Cyborg Heat: A Science Fiction Cyborg Romance (Burning Metal Book 1)

by Lisa Lace

  “Hey there,” Keith greeted her. “Long day.”

  Heather nodded wearily and sipped from her cup, making a face at the taste of it. “Long day, and it’s not even close to being done yet.”

  He winced sympathetically. “I’m off in half an hour, but I’ve been here since it was still dark outside.”

  “At least the hard part’s over for you,” Heather pointed out. “Tell me why I keep drinking the swill down here?”

  Keith laughed at her. “Because there’s a modicum of caffeine in it, and you need it to keep going and not end up biting the head off of a doctor or patient?” he suggested. “Either that or it’s just habit after four years.”

  “Probably a combination of the two,” she allowed, resting her head on the table. “Just another six hours and then I can go home.”

  “How is it up there?” he asked. Keith worked in pediatrics, so he hardly ever had to deal with the chaos of the general part of the hospital.

  “Busy as heck. Same as always. Three dudes from a car crash came in earlier and it took about an hour and a half to get them stable. I just know there’s going to be another big thing before I get to go home. I can feel it in my bones.”

  “Mm, that might not have anything to do with patients,” Keith said, and Heather gave him a look. “Studly young doctor at seven o’clock.”

  Heather groaned and picked her head up just in time to see that yep, Dr. Woodward was making his way over to them. Apparently he was the best thing since sliced bread in neurology, and she had to admit that he was both young and studly.

  He was probably a couple of years older than Heather herself, which put him in the minority among the doctors here who were mostly all older men. His cheekbones looked like they had been sculpted on his face, and he had dark, wavy hair that fell in his eyes at the right angle to make him look carefree instead of messy. He had sparkling white teeth that he was always flashing in a smile, and he was tall and sturdy looking, making even his white lab coat look like something that a model might put on.

  Ordinarily she would have been happy that someone both attractive and smart wanted her attention, but there was just something about Woodward that rubbed her the wrong way.

  He was smiling widely as he came over, and she knew for a fact that he’d been on shift for as long as she had, if not longer. What did he have to be so happy about?

  “Afternoon, Dr. Woodward,” Keith said with a grin.

  “Nurse Thompson,” Woodward replied, nodding to him. “Nurse Sutter.”

  “Hey,” Heather said, giving a small smile. “Hi there.”

  Keith rolled his eyes, but Woodward wasn’t deterred. “How are you today? I hear it’s busy on the main floor.”

  “It’s always busy on the main floor,” Heather pointed out. Keith kicked her, and she sighed internally. “But yeah, it’s a mess up there right now. Car crash with multiple injuries and something else that has the ER packed. It’s going to be a long day.”

  Woodward’s smile didn’t dim. “Do you have plans for this weekend?”

  Heather bit down her lip to keep from saying something she would regret later. She was flattered...probably, but she just didn’t want to spend time with this man at all. He was too cheerful for one thing, and she just didn’t feel anything when she looked at him. Anything other than annoyance, at least. Luckily, she had a built in excuse for this kind of thing.

  “I’m actually working all weekend,” she said. “Hard to get a break in this line of work.” She shrugged. “Sorry.”

  But of course, he didn’t seem put off at all. “I understand!” he said, laughing. “This weekend is going to be my first break in almost two weeks, so I thought I’d spend it with someone special, but maybe next time.”

  “Sure, maybe,” Heather said.

  Across the cafeteria someone waved to Woodward and he excused himself and walked over to them, leaving Keith and Heather alone again.

  “You’re a crime against nature,” Keith said, leaning back in his chair and finishing off his coffee. “A man who looks like that comes up and asks you out and you can’t even give him the time of day?”

  “Hey,” Heather said indignantly. “I really do have to work all weekend.”

  “So you reschedule,” Keith pointed out. “Jesus, girl, it’s like you don’t want to get laid for the rest of the year. What’s wrong with Woodward?”

  Heather shrugged, not sure what to say to that. Her reasons for not liking him made sense in her head, but she didn’t want to say them out loud just to have Keith make fun of her for them, which she knew he would.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t want to get laid or be with someone, because she actually really did. She wanted to have someone in her life who understood her and cared about her, but it wasn’t that easy.

  She didn’t want to date someone from the hospital, she knew that much.

  All they would talk about was work and who’d died and who was a stubborn patient and who was making their job harder than it needed to be, and she didn’t want that. Heather dealt with it enough at work, and the last thing she wanted was to spend all her time with her significant other rehashing the harder parts of the job.

  She wanted someone who was going to take her mind off of all that. Someone who would be like a breath of fresh air after hours spent at the hospital.

  And yes, Dr. Woodward was hot, but that didn’t mean that he was going to be a good partner. That didn’t mean that he was going to understand that sometimes she got in a mood and didn’t want to talk or that sometimes she just needed to drive until she felt less like she was suffocating. Past experience had proved that very few people understood that, and she didn’t really want to put her romantic future in the hands of someone like Dr. Woodward.

  Plus, he really was just too cheerful.

  “He’s just not my type,” she said finally, shrugging one shoulder and draining the rest of her coffee in a few quick swallows. “Nothing against him, it’s just...yeah. He’s not my type.”

  “Oh, so handsome and successful isn’t good enough for you?”

  Heather rolled her eyes. “This is why I don’t talk to you about things. Anyway, I have to get back to work.”

  “I’m just saying,” Keith said as she got up from the table. “He probably has a six figure salary!”

  “Goodbye, Keith,” Heather replied, exasperation heavy in her voice.

  Six more hours and she could go home.

  Chapter 3: Desperation

  In six more hours, the sun would rise over their once proud town, and Sabin didn’t know that he was ready for it. Ironically, the night was the quietest time for them now, which went against everything they had learned about being under attack by the Nine before it had actually happened.

  They were supposed to move in darkness, quiet and unknowable, but in Sabin’s experience, most of the trouble happened in the day time.

  No one knew what the Nine did once the sun set on their corner of Samis, and no one wanted to stay up to find out. Hanging around outside now was probably close to a guaranteed death sentence, and with people already dropping left and right, no one was ready to walk willingly into their own deaths.

  At night, the town was empty and quiet, everyone behind their closed and locked doors. Windows barred, field generators up. What had once been a lively town, where music and light and food were staples of the night, was now a veritable ghost town once the sun went down, quiet as the void.

  It had been days since Sabin had spent these nights alone, though, and now was no exception.

  His bed was warm with Lilera’s naked body and his, and the two of them kissed and kissed and kissed in the darkness, the light from the field around his home seeping through the windows and casting an almost spectral glow to his sleeping room.

  She was under him now, her head pillowed on her arms and the pillows under them, her legs spread wide enough for Sabin to lie between them. She was face down, and not even trying to muffle the sounds of pleasure that wer
e spilling from her lips.

  Sabin swallowed hard and thrust into her deeper, sweat beading on his skin. He was bracing himself on his forearms, head dipped down and nose tucked into the crook of Lilera’s neck.

  Part of him wanted to be gentle with her, to show her that things didn’t have to be rough and hard even with everything that was happening, but he knew she didn’t want that. The first time he’d tried, she begged him to do it harder, faster, and she hadn’t reached her completion until he was pounding into her, the sound of their bodies meeting again and again loud in the otherwise quiet room.

  He’d felt bad about it, especially when she’d had finger shaped bruises on her hips the next morning, but she’d been more clear eyed than he’d seen her since she’d been forced to kill her father, so clearly she’d gotten whatever it was she’d been hoping to get out of it.

  Every night since then it had been the same thing. The position changed sometimes (her in his lap riding him, her on all fours, her bent over the table in the sitting room, etc.), but it was always the same near frantic pace.

  And Sabin couldn’t deny that it was good. It felt good and being able to release that tension after a long day of quelling the mad and burning the dead was therapeutic in a way he hadn’t expected. He still worried that he was going to hurt her, though.

  Samis Das females were built to take the might of their males, impressive length and girth included, and Sabin loved the way her body accommodated his. The way she got wet and slick and opened for him, hot and perfect to push himself deeply into her body.

  When she pushed back into his thrusts, he pushed forward harder, driving into her again and again. She seemed tighter from this angle, and he groaned low in his throat at the delicious friction that was building between them.

  “Creators, Lilera,” he gasped out, hips snapping forward over and over.

  “Sabin,” she moaned. “Yes. Just like that. Yes, yes, yes.”

  Her encouragement just spurred him to move faster, thrusting into her with deep, almost punishing strokes that made her moan and whine delightfully. As worried as he was about hurting her, he couldn’t deny that there was a part of him that loved this.

  It was an unorthodox form of stress relief, to be sure, but it seemed to work for them, and he assumed that was all that mattered.

  “Lilera,” he moaned into her ear, kissing at her neck and nipping at her earlobe with his teeth. He was so close, he could feel the orgasm building in the pit of his stomach. He didn’t want to stop or think at all. He wanted to keep pushing onward and inward until that heat built and erupted into a tide of pleasure. He wanted to keep pushing and pushing until Lilera went tight and hot around him, coming undone for him and only for him.

  “Please, please, please,” she panted, squirming under him, pressing back as much as she could.

  Sabin was a steadying weight on her, he was sure, keeping her pinned down to the bed, and he wondered if she liked it like that. If she craved being held down and held together as much as he wanted to do it for her.

  They panted and moaned and Sabin let out a noise that was closer to a growl than anything as he fell apart, coming so hard that he saw stars.

  He could tell from the way Lilera was crying out and shaking under him that she was coming as well, and they found their completion in each other.

  When it was over, they laid together in the bed, breathing hard, as their heartbeats began returning to their normal speed slowly but surely. For long minutes, neither of them said anything.

  It was always like this, and Sabin wasn’t sure why. There were plenty of things he wanted to say to Lilera. He wanted to tell her that she was the one bright spot in all this darkness and misery and that having her with him made fighting through each day worth it. He wanted to ask her if she felt the same way.

  Somehow, he didn’t think she did. She never really returned his gestures of affection, just slept and then got up the next morning ready to be efficient and strong.

  That was what was needed from them, after all. Strength. Efficiency. No new leader had been elected in the wake of Bristel’s death, but everyone seemed to continue to take it for granted that he and Lilera would lead them.

  Neither of them protested against that, either. They had what it took, and Sabin continued to fight where he could while Lilera organized the quarantines and the burning of the dead.

  In the dimness of the room, Sabin could hear the hum of the energy field outside and he could hear Lilera’s breathing and the way she shifted under the cover on the bed. She smelled like him. She smelled like sweat and sex and him, and he wanted to pull her close and do this the right way, but there was never enough time for that.

  In the distance, the screaming started.

  Lilera sat up in bed, eyes wide. “What is that?” she asked.

  Sabin didn’t know, but he was pretty sure whatever it was meant he wasn’t going to be going to sleep that night. He tossed the covers off of himself and grabbed his clothes. He was always in uniform these days since there was some crisis that he had to attend to.

  Lilera walked to the window, still bare of her own clothing, and her lovely body was illuminated by the glow of the energy field. She was strong and gorgeous, but this wasn’t the time for that.

  Sabin tore his eyes away from her and pulled on his pants, doing up the buttons before he tugged his shirt over his head.

  “There’s a fire,” Lilera breathed. “The quarantine is on fire.”

  There was no emotion in her voice, and Sabin turned to look at her while he strapped on his weapons. “What?”

  She nodded. “It’s burning, Sabin. And the fire is spreading.” When she turned to look at him, he could see the hopelessness in her eyes, and he wanted to take her into his arms more than ever, but they had to act.

  But what could they do? They were fighting a losing battle and more than anything else, they were fighting against thin air for all the good fighting was doing them. They were mostly killing each other and dying off by the hundreds because of it, and there wasn’t anything to be done. After all the time that the Nine had been there, driving them to this, no one had seen them. No one had come any closer to knowing where they were hiding or what to do about them.

  There wasn’t anything they could do. Sabin saw that clearly now. If they stayed here, the only thing that would happen was their extermination.

  It would just continue and get worse until they were all dead and then the Nine would move on to some other group, some other race or clan, and do the same thing to them until there was nothing left on this planet but them.

  And for what? Sabin was no closer to guessing their motives than he had been before, and he had no idea what he was supposed to do. People were looking to him for answers and guidance, Lilera was looking to him like she expected him to have some solution, but he had no idea how to fix this or even if it could be fixed. In his mind, there was only one option.

  “We have to leave,” he said.

  “No,” Lilera replied, shaking her head. “I don’t think the fire will spread this far up. We just need to go put out the flames.”

  Sabin made an impatient noise. “Why?” he asked.

  “What do you mean why? Do you want the whole town to go up in flames, Sabin? We can’t just sit here and do nothing!”

  “There will just be another fire, Lilera,” Sabin told her. “There will always be another fire, another person gone mad, and more sick. Don’t you see that yet? There’s nothing we can do. They’ve won. They won the moment they stepped foot onto this planet. We can’t see them, we can’t fight them, we can only wait to die and watch as everyone else dies around us. Or worse, we have to kill them ourselves and know that it could happen to us. What’s the point here?”

  She looked taken aback by his words, and she licked her lips. “This is our home, Sabin. What can we do but defend it?”

  “We can leave,” he said. “We can go somewhere else. We can find a new home. As long as we’re alive, we can
keep our people going, but at this rate…” Sabin trailed off and shook his head. “I don’t see how we’re going to survive for much longer.”

  It wasn’t their way, he knew that. The Samis Das weren’t compared to stones for nothing. They always stood firm in the face of anything that was thrown against them. They fought until their last breath and always had done. Their very way of life was built on the principle that they were warriors to the last breath, but in that moment, Sabin didn’t care about that.

  He didn’t care what others who had come before them had done. None of that was going to help them now. What he was concerned with was keeping them alive now, and for that to happen, they had to leave. They had to beat a tactical retreat.

  “Sabin…” Lilera shook her head, backing away from him. As the daughter of someone who had risen to the title of Leader of their clan, Lilera was dedicated to the way things were, and Sabin understood that. He knew this was going to be hard for her to take, but he had to make her understand.

  “Lilera, I don’t want to die,” Sabin said. “And I don’t want you to die. I don’t want it to come to the point where we have to kill more of our friends, our family. I don’t want it to come to the point where I have to kill you or you have to kill me. I just want to be safe. I want things to be alright, and that’s never going to happen as long as we stay here. You know that as well as I do.”

  She turned away from him, wrapping her arms around herself. Silence reigned in the room, and Sabin felt like he was holding his breath waiting for her to say something.

  “Alright,” she said softly after a long moment. “Alright. I know you’re right. I think...I think I’ve always know it would come to this. We need to mobilize the people, but how do we do that? How do we know who’s safe to take?”

  “We move quickly and quietly,” Sabin said, snapping into command mode. “Anyone who has the madness won’t be able to hide it for long. We just need to do this in an orderly fashion. Chaos will only make things worse.”

  Lilera nodded. “Where do we start, then?”