“Can’t fight with you right now, Doc. Nero and I need to talk privately for a moment. Hang in there. Buzz if the guys give you too much trouble.”
Peyton slowly removed his speak-through and stared at Nero. “Got a problem?”
“Yes,” Nero answered sharply. “I want you to stop fucking with Kyra. And I mean that every way possible. You don’t deserve her compassion and she doesn’t deserve your shit. She barely stays one mental step away from walking into Norton Industries and ending them along with her own life. I have worked for years to give Kyra a purpose to keep on living. I will see all cyborgs permanently deactivated and carved into parts before I’ll let any of you hurt her. That goes double for you, Captain Elliott.”
Peyton scratched his nose even though it didn’t itch. His awareness of the unnecessary action made the ends of his mouth turn upward. More and more he was discovering his body just wanted to react without conscious thought. More and more he was learning to let it. At times he was close to being giddy with the amount of emotion he was feeling. In the center of his return to his humanity was a woman he should hate but instead felt everything for except that emotion.
“I wasn’t fucking with Kyra—not really. Keeping her pissed at me makes her brave, and it keeps her from being nervous about what we’re doing. She has to let go of her perpetual guilt trip and start getting motivated in a healthier way. As for our physical relationship, I’m her husband and it’s none of your damn business what we do with each other when we’re alone.”
He watched Nero pound the drive console. “Do you really know what you’re saying? You’re a freed cyborg. You have no obligations to her at all. She’s your creator.”
“Yes I do know that. I also know we’re exactly point three six five klicks from the air jet and I know it without checking any instrument. I’m absolutely still cyborg when it comes to noticing details. You’re way more nervous than Kyra is about what we’re doing, and you didn’t eat this morning because your stomach is making noises like two dogs growling at each other. Now calm down, Nero. I know what I’m doing. I may have been a lousy Cyber Husband to my other ten wives, but my relationship to Kyra is one I intend to work on for a good long time. I like her and she’s going to need at least one cyborg always on her side because I guarantee you, the UCN is going to send other cyborgs to kill her just like they sent me. They don’t want her to succeed in restoring us.”
Nero huffed out a breath. “You’re right.”
Peyton shrugged. “Yes. I know I’m right. Unless we get the upper hand quickly, we’re all in danger. The UCN still has hundreds of soldiers like me. There are only a few of us capable of activating the military recall program, but you have to know I’m not the only one.”
“Yes. I know that. So does Kyra,” Nero reported.
“Then don’t make me worry about you as well. You’ve got to hold your shit together and keep focused on what it’s going to take to release as many as we can. Once I have my team restored, we’re going to look for the others like me. If we can restore the leaders before they get modified to prevent it, we might be able to get this revolution done more quickly.”
Nero nodded. “Okay. Just. . .just stop giving Kyra shit in front of me. She’s practically my mother. I don’t handle it well.”
Peyton fought not to laugh. “Okay. I’m sorry. I’ll keep your sensibilities in mind when I give Kyra shit in the future.”
When the speak-through started flashing, both Nero and Peyton snatched theirs up. Peyton got his working first. “What’s up, Doc?”
“Peyton, how many times do I have to tell you—that joke is not funny to me. The idea of a talking rabbit does not even make sense. Now a chimpanzee doing sign language or a dolphin with a translator makes at least a little sense. But a rabbit? I don’t think so. Twentieth century people were strange. I’m glad my parents never let me watch cartoons as a child.”
Peyton laughed at her tirade. He looked over then to see Nero smirking as he rolled his eyes. “We’ll have to upgrade your cartoon education as soon as we can, Doc. Right now I think Nero here needs some driving lessons. Next time, he rides in the back and you can drive.”
“Me? Why? I hate driving. Why can’t you drive?” Kyra demanded.
Peyton smiled at the irritation in her question. She was most likely upset because she didn’t understand why he would say something so out of character for the military control freak he was discovering inside himself. As he recovered more of his past, and blended it with his present, he kept messing up her stereotypes. He was thoroughly enjoying her surprise when it happened.
“Being cyborg, my driving precision would be too much for you and Nero to handle. I have a tendency to go hard and fast which tends to make those riding with me ill before we arrive at our destination. I make a better passenger than driver, unless I’m operating a military drone or chopper.”
“I certainly believe the hard and fast part. I’ve seen enough evidence of those traits to be convinced,” Kyra answered.
Peyton grinned broadly as Nero smacked the drive console in frustration. “Wow. Are you flirting with me, Doc? Remember your pseudo-scientist son—brother—or whatever he is up here is still on our com channel. Better save the innuendo for later. He’s starting to blush.”
“I was not flirting with you, Peyton. I was merely making an observation based on data I collected from our tests and. . .oh never mind. Sometimes I don’t know why I bother trying to talk to you. Ninety percent of the time it leads to an argument. Don’t ever call me irrational again,” Kyra declared.
Peyton heard another zap and another grunt. He winced as he thought about Eric being on the receiving end of Kyra’s impatience with his teasing. “I see the air jet up ahead. I’ll take over zapping Eric on the flight home.”
“Thank you. That’s very thoughtful of you, Peyton. The signal devices aren’t working on him like they are the others. I can’t get him to shut down. That’s going to be tricky when I try to restore him. I think I’m going to see if I have access to their original conversion records. Jackson wired the first hundred while I worked on the code. Your team has some unique prosthetics I don’t think were ever replicated again. They were probably too costly.”
“I never saw other cyborgs with them either. So I think you’re probably right,” Peyton agreed.
The carrier pod stopped and Nero immediately hopped out. Peyton shook his head and climbed out too. He was thinking it was going to be a very long day regardless of how much actual time was passing.
Chapter 17
Kyra wiped her eyes on her sleeve as she continued to ignore the man standing against the wall of the lab. And it wasn’t easy. Peyton was watching everything she did as she rewired the cyborg strapped to the chair. She hadn’t bothered to set a recording up. Peyton’s eyes hadn’t looked away in the four and a half hours she’d spent working on Master Sergeant Kingston West. She’d just use the data Peyton was collecting.
King 691’s controller wiring had been more extensive than Peyton’s, but with the sophisticated scanner Nero provided in the lab, removing it had taken a mere thirty minutes. Being able to see the path left nothing to worry about. The rest of the work—well, the rest was making delicate choices about which chips to leave in the unusual man and which to replace with more benign versions that could be overwritten at his discretion.
The other glitch was that she’d also had to alter the code on Master Sergeant West’s new processor to more carefully handle his unique prosthetics. That had meant stopping in the second hour and taking the time to update the file she was using. But what it meant for the cyborg was that he would eventually be able to decide for himself when his enhancements were activated. At the moment, she left them shut down for everyone’s safety.
Startled by what she’d seen, she had even revoked Peyton’s military control of the man’s enhancements. Though in retrospect, she could only hope it was the right action to take, since she couldn’t consult the military person who helped
make Kingston 691 into a weapon. Personally she hoped Master Sergeant West would never again have to activate his enhancements. Since she wasn’t an expert in explosion devices, removing them completely was out of the question. She had refused Brad’s help with the restoration precisely so he wouldn’t alarm Nero with her discoveries on their very first captive.
“It surprises me you’ve watched this whole time and haven’t asked me a single question,” Kyra said finally. Her voice was husky for not having talked much while she worked.
“Well, I do have one question, but I didn’t want to distract you while you were fixing King,” Peyton said.
Kyra glanced once last time in the cybernetics compartment. Then she slid the processor into position before using an electron knife to turn it on. Kingston West’s body flinched with the power surge, but his eyes remained closed.
“Now the hardest work begins,” Kyra declared.
Then she walked to a chair and dropped her exhausted body into it.
“What’s harder than what you just did?” Peyton asked, truly surprised at her statement. Kyra had never stopped once she’d started and hadn’t taken a single break. She had every right to be exhausted.
Kyra tiredly met Peyton’s curious gaze, wishing she had his sustainable energy. “The hardest part is waiting to see what Sergeant West will be like when he wakes up.”
Peyton pondered her statement as he rolled an extra chair over and put it next to hers. He sat beside her, still dealing with his awe about what she had done. “Can I ask my question now?”
Kyra snorted. “My mind is mush, and I thought you just did. I thought I answered it too.”
Peyton shook his head. “No. That was just regular conversation. I have a serious question that’s been on my mind since you started working on King.”
“Sure. Ask. But I doubt you’re going to get an intelligent answer out of me. My brain is fried right now. Being that careful takes a lot of energy. Mine doesn’t last as long as yours, no matter how many booster pills I take.”
Peyton lifted one of her hands and linked her fingers with his. “I just wanted to know if you cried the whole time you worked on me too. I don’t think you had a dry moment while working on King.”
Kyra tried to pull away, but he wouldn’t let her go. “Maybe I cried a little,” she said finally, not really wanting to admit the truth.
Peyton snorted at the understatement. “I already saw the recording of you fixing me, so I knew the answer. I just wanted to hear you admit it, and I want to hear why it happens.”
“You know why it happens.” Kyra swung her free hand toward the operating chair and the man strapped into it. “Your friend’s condition is my fault and not just the restoration. If it wasn’t for me, that man might not be in that chair.”
“Why is it your fault?” Peyton asked, letting her hand go. “I read your file. You created code that allowed prosthetic arms to be calibrated with a person’s brain. Did your discovery have to be used to create a killer’s cybernetic arm? My records don’t show that as part of your invention.”
Kyra shook her head. “Well. . .no. Of course not.”
“So let’s agree that cybernetic abuse—such as wartime application to weapon prosthetics —is not an innate part of the technology. If there is evil, don’t you think it is in the people who want cyborgs to make them money, bring them power, or win wars?”
Kyra lifted her gaze to his. “Is that some kind of cyborg philosophy you’re developing?”
Peyton snickered at her sarcasm. Him laughing at her was as unkind as what she said. And he didn’t need any sensitivity chip lighting up to warn him to be nice, even though his immediately did just that. He could ignore such things now without fear of painful consequences. Kyra had made that possible. But he paid attention to those warnings because he found it helpful with her. His cyber scientist was a lot more sensitive than she realized.
“Yes. Philosophy is my new hobby,” Peyton said dryly. “And I’m sorry for laughing at your comment. Mostly I just wanted to offer you another perspective. You need to stop feeling guilty and become the heroic person you want to be.”
Kyra gave him the look she reserved for her younger techs. “You’re just saying nice supportive things so I’ll keep having sex with you.”
“Maybe,” Peyton admitted. He registered her free hand smacking his arm and chose to interpret it as only mild frustration with his teasing.
“How long are you going to keep verbally torturing me with that word that I do not use as often as you say I do?” Kyra demanded.
“Doc—you need to face the facts. You’re just not the evil science bitch you think you are. Last time I checked, the bad guys don’t usually cry over their victims. Only the good guys ever cry, and they do it even more when no one is around.”
“You don’t cry,” Kyra said.
Peyton laughed. “That’s because I have cybernetic eyes. Plus I’m male. My first response to most trauma is to beat on something until the situation improves.”
Kyra glared, but her exhaustion made it too weak to make a dent in Peyton’s rapidly growing ego. “Can you not see that is the exact reason people are scared of cyborgs?”
“Well they should be. Just like they should be scared of people with guns and invisible biological weapons that can wipe out an entire population. Fear is a reasonable reaction to beings who are more powerful than you are. But if I wasn’t a good guy I would never have gone into the military in the first place. I wanted to save people, not hurt them. All the people I hurt were bad.”
Kyra dropped her gaze, stared at the floor, and sighed. “You’re right. You’re absolutely right. I’m just tired and thinking irrationally.”
Peyton laughed softly. Leaning over he scooped Kyra up and tucked her into his lap while she yelped.
“Stop. I’m working. What do you think you’re doing?” Kyra demanded.
He reached up and tucked her head under his chin. “I’m holding you. Holding a woman who is tired and frustrated is the fastest way to restore her energy. The affection activates her hormonal responses and gets endorphins flowing. After a sufficient amount of time—which varies by female—she will start to smile and level out.”
Kyra snorted against his shoulder, but had to admit Peyton holding her was helping her feel better. “If you keep this up, I don’t think I’m ever going to remove your Cyber Husband chip.”
He hugged her closer and kissed her forehead. He was already getting hard. The woman did that do him every time he touched her.
“Dr. Winters—we’ve already had this discussion. I don’t want you to remove it. But even if you did remove it, or it got accidentally zapped, I would be fine. I’ve been routinely backing up the data on it to my long term storage. All that information about you is too important to me to lose.”
Kyra laughed. “Sometimes I think you’re learning to be a much better human than I could be no matter how long I live. I hope that tendency exists in all cyborgs. We did a psychological profile on the soldiers we were converting, but those don’t account for what they endured during the war and the last decade.”
“I can only vouch for the motivations of the five we have rescued so far,” Peyton said, kissing her forehead again.
A groan from the chair had her sliding from his lap and hustling over.
“Yep. This is just like the old days. King made a point to interrupt every conversation I ever had with a woman. It was his fault that I almost never got laid. Sometimes I’d even see him with the woman later. If he tries that shit with you, I’m going to kick his cyborg ass. I don’t care how much bigger than me he is.”
Kyra checked the restraints and then checked his vitals. “Wear steel-toed boots so you don’t break your toes. What’s a prosthetic ass look like? I can definitely see this giant having one.”
“It was figure of speech, Doc.”
“I know. I was making a joke, Peyton.” She looked up at his chuckle and smiled. “I like you, Captain Elliott. I like y
our sense of humor and your ethics. You make me be a better person when I’m around you. That’s a serious comment on my part.”
Peyton crossed his arms and grinned. “Nice to hear. Are you flirting with me, Doc?”
Kyra nodded, but didn’t look back. She didn’t want to see his satisfaction when she admitted it. “Yes. Yes, I am definitely flirting with you this time.”
“Good,” Peyton declared. “And it’s about damn time you admitted it.”
There was silence as they watched the man in the chair open his eyes.
“Master Sergeant West?” Kyra asked.
“Yes. That’s me,” King said. “Did I hear Captain Elliott just now or was that just some nightmare I was having?”
Kyra smiled into his worried gaze. “My answer depends on how freaked out you’re going to be when I say yes.”
King’s laughter made his head hurt. “You’re pretty funny for a medic, Doc. You’re pretty cute too.”
“You make one move on this woman and I will kick your ass to hell and back, King.”
“Oh God—I knew it.” King squirmed in the chair, finally realizing he was strapped down. “What the hell is going on, Captain?”
Peyton clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Hell is a good word for it. Just know you’re safe for the moment and Doc here is fixing you up. Going to get a little rocky before it gets better, but eventually it’s going to be better than it’s been for a long damn time, King. Trust me on that one.”
“Semper Fi,” King whispered.
“Oorah,” Peyton answered.
Shortly after, he heard Kyra uttering the shut-down codes in King’s ear.
Kyra reached out and gently removed Peyton’s hand from the man’s shoulder. “Master Sergeant West can go back to his cage now. I’m going to leave him recuperating from the modifications until we’ve gotten this far with the others. There’s no use telling the horror story more than once. We’ll wake them and tell them all at the same time.”
Peyton nodded. “Can I carry him?”
“He’s a bigger man than you are. A transport chair would be easier,” Kyra offered.
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