“We all love Yovit,” Saph told Tayan, placing a hand over the one that Tayan clutched Yovit’s arm with.
“No, you don’t. Neither does Suni.” Tayan sniffled and wiped the tears that ran down her face. “But that’s alright, because I love him enough for all of us.”
“Why do you think that we don’t love him?” Suni asked.
Tayan looked up at them with tear-soaked eyes. “You never have anything nice to say to or about him and you don’t want him around. He knows it and it makes him sad. That’s why he tries to stay out of your sight.” Tayan glanced back down at Yovit and ran a hand over his head. “He’s not as bad as you two think he is. He loves us.”
Suni glanced at Yovit. Really looking at him for the first time in years. He was old. Older than she remembered him being. Age lines cut deep in the loose, gaunt skin on his face. Was he eating properly and getting enough calories? He had daily rations as they all had, but she had never thought to check if he was taking it all in. His hair was thin and greasy. It was longer, but he had taken to wearing it this length for years now. It was more gray than brown. His eyebrows had lost color and was bushy and unruly. His thin lips were slack.
She ran a hand on his chest. His breathing was shallow. His ribs were pronounced under her palm. There was no meat and no muscle tone. He was a fraction of the man she remembered him being. It was obvious that he hadn’t been taking care of himself and neither had she.
Saph and Suni had spent so many years judging him for their mother’s death and their current circumstance that they had stopped seeing him for who he was. Their father.
“X-9,” Saph said quietly. “The engines are a priority. We need to get Yovit to an M-Class planet. Now.”
“Yes, Saph,” X-9 replied.
Aesh turned to Vril and Taun. “Get him to the bed. I have some medical training. I can try to stabilize him until we reach our destination.”
Suni, Saph and Tayan moved out of the way while Taun lifted Yovit gently from the floor and placed him on the bed. Suni and Saph each took Tayan’s hand and held her while she cried, watching their father being worked on by Aesh.
“Please don’t let him die,” Tayan cried, clutching onto Suni and Saph’s hands.
“He’s too stubborn to die,” Suni replied.
Saph kissed Tayan on the top of her head. “And I’m too stubborn to let him.”
Chapter Twenty
After Tayan had finally fallen to sleep, Suni made her way to the bridge. With only running off of three hours’ sleep, she was exhausted. She would’ve loved to crawl into Taun’s bed and go to sleep with his arms wrapped around her while they shared a bed that was too small for either of them. Her bed seemed empty and cold now.
Saph and Vril were on the bridge together. A map of their current sector was on the hologram displayed between them. Suni stopped short when she noticed how comfortable they looked seated next to each other. “What’s he doing here?”
Saph glanced up from the map briefly while Vril continued to focus on it. Saph’s eyes were red and swollen. “We found a physician who can see Yovit.”
Suni crossed the distance and stood next to Saph to view the map. “The problem?” Because there was one if the concerned look on Saph’s face was any indication.
Saph blew out a heavy breath, then closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. Vril watched her with concern. There was a slight move of his body in her direction that Suni didn’t want to address or wonder what it meant. She already had a lot to deal with at the moment.
“It’s going to be expensive,” Saph said.
“Do we have enough credits to cover it?”
Saph shook her head and opened her eyes. “Not even if we combine our fuel, supplies and savings credit accounts together.” Her eyes settled on Suni and Suni noticed for the first time that Saph was on the verge of crying.
Vril raised his hand toward Saph but dropped it. He turned abruptly toward Suni. “But we have a plan.”
Suni put a hand on Saph’s shoulder and squeezed. “There isn’t a ‘we’. There’s an us and you.”
“Suni,” Saph said.
Suni wanted to laugh out loud. Before it had been Suni trying to keep Saph’s emotions toward the cyborgs in check. Now, the tables were turned. “Saph, no. they made it clear that they don’t want to be here with us. There’s no ‘we’. You and I have to figure out how to help Yovit.” She shook her head. “We’ve been doing fine without them and we’ll be fine without them again. If this physician is too expensive then we find another one.”
“Yovit’s spine is broken,” Saph said.
Suni had expected a few broken bones. “Is that all?”
Saph shook her head. “He has swelling on the brain that continues to grow.”
Suni inhaled a sharp breath. Brain surgery wasn’t something she had been expecting. “We can. We can…” Suni glanced around, trying to figure out what they could sell in order to pay for it.
“There’s an asteroid nearby,” Vril said. Vril touched a point on the holographic projection. “Here. Not too far from where we are now.”
“And is this where we’re dropping you all off at?” Suni replied.
She knew she should’ve been grateful to them. Without them, Kenzi’s crew would’ve overtaken the ship and instead of plotting to fix Yovit, they could’ve been trying to find out how to get Tayan back from Kenzi, yet again. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t bring herself to say thank you. Her heart hurt too bad for civility. She wasn’t enough for Taun to stay.
“This is where we’re going to harvest the minerals to sell for your father’s treatment,” Vril continued.
“We can do this on our own, Saph. We don’t need their help.”
“I know you don’t need our help, but you’re going to get it.” Taun breezed onto the bridge like the mere sight of him didn’t cause her heart to hurt. “We’re almost set,” he told Vril. “I’m going to go with X-9. Zema will talk us through it.”
“Raint?” Vril asked.
“He’s on prisoner duty. We have three.”
Vril gave Taun a short nod. “I sent you all the information needed to complete the mission. We’ll work on finding a buyer.”
Suni held up both hands. This all seemed to be moving way too fast. “Just wait a minute. We haven’t decided if we want your help yet. Whatever metals need harvesting, X-9 can take care of it on his own. Saph and I can guide him through the process and Tayan can find a buyer.”
“We need them, Suni,” Saph stated plainly.
The pain of Taun in the same room as her was too great. Her body cried out for his, begging for his touch. Even knowing that she wasn’t enough to make him stay, she still craved him and it made her angry with herself. Suni crossed her arms. “No, we don’t, Saph.”
“The mineral is highly volatile. It’ll take two people to get it out of the asteroid. We’re going to house it in the back storage room and close the blast doors leading to that section just in case something happens. If it blows the damage will be contained,” Suni stated.
“Then I’ll go,” Suni said.
“The area of the asteroid that the minerals are contained is small,” Taun said.
Suni ran a hand down her body pointing out how small she was.
“You’ll be too bulky with your space suit on,” Vril said. “Taun can survive for fifteen minutes in open space without gear. We’re going to send X-9 in first to pry the mineral from the asteroid, and once it’s loose, Taun will join for the transport back to the ship.”
Suni turned toward Taun. “This is crazy! You’re actually thinking about going into open space without a suit! I don’t care how many nanobots you have coursing through your system, you’ll die.”
“Like Vril said, I have about fifteen minutes to get the shipment and come back.”
“And what if it takes longer?” she asked him.
“It can’t.”
“We’re ready,” Zema said over the intercom. �
��Taun, I need you at the external hatch.”
Taun turned on his heels and left without another word. Suni glanced at Saph and Vril. “You can’t be serious. You both are going to let him go out there to possibly die?”
“He’s going to be fine, Suni,” Vril said. “We’ve had countless missions in open space. Taun knows what he’s doing.”
Sending him on a possible death mission seemed so nonchalant to Vril. Suni turned and ran after Taun, catching him as he neared the hatch. “You don’t have to do this.”
His stride was long and fast. Suni had to run to keep up with him. “I know.”
“Then why are you?”
“Because you all helped us in our time of need, and we’re returning the favor.”
She raised her chin. “We don’t need any favors from you.”
Taun stopped and in one swift movement pinned her against the wall. “I know how you feel about me right now and it’s killing me inside. There are too many emotions being awakened that I’m familiar with but can’t process correctly. Don’t make this harder for me than it needs to be, Suni. Let me do this for you.”
Before she could reply or even know what to say to reply, he turned and walked away, leaving her in the hallway by herself and breathless.
* * *
Taun didn’t know why he told Suni all that stuff about his feelings. She didn’t need a wanted criminal in her life, especially an emotionally stunted one. She needed someone who could love her the way she deserved to be loved. She needed someone who could open up to her and share everything with. She needed someone who could provide and take care of her better than she could take care of herself. That realization was what brought him back around to what he had known since meeting her.
Suni needed someone other than him.
He’d had lingering thoughts of regrets about leaving her. While he couldn’t support her because he didn’t have credits and didn’t have a way to make them while on the run, he had thought that he could at least protect her from anyone who’d thought to do her harm. But watching her handle that man on her own had been sobering.
Suni could fight. She wasn’t military trained but that female had skills. He had run to her room after dispatching the male they had found on the bridge, all the while thinking he had to get to her as soon as possible to save her. What he hadn’t expected was to find his female standing on top of a sniveling male who was more than twice her size. And she had hardly broken a sweat!
No, Suni didn’t even need him to protect her. She was used to the space life and she thrived at it. He was the one who’d needed a lot to get used to.
“Taun, you’re almost there,” Zema’s voice cackled over the intercom in his ear.
It was cold and his movements were jerky. The freezing temperature of space made his arms and legs hard to move as the alloy began to freeze in place. He kept his arms outstretched, ready to grab the anchor that X-9 placed in the asteroid for him.
“Target in sight,” he replied.
Although he had done countless space walks before, he didn’t remember it being this painful. His head felt like it was going to explode. X-9 was in front of him, the android’s movements were fast as he dug into the asteroid, carving out a space around the green minerals that gleamed under the artificial light that X-9 had set up.
Taun finally reached his destination and hooked his harness to the anchor. The other side of his rope was hooked to the ship. X-9 immediately began loading up the container strapped to Taun’s back with the minerals.
Alarms went off in Taun’s head. His ocular implant showed a warning of all his systems that were beginning to fail. Too soon. “Something’s wrong,” Taun said. “I think I only have two more minutes before I need to go back.”
“X-9, hurry,” Zema said.
“Not, too fast. The minerals are volatile—”
Boom!
The world around Taun erupted. Pieces of the asteroid went flying and some pelted his face and body.
“X-9!” Zema yelled.
Taun watched in horror as X-9’s body turned and twisted, listlessly floating in space, drifting away from him, the asteroid and the ship.
When Taun left Suni, it would be knowing that X-9 was more than capable of watching over the family. If they were going to make it home safely, it would be because of X-9. They couldn’t lose the A.I. Their lives depended on it. Without X-9 around, Taun wasn’t sure if he would be able to leave Suni when the time came.
There was only one option. Taun unhooked himself from the asteroid and launched after him. He ignored the cacophony of voices in his earpiece. His only focus was getting X-9. He reached him and wrapped his arms around his body. The momentum from the blast didn’t ease. They both drifted away from the ship. Taun’s line jerked him to a stop. He could pull him and X-9 back to the hatch.
Then the unthinkable happened. The line snapped and Taun and X-9 drifted more. Taun watched the ship get smaller and smaller. His vision closed in and everything went dark as he went into hibernation mode.
He was dying.
Chapter Twenty-One
Taun tried to force himself to wake. Everyone around him was talking, but they were talking over him, not to him.
Systems not online.
Was the message that greeted him when he tried to pull up his consciousness. He was forced to power back down and return to the abyss.
* * *
“Taun, you stupid, stupid man.”
Taun wanted to smile at that voice. Only one person could call him stupid and elicit that kind of response from him. Suni.
Ancients, how he loved that female. He tried to wake up so he could tell her that.
Systems not online.
* * *
Raint eyed the smaller of the captives. She was hiding behind a much larger male and although her clothes were loose and there was a covering on her head, he could easily tell it was a female. Besides, his hand had touched that body, had felt those curves under her clothes.
He had also seen her before. But he had thought she was a he and a child.
“I remember you,” he said through gritted teeth. “The marketplace. You tried to steal my blaster.”
The female humphed then chuckled. “If I’d wanted your blaster, I would’ve had it.”
“You’re only saying that because you were caught stealing.”
“Do you honestly still think that I was stealing from you?” She chuckled. “I was spying on Suni to find out if she found a scavenger hunt item and wanted to test her hired help. You were a fool then and a fool now.”
Raint advanced and the other two prisoners closed ranks around the small body. “Don’t call me a fool.”
“Fool,” came the defiant voice.
Raint’s steps were fast and sure as he entered the make-shift prison which was one of the empty rooms. The two males advanced on him, ready to fight. Raint put them on their knees with a few well-placed punches and was at the female a breath later. He grabbed a fistful of her shirt and brought her to him. With his free hand he yanked off her head covering roughly.
It was the face he had recognized. How he had ever thought her a boy and a child was beyond him. Beneath his hand was all female and her face was the epitome of femininity. She was beautiful.
Dark skin with green eyes that spit fire met him. Rosettes followed her hairline and neck. Her hair was in braids that hung down her back. Pouty red lips that were pulled back into a snarl revealed sharp teeth that he wanted to feel across his nipples. His cock hardened instantly.
“You’re my prisoner. I would stop with the name calling if I were you.”
Her snarl turned into a sinister smile. “My brother will be coming for me.”
He lifted her from the floor so they were nose to nose. “He’ll have to get through me first.”
She narrowed her eyes, glaring at him through the slits. “I’ll enjoy watching your death.”
* * *
“Return my sister. Now.”
Saph smiled as she watched Kenzi and Katara on the hologram. They were trying to remain composed and in-check, but she could feel their angst through the projection. And she liked it.
Saph leaned closer to the projection. “This doesn’t feel so good does it? To have someone take your sister, the person you love and have vowed to protect, and you’re left at their whim.”
“Return her or I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” Vril asked, coolly.
Saph willed herself not to look his way, otherwise she would find herself stuck on stupid as she was whenever she let her eyes settle on him. She needed to keep her focus when dealing with Kenzi and Katara. They were a ruthless pair. Saph hadn’t even known they had a younger sister. When she had dealt with them in the past, it had only been the two of them. This development was new and she was pleased with it.
“You boarded our ship and accosted us during a kidnapping attempt.”
Saph didn’t correct Vril when he said “our”. It not only sounded right coming from him, but it felt right. They were a team, and they were a pretty good one at that.
“Only to take back what had been in our possession.”
“Our little sister!” Suni yelled.
Saph allowed a quick look in her direction. She still had on the same clothes as she had a few days ago when she had rescued Taun from open space. She was disheveled and her hair uncombed. The dark circles under her eyes showed that she hadn’t been sleeping. She spent all her time n Taun’s room watching over him while he recovered in stasis.
Katara placed a hand on Kenzi’s arm, stilling him. “This has clearly gotten out of control. Return our sister and we will be on our way.”
“Ha!” Saph yelled. “Out of control?! Our father is undergoing life-saving treatment, we have another team member down, my sister is shaken beyond repair and our vessel has been compromised.” Suni pointed at Kenzi’s image. “This is all because you have to cheat to win. We’re going to send all of our remaining captives into space and you can pick up their bodies from there.”
Saving The Cyborg (Cyborg Redemption) Page 16