach, revealing a short, starkly lit hallway with a closed door at the other end. As he pulled her through, she could only pray that whatever this cyborg had in store for her wasn’t worse than what she’d just escaped.
Chapter 4
Doug bypassed the door mechanism and pulled Attie into the hallway, letting the door slide closed behind them. Hacking open the door in front of the other cyborgs had likely been a mistake; while they acknowledged him as the most powerful cyber-sensitive, he’d kept the true extent of his abilities hidden. He wasn’t entirely certain of their loyalties, and he wouldn’t put it past someone like Rust or Emilryde to rat him out. But he’d protected Attie for so long, his reaction had been instinctual.
Besides, the more trauma she endured, the less viable letting her go back to the admin pool would become. Normally, Consorts were not allowed to return to the general staff, but as long as he kept Attie off Dollard’s radar, he didn’t see the harm. He’d already purged her records from the Consort log in preparation for her release.
He just needed the AI first.
Pivoting, he pushed Attie against the wall and slid both hands down her arms toward her wrists, feeling for the AI. Her soft skin under his palms made him slow, pausing over the pulse points at the crooks of her elbows. His insides felt funny—like he’d just come out of free-fall. He seldom had physical contact with people, and when he did, it was in a clinical setting. Right now he was feeling anything but clinical.
She stared up at him with huge dilated eyes, and the tip of her tongue darted out to moisten her pink lips.
The sudden urge to kiss her flooded through him. Heat rushed over his skin, sending his nanite-regulated heartbeat into overdrive. He hadn’t felt this kind of desire since before an escape attempt had left him paralyzed from the waist down. Since then, he’d embraced his machine side whole heartedly. He had no interest in human passions. Until now.
His attention slid down to the soft rise of her breasts peeking above the tight orange top. Her flawless pale skin had a slight flush that made his mouth water. And she smelled amazing. Not perfumed and powdered like the other Consorts the project brought in, but clean and floral. Roses? He’d grown up in the slums of Whylon Station, and when he was very young—before his parents had died, his mother had pampered a potted shrub inside their small apartment. He remembered being infatuated with how such thorny branches could produce such fragrantly silken petals.
Her breath feathered across his skin. “What do you want?”
The sensation made him want to pull her body against him. She’d been given the aphrodisiac, but he felt like the one who’d been drugged. Or maybe it was because he’d been watching her for so many months he felt he knew her. Whatever the reason, he wanted to draw the plushness of her breasts against his hard chest, to slide both hands down her back to cup her perfect ass. To lift her up and settle her onto…
He shook his head and released his grip on her arms. His pants felt uncomfortably tight, which should be impossible considering his injury—Syndicorp had replaced his legs, but not the functionality of his manhood. He hadn’t had an erection in years.
But he did now.
And he wanted to use it.
But the clock was ticking. Someone would check the feed into the Consort Chamber at any minute. He forced himself to take a step back and look for the AI.
Her slender wrist was bare.
He checked the other.
Nothing.
She hadn’t brought it. Or it had come off in the scuffle. Alarm filled him. “Where is the AI?”
Attie’s eyes grew even wider. “Twerp?”
The door at the far end of the hall slid open and Dollard stepped through.
Fuck. Doug bent down and smothered Attie’s words with a kiss. Dollard must not know they’d been talking.
Attie struggled in his arms, trying to speak against his mouth. He hugged her more tightly and plunged his tongue between her lips.
The soft wet heat of her mouth exploded across his senses like a drug. Every part of him throbbed with a need he’d never expected feeling again. His hips flexed forward against her softness with exquisite pressure and he groaned. To his surprise, she leaned into him and opened her mouth wider, tilting her head back. He knew he should stop himself. She was drugged and taking advantage of her was not part of his plan.
But she was irresistible.
Sliding one hand up, he cupped the back of her head, enamored at how soft her hair felt beneath his fingertips. He wanted to touch every part of her.
“What’s going on here?” Dollard’s voice sliced through the haze that had taken possession of Doug’s senses. “Consorts are not allowed in this area. How did you bypass the door?”
Doug reluctantly broke the kiss and spoke with his lips only millimeters away from Attie’s. “The door was open.”
Attie’s cheeks were flushed, eyes closed and lips slightly parted. He crushed his mouth against hers once more, not needing to pretend his hunger for her was real.
“Release her and go back to your cell.” The doctor slapped the biometric panel, opening the door back into the Consort Chamber. “All of you,” he yelled. “Go back to your cells immediately.”
The other cyborgs grumbled, but Doug heard them moving into the hall. The nanites in his head received silent transmissions from them as they passed the watchful eye of the doctor.
Do you know her?
Did you open the door?
Doc’s bringing out the tranq gun. That was from Benjy.
At the other end of the hall, the two guards from the lab entered, pulse pistols readied. The doctor was a stickler for security and would immediately have the door inspected for malfunctions, so Doug quickly coded a bug into the latch’s sensor, indicating one part had a manufacturer defect.
Doug turned toward the lab, ignoring Attie completely. He did not want the doctor thinking she was anything special. When he heard the door whir closed and the doctor’s footsteps behind him, relief flooded his system. Attie’s presence hadn’t raised suspicions, at least not with Dollard.
The other cyborgs, however, continued bombarding him.
Tell me how you opened that door, Esben said.
Rust said, I’d like to know why our robot role model suddenly has the hots for a Consort.
Yeah, what’s going on? Benjy asked.
Doug ignored their rapid-fire transmissions as he passed between the guards into the lab. He seldom talked to the others; the more people he let into his world, the greater the chance someone would turn on him. Two technicians had risen from their seats holding tranquilizer guns as they watched Doug weave between the steel exam tables. His cell was on the far side of the lab, and the sooner he reached it, the sooner the doctor could engage the dampening shields, blocking further conversation.
As he approached Rust’s cell door, the redhead said, I wonder if Dollard will reward me if I tell him you can bypass the door locks.
Doug’s step faltered, and he met the other cyborg’s piercing gaze. Don’t.
If Dollard knew he could open the doors, he’d secure that loophole and possibly even discover Doug’s other abilities. Doug would be caged like the lab rat he was, unable to reach Attie or the AI. He did not know how the blasted thing had made its way to Attie or where it could be now, but he had to destroy it before it blabbed whatever it knew about his sister and the rebels. And to do that, he needed to be able to use the doors. His sister’s safety was at stake.
Why shouldn’t I tell him? Rust glared at him. I’ve got nothing to lose.
With a sinking feeling
, Doug realized he couldn’t get away with silence. What would you do if I tell you how to open the doors?
What do you think? Rust’s scowl twisted into a grin. Take over the ship.
Agreement radiated from the others.
He needed to make the cyborgs understand the consequences of using the hack, or even better, believe the hack was useless. But they needed to reach that conclusion on their own to end this conversation. It wouldn’t be that easy. How would you get past the technicians, let alone the guards?
Rust lifted his chin defiantly. Next time we visit the Consorts, I’ll escape through the other door.
Doug scowled and continued his path toward his cell. There are more guards on the other side, you idiot. You’d be dead before you took three steps.
How do you know?
You think there won’t be? Doug didn’t mention he could access the security feeds.
You brought that new Consort here. Benjy’s transmission vibrated with reproach. How? What other secrets are you keeping from us?
For the first time in a very long time, Doug felt guilty. Benjy had arrived at the lab not long after Doug and his sister, and had been kind to Lisa while Doug underwent multiple tests and implant surgeries. He’d said she reminded him of his daughter. Doug made a mental note to track down Benjy’s daughter and make sure she was all right the next chance he got.
I recognized her name on the roster, Doug offered a half-truth. She’s someone from my past I’ve sworn to keep safe.
Who cares about some whore? I want to get out of here, Rust said.
Doug’s muscles tightened at the word whore, but right now, bloodying the other cyborg’s nose would only make things worse. He kept walking toward his cell, wishing the lab wasn’t so big.
Emilryde joined the conversation. We don’t need to take over the ship. But if we work together, we could escape the lab and steal a shuttle. That’s how I got free of the slave pens on Enays.
Doug reached his door and stepped inside, grateful the conversation would soon be forced to end. We’re not run-of-the-mill sex slaves. We’re cyborgs. High-tech Syndicorp property. Even if we somehow avoided Dollard’s auto-destruct sequence, we’d never blend in with the general population. Anyone who saw us would turn us in for a bounty. Leaving here isn’t an option.
Dollard tapped Doug’s doorframe with the barrel of his tranq gun. “You, out. You’re getting a full diagnostic.”
One technician uncoiled a hardline near an exam table while the other unbuckled the restraints. Doug’s pulse sped up. He hadn’t been strapped down in over a year.
Share it now, in case he purges you, Esben urged as Doug moved out of his cell.
Doug had never been afraid of the doctor’s diagnostics before. He’d learned to shield his abilities for the most part. But the doctor had never had this much reason to be suspicious. If he discovered anything, even a hint of what Doug was capable of, he’d wipe Doug’s nanite processors. Doug could lose all the hacks he’d developed over the years.
Giving the cyborgs the algorithms he’d developed would likely lead to an all-out riot and completely spoil any chance he had of reaching the AI. But they might also be his only chance at preserving the technology he’d developed. With mere moments before the hardline locked him down, he had little choice. He said, Do not use it until we speak again.
Then transmitted the information.
Chapter 5
Doug lay strapped to the hard steel exam table and endured the doctor’s diagnostic exam. The code he’d just shared with the other cyborgs was still at the top of his mind, and he shunted his nanites to block it so Dollard wouldn’t notice. Usually, discipline wasn’t an issue for him, but while he buried the code from Dollard’s search, his imagination kept wanting to wander back to Attie.
He’d watched her for months, gotten to know her habits and idiosyncrasies, understood how much she valued her sister and her career. Meeting her in person had been overwhelming. His groin ached with unfulfilled, almost forgotten need and his lips yearned to reclaim her mouth. He couldn’t stop thinking about the flush on her pale skin, her soft ash-blonde hair catching the light, the way her orange top strained over her full breasts…
Dollard reached for a medical scanner and waved it over Doug’s body, frowning when he reached Doug’s groin. “You’re having a physical reaction to something.”
Through gritted teeth, Doug replied, “It’s called an erection, doctor. You ended the Consort session before I finished.”
The doctor’s eyebrows shot up. “You haven’t had a physical response to these women before. What’s changed?”
Attie’s rose-petal scent and kiss-swollen lips popped into his mind. He blocked it a microsecond later, but the tech pointed to his monitor where the nanites had already transmitted Doug’s thoughts into code for the diagnostic. “Sir, this might be it.”
Dollard pursed his lips and elbowed the tech aside so he could look at the display.
Shit shit shit. The doctor didn’t care about the women brought in as Consorts, but he still reviewed each new entry, and he hadn’t seen Attie’s. Doug needed to divert their attention. Now. “The algorithm I mentioned I was working on earlier is causing side effects to my autonomic system.”
Hands paused over the keyboard, the doctor jerked his gaze back to Doug. “The one to improve your hacking efficiency?”
“Correct.”
Dollard’s eyes lit up, and he reached for the medical scanner again, monitor forgotten. “Perhaps you’ve stumbled across an improvement to integrating the nanites with biological systems.”
The NIU project had begun with purely biological test subjects, but it turned out the nanites required cybernetic interfaces or they ended up destabilizing and killing the host. Once Dollard had realized that, he’d either added cybernetic implants to his test subjects or disposed of those who rejected them; Doug’s sister had only escaped with her life because the Denaidan pirates had found her and been able to clear the nanites from her system. Now the project relied completely on cyborgs, which in Dollard’s opinion was imperfect; he wanted to create spies who could walk into a room and never be detected.
The doctor adjusted the scanner’s setting while he spoke over his shoulder at the tech. “Have you reviewed that algorithm yet?”
“No, sir.” The tech’s throat bobbed with a nervous swallow. “He only gave it to us an hour ago.”
Dollard scowled as if the guy’d been sitting on it for a week. “Well, get on it immediately.”
“Yes, doctor.” The tech closed the diagnostic Dollard had been looking at and brought up the algorithm.
Doug let out an internal sigh of relief. Both men were now focused back on the nanites. Attie was safe for now.
Hovering the scanner over Doug’s body, Dollard shook his head. “I can’t detect any alterations to the test subject’s physiology. I’m going to need to run diagnostics on each of the cybernetic systems individually.”
Doug gritted his teeth again. A system-by-system check of his cybernetics would take days. And he’d probably be strapped to this damn table the entire time—Dollard seldom considered the comfort of his test subjects. But if it kept attention off Attie, Doug could endure. He’d endured far worse in the past.
“Doctor?” A scrawny security tech cleared his throat as he approached from the direction of the Consort Chamber. “There was a faulty component in the door mechanism. It’s fixed now.”
“It better be.” Dollard thrust a finger toward the other side of the lab. “Install a secondary security field over that entrance immediately. And check the other door.”
“Yes, doctor.” The man scuttled off.
Dollard returned to his scanner, only to be interrupted again a moment later by a call. “Dr. Dollard, your cycle in the cloning lab is finished. What do you want me to do?”
With a frustrated huff, Dollard set his scanner aside. He glared down at Doug a moment, then detached the hardline. “Go back to your room.”
&nb
sp; Doug rose and moved docilely to his cell, grateful the doctor hadn’t ordered the tech to take over the scans. It meant Dollard considered it important enough to handle himself, which was both good and bad. For now, Doug would use the break to his advantage.
He settled onto the bed as the security screen shuttered closed, obscuring his view of the lab. Diagnostic scans always left him with a headache and a bunch of dirty code to clean up, but he didn’t have time for that now. He needed to find that AI. What had Attie done with it? Had it fallen off in the Consort Chamber, or had she left it behind in her room? He couldn’t spy on her in the Consort Chamber—no technology was allowed in there because the cyborgs might hack it.
Reaching out with his cyber-sensitivity, he searched the rest of the ship for the device. Why couldn’t he sense it? He’d never met a computer able to block him, and his stomach churned. The helpless feeling reminded him of his childhood, when he and Lisa were always looking over their shoulders in fear the station police or the cartel were after them. But he was no longer that little boy with no skills or connections. There were other ways of finding the AI.
Accessing the video logs in Attie’s quarters, he rolled back to the last time he’d been certain the AI was in her possession. He watched her move about her room. How many times had he watched her do this? And still, her movements mesmerized him every time.
She selected a uniform from her closet, then opened her desk drawer and tossed the wristband inside. He let out a slow breath. He’d missed that detail while he’d been coordinating her transfer.
Lying back on his bed, he laced his fingers behind his head. As long as no one entered her quarters, the AI was safe. But it also meant he couldn’t simply return to the Consort Chamber and take it from her. He’d have to send her back to her quarters to get it.
Problem was, he knew Attie. She was a dedicated citizen and an even more dedicated trooper. She trusted Syndicorp to do the right thing, and he wouldn’t put it past her to take the entire mess to the admiral. Then not only would the AI lead bounty hunters straight to his sister, his own position would be compromised. Dollard would do a full reset on all his systems at the very least. Or worse, terminate him.