Ashes and Metal (Cyborg Shifters Book 5) Read online

  So she counted down the time in her head, waiting for the guards to come in for their evening visit and find Gunner awake. Everyone knew he was going to be tonight’s entertainment.

  It made her feel sick. It made her feel sicker when she felt relief knowing that she’d make it through one more cycle alive.

  He hadn’t done anything to her, nothing that any of the other men in the brig hadn’t, and yet she was secretly wishing for him to be taken away.

  “Look who’s awake,” one of the guards said.

  “Boss’ll be pleased.”

  Gunner stood and moved toward them. “You stole my ship.” His voice was deeper than before and low enough for her to strain for the words.

  “We did. And it was easy,” one of them taunted. “We’ve ransacked it too.”

  “Have you now?” Gunner tilted his head.

  “Stop fucking talking to him and let’s bring him up for the boss. Get the door.” The other guard lifted his weapon and centered it against Gunner’s head as they opened his cell. Together, keeping their guns trained on him, the guards backed up a step, letting the android behind move forward and restrain him. She’d never seen the guards act the way they did with him. She wasn’t the only one who felt differently about the newcomer.

  Elodie glanced between the three men. She knew based on his eyes alone, that Gunner was unusual, but standing next to the other male guards, his strangeness was even more obvious.

  The electric shackles clicked into place around his wrists. Somehow, the noise made her want to giggle.

  He was taller than the guards, leaner too, and the outline of muscle under his clothes was more apparent now that he no longer wore his jacket. In any other circumstance, she wouldn’t have cared what the men looked like, but this time, something compelled her to take notice. To size them up against each other.

  Sizing them up in comparison to him.

  Gunner was scarier than the guards. Enough so that she believed—hoped— that he would break loose, kill them both, destroy the android, and kill everyone on the ship besides her and her dad. That he’d set her free.

  Wouldn’t that be a fantasy to last the ages?

  He casually strolled from his cell.

  He’s not afraid?

  She moved closer.

  One of the guards lifted a rod from his belt and slammed it into the back of Gunner’s knees. He fell forward with a thud. The moment he landed, the rod came down on him again.

  And her wistful, impossible dream was struck from her mind as the blows continued to rain down upon him.

  Elodie watched in horror as they beat the crap out of him, aiming their hits over his joints and non-vitals. Each agonizing thump beat to the racing of her heart, and she found herself clutching the bars closest to them with ghost-white knuckles.

  She wanted to call out and beg them to stop but she didn’t. As the beating continued and Gunner made no move to defend himself—or any sound indicating his pain—Elodie regretted wishing he would be taken away. He didn't deserve this. He didn't deserve to die.

  Eventually, he slumped forward, unresponsive.

  It was over as soon as it began and the guards both tried to lift him back up to his knees. They quickly gave up and let the android haul his body out of the brig. She didn’t know how long she stood clutching the bars, but eventually, it sank in that he was gone and the door had closed behind him long ago. The lights overhead dimmed further as she peeled her fingers back and returned to her safe place. Safe once again.

  “That cell is cursed,” someone muttered, sending her eyes back to the empty space next to her.

  He won’t be back.

  Once again, she was alone. Over a whole cycle had gone by without her dad and she hadn’t realized until that moment. And as her stomach sucked at the empty air inside her belly, she couldn’t decide whether she missed Gunner as the temporary distraction he had been, or if she was relieved he was gone and her safe space had been returned to her.

  Elodie rubbed the goosebumps from her arms, choosing to forget him and focus on surviving.

  I can’t survive with the dead. Her eyes roamed over the other prisoners, settling briefly on Royce and his new jacket. I can’t survive if I’m an idiot. She quietly moved to the vent and did her business before curling up on her side.

  It was hard to sleep, dangerous to sleep, but she couldn’t resist it any longer. Every muscle in her body ached, every fiber of her being hurt, and her nerves were so beyond frayed, there were times she thought she’d never be able to sleep again.

  Until she forced herself to remain awake for days on end. She hadn’t slept since before her dad was taken.

  Elodie pushed her hand under her head and bent her knees, leaving her other arm to drape heavily against her middle over her hollow stomach. The pressure gave the illusion of helping although it really didn’t. It let the pressure on her heart grow.

  Elodie tried to picture her dad beside her but couldn’t. Instead, she only saw the man with gun tattoos in the space beyond.

  When had they switched places?

  Maybe she was finally going crazy.

  I can’t survive without sleep.

  It was the last thing she told herself before she let her body give in and give up.

  AN ANDROID HAULED HIM from the brig, clutching his arm, shuffling him in an awkward way over the floor grates to keep its hold away from the electric shackles.

  If he were human, it would’ve dislocated his shoulder, and so he dislocated it. He had to maintain appearances, after all. If they learned he was a weaponized Cyborg, he’d be shot, ejected out of the airlock, and shot again with the ship’s cannons. That’s if the pirates lived long enough to do so.

  Gunner let the pain seep through his systems like a drug.

  It wasn’t long before he was propped up into a chair and bound to it. The guards left him alone in the room with the android who’d moved to stand next to the open door, and Gunner’s ears filled with the sounds of receding footsteps. He was closer to the ships main systems in this room, and because of that, it was easier for him to connect. His infectious codes were working hard to break through.

  But he looked forward to finding his information another way.

  He leaned forward and drooped, forcing his systems to shut down and go into stasis. His skin immediately cooled off and his brow broke into a sweat, and his shoulder sagged to the side. He looked at the android through his bangs.

  A man walked through the opening and kneeled before him. Unlike the guards, he was dressed a little nicer, and by nicer, Gunner eyed the pistol at his side.

  “They say your name is Gunner. I’m in charge of the patrols, and in charge of your fate. I’m your god.”

  Really? Gunner mumbled. The man grabbed Gunner’s hair and yanked his head up until their eyes locked.

  “We can make this quick.”

  Can we? “That so?” Gunner said. “God?” Really?

  His tormentor smiled and jerked his head further back. “Give us your ship.”

  “Thought you already had it.”

  The man’s smile only grew. It made him want to smile back. “Ah, so we do, why else do you think I’m asking?”

  “To set me up.”

  His hair was let go and Gunner leaned back into the chair, watching the guy. He couldn’t tell if he was just another guard or if he was the captain. He’d settle with a member of the bridge crew if he had a clue. Pirates didn’t wear name tags...only governmental workers did, and although he worked for the EPED, he never wore one either.

  “Why would we set you up?”

  “Because you don’t know who I am,” Gunner countered. “That’s a problem isn’t it, God?” he mocked.

  The man’s grin fell and he knew he guessed correctly. Because I have the same fucking problem. He had no idea who attacked him and his patience for that information quickly waned.

  A metal rod came down on him again, and he was prepared for it, even without the numbing effects his
nanocells provided and the accelerated healing, he endured.

  It slammed into his gut and the tops of his thighs in an effort to break something inside his body. Nothing would break. At least not for long. His only problem was if the man truly wanted to kill him, he wasn’t good at playing dead. His jackal had its limitations on tricks.

  “Please,” he sputtered, groaning, and laughing a little through it, but his laughs sounded like painful moans. “Please stop.”

  He was hit several more times for good measure before the man leaned in and got in his face. “Do you want to die?”

  Gunner licked his teeth. “No.”

  “Do you know how a man like me comes to beating a fuck like you?”

  Hrrmm... “No?”

  “Because men like me don’t tolerate shits like you.”

  The man rammed his fist into his dislocated shoulder. Fuucck. Gunner fell into a brief void of pain before he could react, and stopping his systems from kicking back on in retaliation. The man raised his fist again and the lights flickered, stopping him, and stopping Gunner right before he killed him.

  The android in the corner moved forward on his behalf, sensing a threat to the guard it was programmed to protect. The android could read his violence better than any human, the signals were hard to fake even for a Cyborg, harder still for one who was tempering his strength.

  “Why does a guy like you have a ship like that?”

  “Luck, I imagine.”

  The smile returned. “Oh come now, luck has nothing to do with it. You have cybernetics in your body and not the second-hand shit. Only a rich man without a background can get that done to himself. And you’re not a Cyborg, no Cyborg would be dumb enough to get his ship stolen from right underneath him.”

  Gunner kept his mouth shut and his anger under control.

  “No, but you’re something or somebody special, and I’m going to find out one way or another. I don’t have to torture it out of you, yeah know. We could work together.” The man walked around him in circles as he spoke but stopped at his back. “Or we don’t and I can have a little fun...”

  “Work together?” Gunner made a show of looking around the bare room, the outdated design, and the metal piping along the ceiling and sides. “I’m doing better on my own.”

  “Are you?”

  “I’m not the one who can’t crack the codes.” Gunner braced as a fist struck straight down on his shoulder again, harder than before, but he continued through the pain, “I’m doing much better on my own.” He heard the rod slice the air.

  “Even being hit by a man like you, I’m doing better,” Gunner taunted.

  “You really don’t know when to shut up?” And again and again.

  No. I really don’t.

  All he knew was that he had more men on his list to kill, and some men had their names double listed. And that his tattoos didn’t look nearly as good with bruises.

  Chapter Five

  ELODIE WOKE UP TO THE lights of a new ship cycle glowing overhead. She looked toward Gunner’s cell.

  She wanted to excuse her slow reflexes as hunger and exhaustion, but it wasn’t that hunger and exhaustion that stopped her from jerking away and scurrying to the opposite corner of her cell.

  It was the prisoner in the cell next to her—Gunner—who was staring intensely at her and pressed up to the bars they shared. He pinned her to the spot.

  He’s back.

  He’d been brought back while she’d been asleep. Worry careened through her that his return hadn’t woken her. I’ve always been awake when the guards came.

  His hand slowly reached up between them to place a single finger over his lips.

  Every fiber in her body solidified into a monument erected by silent fear.

  He wanted her to remain quiet. Why?

  Elodie parted her lips and brought the hand resting under her cheek up to slip over her mouth, hiding the sound of her breath and to partially hide her face from him. If they both reached out, their fingers could interlock through the bars.

  “Good morning,” he whispered, his voice low and harsh. She broke out into a sweat. “I see you didn’t wait up,” he said.

  I did. At least until...I fell asleep.

  His eye was swollen and bruises spotted his flesh. But he returned. Just that alone meant something, that he wasn’t lumped in the same category with her and the rest of the prisoners.

  She’d wished for her dad to return, but instead, Gunner had.

  He lowered his finger and tapped the metal, making her eyes dart back and forth between his mouth and bar. Their faces were a handspan apart, their fingers barely an inch. She slunk back slightly.

  “Don’t.”

  She shuddered and stopped, pressing her free arm into her chest. She balled her fingers against her thundering heart. Like her stomach, she couldn’t apply enough pressure to make it stop aching.

  “Keep being smart, Ely.”

  Elodie stiffened at his words and hated herself a little more for it, knowing he was voicing out loud the same thing that ran through her head a thousand times a day.

  She pressed her hand harder against her mouth and took a deep breath through her nose, bringing with it the stench of fresh coppery blood. It pulled her attention from Gunner’s messed up face to what she could see of his body.

  He was lounging on his side, not hunched like a man would be if he was in a lot of pain. The old fatigues and undershirt from before were still in place but they were no longer clean, but blood splattered. Nothing stays clean here for long.

  “They beat the shit out of me, not literally though. Unless you count blood and sweat as shit,” he told her as she stared at the numerous stains on his clothes. Some spots were still wet and they clung to his body but most of them seemed crusted and dry.

  How much time had passed? Losing time was not a good thing.

  Gunner’s finger stopped its tapping, bringing her perusal to an end.

  He’s baiting me.

  “You still won’t talk to me?” he asked.

  You told me to stay quiet! She wanted to yell and ask why he cared so much. Baited. Elodie closed her eyes and decided to make him disappear.

  “Don’t shut me out...”

  She let her hand drop and move back to cushion her head, shifting away from him to lie on her back.

  “I won’t tell anyone you’re a girl,” Gunner whispered low enough for only her to hear.

  Elodie grumbled and evened her breathing. Bluffer. There was no way for him to know for certain, and no way for him to find out without breaking through steel. The last she checked, men, even those with cybernetic enhancements, couldn’t do that.

  The raspy laugh he released fell upon her ears, eliciting a shiver. She shouldn’t be so curious about him, and it troubled her deeply that rather than wane, her curiosity only grew.

  She heard him move away and she squeezed her eyelids tighter.

  If I talk to him...it would be a distraction. I could learn new information. He’s been outside the brig and came back. He may have seen my dad. Although she knew the chance of that was slim.

  If I talk to him and get on his good side, maybe I’ll get to keep my safe place, maybe he won’t touch me like Kallan...

  Based on the last two cycles alone, the newcomer hadn’t touched her at all, not even when he had the chance to.

  But she knew she could never trust him, right? Elodie curled her fingers under her cheek. She could never expect him to keep his word.

  Could she?

  Elodie could reach through again and touch him. She could attack Kallan too, but the negative outcomes were more than she cared to contend with. Was it the same for Gunner?

  And I’m far from the only prisoner who keeps to himself.

  She hadn’t been able to trust anyone since her dad volunteered like a fool.

  The wayward thought filled her with bitterness for a brief second before vanishing. He left me. And there was nothing she could do about it, not anymore. Any plans
of escape eluded her, still, and the added variable of getting to her dad, as well, made what plans she could muster up that much more impossible in her head.

  The tapping returned on the bars but she refused to acknowledge it. Eventually, he’ll grow bored.

  Kallan forgot her existence for days sometimes. She’d had a three cycle streak without his attention at one point.

  The taps got a little louder.

  If I talk to him and get on his good side, we could ally, even for a short time.

  Ally for what? She almost laughed at the idea. Gunner wasn’t a plan. He was just another unlucky man.

  There was no real escape from this brig, and even if there was, she didn’t know how big the ship was, how many men crewed it. She had no idea how to pilot or where to find the emergency pods. She only knew they were being delivered somewhere, for something, and that delivery could happen at any time.

  If she survived until then, the possible dubious connections she could make here in the brig would mean nothing. If blood couldn’t hold two people together, simple words said in desperation held no more weight than a forgotten dream.

  Elodie sighed. The tapping next to her head stopped. Then it picked back up. She held in a second sigh.

  She couldn’t think of very many pros to getting to know Gunner besides those with immediate gains.

  “What are you thinking about?” he asked as if he knew the argument going on in her head.

  Food! she yelled internally. You. You and food.

  She didn’t have the strength to look and see if there were rations by her cell door. She especially didn’t have the courage to open her eyes and move away from Gunner knowing that he was poised so close that he could hurt her badly if he wanted to.

  She also didn’t want to know if breakfast had once again been denied them. Not looking meant she could pretend for a little longer.

  I’m thinking of you holding food. You with so much food to offer me that I can remember what it was like to feel full. A picture of his face and his tats came to mind and the way they might move over his cheeks as he chewed. From there, to a feast of everything she loved to eat...