Defying Death (20 page)

“You know that my smile is for you and only you.”
She touched his cheeks, unshed tears misting her vision. “It is.
You’re the sole being in my thoughts. You’re the male giving me
that joy.”

His lips curled upward, that hint of a smile
lighting up her soul.

When he asked her to suck his cock, he wasn’t merely
asking for physical release. Death was asking for emotional
reassurance, for proof he was in her thoughts, that he made her
happy.

He played with her hair. Tifara rested her cheek on
his left pec, above his heart, listened to the triple beats, steady
and strong. She prided herself on being practical, on accepting
reality as it was, and her reality was obvious. She loved the
tortured male. He owned her body, heart, soul.

She didn’t know if cyborgs could feel love, if they
knew what that emotion was. A machine would have no concept of
love. It wasn’t logical. But he was half human.

She realized he’d likely never say the words. He was
unable to call Menace his friend and the male had given up
everything to follow him.

That was okay. She splayed her fingers over his
golden skin. What she had with him was enough, more than she ever
dreamed she’d have. Her world had expanded past healing others to
include loving him.

Rest cycles consisted of sleep and fucking, both of
them sexually insatiable, greedy for each other’s touch. Daylight
shifts were spent in the cave, tending to Ada-972.

The rot continued to slowly spread. Tifara tried
more and more extreme measures and nothing worked. The pain
inhibitors were running alarmingly low. The female required heavy
regular doses.

“Medic Tifara.” The clone female beckoned to
her.

Her friend, Ada-971, was exploring the surrounding
terrain with Menace, the two of them enthralled with each other.
Death remained with Tifara, never straying far from her side.

“Ada-972.” Tifara crouched near her.

“I have a favor to ask of you.” The female grasped
her hands. They’d discarded the gloves. An accidental and unlikely
transfer of nanocybotics could only help Ada-972, not harm her.

“I’ll do anything for you.”

“Wait until you hear the request before agreeing to
it.” Ada-972’s smile was sad. “The pain is spreading. It’s in my
hands.”

“You should have told me that.” Tifara reached for
the injector gun. “I—”

“Don’t.” The female pushed the medical device away
from her. “I want to be able to touch you, Ada-971, your male,
objects, and feel it. Don’t take that away from me.”

“As you wish.” She didn’t agree with that decision
but she’d comply with it. Tifara set the injector gun back on the
stone floor.

“What I’m trying to say is it is spreading. Soon, it
will reach my mind. I don’t want that. I don’t want Ada-971 to see
me like that, to remember me that way. It would hurt her.”

It would hurt all of them. Tifara glanced at her
cyborg. Even Death was emotionally attached to the clone
female.

“I was holding on because Ada-971 and I only had
each other. If I died, she’d be alone.”

“She has Menace now.” Tifara knew where this
conversation was leading. “He will never take your place,
Ada-972.”

“I know.” The female squeezed her hands. “But he’d
help her deal with my passing.”

“You’re not dying any planet rotation soon.” Tifara
jutted her jaw. “I’ll see to that.”

“I don’t want you to see to that.” Ada-972’s voice
softened. “You’ve given me this time with Ada-971, with you.” Her
gaze slid to Death. “Both of you. You’ve allowed me to meet Menace,
the male my sister will love for her now long lifespan. I’ll always
be grateful to you for that.”

“But…” Dread twisted Tifara’s stomach.

“But, it is time for me to go.” Ada-972 summoned a
smile that was so damn brave; it broke Tifara’s heart. “She won’t
leave the planet while I’m alive, and I’m tired, so very tired, of
fighting. I can’t do this anymore.”

Death moved to stand silently behind Tifara, his
proximity giving her the emotional strength she needed to deal with
the situation. “You want me to stop slowing the spread of the
rot.”

“No.” Ada-972 met her gaze, a steely resolve in her
bright purple eyes. “I want you to end my lifespan.”

“What?” Tifara straightened. “No, I can’t. I’m a
medic. I prolong lifespans. I don’t end them.”

“
I
can’t do it.” Ada-972 stared up at her.
“To end one’s lifespan is forbidden.” She paused. “And I don’t have
the spiritual strength. I tried and couldn’t do it.”

“You can’t ask this of me.” Tifara paced, her heart
telling her it would be a kindness, the medic in her refusing to
consider it.

“Ada-971 won’t do it. She will never give up on me.”
The female had clearly thought about the alternatives. “She’d hate
Menace if he ended my life. I couldn’t do that to him, to them. The
only other beings are you or—”

“I’ll do it.” Death’s voice was flat.

Relief flared inside Tifara. Shame followed. He
cared for Ada-972. It would wound him as much as it would wound
her. “No, I’ll do it.” Her voice lacked conviction even to her own
ears. “She asked me.”

“I’ll do it,” he repeated, resting his hands on his
daggers, visibly reminding her of who he was—a warrior, a
killer.

“I don’t want pain,” Ada-972 whispered. “A medic
would end my life without pain.”

“I’ll end your life without pain.” He extracted the
daggers from their sheaths and spun them so quickly, they blurred.
“You won’t feel a thing. One moment, you’ll be here. The next
moment, you’ll be gone.”

“If Ada-971 sees blood—”

“There won’t be any blood.” Light reflected off his
blades.

Tifara couldn’t allow him to carry her burden.
“Death—”

“You’ve done what you can for her, using your skills
to bring her happiness.” His eyes were dark, unreadable. “Let me do
this. Let me use my skills to bring her peace.”

“It would be your last gift to me.” Ada-972 smiled
at him. “Thank you, my friend.”

Death nodded curtly.

Tifara knew how much that smile meant to him. Her
heart ached. “When?”

“At sunset.” The clone female had thought about that
detail also, her planning reassuring Tifara, telling her it wasn’t
a recent decision. “Ada-971 plans to show Menace the constellations
she and I used to gaze at and dream about visiting. She’ll get that
opportunity now.”

“And you will go on a different journey.” Tifara
didn’t know what that journey was—the scientist in her warring with
her more illogical side.

“I will. I—”

“Ada-971 and Menace are returning to the cave,”
Death informed them.

Ada-972 stopped talking. Tifara fiddled with her
medic pack. Deception wasn’t a skill she excelled in. Death placed
his big hands on her shoulders and massaged her tensed muscles. She
leaned back, into his heat, his scent, borrowing his strength.

“Look at what Menace made for you, Ada-972.” Ada-971
rushed into the space, a clear stone in her hands. “He made this
from heating sand.” She sat cross-legged by her friend’s side and
held it up to the light. The stone was transparent. “Isn’t it
wondrous?”

“It is.” Ada-972’s laugh sounded forced. The other
female didn’t appear to notice. “How can such a stone be made from
sand?”

The two chattered. Tifara tried to act like nothing
had happened, like they hadn’t moments ago decided to end a loved
one’s lifespan.

She couldn’t, the façade unbearable.

“My female and I are returning to the ship.” Death
slid his arms under her and lifted her into the air. She squawked,
surprised. “We’ll check on the patient near sunset.”

That was the time they’d decided Ada-972’s lifespan
would end. “I’m the medic.” Tifara swatted his body-armor-clad
chest. “I decide when we check on the patient.”

“And when will we check on the patient?” Her cyborg
raised his eyebrows.

Her lips twisted. “Near sunset.”

The others laughed. Ada-972 watched them as they
exited the cave.

Menace followed them, not speaking until distance
had been placed between themselves and the clone females. “Do I
want to know what is happening at sunset?”

“No,” they said in unison.

“Understood.” The cyborg held up his hands in mock
surrender. “I have my theories and I won’t leave my female’s
side.”

“She
is
your female.” Tifara had scanned
Ada-971 earlier in the planet rotation. She was covered with
Menace’s nanocybotics. “You bred with her over the rest
period.”

“Yes, I did.” The cyborg’s grin stretched from ear
to ear. “But don’t mention that development to Ada-972. Fornication
is forbidden.”

“We know.” Death’s tone was dry.

“You didn’t affect Ada-972 at all and she didn’t
affect you, yet she’s a genetic copy of Ada-971.” Tifara focused on
that scientific puzzle and not on the task they had to perform at
sunset. “There must be an abnormality I can’t detect.”

“I’ll run their genetics through my systems,” her
cyborg offered.

“I’ll return to my female and perform other tests.”
Menace’s eyes danced with mischievousness. “They’ll be less
scientific but more fun.”

Tifara looked over Death’s shoulder, watching the
warrior as he swaggered out of sight. “He knows, doesn’t he?”

“Yes.”

“I’m glad she has him.” She allowed her head to fall
back, trusting her cyborg not to drop her. “And I’m glad I have
you.” She touched his face. “We’ll complete this planet rotation’s
task together, the two of us, as a team.”

“The two of us, as a team,” he agreed.

They’d kill the female they loved together.

Half a planet
rotation later, Death watched his female buzz around the ship’s
chamber, touching objects and chattering to herself. They’d had two
breeding sessions. Those frantic ruttings had decreased their
tension but hadn’t eliminated it.

He processed that their relationship would be
altered with the action they must take. It might not survive it. He
checked his weapons, moving his hands over the daggers and
guns.

One gun had been calibrated specifically for
Ada-972, factoring her size, shape, the diameter of the projectile
minimized to reduce trauma. He had never put so much planning into
a kill.

Even if the kill were flawless, it would change
them. Tifara had seen him end lifespans but those deaths had
belonged to near strangers. The clone female was a friend. His
little medic cared for her.

He did also. Too much.

It was an act of mercy, he reminded himself.
Ada-972’s body was decaying. The pain, if Tifara had allowed her to
feel it, would have been horrendous. The clone female wanted her
limited existence to end.

A cyborg warrior would seek death also.

“It’s time.” He interrupted Tifara’s mumbling.

“It doesn’t have to be time.” She approached him,
her hips swaying. “We don’t have to leave right now.” She ran her
soft hands over his body armor. “I could—”

“No.” He caught her fingers, stopping her caresses
and her tempting words. “We must do this, my female. Delaying it
won’t make the task easier.”

“It was worth a try.” Tifara sighed, walking slowly
toward the exit. Death matched her shorter stride. “I should end
her lifespan. She asked me.”

“She knew I wouldn’t allow it.” He linked his
fingers with hers. He was a killer. His little medic was not.
Intentionally ending a lifespan would damage her soft heart. He’d
die before he permitted that to happen.

“I suppose.” Tifara chewed on her bottom lip.

He yearned to lick that abused flesh, to soothe her
turmoil—both physical and emotional. They trekked toward the cave.
The white sand blew around their boots. It had covered the picked
clean bones of the three male clones, the insects having feasted on
their remains.

The sun was low on the horizon, painting the sky
orange and crimson, lighting the red in Tifara’s brown curls,
dancing upon her pink cheeks. The air temperature cooled. It was
warm rather than scorching hot. The wind whistled through the rock
facings before them.

Menace waited for them outside the cave, cleaning a
long gun, one of his legs crossed casually in front of the other.
“My female is taking me to a favorite rock outcropping to see the
stars. She’s worried about Ada-972. I suspect we’ll return soon
after it becomes fully dark.”

Menace’s female must sense what was about to happen.
“We’ll complete our tasks quickly.” Death nodded, grateful for the
warning.

They entered the cave. Ada-971 sat beside her
damaged sister, the two of them laughing and chattering.

“Medic Tifara is here to administer the pain
inhibitors.” Menace’s female kissed Ada-972’s forehead. “Don’t give
her or her male any trouble. And no more talk about not being here
when I get back. They won’t allow anything bad to happen to
you.”

“That I don’t want to happen to me.” Ada-972’s voice
was soft, inaudible to human hearing. Death, however, was a cyborg.
He heard everything. “I love you, Ada-971.”

“I love you too.” Her friend shook her head and
hurried toward them. “She’s very emotional this planet rotation,”
she whispered. “Don’t allow her out of your sightlines while I’m
away.”

Tifara’s lips trembled. His female was just as
emotional.

“We won’t allow her out of our sightlines,” Death
promised for both of them.

“Don’t return until you see a spirit star,” Ada-972
called.

“I won’t.” Ada-971 gave her a wave and then ducked
out of the cave.

“What is a spirit star?” Tifara rummaged through her
medic pack, her voice suspiciously watery.

“It’s a star that moves across the darkened sky.”
The damaged female gazed at the ceiling of the cave. “As the
original has shared with us, this star collects the spirits of the
clones who die, bringing them upward to be assimilated into the
black nothingness that holds the constellations together.”