Eric nodded. “I get it. Like liberating her from within the system.”
“Exactly—only I have no idea how much good that will be to her,” Kyra said, reaching out and adding another Evelyn 489 chip to the growing pile.
Chapter 14
On the ground, Eric joined Marcus and the women in looking for the source of the mysterious signal, while Peyton, Kyra, and Nero moved Lucy into her redecorated cell.
Having exhausted their signal search after several hours with no results, the four of them met back at the bunker. Marcus checked their security a final time and then headed to catch public transport so he could walk Rachel home from work. Nero took the newly restored corporals to Norton for processing so they could get temporary housing near the apartment Marcus and Rachel shared.
The women feared living out in the open. It surprised no one when Meara insisted they room together so she and Aja could continue to protect each other. Aja declared she would never sleep again if Nero put their names into Norton’s restoration database. She continued trying to talk him out of it as they climbed back into his airjet.
When everyone was gone, Eric descended into the underground shelter, pushing worry about all others aside. No longer reeking of dungeon, there was a wall mounted com with outside access. Marcus, or someone he’d hired, had installed real furniture bought with a small chunk of Eric’s UCN settlement. The only visible security, otherwise known as cell bars, had been moved discreetly to the bottom of the stairs to serve as an entrance gate. Marcus had complained it was like putting a lockdown on an efficiency apartment.
Eric lifted his wrist com to his mouth after he’d looked around. The topside guard station was on speed swipe. “I’m in for the evening, Higgins. You can lock up now.”
“Right way, Corporal Anderson.”
Eric rolled his eyes at being addressed by his military title. He probably had Peyton to thank for the boy calling him by it every chance he got.
In one corner of the room, Lucy was lying on a large bed, but with no security measures in place. He hadn’t wanted her to wake up from the sedative and find herself tied down. Instead, he had an injector in his pocket with her name on it in case she came to in a bad mood.
Eric stretched out on the newly purchased sofa, trying to watch sports while he stood guard. Two hours passed uneventfully. Watching the mock fighting of modern football didn’t help his patience. His thoughts were all on who Lucy would be when she woke.
And he wondered what she would remember. For example, would she remember him?
Kyra’s cursory exam once they had her installed here had indicated the secondary processor was in charge and functional… and still running some form of the New World Companion code. Access to any crossover information was gone and no one knew what that ultimately would mean for her. Eric figured it was too much to hope Lucy might have retained memories of their short time together. Maybe she had kept the recordings she’d made of them at least.
His attention zoomed to the bed as Lucy shifted her legs under the covers. It was the second time she’d moved in the last fifteen minutes. It wouldn’t be long now before his sleeping beauty awoke.
Lucy’s pain-filled moan twenty minutes later had him rising and walking to her. Sweat beaded on her forehead. Eric went to the institutionally sparse bathroom and came back with a cool, wet cloth. He dabbed at Lucy’s face, smiling when her eyes finally opened. She blinked, turned her head, and looked around. It was a good thing that the pheromone effect had been lessened by whatever Kyra had done. He still got aroused around Lucy, but now a closer proximity was required. And he could control his reaction—well, mostly control it.
“How are you feeling, Sweetheart?” he asked softly.
“My head hurts,” she croaked, her throat dry.
Eric turned and picked up a bottle of water. He let her watch him open it before handing it to her. He wanted her to trust that he only had her well-being in mind.
Lucy rose to a sitting position and took a cautious sip… and then another. She cleared her throat and ran a hair through her messy hair. “Where am I? Is this a medical center?”
Eric shook his head. “No. It’s our residence… for now. But there are some things installed here to facilitate medical help if you need it.”
“Our residence? What do you mean?” she asked, letting the bottle drop to her lap.
Eric nodded as he held her confused gaze with his steady one. “I’m staying with you to take care of you. Can you tell me what you last remember?”
He watched her face crumple with frustration.
“No. Everything is dark in my mind. I know I was hurt… and in a lot of pain…” she said, her gaze darting around the room. “That pain is gone now, but I feel strange. My programming confuses me—and seems to be failing in almost every way.”
Eric slid a seat over near the bed. “I think that will resolve itself in time. Do you know who you are?”
Lucy closed her eyes and slowly shook her head. “It’s there… but I cannot access the proper answer. I am… there is a loop running that says I am a New World Companion. However, I am unable to run diagnostics on that program. It appears I have multiple malfunctions. My cybernetics require maintenance.”
Eric put out a hand when he noticed her voice escalating with her distress. “Don’t worry about not remembering. Your name is Lucy and everything is going to be alright. You just need to rest and get well.”
Lucy shook her head. “No. Things are not right. Something says I must escape. Yes. That is what I must do.”
Eric gripped her hand and held her gaze. “Escape from what, Lucy?”
Her gaze sought out his and she stared intently at his face. “I don’t know. Perhaps from you.”
Eric shook his head as he smiled. He squeezed her fingers gently. “No need. I’m harmless.”
Lucy eased her hand from his, breaking his hold without effort. “It is not necessary for you to lie. Your heightened blood pressure and flushed skin indicate the first stages of male arousal. I can tell muscles are tightening in your arms, across your chest, and… probably other places. I have a chip that orders me to notice such signs. You are approximately seventy-four percent ready to engage in intercourse with me.”
Eric snorted. “Wow. That’s a pretty low percentage considering the significant effect you tend to have on me. It’s true I haven’t been able to get kissing you out of my mind, but given how noble I’ve been, I think I have a bit more self-control than your statistics indicate.”
“I am a cyborg. All I know is my programming. Do I belong to you?” Lucy asked.
Eric swallowed. He thought of how he wanted to answer her, then considered what she needed to hear. “Let’s just say it’s my job to take the best care of you I can. Before you were… hurt… you considered me to be your new contract. If that’s what your code needs me to be, then I will be that until we figure out some other definition that works.”
Lucy dropped her gaze, then nodded. “I see. I am your duty. You are mine. This resonates with my primary directive. Forgive me for not remembering the details of our arrangement.”
“Hey.” Eric reached out and lifted her chin until she met his gaze. “It’s not like that between us—never has been. And no one else gets to choose for you ever again. Remember that.”
Eric leaned forward and kissed Lucy’s non-resistant lips. She didn’t move, not even when he broke off the connection. She just stared at him strangely when he pulled away.
Then she lifted a hand to his face. “It does not seem logical that I would forget you. I find your face very pleasing. My visual recorder wants to make an entry every time I look at you.”
Eric laughed at her offbeat flattery, but he liked knowing she liked how he looked.. “Lucy, you are without a doubt the most intriguing woman I’ve ever met.”
“I cannot tell if that is really praise,” Lucy said, dropping her hand.
Eric smiled at her slight irritation. “When you start to get your sens
e of humor back, I’ll help you figure out how to tell when someone is being sarcastic. Otherwise, you won’t survive talking to Marcus.”
“Who is Marcus?”
Eric shifted in his seat. “Marcus Kells is my best friend. You’ll meet him soon. He was here earlier, but you were still asleep.” He watched Lucy absorb his words. Her nervous gaze met his and held before she spoke.
“I can tell you are a cyborg as am I, but I don’t have recall of your name. You are familiar only because I have recordings of your face in my emergency storage. Your ID is not located where I am used to seeing it. Either that or my scanning capacity is malfunctioning.”
Eric leaned back in his chair. Now was as good a time as any to reset their communication. “I’m not surprised you forgot me considering all you’ve been through. My name is Eric. I am the cyborg known as Eric 754, but I don’t like being called by my ID number. In fact, most of the time I tend to forget I’m a cyborg.”
“Very well. I will omit your ID from my spoken references. You are Eric… and I am your Lucy,” she repeated, unwilling for some reason to state her companion status again.
Eric nodded, snorting a little over her choice of words. “Yes. That’s right. You are my Lucy. From the way I’ve been acting, pretty much everyone thinks that by now anyway.”
“Pardon my shift in attention while I check some notes I found about you in my storage area. They have recent time stamps.” Lucy focused on the other side of the room while she read through them. It was a slow process given how damaged she was.
“You granted me an endearment. I am… Lucy Hellcat?” she asked, her startled gaze meeting his as her tone rose on the phrase. “Did you really call me that?”
Eric winced and then laughed. “Okay—yes, I did call you that. Please don’t hate me for it. I meant it as a compliment. Maybe I was being a little bit sarcastic.”
Lucy released a slow breath and slid back down deeper into the bed. “Very well. Forgive me again. I am tired—very tired. Must rest now.”
Eric rose and helped her pull the covers up under her chin. When he started to walk away, Lucy rolled her head until she could look at him.
“I cannot hate you if you are my contract, Eric. To do so would be to go against my prime directive. I am broken, but that command remains clear. You must not worry about my feelings for you. It is forbidden for me to cause you that kind of concern.”
Then she rolled her head against the pillow and instantly slept.
Eric sighed as he lifted his wrist com to his mouth. He needed to let Kyra and Peyton know that the New World Companion version of Lucy was back… well, mostly back.
As he waited for the com to connect, he stared at the couch and was grateful it looked comfortable enough to sleep on.
***
Aja glared at Nero even though he was refusing to look at her or Meara. “We have checked into the apartment and registered with the building guard. Now we want to see Lucy, even if she is still sleeping. And if you don’t make it happen, we’ll find our own way to do it. It’s not like Peyton Elliot’s little guard boys present a challenge. Even on a bad day, Irish could take them out on her own.”
“No. You cannot see Captain Pennington yet,” Nero said flatly, going back to his work. “I realize you just met Marcus Kells and don’t know about his skill set, but I assure you there are far more security measures on the descent into the bomb shelter than exist topside. Plus, we do not know what effect your proximity might have on Captain Pennington while she is under the influence of her currently unstable version of the New World Companion program. Eric reported she was mostly functional and calm when she woke a short while ago, so we’re going to leave her like that this evening.”
He looked at Meara who was rapidly reading the research notes he’d just transferred to his portable com. “And just what do you think you are doing? That information about Captain Pennington is confidential.”
Meara glanced up at Nero as he took the com from her hands. “I was only passing the time while ya argued with Aja. I have to say though, ya sound very formal in yar notes. All you write is subject known as Evelyn 489. Can’t ya just call her Lucy and be done with it?”
Nero put the com on his lap when he returned to his console. “Please leave. I have no time to waste on your mischief.”
Aja released a frustrated breath. “Meara, take a short walk down the hall, will you? I need to talk to our good Dr. Cyberstein alone.”
Meara snorted. “Oh no, Aja… I’m thinking that would not be a good idea at all.”
Aja walked to her friend and held her gaze. “May Shiva end my life this day if I hurt so much as a single hair on his head.”
Nero watched as Meara’s gaze swung his way. He got a bit nervous when she grinned at him.
“Well, she sounds sincere at least. Are ya willing to risk being alone with her, Nero?”
Nero narrowed his gaze on both women. “As I have said several times now, I am not afraid of Aja. But I have no time to chat this evening. I am going to have to take a booster to make any progress on my investigations before tomorrow.”
Meara snorted again. “Well, ya should be afraid of her—at least a little—but I’m tired of refereeing the two of ya. It’s a tiresome job.” She rose from her chair and left the room.
“Okay, Aja. You have wrangled five minutes of my time. Have a seat and tell me what is important enough that I should interrupt my work on your captain’s problems to hear it.”
Chaffing at his commands, and his attitude, Aja finally sat in the chair closest to him.
“I can see I’ve made you cranky again. I suppose I should apologize for my Dr. Cyberstein reference. Meara tells me I’m working through some anger issues that have nothing to do with you. Since she’s usually a better judge of such things than I am, perhaps you can accept her explanation as my excuse. She also says, if I understand her intellectual gibberish correctly, that you aren’t making much headway because of the extensive damage done to Lucy’s original cybernetics.”
“I am making all the progress I can given the small amount of still functional cybernetics Kyra managed to extract from Captain Pennington,” Nero declared, dropping his defensiveness to frown at his statements.
The truth was he wasn’t gaining much insight into what the damaged chips did, or to her primary military programming. Given Captain Pennington’s volatile reactions to date, and the weapon she carried, any mistakes he made could be deadly for everyone. The last time he’d been this nervous was when they removed King’s internal weapon and had to disconnect it from his processor.
“Many of her chips are too damaged to be read, even by the most sophisticated of code-reading devices. Without knowing what was once on those chips, all I can do is surmise answers based on other chips that are less damaged. Since this involves Captain Pennington’s continued existence, such guessing is not good enough.”
Aja nodded—crossed her arms—and swallowed hard. “Yes. I understand what you’re saying is true. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I can save you a lot of time. You can get all the research you need from me.”
Nero felt his attitude toward her soften at her offer. Aja was wrong, but well-meaning for once. “I appreciate your suggestion. However, I examined your chips carefully during your restoration. The coding on them is vastly different from Captain Pennington’s.”
Aja nodded. “Indeed the coding is vastly different and it took me nearly a whole year to make sure that was the case. However, I kept a copy of the version we had when we escaped. It should be far closer to hers.”
“Are you telling me you actually re-programmed yourself?” Nero demanded, searching Aja’s gaze for the truth. “I don’t know how to respond. That is a statement I have never heard from another cyborg.”
“Well, it’s not like I had aspirations of becoming a freaking code monkey. Being an amateur, I greatly feared shutting us down accidentally, so I restricted my changes to a rewrite of end tasks. I made it so our New
World Companion code directions would prompt us do a silly thing instead of a humiliating thing when activated. Not as elegant as your full out restoration and processor swap, but what I did at least freed us from the worst of our original torments. My intention was to steal Lucy and apply the same strategy to her. In the beginning, all three of us were practically mirrors of each other code wise.”
Nero sat straighter in his chair. He was literally at a loss for words. Many cyborgs had breakthrough moments where their organic brains learned how to disrupt their cybernetic programming. But this was the first time he’d ever heard of a cyborg who decided to rewrite the code that controlled her.
Eric 754 Page 15