Marcus 582: Book Three of Cyborgs: Mankind Redefined (17 page)

“You got that right,” King said. “Move it, Queenie. They’re getting too far ahead of us.”

“If you keep calling me that, I’m going to forget how strong you are and kick your ass anyway,” Peyton declared.

King chuckled and followed him through the opening. At the end of the first tunnel, it branched off to several. Peyton eyed all the directions. “The left one has unswept floors and looks like it hasn’t seen much use. King, you and Eric head down the middle. Vincent, Steve, and I will take the right. Watch yourselves. Our private communication is throttled down here. Use the com radios Eric made to keep in touch.”

***

Rachel glared at the food the two muscle guys had brought to her. She was starved but afraid to eat. Brad had regularly drugged her food and she hadn’t forgotten the shock of waking to find herself naked with him.

When her white-coated torturer came to get her for whatever he planned to do to her later, she wanted to be fully capable of fighting until he took that power away. She would struggle for herself and for Marcus. She would do it for Seetha who had survived her own hell. She’d do it for people like William Talon, who had been turned into a customized killer at the hands of someone like her tormentor.

And while she waited for her fate, she would pray to the Goddess that her mind would eventually break through whatever they did to her and do something exceedingly bad to the doctor. She had given up wanting to remain human and now aspired to be more like the female cyborg Kyra and Peyton kept locked away. She hoped she went rogue on their asses and took them all out.

“Better eat while you can,” muscle guy one told her.

“Not hungry,” she reported.

“It will make things easier for you,” he said, receiving a slap from muscle guy two for giving his unsolicited advice.

Rachel sighed. “How can you two help him do this to me?”

“Because he did
this
to us,” muscle guy two bragged, flexing for her benefit. “Look at how amazing we are.”

“Amazing?” Rachel exclaimed. “You’re two bullies working as some mad scientist’s thugs.”

When the door opened, she expected to see the doctor in his white coat. Instead, it was worse. An angry Nathan came through the door.

“Did these guys touch you?” he demanded.

Rachel snorted and glared. “No. But I’m sure they’re going to get their turn eventually. Brad didn’t have a problem passing me around when it suited him.”

Nathan frowned. “I would never do that to my companion. I wrote your code. You’re going to be special to me.”

Rachel shook her head and looked away. “No, I’m not. I’m going to be a robot girlfriend you had to force into having sex with you. But my mind will break free eventually, Nathan. It broke through Brad’s code. It will break through yours…or any other crazy scientist’s. Some humans have more will than others. I have a lot.”

“Creator Omega said it wouldn’t happen this time.”

Rachel snorted. “Yes, well, I’ve seen a lot of cyborgs pass through the lab where I work. Nearly all of them were breaking free of their programming in one way or the other. One day, all this programming craziness is going to implode on those doing it. Your Creator Omega is going to face the same fate Jackson Channing did. One of his creations is going to get even just like Dr. Channing’s customized Cyber Wife did with him.”

Nathan rubbed a hand over his head. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this, Rachel. I let you bump into me in the hall. I did that on purpose. You were supposed to like me. I researched you when you were in college and made myself into the type of guy you liked to date. I tried to be nice in every way I could. I knew you didn’t like being a cyborg. That’s why I pretended to hate them. But customized cybernetics are the future. You don’t have to get everything replaced to be better. You can be like us. We are the new evolution.”

Rachel watched him wave between him and the muscle guys. “Do you think your intelligence or your muscles are impressive? Without a kind heart, you’re just bullies and villains who are too stupid to know it. And no matter what you do to me, you’ll have to live knowing I willingly chose a real cyborg over you as a boyfriend. Marcus might not be completely human, but he would never, ever hurt me.”

“We killed your guard dog cyborg. He’s gone, so there’s no use talking about someone you will never see again,” Nathan declared.

Angry at his declaration, Rachel tapped her chest. “Marcus will never be gone so long as my body breathes. He lives in here, in my humanity, in my heart. He was my choice as a lover and I will not forget him.
You
—I will always hate—
always
. Stick that in your advanced neural implant and process it because it is a profound truth. You might do to me what was done to those other women, but inside I will still be the same Rachel Logan who hates you. And no matter how smart or physically fit you get, inside you’ll always be a desperate asshole who abuses females.”

“You don’t understand. This is the future. It’s a better life. People can be anything they want. They can have the customized life partner they need,” Nathan yelled.

He shook off the grabbing hands of the laughing muscle guys guarding her. They always seemed amused at him. One day when he took Creator Omega’s place, he was going to wipe that amusement completely away. Then he’d see how funny they found him.

Rachel snorted and glared. “When they finally find me, Kyra Winters is going to do to you guys what she did to Evil Brad. I just hope I have the sentience to enjoy it when it happens.”

Furious with her, Nathan slammed his hands on the still humming bars. When he yelped in pain, the muscle guys laughed and grabbed him on either side. They literally dragged him through the door while he yelled at them to let him go.

Moments later the muscle guys came back. Both were smiling at her and chuckling. Rachel crossed her arms and glared at them like she had at Nathan.

Then they both lost interest in her. One held up a familiar remote to show the other.

“What did you do? Did you steal that from Creator Omega?” she heard muscle guy one ask the other.

“No,” the second one brandishing the remote answered. “I stole it from whiny ass when it fell from his pocket. I guess Creator Omega offered him access to the girls because he was in such a funk when he got here. Fool got hung-over last night and didn’t make it back here. Now he’s all pissy over it.”

Rachel watched as he pressed the remote. The women woke and stretched their limbs, mildly groaning with their efforts. The muscle guys leered as the women sat up and swung their shapely legs over the side.

A piercing alarm split the air over their heads, taking their leering attention away from the women. Before she could blink, both muscle guys rushed out the door.

Was that alarm her rescuers?
She fervently hoped so.

The women on the table suddenly turned to look at her. Their expressions were serene and unreadable. “If you’re waiting for directions about something to do, get me out of this cage,” Rachel ordered.

To her complete shock, each woman slid lightly to the floor and walked toward the cage. One moved to the wall and punched a code into a panel that stopped the bars from humming. The other punched a code on the cage door and it slid instantly open.

Continued shock held her in its grip for a few moments more, and then it galvanized her into taking the only chance she was apt to get to escape. Rachel racked her brain as she stepped free.
What was it the doctor had said to them?

“Come with me Companions. I require entertaining,” Rachel ordered.

She saw them blink rapidly and turn to face the lab door.

Rachel snuck past them and opened the door a crack. She saw no one in either direction. She held the door open and let the women walk by her. Looking back, she saw their controller remote lying on the floor where the over-anxious muscle guy had dropped it.

She picked it up and headed out behind them emerging into some sort of underground tunnel.

“Take us to the nearest exit to the outside of this building,” she commanded.

The two women marched forward in their tall-heeled shoes, never wobbling once.

***

Kyra sighed nervously. She and Nero were in her lab at the house because she hadn’t wanted to do the repairs on Marcus at Norton where they would have to be recorded. She hadn’t done Edward’s there either. She and Peyton had agreed they needed to keep this newest challenge to themselves.

Kyra held the newly formatted logic chip in her hand. “How much were you able to save?”

Nero shrugged. “What was left of the one you pulled was too unreadable to do a proper calculation. I scraped bits and pieces of data and overlaid those onto a copy of the logic chip we customized for the original cyborgs. I don’t know what percentage was on the chip that fried, but I can tell you the number I managed to transfer if you want the information.”

“No, it doesn’t matter.” Kyra sighed in resignation. “We did all we could to recover it. If this is our best shot, so be it.”

Nero reached out and stopped her before she inserted the new chip into Marcus. “I kept records of all of Peyton’s team. All other logic chips were based off theirs. I had an exact copy of what we had given Marcus originally. What I transferred should snap right in and feel natural to him. Maybe those bits will be enough to boost memories from his human side.”

Kyra nodded. “I really want to believe that.”

“Then do so,” Nero urged. He pulled his hand away. “Now you may insert it. We are in the right frame of mind and our spirits are in agreement.”

Kyra laughed. “Back to doing energy work, I see.”

“You could use more spiritual practice, Kyra. It might soothe that warrior soul the UCN has awakened in you. It is unhealthy to be so focused on conflict all the time.”

Kyra snorted as the chip snapped into place. Her gut churned. She cared too much. Her objectivity was shit. Working on Marcus was as bad as working on Peyton.

“It’s hard to be anything but anxious, especially now that I know someone is hacking my code so successfully. If I hadn’t watched Jackson being cremated, I would swear he was back from the dead. Creator Omega has come closer to creating a new source code than anyone else. He makes Brad look like a kindergarten coder.”

Nero nodded. “I agree the news is disturbing.” He stared at Kyra. “Would you like me to execute the reboot?”

“No,” Kyra said softly. “I’ll do it.”

She touched her insertion tool to the processor switch. Power surged through Marcus’s body. Kyra and Nero both stepped back. His furious yell as he came to consciousness broke the silence.

Marcus glared at Kyra. “Why am I in your chair, Doc? What are you doing to me?”

Kyra bit her lip and stepped forward. “Ten more minutes and I’ll release you. There was an attack on you…”

“Rachel…where is she? Is she okay?” His glare deepened. “No. She isn’t okay. The geek took her.”

“Right on all accounts,” Kyra declared. “Peyton took the guys and went to get her.”

Marcus closed his eyes. “There was…someone else…I can’t remember.”

“Lieutenant Jensen,” Kyra supplied as she closed his panel. She watched Marcus shake his head, obviously not recalling. “He’s a friend of Rachel’s. He was there when you were attacked. He’s still being worked on, but he’ll be okay eventually. You were a lot worse off. Your logic chip got fried.”

“Let me go. I have to get to her before they hurt her,” Marcus declared.

“Six more minutes…then you can contact Peyton. We’ll do cognition testing when Rachel gets back.”

“Nathan…the geek’s name is Nathan,” Marcus declared.

“Good to see so much is returning. The geek is also a cyborg. Do you remember that?”

“No. Everything is scrambled…and hazy…but I remember Rachel,” Marcus said.

Kyra looked at Nero. “Well, he’s better than he was and seems to have kept the most important information.”

Nero nodded. “Perhaps his human memories will help him fill things in.”

Marcus let loose a frustrated sigh and brought their full attention to him. “It’s been five minutes and twenty seconds and I wish you’d stop talking about me over my head like I can’t hear you.”

Kyra laughed as she swiped the locks and deftly released the straps holding him in place. She stepped away when Marcus stood. He ran a hand over his face. “I feel…strange.”

“Most of your chips were salvageable so I left them. Disorientation will occur until your processor and logic chip are able to sync completely with the others. Normally, a day or two of downtime would make the process easier. I know better than to ask in this case. Can you wirelessly connect to Peyton yet?”

Marcus closed his eyes and tried with no luck. “I can’t reach him.”

Nero shook his head. “It depends on where they went and if they’re above ground to catch the satellite signal. Don’t worry yet. Set a repeating message to broadcast periodically while you do something else.”