Shock and humiliation flickered through Brooke when she saw the intruder's face. She was stark naked, bare to his gaze. As if it wasn’t bad enough that the other Cyborg had seen her, it made it worse that another was witness to her debasement. Slowly her mind digested the man’s voice, though. She would know that voice anywhere! It was her beloved Zeno! Confusion instantly filled her since she’d never seen his face like that, but as she stared at him, she began to recognize his beloved features cloaked now in human flesh. She felt her heart begin to pound in her chest. A shiver coursed all over her body like waves of tiny fingers touching her everywhere. The feeling made her feel faint and weak. Her eyes became dazed and began to glaze over in shock.
“Z-Zeno?” she whispered shakily.
“Did you doubt that I would come for you?” he said gently.
She was finding it hard to comprehend that her man was alive as she hung from the wall weakly and watched him, her gaze on him.
A part of her felt sick that he'd found her like this, that although the cyborg hadn’t raped her, she was no longer pure. She felt a deep burning shame and longed to hide herself from him, longed to cover herself up and seek shelter from the ramifications of her captor's touch. Suddenly, a disturbing thought came to mind. What if he didn't want her anymore because of what had happened?
The thought was enough to make her feel physically sick. She was too distressed, at first, to notice the Cyborg’s reaction was as violent as her own.
Deltra jumped back and away from his captive at the sound of Zeno’s voice, which he recognized instantly. Staring in shock and confusion at the intruder in his quarters, he asked with a quizzical frown, “Zeno?”
“You made a mistake when you took Brooke, Deltra.”
His shock now gone, Deltra sneered cockily. “I did, did I?”
“Yeah. Brooke will never sleep with you because she's my woman, and she knows it. By touching her, you've just signed your own death warrant.”
Eyes narrowing, Deltra's mouth tightened angrily. “How dare you sneak into my quarters and threaten me ....”
Zeno interrupted him. “I didn't need to sneak. The whole fucking place is dead. Your warriors are all too busy fucking their captives or enjoying the comforts of the headquarters. You’re a fool for letting security grow so lax, Deltra.”
“Fuck off, Zeno. Why don’t you go back to where you came from so I can continue with what I was doing?”
“Not without Brooke … and your head on a pike.”
“You don't think you can beat me, do you? I'm the leader of the Cyborgs! I’m renowned for my strength and skills as a warrior!”
“Bullshit. That’s all just propaganda, and you know it. You never could beat me, and, now, you never will.”
“Rather confident, aren't we?”
Zeno smiled coldly. “You touched my woman. I can't let you live. I’m going to have to kill you.”
As he spoke, his gaze darted between Brooke and Deltra. The shock on Brooke's face had spoken volumes. It was true then what he’d feared. She'd thought he was dead.
Scanning the room, he searched for signs of concealed weapons and saw none. Stepping forward, he launched an attack on the bastard who'd dared to take Brooke from him.
Brooke sucked in a shaken breath when Zeno punched the other cyborg he’d called Deltra in the face, sending him flying. Zeno had told her during her training sessions that if she was ever going to incapacitate a Cyborg that she was going to have to damage its head and sever it, then destroy that part. That was why she'd believed him to be dead. Reliving that thought made tears course down her face once more.
She couldn’t shake the feelings of loss that had overwhelmed her since her capture, and, watching him, seeing him with her own two eyes as he began to fight the bastard that had taken her from him, she found it as hard to accept the fact that she’d been wrong, that he was alive and had come to rescue her as she’d had trying to accept that she’d lost him.
She watched as they summed each other up and began to use the engineering they'd been given against one another. Deltra, she thought Zeno had called him, had a laser eye on his mechanical side that kept penetrating the ultranium framework of Zeno's body.
Her breath caught in her chest as she realized that she could lose Zeno in truth, as she realized that he could be killed and in front of her very eyes. The thought stunned her. While she longed to shout out her encouragement, she feared that her yelling would merely distract him and cause him to lose focus from the battle, endangering him.
Instead, to keep herself sane, she focused on his head. It seemed hard to believe that the man she loved could look so different and when she thought different, she meant amazingly beautiful. The metal of his face had never repulsed her. Far from it. She thought she’d always loved him—first as a companion and mentor, and then as a woman loves a man—and his face was dear to her as it had always appeared to her, but seeing him appear human was a shock to the system.
His features were perfect, like those of an archangel. Blacker than black hair glimmered against his olive skin. Dark brown eyes shimmered between black and a lustrous coffee brown. The mouth that she had longed to kiss was pert and fleshy.
Looking at him, just seeing his face, made her pussy weep.
After hours of being touched down there, feeling honest desire sweep through her system made her feel somehow cleansed. Her love and passion for Zeno washed Deltra's hideous touch from her, and she reveled in the fact that Zeno truly was her hero.
The laser eye was doing her man damage, but somehow Zeno managed to stun her captor. She wasn't sure how, had just witnessed a flash, a spark that obviously cut down his defenses and suddenly Deltra was stunned and on the floor.
“I-is he d-dead?” she stuttered. Even knowing he wasn't, that he had to be decapitated to die, she had to ask the question.
“No,” Zeno muttered, not looking at her as he stalked around Deltra’s lax body.
“Z-Zeno, leave me here. I don't want you getting hurt. Please, protect yourself. I can't bear the thought of you getting hurt. I-I'll be fine,” she said, her voice trembling, but wanting her man to be safe.
Distracted by her words, he swapped focus from Deltra to her. A scowl lit his features, and she had to stop herself from jerking back in fear.
“Are you crazy?”
“N-no. I-I want you to be safe.”
“Honey, I've just done half of the hard work. He's on the floor, not me, and you want me to leave you here?” Zeno pointed out with a raised brow.
Blinking at him, Brooke tried to focus, but it was too hard. She looked from Zeno to the man on the floor and whispered, “Oh.”
Her eyes fluttered and a faint sweat swept over her skin, making her feel clammy. Her vision blackened for a moment, and it was hard to keep her eyes on Zeno.
Brooke's stomach fluttered as she watched Zeno sever Deltra's head. Unable to help herself, she almost vomited and had to shut her eyes to the sight before her.
As a burning smell assailed her nostrils, her body helped her out. On a trembling moan, she passed out.
Chapter Five
Hearing Brooke's moan, Zeno realized she'd passed out and was glad of it. He didn't want her to witness him decapitating Deltra and cauterizing the neck and head. He didn't want her to smell the burning flesh as he destroyed it, and he didn't want her to be sickened by what he had to do.
If that meant she had to pass out, then he was pleased she had. It was the only time in their lives he would ever want her to pass out, but if meant she didn't witness the sickening act that would kill Deltra, then so be it.
The moment he was certain Deltra was beyond recovery by his nanos, he straightened and strode quickly to Brooke. Breaking the chains that bound her, he caught her in his arms. When he’d lifted her against his chest, he glanced around the room and strode to the bed with her. Settling her carefully, he quickly scanned her for injuries. She came around as he did. For several moments, she lay perfectly still and t
hen she launched herself at him.
She’d sought comfort in his arms many times before and in much the same way and Zeno had managed to control his need for her. The hours of torment when he’d thought she might be lost to him forever tore his control from him, however. Tangling his hands in her dark hair, he dragged her head back and opened his mouth over hers with a mixture of hunger and urgency, anger and despair. He felt the jolt of shock that went through her, but it seemed that he’d lost any ability to rein himself in once he had opened the flood gates.
She sucked in a sharp breath when he lifted his head, releasing her lips and then immediately dove toward her throat. Even as he captured one tight bud in his mouth, though, she clutched at him. Relief flooded him, but it also wrenched any possibility of control from him.
He was starved for her and she was his!
His possession was feverish, frantic, but he couldn’t even seem to slow himself down once he’d unleashed his needs. Dimly, in the back of his mind, a part of his possession stemmed from a desire to wipe away Deltra’s touch from her mind and fill it with his own, to insure that it was only his touch she remembered. Even more dimly, a part of his mind screamed for tenderness she deserved, probably needed after what she’d been through, particularly when she had never known a man, but although that flickered in and out of his thoughts, he couldn’t command himself to slow down, to be careful.
He tasted every inch of her from her lips to her lower belly and then climbed over her shakily, pushed her legs apart and sank into warm, wet pussy. The moisture that greeted him and eased his possession relieved that part of his mind that was anxious to give as much pleasure as he took, but it also sent the fever higher, broke any attempt to regain control. As soon as the walls of her sex closed tightly around him, his hips began to jerk with a will of their own.
“Mine!” he said through gritted teeth. “You were always mine, Brooke!”
“Yes, Zeno!” she gasped, clutching at him, rising to meet him when he withdrew and thrust again. “I’m yours. I was always yours.”
A kind of madness swept through his mind as soon as she acknowledged him. He began thrusting into her in long, powerful strokes, feeling his body tightening toward explosion. Her gasps and moans made his heart pound wildly with a sense of triumph that mingled with desire, set fire to him. When she abruptly arched her back and began to quake and shudder with release, it sent him over the edge. He felt her inner muscles milking him and groaned as his body yielded up his seed, driving deeply inside of her and holding himself there to bathe her womb.
He wanted nothing so much as to begin all over again as soon as his body had expelled every ounce of his semen, but the sound of pounding feet on the stairs brought him back to their danger with a hard jolt. He came off of her abruptly, landing beside the bed in a fighter’s stance as he heard the Cyborgs reach the door.
Hell, no wonder Deltra was dead, he thought derisively. The others had only just realized their leader was under siege—no doubt drawn, at last, by the stench of burning flesh! After all that noise they'd made during fighting ... for them to have only just made that realization, they were either dumb, not fighting fit, or they had wanted Deltra dead.
It occurred to him that the last was the most likely. As arrogant as the bastard had been, it seemed clear he’d abused his position and men like that didn’t make loyal followers.
Shaking his head at the complete and utter useless security in this Godforsaken place, he stood, hands on hips, and watched as the door burst open and a handful of Cyborgs stampeded in, obviously ready, now, to protect their leader.
Zeno spoke loudly, sarcasm evident in his voice. “You're too late, boys. Deltra's dead.”
“Zeno?” one of the Cyborgs called out hesitantly.
“Yes,” he answered with a raised brow.
“Is that really you?” one of the other cyborgs asked, stepping forward hesitantly.
“Of course, it's fucking me.”
“You killed Deltra?”
He inclined his head to indicate Deltra’s headless corpse and tilted it to the side in question.
The cyborgs glanced at one another and relaxed fractionally. “We have a new leader then.”
“We do indeed. Anyone have a problem with that?” Zeno replied coolly.
Again the other cyborgs exchanged a questioning look. “Remove this trash from my sight immediately,” he said when no one seemed inclined to challenge him.
Two Cyborgs immediately stepped forward and dragged Deltra's body from the room.
“Don't you recognize me, Zeno?”
“No. Should I?” he asked a little absently, glancing Brooke. Frowning slightly as something niggled at the back of his mind, he grasped the coverlet she was clutching and covered her bare legs. She looked frightened and he wanted to comfort her, but he had to deal with the other cyborgs first.
“I'm ... I was one of Deltra's advisors.”
That caught Zeno’s attention and he turned to study the cyborg speculatively. “Are you swapping allegiance?” he asked wryly.
“Aye,” the Cyborg answered slowly. “I've heard about you. Who hasn't? One of the eldest, apart from Deltra himself. May I ask why you've done this? I'm assuming it's to do with the girl?”
Nodding his head sharply, Zeno growled challengingly, “She's mine. Deltra should never have touched her, dammit. Be warned. Anyone else who touches her will meet the same fate.”
“I’m not about to argue that point,” the other Cyborg said calmly, accepting his words with a nod. “He had a problem seeing we had rights just as he did. I’m not going sorry to see the bastard dead and doubt anyone else will be. Are you prepared to take on Deltra's role as leader?”
“Yes. I'm fully aware of what I did. I don't need to be advised on that,” he muttered impatiently.
The other Cyborg merely nodded once more.
“I tell you what I do need. Record this and follow out my instructions exactly. One: Call out for three hundred warriors, place them strategically around the Base. Tomorrow we can discuss positions and rotations, but our late lamented leader died because of his laxness. He may have been a fool, but I certainly am not!
“Two: Clear all the rooms and take any captives or humans from them and make them gather in the great hall. I want to release those who wish to be released and allow those who want to, to stay. I imagine there will be a mass exodus. So, of those three hundred warriors who aren't needed around the Base, they can return the captives to their homes.”
“But, Zeno, you can't do that! The guards, I agree with. Deltra was foolish in the extreme to allow so few guards to secure the Base. But he believed his power was supreme. Obviously he was wrong. The captives cannot be released. Most of them were caught fairly. Either that or bought! There will be outrage!”
“I take it you're implying my Brooke was caught fairly? Abducted from her home and her own Cyborg?” He glared at the cyborg furiously. “What's your name?”
“Adfa.”
“Well, Adfa, the captives who wish to remain can indeed remain. But no longer will humans be treated with such disrespect by us. Fuck, are we not part human as well? Honestly, it's time we came to the conclusion that we can't keep these wars up.
“When the Robots are gone, who then? What next? We have to seek more than war! Surely, you can see that this pointless existence most Cyborgs are leading causes only slackness and boredom. War cannot be the answer every time the ranks start to shuffle with impatience!”
“I understand what you're saying, Zeno. But surely, a little bit at a time? To take away the captives .... I dread to think what havoc that will cause.”
“Deltra’s dead. I’m the leader now and I not only intend to lead, I expect my orders to be followed. Release them. If there's a problem and they start to revolt .... Let them. The Robots will soon begin to attack, sensing the revolt and dissension in the ranks, and the Cyborgs will return to battle, forgetting whatever petty grievances assailing them to fight for supremacy.
I want those captives released, Adfa. Those two things are imperative. Will you comply with my orders?”
“I can but try, Zeno.”
Zeno nodded and dismissed the man. There was nothing more that he wanted to do than curl up with Brooke. Let her wake up in his arms and find solace in his embrace. But he had work to do, and, although he didn't want it, in no way wanted to be leader, it was a role he now had to take.
He could only hope that Brooke didn't hate him for it.
* * * *
Opening her eyes blearily, Brooke sat up in the huge bed in the massive bedroom she was currently occupying.
Remembering where she was, she quickly leapt out from under the covers and shuddered at the thought that Deltra had once slept there. That he'd intended to sleep with her there. Sleep being a kind word for what he'd obviously had in mind.
As yesterday's events began to penetrate her mind, as she processed her memories, she realized that Zeno was alive. Any sadness or melancholy that had weakened her the day before vanished in an instant. She jumped up and down with a jig of sheer happiness and contentment. Feeling like a child as happiness and relief, a relief so strong it almost knocked her over, cleansed her free from all those paralyzing days of apathy.
He was alive! And he had claimed her as his woman! Warmth fluttered through her at the memory and excitement.
And then doubt as it occurred to her to wonder where he was, to wonder why he’d left her.
She shook it off as it dawned on her that he was the new leader of the Cyborgs. No doubt there were a great many things he had to do.
It still bothered her that he’d left her, though.
She shook the niggling anxiety off. As soon as she saw him, she would tell him she loved him. The sooner she saw him, the better.
Yesterday, it had been her greatest regret that she'd never shared her feelings with him, never told him how important he was to her.
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