Cyborg (26 page)

She was more glad than she would ever have imagined when she finally woke from an exhausted sleep some time later to discover that Cain had gone. Feeling vaguely ill, she’d climbed from the bed and moved to the mirror to study herself, but she couldn’t tell that her belly was any bigger than it had been the last time she’d noticed.

She covered her face with her hands, realizing she’d been lying to herself so long that she simply couldn’t face the truth. No solution was going to come to her whether she worried it over in her mind constantly, or tried to ignore the problem by pushing it to the back of her mind as she’d been doing for weeks now. There
was
no out. She could feel the child move.

She didn’t remember nearly as much about her mother’s later pregnancies as she needed to know, but she did know that she was well beyond termination. Whatever she did now, she would be risking her own life as well as the child’s.

But didn’t she owe it to the child to do her best for it? Why should it have to suffer because she was a coward? Her own life was certainly no more valuable than the child’s.She cupped a hand over her belly when she felt a slight flutter, as if the child had heard her thoughts and was responding. What would the cyborgs do if it wasn’t normal?

Would they be as repelled as her own kind were? More repelled? Despite their human side, logic ruled them. Would they decide it was best to terminate it on the spot?

What would the child want? Would it want life anyway? Or would it spend much of its life hating--hating itself for being malformed; hating her for bringing it into world; hating everyone else for the horror it saw in their eyes whenever they looked at it?

She hadn’t. There had been times when she’d thought she did. There’d been times when she’d felt like she hated the whole universe, but her parents had loved her, and her brothers and sisters had accepted her and loved her.

She moved back to the bed after a while and sat down to try to think calmly. Was she just being paranoid? Was she just frightening herself because of what had happened to her, or was the possibility real?

Her parents had always blamed what had happened to her on defective shields.

The doctors had refused to be cornered one way or the other, but did that mean they didn’t know? Or that they didn’t agree? Or that they
did
know that it was the shields, but were afraid to say so because of The Company? And if it actually was the shields, did that mean it wasn’t something she could pass to her offspring? Or had the radiation damaged her chromosomes?

She wished that she could see the child. If she could just look at it, assure herself that it was developing normally, she wouldn’t be driving herself crazy worrying about it.

There was no hope of that, of course. The cyborgs had made great strides in building this place, but they hadn’t anticipated that they would have families. From what she’d heard it wasn’t until they’d discovered Dalia had conceived that they realized they were evolving to a point where they would be able to bear young. Rumor had it that they’d been disastrously unprepared for Dalia’s labor and delivery and they were still collating and gathering information. They were certainly not advanced enough in that area to have what she needed.

It plagued her mind throughout the day like an aching tooth, impossible to banish once more to a safe distance no matter how hard she tried. Time seemed to hang on her hands, but she found herself moving restlessly about the house, unable to concentrate on anything long enough to accomplish it.

It wasn’t until she heard the scrape of feet in the foyer that she managed to compose herself even a little, but she was more relieved than sorry when she realized that it was her free night--she could spend the evening alone in her room worrying herself sick. By the time they’d eaten, she was exhausted from her anxiety. Feeling somewhat hopeful that she might at least escape her worries for a little while, she excused herself and went up to bed. When she woke, the house was as dark and silent as deep space.

Amaryllis lay listening for a time to the tiny creaks and groans of the settling house. Slowly, it dawned upon her that everyone was asleep … unless someone was standing guard. It also occurred to her that this might be her only opportunity to try to find out what she could about the baby, to find out positively one way or the other so that she could make an informed decision instead of one driven solely by her fears.

Since she now knew there were native inhabitants, most likely a guard was posted about the city around the clock, but she doubted very much that anyone would be in the med center. The cyborgs had so little need for such a thing she’d actually been surprised to see one at all, but she supposed it was probably geared more toward research anyway.

If she could get in, she could at least find out what they had. She could operate a scanner if they had one. She doubted she’d be able to make heads or tails of a lot of the information, but she only needed to find out one thing--was it normal.

She’d fallen asleep in the clothes she was wearing so she had no need to stumble around in the dark looking for something to wear.

She just wished she had her uniform. As lightweight as it was, it was made out of a material that was surprisingly protective. There was no hope for it, of course. She hadn’t seen her uniform since she’d been captured. She removed the skirting from her clothes, however. It wasn’t any sort of protection, but it could hamper her movements and she needed to be prepared to defend herself, or run.

Which brought her mind to weapons.

She didn’t have one and didn’t know where to find one.

The cyborgs primarily carried swords. She didn’t know why they seemed to prefer to carry swords instead of lasers, but they did, which meant it was highly unlikely she’d find a laser even if she took the time to look, and even swords weren’t readily available. Until and unless the cyborgs began to trust, hunters weren’t allowed to arm themselves at all, and she had a strong feeling that Dante and Reese kept their own weapons close to hand.

She was desperate or she wouldn’t even have considered going out unarmed.

She’d just have to be careful she didn’t get caught.

After very little consideration, she decided not to try to leave by way of the stairs.

She wasn’t that familiar with the structure and it was made of natural materials. Cyborg hearing was acute. One creaking timber and she’d have some explaining to do.

Moving from window to window, she checked the perimeter carefully. The moon had just cleared the tops of the trees and brightened the rear landscape, casting deep shadows in the lee of the stonework and plants, but she couldn’t see any movement that indicated anyone was about. There was nothing below any of the windows to use to climb down, but no obstacles to clear either.

Calculating the distance, she decided she could make the jump without damaging her bionics and slipped the window open. She hovered on the sill for several moments, trying to decide what to do about the window, but finally realized she would either make it there and back without being caught, or not. If her mission was successful, then she would still need to get back into the house undetected. If they checked on her, it wouldn’t matter whether the window was open or not. They’d immediately notice that she was missing.Balancing herself, she pushed off of the sill, landing in the soft soil of the lawn in a half crouch. She held her breath, listening intently, but she could hear no movement that indicated she’d been heard.

Getting her bearings, she decided to take the most direct route. A roundabout route wouldn’t help that she could see and it would take more time.

She jogged until she neared the edge of the city. Slowing, she drifted into the shadows and kept to them as much as possible, stopping from time to time to listen and study her surroundings. The streets were deserted. Here and there, light spilled out of the window of a building, but she could see no movement inside.

She almost ran smack into a pair of cyborg guards on patrol, but managed to squeeze herself into a tiny corner and waited until they’d passed out of sight before she moved again.

More cautious now, she moved from one hiding place to another, scanning for some sort of cover each time before she moved on. There were a few lights on in the med center. For security? She wondered. Or was someone working the night shift?

She circumnavigated the building before she found an unlocked window that she could reach. Pushing it open as far as she could, she hoisted herself up and over the sill, then dropped into the room, catching herself with her hands.

Light from the corridor outside filtered into the room. Glancing around, she saw that it looked like an examination room. It seemed doubtful that she would have chanced on a room with a scanner, but she looked anyway, pausing from time to time to listen. As she’d expected, she turned up nothing.

Moving to the door, she pressed her ear to it to listen. When she heard nothing, she eased the door open and glanced up and down the corridor. The heels of her boots clicked on the tile floor when she stepped out of the room and she froze, listening once more. When she was certain she hadn’t alerted security, she moved quickly down the corridor to the next examination room and ducked inside.

To her great relief, she found a scanner in the fourth cabinet she checked. Moving to the gurney in the center of the room, she lay back on it, switched the scanner on and moved it slowly over her abdomen. She sat up again when the light blinked, indicating the scan was complete.

The scrape of a heel on the tile floor startled her so badly she almost dropped the scanner from suddenly nerveless fingers. She managed to recover it just in time and clutched it against her frantically pounding heart, trying to determine whether the footsteps were coming in her direction or not.

A door, fairly close by creaked as it was pushed open.

They were checking the rooms!

Amaryllis glanced down at the scanner. The readout glowed in the dim light, but it was scrolling across the screen far too quickly for her to read it. One line seemed to leap right out at her, however.

Unknown life form.

“Oh God!” she whispered, clamping a hand to her mouth an instant too late to still the horrified exclamation.

There was a furtive movement, closer this time. Dropping the scanner to the gurney, Amaryllis abandoned any attempt at silence, dashing for the window. She’d barely landed on the ground outside when she heard the door of the examination room she’d just left crash open and slam against the wall.

Leaping to her feet, she charged down the side of the building until she reached the point nearest the next building, then followed that building until she reached an alley.

Behind her, she heard the sound of pounding feet and the order to halt.

She ran faster, zigzagging down a street, then veering into an alley. Along the way, she collected two more guards.

Pain blossomed in her side. She ignored it. There was no place to hide and she was of no mind to chance being trapped even if she’d spied a likely looking spot.

She’d almost reached the edge of the forest when she ran headlong into a guard.

The impact stunned both of them, but Amaryllis’ momentum not only bowled him over, it propelled her several yards further and through a hedgerow. Disoriented, she scrambled to her feet as soon as she stopped rolling, staggered a couple of steps and finally found her equilibrium.

The woods were dark, however, with the trees blocking the little light filtering down from the moon, and she didn’t have the advantage of night vision that the cyborgs did. Twenty feet more and the ground dropped from beneath her unexpectedly. She rolled part of the way down and skidded on one hip the remainder, landing in a trickling brook of icy water. It snatched the breath from her lungs, but the shock cleared her head.

Shivering, she realized she’d stumbled on a bit of luck. The cold water would make it harder, if not impossible, for the cyborgs to track her with heat vision. Sucking in a few breaths of air, she dropped down and half swam half crawled through the shallow water until the sounds of pursuit faded into the distance.

When she was certain the search had turned away from her, she climbed out of the water and sat on the bank for several moments, trying to catch her breath and figure out where she was.

She couldn’t see the moon anymore and without that she had no idea which direction was north, south, east or west. The stars in the sky were unfamiliar to her, giving her no heavenly landmark at all, and she couldn’t see even a glimpse of the city.

She couldn’t stay where she was, however. The night was mild, but she was still cold from being in the frigid water so long.

In any case, she had to figure out some way to get back before she was discovered missing. Getting to her feet, she struggled up the embankment and looked around hopefully. At first, she saw nothing at all, but then, just as despair was beginning to descend upon her, she saw a wink of light in the distance. Her heart leapt. She couldn’t tell whether it was the moon, or light from a structure, but it didn’t matter. Either way, if she followed it, she was bound to find some sort of landmark that would tell her where she was.She hoped.

A flutter of movement in her belly brought her focus to the baby.

The unknown life form.

A wave of nausea washed through her. What the hell did that mean?

The machine didn’t have the data to interpret its findings, which meant the data was pretty useless.

Tears stung her eyes abruptly and she blinked to clear her vision.

She just couldn’t think about it right now. Later, when she found her way, she’d try to figure out what it meant.

She’d been stumbling through the dark for nearly an hour before she realized she hadn’t seen the wink of light not once since that first time.

She could be following some sort of phosphorescent weather condition, or animal, or even a plant.