You will scare her and possibly loose her if you do not.
It was enough for reason to permeate the heat. I understand. He sent calming instructions to his data banks. Instructing cooling his core temperature.
Better? Taln asked after a moment.
Yes. Thank you.
They moved passed his men and the guide and went inside the shop. The scent of the blond female was strong. His body stirred once more. From the scents and comments Ben had told them, he’d expected it to deal in food. It did a restaurant. The Diner. It had an old world feel about it. His emotions squarely turned off, his data still told him he liked it. Such an emotion seemed impossible and yet, there it was. The aroma of the female heady and strong all around him. His body started to hum. Both women were cleaning up inside. “Please sit down,” the dark haired one told them. They moved to a table and sat down gingerly. Cyborgs weighed a great deal compared to humans. Their skeletal overlay alone, was impressive. The chairs held.
CraZ only had eyes for the blond female. She continued to work while the dark haired one approached. “So, what can I get you?”
Taln answered. “Anything cold. No alcohol.”
She pointed to the men outside. “And them?”
“The same. Thank you.” She turned and headed back to the counter and started making the drinks. He wondered which was Racle and which was Chris. They had no name tags on. Not that it mattered to him what her name was. It was the connection that mattered. To find one a second time…….
The dark haired one loaded two jugs and glasses on a tray. The blond picked it up and walked it outside. One chair had been found sound and put by the door. He could see her telling his men to drink when ready and put the tray on it. She stood and spoke to Ben for a moment. The dark haired one came back to their table. “Your friend, I’d like her name,” he asked her.
“Why? Cyborgs do not normally ask such personal details.”
CraZ smiled. “It is polite is it not?”
She huffed while she poured their drinks. “Cyborgs don’t worry about that stuff, so what gives?”
He looked to Taln. A smile creased his lips. She knows us.
They were both silent as she finished pouring the drinks and looked at them. “I am curious,” he told her.
This time she raised both eyebrows and shook her head. “Not the Cyborg way. Try again.”
“I do not lie,” he told her getting agitated. He didn’t like that the other female was still talking to Ben.
“I don’t doubt it.” she told them. “But she’s my friend and I want to know why you want to know her. She’s been through a lot, these last 7 years. She doesn’t need any more shit to deal with.” She pointed out the window. “That’s more than enough.”
CraZ agreed. “I would like to help her. This is not right and shouldn’t go unpunished. I wish to ensure that does not happen. It is possible she is important to me. I will not harm her.”
Taln threw back his cold drink. “She’s a possible mate to him.”
She stared blankly at them both, then recovered. “A Mate?” she looked confused, then seemed to come to a decision. “I’m Racle, Chris is outside. She’s a good woman. We’d appreciate you helping to catch these fuckers. We think its Cho pulling the strings and we were devising a plan to uncover him.”
Ben came in, Racle passed him a drink. He took several mouthfuls. “They’re nearly finished out there. We should be making tracks.”
CruZ looked over at him. “That won’t be needed. We’ve seen enough. We’ll be staying awhile to talk to these ladies.”
Ben looked surprised and glanced over at Racle. She nodded. “All good here.” She told him.
“Ok, well if you need me, call.” He turned to leave and walked to the door.
“Thanks Ben,” Racle called out after him as he gave her a wave and disappeared through the doorway.
CraZ gazed passed him giving instructions to his men. When clean-up is finished, take the nourishment from the female, then back to barracks. He focused back on the dark-haired female. “Neat trick,” she told him. “That’s how you communicate?”
He gave her a slow nod. “At times, yes. Is there a reason you know so much about us?”
Racle smiled at them. “Grandad was in the wars before going for colonisation. He spoke highly of his Cyborg troop.”
CraZ nodded. He smelt the female coming before she re-entered the building. Her scent already surrounding him from every part of the building. Just got stronger.
“Thank you for your help,” she called over as she walked passed, taking the tray into the back room. The kitchen, CraZ guessed. He got up to follow her and found the dark haired Racle in his way.
“Do anything to hurt her and I will not be nice.”
CraZ stared at the female. She was bold. Did she not realise he was Cyborg? She couldn’t hurt him. “I do not wish to hurt her. I wish to know her.”
“And if she doesn’t want to know you?”
“I will help with this business and leave her alone.” He meant the words when he said them but once the words left his mouth, CraZ wasn’t so sure he could just leave her alone. The impulses were strong. Driving him. His diagnostics telling him his control was thin. The chances of him doing that now were……… low.
The female stood aside. “Cyborgs do not lie so I’ll allow that.” CraZ gave a short nod and walked towards the female that called to him. He watched for a moment through the window of the door to what was the kitchen. She was tidying up and cleaning. Then she put things away and brought out food items and started to cook. She was the cook here? It was logical. Her occupation mattered little as long as it made her happy. She was a fine female.
He knocked, not wanting to startle her. As she turned, he pushed through the door.
He couldn’t move. She stood before him, blinking. He tried not to breath her in. “Are you lost?” she asked him.
CraZ swallowed. “No. Thank you for your concern. I wished to speak with you.” He watched as she went to wash her hands and dried them, waiting for him to continue. “Do you know anything about Cyborgs and the Empire?”
She shook her head. “Sorry no. I’ve seen your people come and go over the years but apart from serving meals at Cho’s, I didn’t take much notice.”
He nodded so she would see he understood. His data told him he would have to explain it fully to her and there was a large probability that she wouldn’t understand it all anyway. But he had to try. “We are Cyborg,” he started. “Created by Earth Corp initially to win the Corporation Wars and before the end, the colony wars too. They used human DNA to grow us, gave us cybernetics and added portions of animal DNA to the mix and gave us computers embedded in our brains for programming and special skills to make us the ultimate soldiers. The outcome, over several generations of trying, was …. us.” CraZ registered that she was a little confused by his statement but was still with him. She was curious. It was a start.
“Some decades later, the people of Old Earth helped to free us once word got out about what was going on. But not all of us. We were a large investment for Earth Corp, billions upon billions of credits and they were unwilling to lose so much money so easily. We don’t know exactly how many of us there are but from what we do know, more than 70% of us were not on Old Earth at the time our freedom was declared. Those were quietly sold on, bartered, traded or unknowingly, continued to fight for them on different worlds.
We were soldiers without a future. Made to fight and die. Until we were free and decades after that, while we searched the stars for our bothers, the Admiral found his Kim. His mate, his wife in human terms. Before that moment, Cyborgs did not believe they had any kind of future but what was now. The knowledge that we could have lives that were more than fighting. That we could have a future. Was new to us. There was no data on that. But once the Admiral shared his experience of finding her, it rippled throughout the Empire over our shared neuro nets. Triggering something in all of us. A need and wish. For t
he same future.”
He was talking and talking, and she wasn’t sure why. He was earnest in what he was telling her. She could see that much. It was important to him to tell her. She just wasn’t sure why he was telling her their history. It didn’t matter to her. They were people like anyone else. She knew their beginnings were controversial. She’d heard the talk and read a bit about it before they’d left for this new world. It had been old news even then. Very old news. So why he thought she needed to hear it all, she didn’t understand….
The female was looking a bit more confused. She hadn’t got the connection yet. CraZ went on… “Suddenly having a life beyond fighting and struggling to survive, was available to us. It was something so beyond what we’d considered possible in our lives, that we had no data to support it. It was all new to us. Mistakes were made. Cyborgs died and protocols had to be put in place.
“Not that finding compatible females was easy. The odds on doing so were originally beyond conceivable. But that is changing with every new connection. Over our years of living, we’d met many females but before Kim, none of them triggered anything in us. With some help from our Doctor, it was established that our DNA mix rules us in this regard. Not all females trigger the response in us, and it was possible that as a species, timing was everything. We’d evolved to the point where we were ready to receive it. We could see hundreds of thousands of females on many worlds and none of them could be the one. Or we could see one and that would be it. Age, colour, statue matters not. If they are of adult age and carry no male scent and our DNA recognises them as a compatible match, that is all that matter’s. In some, we recognise the adult the child will be and wait. Time is on our side.”
He’d said ‘decades’ more than once. As in their creation and in time. Just how old was he? “How old are you? Your people I mean?”
In everything he’d said, she’d picked up on the time element. “Some of us are reaching 100 years living or more. There are several generations of us. Some originals, it is unclear. Their programming is different to ours. It is likely they are around 180+ years.”
The female’s mouth opened in surprise. He expected her to ask him his age next, but she didn’t. “You said mistakes were made and Cyborgs died? How?”
It was a reasonable question. The data flowing across his optic told him he felt ‘caution’ in answering her. A reaction to his last engagement with a female? The data supported that. Most likely. The chances of finding a third compatible female flowed into his optic. They were not good. “Our animal DNA carries animal traits. Behaviours if you like. It makes us more aggressive in battle, but it also comes with other features. We bond and imprint on a female, like large predators do. They become the centre of our world, everything else, settles into the background. We’re very protective. Their protection is fiercely guarded. Their wishes and feelings, their needs are paramount to us. And because they are so central to our being, Cyborgs need to be careful. If they bond with a female who later rejects them, there is the possibility that the Cyborg will be unable to recover from the loss. They in effect, pined away for the female and in a few cases, the Cyborgs died before we knew of the connection and what was happening.”
“That’s…. terrible,” she told him. The words were sincere and automatic on hearing that people had died at the chance of finding love. That wasn’t right. It was hard enough finding it anyway, thought Chris. She knew that only too well. No one should have to go through that kind of deadly lottery.
“The safeguards help us,” he told her. “We all know now what this means. And how to approach it. It is not always easy, but we are able to turn off our emotions and pain receptors and that helps. However, data informs us that even with those off, when it comes to Mates, we can still feel pain and emotion. It tends to override other programming. Those emotions can be……. difficult to control.”
Chris nodded. She understood what he was telling her. It was a warning. They all had to be careful. The Cyborgs had been through a lot but still wanted what everyone else did. A future. “I understand and will ensure that the women here know this.”
She saw a frown cross his face for a fleeting moment then it cleared. “You may already know that due to our experiences, we do not touch humans willingly. With mates that is different. A Cyborg will crave the females touch continuously and wish her to touch him in return. It can be explosive. Needy. Dominant, demanding and highly pleasurable. No harm will come to the female, but you may have already heard that Cyborgs are…… known to be very demanding of their mates. Cyborg sexual appetites are both expressive and excessive.”
Chris’s face flushed. Wow. How direct did they get? She felt the need to fan herself, wondering if someone had turned the heating on. Was it getting hot? Had he really just said that? The man might be four feet across the room, but he was blasting her with heat, or his words were or both. It felt a bit uncomfortable. She looked at him while he kept on talking. Tall and broad, he filled the doorway. He was beyond handsome. Rocked the wild man look. The kind of guy who wouldn’t have looked at her twice back home. A twinge of something stuck her then. She was being silly. Her time for that was long passed. He stood there calmly telling her everything about his people. So they would know. So mistakes wouldn’t be made.
If it came to it they’d be no getting passed him in a battle, she thought. If anyone tried, it would be over before it began. No one would be stupid enough to want to take them on, crossed her mind. Not that she felt any fear being with him, quite the opposite. He oozed protection and wasn’t trying to frighten her but seemed to be trying very hard to ……enlighten her. They didn’t get diseases like human men did…
He’d stopped talking again. Like he was waiting for her to catch up or give him a response. “I err, thank you for the information.” A growl sounded in the room. For a moment Chris wondered if a stray animal had got into the restaurant. She looked around trying to locate the source.
“Please, do not move around, you are making it worse.”
Chris froze and looked over at him. “I don’t understand. Making what worse? Did you hear that? I’m not sure what animal it was but it can’t be in here.” His eyes had turned a warm orange colour. She could read the change in him. There was hunger in those eyes and they were focused all on her. Her flight or fight instinct broke out. She straightened as he groaned, again taking a step back.
“Don’t run. It will be worse. I will be unable to stop myself from hunting you down and taking you. I can smell your desire female. Your scent fills these rooms. Potent, challenging, calling to me.”
Chris stilled. Hold the goddamn horses! He was talking about her! Seriously? All this chat was for her? She was flattered, who the hell wouldn’t be with all that muscle and sexual vibe going on? And those looks? Hell, when she was younger, she’d have bitten her right arm off for a piece of that! But that, wasn’t now. His gaze penetrating. Asking unspoken question’s she didn’t have the answers to. She could feel the heat and desire rolling off him. His hunger focused on her.
Surprise and shock hit her at her own body’s response suddenly fired up and came alive once more. Shit shit shit…
“Tell me you’re real….” He whispered breathing her in…..
Chapter Four
She was all too bloody real….. He hadn’t moved. That was a good thing, right? Chris wasn’t sure that if he did, she could deal with it. He seemed to be ….. savouring the air between them. She wasn’t sure what that meant exactly. Tell me you’re real? he’d asked. As if he was unsure himself all of a sudden. She didn’t know that that meant either.
“I’m sorry, I’m flattered, very flattered but I don’t understand what’s happening here. I’m not looking for anything and have a business to run. I should get back to work.”
Her words pulled CraZ back from devouring her essence to focus on the female. Her voice and body language told of her interest, but she was fighting it. CraZ felt the pull grabbing hold of him. He was rock hard and unable to mo
ve. His logic told him he couldn’t lose a second mate. The sight of the counter behind her only added to his vision of her bent over it, stripped to the waist and him thrusting in deeply, her screams of delight on her lips as he penetrated her over and over again. Striking her hard, his balls slapping at her ass. Her bare breasts heavy and full, bouncing against it as he thrust in. Aroused with hard nipples for his mouth and hands.
He bit back a growl that crept up his throat, wiping the visual away. His data told him she wouldn’t understand it. He swallowed, trying for control. Sending calming cool energy throughout his body. It helped. “It has nothing to do with flattery. My name is CraZ. There were times when I was owned, that I thought I’d go crazy and was often placed in crazy situations with little expectation to survive. When my emotions were turned on, and under duress, I…… lost control on the battlefield many times to survive and crazy was how I survived. The name stuck. I do not lose control now or did not until meeting you. My emotions are turned off but even with that, I feel the pull towards you female. Down to my very core, inside my bones and cybernetic frame, my system is screaming that you are my mate. But, I have been wrong before and I cannot risk getting it wrong a second time. I do not think I would survive it this time.”
Chris stared wide eyed at him. Holy shit. Had he just said all that? Kevin had never declared himself in such a way. His words were brutally honest and a little bit scary. She could feel that. They’d been no one since Kevin had passed. She’d been too busy keeping a roof over their head and coping with her responsibilities. Did she want this? The thought of enjoying a male’s company once more, was attractive. How long had it been since a male had touched her. Made her feel? Kevin wasn’t the ‘make you scream’ type. He was loving and caring but not exactly exciting. Would CraZ be that exciting? She couldn’t help but think …….he would. He sure looked it and he was right about the rumours of Cyborg sex. It was legendary.
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