Containing Malice, page 5
“Why am I doing this?” The female’s gaze lost focus. “Help as many as you can.”
What the frag did that mean? Was she helping him or helping the Humanoid Alliance?
He huffed.
Her attention returned to him, her gaze sharpening. “Someone should escape this horrible place.” Her smile didn’t reach her eyes. “And that someone won’t be me.”
“You’re not a captive.” He deleted that possibility from his processors. “You can escape at any time.”
She stroked the skin under her chin again. “I can escape at any time.” A tinge of humor lit her eyes, banishing the sadness there. “You’re right about that point.”
“I’m right about all points.” He took a step toward her.
Her reply, with its specific wording, had suggested that wasn’t the truth. It implied she was a captive.
That was a lie. His lips flattened. She had free range of movement, could enter his chamber whenever she wanted to torture him.
She gazed at him.
He looked back at her, not bothering to hide his disgust, his loathing of her and her kind.
She sighed, that sad sound pulling at a heart he should have long ago hardened to her manipulations. “Nothing I say will stop you from hating me, will it?”
Malice stared at her. Was that what she wanted—his forgiveness?
He wouldn’t ever give that to her. “I plan to fraggin’ kill you.” He couldn’t process why he was delaying that sure-to-be pleasurable act.
“Ahhh…” The medic’s expression brightened once more. “Hating me would make that easier to do.” She nodded, acting as though she had everything all figured out.
That made one being who’d accomplished that. His processors spun.
“Wait for a planet rotation to kill me.” She said that as though that decision was hers.
It wasn’t her decision. It was his. “If I wait for a planet rotation, I’ll be the being killed.”
She would ensure he never got another opportunity to damage her.
“You could be killed.” She surprised him with that admission. “I could be killed before we have an opportunity to see each other again. Neither of us is safe in this horrid place.”
There was a bleakness in her eyes he didn’t like.
It passed quickly from her countenance, like clouds racing across a sun, yet lingered with him, making him want to kill beings.
One of those beings should be her.
She angled her form toward his, acting as though he was her confidant, not her killer. “I vow to you”—her tone was deceptively earnest—“if we’re both still alive when the next rest cycle comes, I’ll return to your chamber and you can end my lifespan yourself.”
Malice lifted his eyebrows. “Why would I trust you to do that?”
She pursed her lips.
There was a pause.
Then that lush flesh curved into a smile.
“Trust me. Don’t trust me.” She shrugged. “My fate remains the same. It is only your fate you’re fucking with.”
How could her fate remain the same if one of the possibilities was she would die?
He frowned at her. “Your brain is malfunctioning.” Her lies were contradicting each other.
“It likely is malfunctioning.” She threw back her head and laughed, the sound of her mirth echoing in the chamber.
There was a wildness about his normally reserved medic this shift, a daring, a boldness.
It called to him, excited his primitive C Model nature, pushed him to trust her, his enemy, with his cock, his fate, everything.
His response to her wasn’t logical.
His brain and processors must be malfunctioning also.
“I’ll give you another decision to make, cyborg.” The blasted female compounded his damage by spreading her thighs wider. Her pussy glistened with wetness. The scent of her bombarded his nostrils, stroked along his shaft. “The time for talking is over. Either kill me or fuck me.”
He should kill her. There was a 99.5214 percent probability she was setting him up for some sick new kind of torture.
But he needed her. Badly. His big form ached with yearning.
And she was right there, slick and willing and oh-so-soft.
Malice strode toward her, his soul gripped by purpose, his body shaking with anticipation. Before he put his hands around her neck and squeezed, he would take her one more time.
He would breed with her with everything he had, venting his frustration, his anger, on her slender curves, coming inside her until he had nothing left.
That would end his fascination with the human female.
“My choice is both.” His gaze locked with hers. “I will fuck you and kill you.”
He clasped her hips, holding her in place, positioned himself at her tight little entrance, and slammed into her, burying himself up to his base in her wet heat.
“Yes.” His little medic shrieked her approval.
Fraggin’ hole. She was a formidable and enthralling foe.
But he would defeat her.
Chapter Five
Malice fucked her two more times. Vigorously.
Illona embraced the passion, the sweet agony, the rare connection with another being, with the cyborg she’d wanted for the past solar cycle and a half.
And she waited for him to kill her.
After the fourth fuck, he withdrew from her, paced around the perimeter of the space. The male was gloriously naked and moving quickly, his muscles rippling as he strode. If she had the opportunity, she would watch him all planet rotation. He was magnificent.
Judging by his expression, she wouldn’t be granted that gift. Her warrior’s face was dark. His lips were flat, grimly set. His eyes blazed with energy.
Her cyborg was angry…again, his fury building with each orbit of the chamber. When that rage boiled over, he would likely end her lifespan.
She should care about that, should try to save herself, but she couldn’t summon that energy.
Her pain was gone. That wasn’t the cause of her apathy. Her nosebleeds had stopped. She suspected the nanocybotics he’d relayed to her during their fucks were responsible for her healing, for her recovery. They bubbled and fizzed inside her.
It was her weariness of the solitude, the emotional and physical isolation that wore away at her. Medic Febris, her friend, would soon be dead. Malice hated her. She was tired, so fuckin’ tired of battling the Humanoid Alliance and the evilness of the universe alone.
Dying now wasn’t ideal. She wanted to down the transmission blocker before her lifespan ended, give her cyborg and his friend a better chance of escaping. That was one more thing she could do, one more way to help others.
But the timing of her demise wasn’t in her control.
Malice, the male with that responsibility, skidded to a stop. She braced herself for the end, for her death.
Her cyborg didn’t advance toward her. He tilted his head to the side, stepped closer to the door.
“Two humans are approaching the chamber.” He rushed across the space, moving faster than her eyes could follow, scooped her white jacket off the floor. “Wear this.” He tossed the garment to her.
She caught it, held the fabric against her form, stared at him. “You’re letting me go?”
“If you don’t return, I will hunt you down and kill you.” Her cyborg’s voice was devoid of emotion. “You’ll hurt before you die, Medic. Badly.”
He was releasing her. She would see Medic Febris, her friend, one more time, have another opportunity to help others, to help her cyborg and his friend, before her lifespan ended.
“Liquefy my brain.” She donned the jacket, was grateful Picton, that creep, wouldn’t see her completely naked. “Don’t allow them to bring me back from the dead.”
That was her worst fear—that she would become a participant in that Humanoid Alliance experiment, spend countless moments in excruciating pain, be forced to do their bidding, killing and harming others.
Malice looked at her. His forehead furrowed with thought lines. He opened his mouth, then closed it again.
The door opened. Bonin, the youngest guard, stood on the threshold and gawked at them.
A second guard, Nelson was positioned in the hallway, behind the male.
Picton must have believed having another being find what was left of her body would shield him from any reprimand from the Humanoid Alliance.
He would seek to kill her once he found out she survived the rest cycle.
“Medic Illona, I didn’t expect to see you here this early.” Bonin’s gaze lowered to her bare legs and his disbelieving gape turned into a lecherous leer.
She held back a shudder.
Malice rumbled. That sound was thrillingly ominous.
The guard’s gaze snapped to the cyborg. He placed one of his palms on his reprimand stick. He glanced at the monitoring device. It remained deactivated. His gaze returned to her.
Her possible contagious state stopped Picton from touching her. It didn’t appear to deter the young male.
Fuck. She had to get away from him before he acted on that bulge in his uniform.
And before Malice killed him. His growling grew louder.
She not-so-casually brushed against her cyborg as she hurried toward the exit.
He shuddered. His rumbling stopped.
She quashed the smile lifting her lips, hiding her smug satisfaction behind a serene facade. Her cyborg might hate her, might be planning to kill her, but he also wanted her.
As badly as she wanted him. They might have another fuck if she survived her next mission.
And if she could leave the chamber.
Bonin stood in her way, blocking the exit. “You—”
“I handled the situation.” She glared at the guard, feigning indignation. “You’re welcome. Now step aside. I have to log this shift’s developments with the Humanoid Alliance before they open an inquiry. We do not want that to happen.”
“No, we don’t want that to happen.” The male moved to the left. “But—”
She rushed along the hallways, not wanting to hear what he had to say. Bonin would likely take out his frustration with her on Malice. That guilt jabbed at her. But deactivating the transmission blocker was her first priority and the cyborgs’ best chance at escaping.
The Resurrected flung themselves against the portals as she passed their chamber. That shook her. Their pain was palpable, unnerving. She pushed away those unsettled feelings and walked faster.
Despite Malice’s hard usage of her, she felt good. The chill inside her had been banished. Her head was clear. Her thoughts weren’t muddled.
She’d need a functioning brain if she and Medic Febris were to successfully accomplish their mission. One mistake would kill them both and make their efforts meaningless.
Illona entered her private chambers, tidied her form and her medic jacket, then donned a new flight suit and her jacket. Remnants of the rest cycle remained with her. She tingled all over with Malice’s nanocybotics. They hadn’t faded.
That must have been a side effect of the formula she’d injected into him.
She gathered all the tools and devices she might need, stuffed those in her pockets. Then she grabbed a handheld and accessed the monitoring equipment in the chamber and hallways she had to enter. She used Picton’s authorization codes.
His beatings of test subjects weren’t publicly sanctioned by the Humanoid Alliance, but they were tolerated…as long as he disabled the monitoring equipment first. He did that so often they might not investigate the additional disruptions for a couple planet rotations.
They might not do that. The Humanoid Alliance could uncover her deeds immediately.
She could die during her self-appointed assignment. Illona touched her lips. They were plumped from Malice’s kisses. He was a male without equal, had endured too many solar cycles of torment. If there was any possibility she could free him, she had to take it.
The hallways were sparsely occupied as she navigated them. The few beings she saw paid no attention to her and they didn’t notice the deactivated monitoring equipment. They were too wrapped up in their own problems, their own agony.
Medic Febris waited for her outside an unmarked door. Her friend leaned against the wall. Her too-thin form trembled. Bits of a cleaning cloth were stuffed into her nostrils.
Illona’s heart squeezed. Her friend must be in tremendous pain.
The female looked at the monitoring equipment fixed to the ceiling above the door. “You came.”
“I said I’d be here.” She didn’t share how a certain cyborg could have prevented that from happening. Her friend had enough trials of her own. “You don’t have to do this.” Illona gently grasped one of Medic Febris’ shoulders. “There might be a cure.”
Malice’s enhanced nanocybotics had healed her. They might heal her friend also.
“That cure won’t give me absolution. It won’t undo the damage I’ve done.” Medic Febris pressed her shoulder against Illona’s palm. They were all starved for touch, for caring. “If I’m cured, I’ll be forced to hurt more beings. I want this to end, Medic Illona. I want my last act to be healing someone.” Her smile held a universe of sadness in it. “That isn’t possible, unfortunately. The Humanoid Alliance isn’t interested in healing others. But I can do this. I can make this one sacrifice for another being.”
Medic Febris’ words echoed Illona’s thoughts. “You made a difference in this universe…to me.” A swell of love swept over her, chased by regret. Their friendship, kinship, would soon end. “I wouldn’t have survived this long without you. I look forward to our brief conversations in the hallways. I live for one of your grins.”
The grin her friend gave her was strained. “I feel like a medic when I’m with you.”
“You are a medic.” Illona hugged her. “And you and I will save two more beings before we die. We won’t heal them.” Someone else would tend to Malice’s emotional wounds. Regret filled her. She would have liked to witness that healing, to see her cyborg happy and whole. “But we will set them free, allowing others to do that task.”
“You might survive this.” Her friend hugged her back.
“I won’t survive this.” She drew away from the female. “I’ll live a mere shift or two longer than you do…if we’re fortunate.” Both Malice and the Humanoid Alliance wanted to kill her. “And I’ll require every one of those moments if we are to liberate them.”
“Then we do this now.” Medic Febris turned toward the door.
“We do this now.” Illona nodded.
Her friend lifted one shaky hand, pressed her palm against the control panel.
The door opened. Medic Febris entered the space first. Illona followed her. The door closed behind them.
No one was inside the chamber…as she had suspected. The lab was operated mostly by the machines lining the walls. They and other beings were watched by the Humanoid Alliance through the monitoring equipment.
The surveillance devices inside the space had also been deactivated. It had taken her almost a solar cycle to collect the information needed to access their captors’ systems, to teach herself how to breach their security.
That type of technology was regretfully not her strength. She was a medic, was skilled at healing, not hacking into programs. Everything she now knew had been stealthily self-taught.
“I thought this would be more dramatic.” Medic Febris sighed as she sank into a chair. “Alarms would sound and males with big guns would barge into the chamber.”
“Once the Humanoid Alliance figures out what we’ve done, we’ll have plenty of excitement.” Illona smiled and reached into a pocket of her jacket, extracted four small containers. “These are pain inhibitors.” She placed them in her friend’s pockets. “Inject yourself with at least one every half a shift. Take more if they’re needed.”
“I’ll be higher than a battle station.” Medic Febris summoned a smile. “Did you save some for yourself?”
She saved none for herself. Pain inhibitors were difficult to obtain. She’d hoarded the meager supply she’d given the female. “I’m injecting you with a container now.” She pulled out an already-loaded injector gun. “Lower your jacket.”
Medic Febris complied with her order, baring her bony shoulder. “You should be focusing on deactivating the transmission blocker, not worrying about me.”
“You’re my friend.” Illona’s voice was gruff with emotion. “I’ll always worry about you.” She injected the female with pain inhibitors.
“Ahhh…yes. That’s the good stuff.” Medic Febris’ face softened. The lines around her lips dissipated.
“Use the rest on yourself.” Illona placed the injector gun back in her pocket, pulled out a pair of hand coverings. “Don’t give them to your test subjects.”
She immediately regretted saying that. Her friend’s expression became stricken. “They’re in such pain.” Medic Febris had been assigned to the horrific resurrection experiment. “But the inhibitors won’t help them. That’s where I wasted my meager supply, and it did nothing for them, didn’t impact them at all. Nothing will help them…except death.”
“Sometimes there is nothing that can be done.” Illona had learned that while healing on the battlefields. Not every patient could be saved.
But some could be saved, could be freed.
Intent on helping those beings, she donned her hand coverings. The fabric should be thick enough to conceal her fingerprints.
It might take more time for the Humanoid Alliance to figure out she had also entered the chamber. That could give her additional moments of life, additional time to assist Malice and his friend.
She might fuck her cyborg one more time.
“I considered blowing up the lab.” Medic Febris made that surprising confession. Her friend’s words were slightly slurred. “That’s the only thing that would prevent the Humanoid Alliance from resurrecting my test subjects again. But I couldn’t do it.” Her shoulders slumped. “I don’t have it in me to intentionally kill any being.”
“You’re a medic, not a warrior.” Illona didn’t have the emotional strength to kill either. She accessed the transmission-blocking system, entering the password she’d uncovered. It worked. She exhaled heavily. “I suspect the beings we’re helping will level the structure.”
