by Cynthia Sax
One gun had been calibrated specifically for Ada-972, factoring her size, shape, the diameter of the projectile minimized to reduce trauma. He had never put so much planning into a kill.
Even if the kill were flawless, it would change them. Tifara had seen him end lifespans but those deaths had belonged to near strangers. The clone female was a friend. His little medic cared for her.
He did also. Too much.
It was an act of mercy, he reminded himself. Ada-972’s body was decaying. The pain, if Tifara had allowed her to feel it, would have been horrendous. The clone female wanted her limited existence to end.
A cyborg warrior would seek death also.
“It’s time.” He interrupted Tifara’s mumbling.
“It doesn’t have to be time.” She approached him, her hips swaying. “We don’t have to leave right now.” She ran her soft hands over his body armor. “I could—”
“No.” He caught her fingers, stopping her caresses and her tempting words. “We must do this, my female. Delaying it won’t make the task easier.”
“It was worth a try.” Tifara sighed, walking slowly toward the exit. Death matched her shorter stride. “I should end her lifespan. She asked me.”
“She knew I wouldn’t allow it.” He linked his fingers with hers. He was a killer. His little medic was not. Intentionally ending a lifespan would damage her soft heart. He’d die before he permitted that to happen.
“I suppose.” Tifara chewed on her bottom lip.
He yearned to lick that abused flesh, to soothe her turmoil—both physical and emotional. They trekked toward the cave. The white sand blew around their boots. It had covered the picked clean bones of the three male clones, the insects having feasted on their remains.
The sun was low on the horizon, painting the sky orange and crimson, lighting the red in Tifara’s brown curls, dancing upon her pink cheeks. The air temperature cooled. It was warm rather than scorching hot. The wind whistled through the rock facings before them.
Menace waited for them outside the cave, cleaning a long gun, one of his legs crossed casually in front of the other. “My female is taking me to a favorite rock outcropping to see the stars. She’s worried about Ada-972. I suspect we’ll return soon after it becomes fully dark.”
Menace’s female must sense what was about to happen. “We’ll complete our tasks quickly.” Death nodded, grateful for the warning.
They entered the cave. Ada-971 sat beside her damaged sister, the two of them laughing and chattering.
“Medic Tifara is here to administer the pain inhibitors.” Menace’s female kissed Ada-972’s forehead. “Don’t give her or her male any trouble. And no more talk about not being here when I get back. They won’t allow anything bad to happen to you.”
“That I don’t want to happen to me.” Ada-972’s voice was soft, inaudible to human hearing. Death, however, was a cyborg. He heard everything. “I love you, Ada-971.”
“I love you too.” Her friend shook her head and hurried toward them. “She’s very emotional this planet rotation,” she whispered. “Don’t allow her out of your sightlines while I’m away.”
Tifara’s lips trembled. His female was just as emotional.
“We won’t allow her out of our sightlines,” Death promised for both of them.
“Don’t return until you see a spirit star,” Ada-972 called.
“I won’t.” Ada-971 gave her a wave and then ducked out of the cave.
“What is a spirit star?” Tifara rummaged through her medic pack, her voice suspiciously watery.
“It’s a star that moves across the darkened sky.” The damaged female gazed at the ceiling of the cave. “As the original has shared with us, this star collects the spirits of the clones who die, bringing them upward to be assimilated into the black nothingness that holds the constellations together.”
A spirit star sounded like a meteoroid that had fallen into the planet’s atmosphere, burning to nothing. Death pressed his lips together, choosing to keep that information to himself.
“I want Ada-971 to see my ascent.” Ada-972 smiled. “She’ll know that I’m fine. I’ll be with all of the others who were created before me. I won’t be alone.”
“I’m injecting you with all of the pain inhibitors we have left,” Tifara said brusquely, her eyes glimmering with unshed tears. “You’ll go completely numb but you’ll be able to talk.”
“I would like to go outside, if that is possible.” Ada-972 slid her gaze shyly to him. “That will aid in my ascent and I would like to see the constellations one more time.” She paused. “From this angle. My view will soon be very different, won’t it?”
“I’ll carry you outside.” He knew nothing about her future view. The black nothingness, from his observations, consisted mostly of ionized hydrogen, not clone spirits, but he hadn’t yet scanned all of space. He couldn’t be certain.
“You’ll have to touch me and you’ve already agreed to do so much.” Her gaze was apologetic, the female continuing to believe a male touching a female was forbidden.
Menace had done more than merely touch her friend. Death smelled the warrior’s nanocybotics all over the clone female. He kept that information to himself also, sliding his arms carefully under Ada-972’s decaying body and lifting her.
Insects scurried away. A damp spot was left on the makeshift sleeping support her sister had crafted for her. The putrid scent of rot strengthened.
He carried her into the fading light, their surroundings bathed in a wash of gray. She gasped at the increase in temperature, gazing around her, blinking. In the planet rotations he’d known her, she had never been outside.
Tifara took off her white jacket, removed her private viewscreen from a pocket, and spread the garment on the sand. Death set Ada-972 upon it, knowing the sacrifice his little human had made. That jacket was a symbol of her medic status. He had cleaned it with extra care during her rest cycles.
Tifara lay down beside her and clasped the female’s hand. “Tell me about the constellations. What does the original say about them?”
She was distracting Ada-972, allowing him to do the task he was assigned. There was no time to delay. Menace and Ada-971 could return at any moment.
Death rubbed his palm over the muzzle of the gun, warming the metal. Then he slid it under the clone female, positioning it between the clavicle and the trapezius muscle. Her body was in alignment. The weapon was angled toward her heart.
Ada-972 chattered nonsense about clones immortalized in distant suns and planets, no trepidation in her voice. She must have been aware of what was about to occur yet she expressed no concern about it.
The clone female could teach some human warriors about bravery.
Death ran through his mental checklist one more time, verifying that the kill should be quick and painless, and he pressed the trigger.
The gun boomed. Ada-972 jerked, stopping mid-sentence.
It was over.
Tifara sat, pressed her fingers to the clone female’s wrists, to her neck, scanned her with the private viewscreen. “It’s done.” She rubbed her hands over her face. “She’s dead. We killed her.”
“I killed her.” Death holstered his gun, licked his fingertips and stopped up the small entry wound. The bleeding immediately ceased. “I pulled the trigger.” He lowered his head, unable to meet Tifara’s gaze, to see the horror in her beautiful brown eyes. “I ended her lifespan.”
“Death—”
“I called myself that because that’s what I do, Tifara, and you shouldn’t ever forget it. I’m a killer, trained to end lifespans. I enjoy ending some lifespans.”
“You didn’t enjoy ending Ada-972’s lifespan.”
No, he didn’t. He fraggin’ hated it, wanted to howl at the injustice of it. “This won’t be my last death. I’ll end more lifespans. I’m a killer.”
“Stop saying that.” She flung herself at him. He caught her. She wrapped her arms around his neck, hugging him to her. “You kill b
ut you’re not a killer. That’s not who you are.”
“That is who I am.” He would force her to accept that.
“You’re more than a killer and I’m more than a medic.” Tifara’s cheeks were wet with tears. “You cared for her. I did too. That’s why we did this.”
“I’m—”
“Tell me you didn’t care for her.” She gripped his face, forcing him to look at her. “Gaze into my eyes and tell me you didn’t care.”
He glared at her, unable to say that. Cyborgs couldn’t lie.
“You can’t tell me that.” Her eyes flashed with triumph. “Because you cared for Ada-972.” She stroked his skin with her soft fingers, her touching easing the knot that had formed in his gut.
His female wasn’t rejecting him, wasn’t ending their relationship. She accepted what he had to do and was seeking to comfort him.
“We did this together.” She leaned against him. “The two of us are a team, remember?”
“I will kill again.” He was a warrior.
“You’ll kill. I’ll lose patients.” His female nuzzled her head against his jaw. “We don’t have to carry these burdens by ourselves. We’re no longer alone. We have each other.”
Did she need his strength as much as he needed hers? Death threaded his fingers through Tifara’s curls, wishing to lose himself in those decadent strands, to escape from the harsh universe for a moment.
“What we did was necessary,” she mumbled into his neck.
“It was merciful,” he assured her.
“She didn’t feel any pain.”
Considering how many pain inhibitors she’d been injected with, that was unlikely but he didn’t know that for certain. “It was quick.” The projectile had struck her heart, stopping it.
“We should clean her.” Tifara straightened.
They worked together, ensuring there was no trace of any trauma. Tifara talked to the clone female as though she remained alive. They positioned her in a seated position, propping her against a rock. His female tidied Ada-972’s hair, tilted her face to look up at the constellations above them.
“Come.” Death held out his right hand. “They’re approaching.”
Menace’s tread was unusually heavy, his voice loud, the cyborg warning them.
“We said we wouldn’t allow her out of our sightlines,” Tifara whispered.
“We won’t.” He drew her into the shadows. “We can see her from here.”
He wrapped his arms around his lush female, holding her, savoring her musky scent, her gentle curves. She slanted her body toward his, her breathing ragged. His medic continued to grieve as they waited.
The sound of Menace’s stomping grew louder. Death’s lips twisted. The warrior must think him deaf. A human could hear him.
Ada-971 stepped into the moonlight. Menace followed closely. He turned his head, met Death’s gaze, nodded. Death nodded back.
“Ada-972, what are you doing outside?”
They had hidden the trauma too well. The clone female rushed toward her sister.
Tifara didn’t need to see Ada-971’s sorrow. Death scooped his female into his arms and carried her away from the entrance of the cave.
Ada-971 howled behind them, her grief twisting his stomach.
Tifara squirmed against him, sobbing quietly, the sound pulling at his big cyborg heart. Menace would comfort his female. Death had his own female to care for.
“It was a kindness, my female.” He murmured reassuring words into her hair and carried her up to a rock outcropping, sensing she didn’t want to return to the ship.
Death sat on the hard stone and cradled her in his lap, handling her as delicately as he was able, aware of how very precious this female was to him. Tifara cried, openly expressing the pain she felt, a pain he shared.
He envied her that release. A lifespan of hiding his true emotions didn’t allow him to purge them. They’d remain trapped inside his chest, to be harnessed during the next battle.
There would be a next battle. Mayhem hadn’t yet contacted them. The cyborg council’s chosen warriors would soon find them.
He’d fight and die. Death gazed up at the dark sky.
A meteoroid streaked across the blackness, burning into nothing.
No, not a meteoroid.
A spirit star collecting Ada-972’s spirit.
His friend was no longer damaged, in pain, trapped in a nonfunctioning body. She was free, would soon be assimilated into the nothingness, be part of whatever held the constellations together. She’d never be alone again.
She was at peace, happy.
As he was. Death glanced down at his beautiful female. The next planet rotation or the one following or perhaps the one after that would bring battle, killing, death, but this moment held serenity.
It held love.
Chapter Sixteen
Tifara opened her eyes. She sat in her cyborg’s lap, in the shade of a rock outcropping. When she’d fallen asleep, they had been sitting on top of it.
“We stayed here all rest period.” She stretched her arms and legs, her joints cracking in protest. “That couldn’t have been comfortable for you.”
“There’s no place I’d rather be.” His dark eyes glowed.
He turned her until she straddled him. The male was aroused. The ridge in his body armor pressed against her fabric-covered mons.
“We’re not fucking under a rock.” She shook her head. “I need a cleansing cloth.” Her skin was covered with a layer of sweat and grime.
“You need me.” Death captured her lips. She opened, allowing him inside her, savoring his metal and male taste.
Nanocybotics fizzed and popped, working constantly to repair the wear and tear of simply existing, ensuring she never had to worry about aging, infection, or even embarrassing sunrise breath.
She splayed her fingers over his scalp. The short strands of his hair were soft against her palms, a sharp contrast to the strong set of his chin.
At first glance, her cyborg appeared as unrelenting as his frame, but there was give in him, a caring in his soul he fought fiercely to conceal, a yearning in his eyes that she couldn’t resist.
He did what had to be done, no matter what the price was to himself, tolerating the pain quietly, without complaint, without tears.
Yet he hadn’t judged her for crying, for breaking down. He’d held her and comforted her and now he was kissing her.
She twined her tongue around his and sucked. Their gazes met and locked. She smiled, her lips moving against his.
His eyes glittered. He knew what she was communicating. Her smile was for him and him alone, her happiness due to her rough tough warrior.
They’d lost a friend, a special soul, but they still had each other. She wouldn’t hold back, wouldn’t hide what she felt, what she needed.
She rocked against him. He cupped her ass, kneading her curves, the sensual massage heating her all over. They taunted and teased each other, taking their passion to the brink and then pulling it back.
He plucked at the collar of her flight suit. She was tempted, so very tempted to relent, but the temperature was rising and she was still mostly human.
“No fucking under a rock.” She reluctantly drew away from him. Her hands, out of habit, lowered to her jacket’s pockets.
Except she no longer had a jacket.
“Where is that private viewscreen you modified for me?” She frowned.
“It’s back at the entrance of the cave.” He stood, lifted her over his right shoulder and she yelped. “And we’re not returning to retrieve it.” Her cyborg swatted her ass. “Not unless you want our breeding to have witnesses.”
“You’re a savage being.” She smacked his back. “Set me down.”
“If I was a savage being, we’d be breeding under a rock right now.” His stride was long, his pace fast.
Someone was in a hurry. She smiled, her heart light.
Her joy made no sense. They’d suffered a loss, were stuck on an inhospitable
planet, were running out of nutrition bars, had no pain inhibitors left.
But she was with him. Death cared about her. She knew he did. She didn’t require the words.
Though they’d be nice to hear.
“Death.” She would be brave, tell him how she felt first. “I—”
“Fraggin’ hole.” He stopped so abruptly; she almost toppled off his shoulder. His entire body stiffened.
“What is it?”
“Fate.” Death set her down on a sand dune.
“Fate?” Not this again. “We talked about this. You don’t believe in fate.”
“That’s too bad, little female, because fate believes in you.” A warrior dressed in black body armor stepped forward. Another warrior followed. They looked very similar except the first had brilliant blue eyes and the second’s eyes were brown.
They were both cyborgs, their model numbers starting with K inked on their cheeks, and they were both ready for battle, daggers twirling in their hands.
Neither of them was as impressive as her cyborg.
“She’s my little female.” Death stepped protectively in front of her, daggers in his hands also.
Shit. She’d left her gun at the cave. Tifara slid two daggers out of her cyborg’s back sheaths.
“We know she’s yours, warrior.” The second cyborg bumped his shoulders against his brethren’s. “We smell your scent all over her. But we were given a mission. Retrieve the medic from the battle station.”
“Imagine our surprise when she wasn’t there.” The first cyborg grinned. “It wasn’t a wasted trip.”
“No, it wasn’t.” The two males exchanged a heated look. “But we were given a mission and we plan to complete it.” Their attention returned to her. “The medic is coming with us. You can take up your grievance with the cyborg council.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you.” Tifara moved beside Death.
“Get behind me, you foolish female,” her cyborg barked. “They’re cyborgs. You’re human.”
“I realize that.” She rolled her eyes. “I see their model numbers. They don’t seem concerned about putting their cyborg brethren in peril.”
The brown-eyed warrior glared at his brethren. “I told you we should have covered our model numbers.”
