Peyton 313 (12 page)

Peyton laughed and swore as he raked porta-disks and rapid drives off his magnetized finger and onto the floor. It should be entertaining to hear what the easily irritated doctor would say when she saw the mess. He tossed back a metal pen she’d been using as a chew toy and congratulated himself when it landed in nearly the same place it had originally been.

“Oh well. Escaping was at least worth a full cyborg try,” Peyton said loudly.

Then he smiled up at the camera recording his every movement and winked as he pulled the already healing skin of his finger back over the metal still showing.

Chapter 8

Nero glanced at the single room sweeper turning rapidly on the counter next to him as he studied the video in silence. He waited for the color on the sweeper to change from red to green before speaking.

“This is very promising, Kyra. Peyton 313 prowls the cage restlessly and has already tried to escape more than once. His disrespectful, yet humorous attempts to anger you are what a normal person might do in his captive circumstances. You’d never identify the man as cyborg unless you saw him use his prosthetics to try and obtain the key.”

Nero restarted the video for a third time, watching the action again, including the man’s wink at the camera. Captain Elliot was pretty sharp for someone who’d had a good part of his brain rewired yesterday.

“I have Peyton’s general schematics, but the military aspects of his prosthetics were not in the original information I pulled on him. Since I left all his secondary chips in place,

“My military clearance was just renewed. I’ll pull Captain Elliott’s full file so we can have the details of everything that was done to him. Based on his irreverent wink at the camera, he’s handling his captivity fairly well. He probably had above average intelligence even before his cybernetic modifications.”

Kyra sighed and huffed. “Don’t let that Zen act of his fool you. Peyton’s been super angry off and on since he woke from the initial assimilation. I was distracted when I left the lab but I can’t believe I left the cage key just lying on the desk like that. He likes to torment me with sexual suggestions. I swear I don’t see any indications that his libido is leveling out at all. Do you think the pulse effect of a cyborg’s prosthetics might make him more interested in sex than the average man?”

Nero chuckled at the irritation in Kyra’s voice as well as at the odd question. “A cyborg with an amped up libido would be far too aggressive to constrain physically. I would venture that Captain Elliot’s testosterone level is probably the same as mine. However, the man has had ten wives, so chances are he’s been getting laid on a steadier basis than most. Could be he’s just having withdrawal. Or it could be that he really does have the hots for you, like his teasing indicates. I think you must consider both possibilities as equally feasible.”

Kyra rolled her eyes at Nero’s automatic support of another male. With the exception of her years with Jackson, she had been alone most of her life. Nero Khalid Bastion—child prodigy and now impressively handsome geek—was her longtime assistant. He had been assigned to her when the Cyber Soldier program was in full swing. He was twenty years her junior and technically young enough at thirty-two to be her child, even though she’d never thought of him that way. Instead, Nero was more like the younger sibling she’d never had, and often as annoying as people said such younger siblings were.

“Sure, Nero. All the cyborgs I rewire get the hots for me afterward. Unfortunately that passion tends to fade really fast once they realize I’m part of the reason they’ve been enslaved for years.”

Kyra had been trying for sarcasm and sighed when it came out sounding wistful. She winced at Nero’s chastising look. It was one he seemed to use often with her lately.

“Captain Elliot is not the typical cyborg you have been trying to restore. The other two were modified toward the end of the war, but Peyton 313’s design is one of the originals. Despite all his software upgrades, the core programs are likely still the original delta level he received because his unique prosthetics require them. That could easily explain why he rebelled against taking housekeeping orders from his wives. As a Marine Captain, he was programmed to be the giver of orders, not the receiver. I would love to see an EEG image of what happened in his brain every time he refused to do something. It would probably look like a pyrotechnical explosion inside a blast chamber.”

Kyra shook her head and laughed. “Wow. That’s quite a defense of a man you haven’t met in person yet. Are you seriously trying to hook me up with a guy who now hates me enough to want to kill me? I thought we were much better friends than that, Nero.”

Hearing her tone finally hit sarcasm level alleviated her nervousness about the subject matter. She never bothered filtering herself for Nero and had no intentions of starting. Instead, she walked calmly over to silence the dancing teakettle from its insistent screaming.

She loved the ancient artifact she had rescued from an antique store. Sure, there were easier and more efficient ways to boil water, but she preferred the old-fashioned ritual of heating it slowly in the device. Waiting the time it took gave her something to do while she calmed her mind.

Lifting the teakettle and its boiling contents, Kyra felt deeply satisfied as she poured steaming hot water over the powdered green tea she’d spooned into each cup. The bubbling froth promised both taste-bud delight and a little mental boost. As she stirred, she decided that it was definitely all the little rituals that made it a pleasure to be alive.

The only downside of her tea ritual today was that it, like nearly everything else, was making her feel even more guilty because Peyton Elliott had been blocked from this kind of enjoyment for years. Since his awareness of his past was growing, she was sure she was going to hear more about his deprivation before his assimilation was finished.

Nero glanced from his screen to Kyra’s blushing face. “I’m not encouraging you to do anything with the man. Actually, I think it’s a bad idea for you to get physically involved. I’m just warning you to be aware of probabilities given what I’ve heard so far.”

“Your concern is appreciated, but totally not necessary. I’m hardly the kind of high-end woman Captain Elliott is used to servicing. I’ve had no lifting or tucking work done at all. I guess I’m in fairly good shape for the most part, but you know I look every bit of my fifty-two years. I admit the man had me convinced he liked me before the assimilation. Sure, I never felt that conflicted with the other two cyborgs I bought, but that doesn’t mean I’m willing to forgo my scientific goals for a chance to sleep with a sexually trained cyborg. I’m not that desperate for companionship.”

Nero raised his head to look at her again. “You’re human, Kyra. And so is Captain Elliot. He’s just human
plus
. Isn’t that how you always describe the Cyber Soldiers? It would not have been a crime if something intimate between you had happened. Now you have made me curious. What exactly
did
happen between you two?”

Kyra shook her head. “Nothing happened. Or at least nothing important. Peyton can be very charming, that’s all. I didn’t let him get to me. His friendly manner just made me sincerely regretful to turn his cybernetic programming completely back on.”

Nero put his gaze back on the screen. “Maybe you should have let yourself live a little with the human part of him when it surfaced. Have you even let a man into your life since the asswipe died?”

“You know damn well there hasn’t been anyone since Jackson. It wouldn’t have been good for my cover story of why I needed to buy a Cyber Husband,” Kyra declared, sipping her tea. “Since we’re talking about our sex lives—how about you? Any good prospects lately?”

Nero shrugged. “There’s a new lab tech over in the prosthetics department that I had dinner with last week. She seems nice enough, but isn’t as sharp as I would like. We’re catching a movie at the Plex this weekend. I’ll know after that if she’s worth the trouble of sleeping with her.”

Kyra sighed in defeat. Nero’s man parts were hard-wired to his brain. She never knew whether to feel sorry for him or to admire that he was vastly different from men like Jackson. Her ex-husband had obviously thought happiness came with every piece of strange ass he conquered.

She carried the tea to Nero as she glared at his smirk. “Tell me you’re not taking that poor unsuspecting woman to see that awful gamer movie that just came out. I heard they decapitate nearly every character in it before the end.”

Grinning, Nero took the cup from Kyra and lifted it to his mouth for a sip. “Okay. I’m not taking her to the gamer movie.”

“Yes, you are. You’re lying to me, Nero. Your pupils are dilated and your pulse is jumping at your neck,” Kyra declared.

Nero laughed. “I’d be a happy man to find a woman half as sharp as you, Dr. Winters.”

Kyra huffed. “Right. You just want someone to be responsible for curbing your childish tendencies.”

Nero nodded and smiled. “Absolutely. Isn’t that what women are for?”

“No wonder you haven’t found someone to love you yet. No woman wants to mother the man in her life as well as his children.”

Nero grinned as he smoothly changed the subject. “The sweeper is running low on power so let’s get back to discussing Captain Elliot. When are you letting him out of the cage?”

Kyra took another sip. “Today—probably right after you leave. I was trying to wait until tomorrow, but. . .something is urging me to move this along quickly.”

“Today is a little soon, isn’t it? He’s still pretty angry at you.” Nero sipped his tea and watched Kyra over the edge of his cup.

“It can’t be helped. Just hours before he arrived, I turned down twenty million to go back to work in the cybernetics lab. They know I spent the last of my funds on Peyton. I expect the investigation to ramp up to the speed of a mag-train shortly.”

Nero’s eyebrows shot up. “
Twenty million?
That’s a hell of a lot of money to turn down, Kyra.”

“It wasn’t hard at all,” she said firmly. Kyra frowned and remembered how disgusted she had been by the offer. “The next time I set foot in that lab will be the last steps I take in this life.”

Nero set down his cup and put both hands over his ears. “I refuse to listen to your Mad Max plans. You know that shit deeply disturbs me.”

Kyra put down her cup and pulled Nero’s hands from his ears, gripping his fingers with hers.

“If anything happens to me, you’re the only one left who can change this. Copies of my research will be everywhere by then, but it would take the inexperienced scientists too long to come up to speed. They’ll need someone with your kind of brain to undo this mess, Nero. Jackson was the father of cyborgs, and I am their regretful mother. You may have to be their savior instead of me. Promise me you’ll try if it comes to that.”

Frowning, Nero used their linked hands to tug Kyra into his arms for a hug. The thought of something happening to her sickened him. “You know I’ll always carry on your work one way or the other. But I won’t have to if you stick around and do it yourself. Don’t do anything stupid, Kyra. That’s not your style.”

Kyra nodded against his shoulder. When had the dark-haired, dark-eyed teen she’d met morphed into the hard-muscled, chiseled-jawed man in her arms? She pulled back to look up at him. The product of planet conscious parents, he was an only child just as she had been. Nero’s father Rajesh was full Indian and a brilliant research doctor. His mother Althea was from Euro-Roman stock and a family that produced nothing but beautiful heirs. The boy had gotten the best of both his parents, but his father’s genetics had won out.

“I’m not going to do anything stupid. I’m just going to do what’s necessary. Now turn off the sweeper, Nero. I don’t need the UCN investigators showing up on my doorstep today. I still have to talk my restored cyborg into letting me fake seduce him.”

Nero pulled back to look down at her. “I half wish it wasn’t only pretending, and totally wish he wasn’t a cyborg. I would like to see you happy, Kyra.”

Shaking her head at the improbability of anything real ever happening between her and Peyton Elliott, Kyra pulled away. She didn’t need Nero to remind her about the seriousness of her situation. She thought of it each time she contemplated Peyton having to pretend to be her Cyber Husband. She counseled herself about the need for the deception as she carried both their empty tea cups to the sanitizer.

***

Peyton felt his processor shift his body to full alert when the lab door open. Kyra walked to her desk, picked up the forgotten key fob, and pointed it at the cage. The door of his prison slid to one side. He picked up the reading device and walked cautiously to the opening.

“I thought you said I’d get out tomorrow. Is this another test, Doc? You’re not going to start chanting codes again the minute I step across this threshold are you?”

“No. I’m letting you out early. You’ve shown no indications of mental illness outside normal ranges.” Kyra tossed the key fob back on the desk and sat in her chair. She swiveled it to face him instead of the console.

“Plus—I still have this.” She held up her wrist where his mobile restraint controller flashed the active and armed status every few seconds. “In case you have any ideas about being fast enough to stop me from using it, this one is my own tweaked version. The device is monitoring all my vitals and my stress levels. In case of my death, or even what it determines is a threat, such as a significant pause in my breathing, a failsafe command will send current running continuously through your restraints until I shut it off. The pain level has been specifically set to upper range cyborg levels so it will incapacitate you long enough for your apprehension. I can’t have the UCN killing every existing cyborg just because they think you went unexplainably rogue on me.”

“You know—you’re pretty sharp at strategic planning for a scientist. Think you’ve covered all the bases, Doc?”

Peyton paused at the open cage door and took a moment to look around the lab. It looked a little less intimidating without the bars blocking his vision. He looked back at Kyra and saw her shaking her head.