Titanium (Bionics) (14 page)
Read Titanium (Bionics) Online
Authors: Alicia Michaels
Dax
seems to consider this for a moment, watching me through narrowed eyes as if he’s trying to figure me out. “You’re right,” he says slowly. “I don’t like you.”
Silence follows and I roll my eyes, scoffing out loud at the idea that I could try to make
nice with this jerk. It was a dumbass thing to do.
Dax’s
laughter is unexpected and my head whips around at the sound. I find him looking at me, his shoulders and chest shaking with humor. The tension melts from my limbs and I laugh as well.
“Now that we got that out of the way,”
Dax says, once the laughter has passed. “I don’t trust you and I’m not shy about admitting that. I think there are things you aren’t telling us, things that could affect us all in the long run. You have to understand that the Professor is like the father I never had, and these people here, the Bionics, are like his children. I won’t let anyone, not even you, fuck with that. You don’t like me, I can tell. But like each other or not, we do make a pretty good team. You’re a quick thinker and you’ve got big balls of steel. That, I do like about you. So I agree, let’s do what we have to do without letting the other stuff get in the way. This is about the Resistance. It’s bigger than us, you know?”
“Yeah,” I say with a slow nod
, deciding that I might not dislike Dax as much as I thought.
The nurse comes back in with her assistant and each of
them takes a place beside us. The other nurse quickly removes the armor from my left arm and rolls up my sleeve like the other nurse did Dax. Moving as one, the two nurses clean us with alcohol swabs and tie off our arms with a tourniquet, each searching for a good vein. Again, as one, they lift their syringes from the silver tray between them, careful to ensure that they each have the right one. My nurse pauses, needle poised inches above my skin.
“Ready?” she asks as the other nurse asks
Dax the same.
“Just get it over with
; I hate needles,” Dax says, his voice a bit edgy.
“Oh, come on, you can do this,” I encourage him. “We’re doing this for the Resistance.”
“For the Resistance,” Dax agrees as he turns back to his nurse. “Do it.”
The prick of the needle is nothing compared to what follows. Tiny pinpoints of light flood my vision before melting into swirls of color as pain explodes like fire in my veins. My entire body goes tense and spasms uncontrollably as if I’m having a seizure. I writhe and grit my teeth to keep from screaming
. Even if I did scream I doubt anyone would hear me over Dax’s enraged bellows as the transformation grips him. I am soon to follow and the pop and snap of bones realigning in my face is unlike anything I’ve ever felt. What feels like hours is really only a few minutes by the time the pain ceases. The burning in my veins slowly subsides into a slow tingle, a side effect we were warned would occur but would only last for a little while.
The tingle feels good, like a flood of extra adrenaline in my veins, rushing from my head to my toes. As the nurse releases me from the table by unbuckling the straps holding me down, I leap to the floor, energized and ready to go.
Dax does the same. When I look at him, I am stunned by what I am seeing. He has been transformed into a Caucasian man in his mid-thirties. Green eyes stare at me from beneath brown eyebrows, and much thinner lips curl into a smile.
“Sergeant Grayson Barnes, at your service, Captain,” he says with a laugh.
Even his voice sounds different, its pitch higher. The Dax I know is gone. “Dude, you look like you’re going to be sick.”
“It’s just so weird,” I say, tilting my head and staring into the unfamiliar eyes. “I know it’s you, but my mind is telling me you’re someone else. This is crazy.”
“Me?” Dax laughs and points at the mirror behind me on the wall. “Take a look at yourself, bro.”
I turn slowly, my shoulders stiff with tension. I know that I will not se
e my own reflection but I am unprepared for what meets me in the mirror. The face staring back at me is not my own.
Ever since she first read books like
Chronicles of Narnia
or
Goosebumps
, Alicia has been a lover of mind-bending fiction. Wherever imagination takes her, she is more than happy to call that place her home. The mother of two and wife to an Army sergeant loves chocolate, coffee, and of course good books. When not writing, you can usually find her with her nose in a book, shopping for shoes and fabulous jewelry, or spending time with her loving family.
Alicia can be found on the web at any of the following links:
www.facebook.com/fantasybyalicia
www.goodreads.com/alicia_michaels
Follow her at Twitter: @
fantasybyalicia
Titanium
The Bionics Series Part #2
Daughter of the Red Dawn
The Lost Kingdom of Fallada Book #1
Child of the Sacred Earth
The Lost Kingdom of
Fallada Book #2
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By: Award Winning and Best Selling Author, Jon Messenger!
Between the alien Alliance and the Terran Empire, a neutral zone stretches between the galaxies, a demilitarized zone that was established 150 years previous, following the Great War. The peace accord granted a semblance of peace to the universe. The peace, however, is a facade, and it is the responsibility of Michael Vance and his covert operations team to maintain that illusion.
Recently, the Alliance lost contact with one of their outposts near the neutral zone. Surveillance scans show an abandoned city and no signs of life. The Alliance does what it always does: send in the best. But an unexpected betrayal leaves Vance and his team stranded. Worse, the city that was supposed to be dead is quite alive. And the monsters that now roam its streets are slaughtering his team, one at a time.
Between the alien Alliance and the
Terran Empire, a neutral zone stretches between the galaxies, a demilitarized zone that was established 150 years previous, following the Great War. The peace accord granted a semblance of peace to the universe. The peace, however, is a facade, and it is the responsibility of Michael Vance and his covert operations team to maintain that illusion.
Recently, the Alliance lost contact with one of their outposts near the neutral zone. Surveillance scans show an abandoned city and no signs of life. The Alliance does what it always does: send in the best. But an unexpected betrayal leaves Vance and his team stranded. Worse, the city that was supposed to be dead is quite alive. And the monsters that now roam its streets are slaughtering his team, one at a time.
One-by-one, the brilliant suns of Alliance space are disappearing, left cold and lifeless after exposure to the
Terran biological epidemic. Trapped on one of the sunless worlds, Keryn Riddell, the ruthless Wyndgaart warrior, fights against both a frozen landscape and her Terran captors.