Skye couldn’t stop looking at Rader’s handsome face and listening to the deep rich tones of his voice. Even though she couldn’t understand his words, she thought he was speaking from his heart. She read the translation after the first time through. As she watched his lips move and saw the sparkle in his blue eyes, she realized her body yearned for his touch.
Everything about him tugged at her heartstrings, and she wanted to say yes. Sure, he looked strong and badass, but he also looked like he needed someone to love him. Skye couldn’t even put her finger on what it was about him that made her think that. Somehow, she was convinced that he was mean for her. How crazy was that?
Then she realized she was going to do it. Janie would think she was crazy. Even Skye thought it was possibly imprudent, but she felt compelled to know this man better.
She was starting to suspect the recent chain of events caused her life to unfold to lead her to this man. Her alternative was to start over---alone. The money from the sale of her house would be enough to rent a storefront and restart her business with a modest amount of stock and a new server for the internet. She could get an apartment, and her life could go on pretty much as it had before.
Or, she could take the chance of a lifetime and go to Rader’s world and be his mate. She had reread the information about cyborgs like Rader. He was genetically human with a human mind but enhanced with an onboard biocomputer, a steel alloy skeleton, and nanocybots or nanites that kept him healthy and healed any injuries he received in battle. He also had superhuman strength.
Cyborgs were artificially bred in vitro and grown to maturity in nurturing tanks. Their growth was enhanced and accelerated by the nanites. The biocomputer was installed while he was still in the fetal stage. It took five years to bring a cyborg to maturity. While they were primarily bred to be warriors, they could easily adapt to other professions by uploading virtual training into their computer.
Most of the cyborgs produced were warriors for the United Galactic Alliance of Worlds. The only family they ever knew were their fellow cyborgs and brothers and sisters in arms. The concept of love was pretty much abstract to them in part because their emotions were subdued to allow them to be aggressive fighters and ruthless killers.
But Rader was reprogrammed to an extent to allow him to experience a full range of human emotions when he was released from service. He wanted a mate, and he wanted a family.
Skye Carpenter wanted him. She’d made up her mind.
The video he’d sent of his world and his home surprised her. Glasica looked very Earth-like. A lot of green---farmland surrounding the villages and thick forests, large and small inland lakes, and two major continents with vast oceans between dotted with large and small islands.
His home apparently was built of fieldstone with a rounded roof that was also a solar collection unit. Although he was a law enforcer, Rader had enough property to grow crops and keep some livestock if he wished. He mostly ate his meals at the local eatery, but he would get a bot to grow food for their family if she wished it.
The house itself was simply furnished but surprisingly elegant and naturally well lit during the day. The more Skye saw, the more confidence she felt in her decision. Her only wish was that it wasn’t so far and she could just beam up there like on Star Trek.
It was a three-month journey by spaceship. Narovian matchmaking assured her that it was perfectly safe. The Alliance had been spacefaring for over a thousand years. She could do this. It would give her time to catch up on some of the reading saved up on her tablet reader.
First, she made a video reply to Rader’s proposal:
“My Dear Rader,
You honor me with your proposal. Based on what you have told me and the information from the matchmaking service I believe we are meant to be together. I am honored and pleased to accept your proposal to become your mate.
As soon as I send this to you, I will give my print to sign the mating contract and notify the agency to make arrangements to travel to Glasica. I know it will take time for us to become acquainted and bond with each other but I am prepared to do this. I am completely attracted to you. We can start with that and let love grow between us naturally.
I wish I could come there now and give you my answer in person, but I have learned it will take three months to reach your world. At least we will be able to com interactively from space once the language implant they will give me has taken effect.
Sometimes, love just happens, but it can also be a conscious decision. People can love whomever they want to love. I want to love you, so I will.
I look forward to seeing you soon.
Skye Carter.”
She pressed send then went to the Narovian Interstellar Matchmaking Service website to complete her contract and make arrangements for her starship journey to Glasica.
As she thought about it, she was a lot like Rader in that she had never had a real family---just her grandmother who though unable to care for her kept in touch with her at whatever foster home she landed in until she was older and could care for her grandmother. Skye’s mother was missing in action since shortly after she was born. Skye didn’t even know if she were still alive and she didn’t much care either.
She was going on the assumption that Rader truly was her genetic soul mate. She was taking it all on a leap of faith that the matching service claimed their matches were ninety-nine percent accurate and successful. She absolutely refused to be in that one percent that was not.
Once she made her decision, she suddenly had much to do. Her car, though in good condition was almost ten years old. She determined that all she really needed to take with her were clothes and personal items. She didn’t have any hobbies except writing in her journal and shooting pictures with her smartphone.
While her phone wouldn’t work where she was going, she wanted to have the pictures she’d taken on it. There were things on her laptop that she wanted, too, but there was the question of being able to charge the devices away from Earth. She would try to find out.
Skye was going through her clothing later that day when someone rang her doorbell. She was surprised to find a florist’s delivery van in her driveway and a person at her front door with a long flower box. She was genuinely surprised as she took the box from the young delivery woman. Skye tried to tip her, but she said it was already done.
She took the box to her coffee table in the living room and slid the elastic cord off the box to read the card. She opened it, and it said, “Complements of the Narovian Matchmaking Service on behalf of Rader Knight.”
She opened the box, and it contained a dozen long-stemmed pink roses and a small red velvet ring box with another card attached.
“I am honored to accept your contract to become my mate. As I am told that it is the custom on your world to give one’s mate a ring. Please accept this ring as a token of my commitment to be a good and caring mate to you.
“Your mate,
Rader Knight”
Although she was aware that the flowers and the ring were arranged by the service, Skye felt certain Rader had some say in the response. After admiring the beautiful roses for a moment, she picked up the ring box and opened it. It was a silvery metallic with inlaid designs and faceted pale blue stone embedded into the metal. Inside the band, it said ‘Forever Yours.’
Skye smiled and put it on her ring finger, and it fit perfectly. It was unusual but lovely, and it brought home the reality of the commitment she had made. And so, the adventure begins.
Rader was on patrol when he received Skye’s acceptance of his mating proposal from the matchmaking service. The normally calm and stoic cyborg commed Makus excitedly after he had reviewed the acceptance several times to be sure his new emotions were not causing him to misinterpret the message.
He now had a mate, and she was coming to Glasica to be with him!
Impatiently, he signaled Makus’s com a second time, and the other man answered.
“Yeah, Rader. What’s up?”
“Skye Carter from the dirt planet has signed the mating contract, and she’s coming on the next ship. It will take three months.” Rader said grinning.”
“Man, that’s great Rader, I am happy for you. Jhenre will be almost as excited as you are. She wants you to be as happy as we are. I don’t know much about Earth---just that the people are human like we are. But I’ve heard only good things about the matchmaking service. It could be rough getting to know each other at first, but you’re smart. You’ll figure it out.”
“I have studied everything I could find about Earth culture of the people indigenous to the area around our base there. They seem a lot like us but low tech. But Glasica is very much Earthlike. It will all depend on how we do together. I worry that she might not like me in person.”
“Don’t do that, boss. Jhenre said any woman with half a brain will see you have a lot to offer in a relationship, not to mention that all you cyborgs are good to look at.”
“Jhenre thinks I am attractive?”
“She does, but she’s mine,” Makus chuckled.
“Of course, I know that. If Jhenre thinks I am attractive, then Skye may think so too.”
“Right,” Makus said. “Don’t forget that you will be able to com with her interactively once she leaves Earth. That will give you time to get to know each other while she is traveling here.
“I have not forgotten. Is it normal to have this much apprehension about the esteem of a female?”
“I believe it is.”
“Life was so much simpler when all I had to do was kill the enemies. I really want this female. I feel like she is intended to be mine.”
“Apparently Narovian Matchmaking came to the same conclusion. Don’t worry Rader. After she comes all this way, she’s can’t just turn around and go back. She could have the same feelings about this as you.”
***
“Are you crazy?” Janie squealed when Skye confessed her plans. “You’re going to another planet to be some man’s wife you never met?”
“But the service said he is my soul mate. They match people by DNA.”
“Why are you doing this? Is it because of the attack last month?” Janie asked.
Skye sighed. This was exactly the reaction she expected and the reason why she’d waited so long to tell her. “That’s part of it. Janie, I lost everything in that attack. When I was looking online to see what had happened, I found the matchmaking site. Then I thought why not?”
“Why not use one of those dating sites here? Skye, you’re beautiful. You should be able to find a husband right here on Earth.”
“I haven’t had a date in two years. I can’t even remember how long since I got laid,” Skye told her. “I’m twenty-eight years old. I don’t have that many more years to have kids. If I started dating a man right now who I could marry, it might be two more years before that happened.”
“They couldn’t find a man here on Earth out of seven billion people?”
Skye shrugged. “There might not be that many in their database from Earth yet. I don’t know.”
Skye took out her smartphone and scrolled through her pictures until she found the ones of Rader. “Here, this is him.” She handed Janie the phone.
Janie took it and groaned as she looked at Rader’s handsome face and broad shoulders. “Well, they sure picked you a pretty one. Ooh wee. But still, three months in space to another planet. I wouldn’t do it---not even for this handsome hunk.”
“Well, I am. I’ve already signed the mating agreement. It’s all arranged,” Skye said. “Anyway, I didn’t call you here to have you talk me out of this. I wanted to see if theirs any of my stuff here you want before charity comes to pick it up. I’ve got kitchen stuff, clothes, any of the furniture. The appliances are staying.”
“When are you leaving?”
“Day after tomorrow,” Skye said with calm determination.
“What about the closing on your house?”
“The lawyer will handle it, and the money will be deposited in my account. It will be converted into Alliance funds as will all my savings.”
“Will that be enough to get you home if you find you have made a colossal mistake?”
“Possibly,” Skye said, “Or it might be enough for me to start a new business on Glasica.”
“That’s the planet name?”
“Yes.”
“Will I ever see you again?”
“Possibly not, but we can keep in touch on the internet.”
“I’m going to miss you.” Janie suddenly hugged her.
“You are one of the few people I will miss,” Skye said blinking against the sudden prick of tears. Janie had always been more than an employee. She had been with Skye since the beginning five years ago when it was just the two of them running the “Books and Data Stop.”
After their hug, Janie started looking through the clothing on the living room sofa that Skye was getting ready to pack in boxes for the charity pick-up. Janie picked a few things and Skye packed the ones she rejected into boxes.
Then they went through the kitchen cupboards. Janie only needed a few things from the kitchen, but she helped Skye pack the rest of the things then they ordered Chinese food and had more girl talk. Skye then showed Janie pictures of the planet and Rader’s house.
“It pretty much looks like Earth,” Janie admitted.
“I thought so, too.”
“Are you nervous about traveling in space, going there and meeting him.”
“I sure am,” Skye admitted. “I’ve turned this over and over in my mind, but it’s like I knew I was going to do it, as soon as I saw their ad on the internet.”
“Well, I hope it works out for you,” Janie said.
“How’s the job hunting going?” Skye asked.
“Still nothing. I’ve sent out resumes and applications. This week I finally signed up with a couple temp agencies, hoping for a temp to hire job.”
“That’s probably what I would have done, because I wasn’t getting any offers, either. The alien attack sure messed things up around D.C. I figured I would have to move, anyway.”
“Yeah, but not to another planet.”
“Well, until a couple months ago, who knew it was even possible?”
Two days later, Skye packed her old compact and drove to the Matchmaking Service in the mountains of West Virginia. When she arrived, there were half a dozen cars parked in front of the isolated storefront. Beside the building was a large helicopter on a landing pad.
Parking in the row with the other cars, Skye drew a shaky breath and let it out before she climbed out of the car and went inside. Three men and four women sat on padded chairs in the waiting area to the right of the entrance. She signed in at the counter then took a seat with the group as the sign instructed.
Momentarily, an attractive woman with feline eyes and pale blue hair came out into the waiting area and called one of the women. A few minutes later, a man came out and called Skye. She followed him down a short hallway to what looked like a medical treatment room.
“Hello, Miss Carter, I am Thanden Amar. I will be doing your language implant. Don’t worry. It is a fairly painless process. I will apply a topical pain suppressor when I do the injection so it shouldn’t hurt a bit. The implant itself is made from your own cells programmed with the language you will need to communicate with the people on Glasica.”
Thanden handed her cotton swab on a wooden stick. “Rub the swab on the inside of your cheek to harvest some epithelials, and I will make your language implant from those. While you wait, an AI Medic---a robot to you---will run a full body scan and analysis of your tissues.”
The robot appeared and stated, “Please stand with your arms at your sides and stay as still as possible.”
Skye complied and became enveloped in soft blue light for about thirty seconds. Then it was over, and the robot left the room. So, she sat back down on the exam table. Two minutes later, Thanden came back with a small tray. On it was a small spray bottle and a syringe with a small amount of liquid in it. First, he sprayed her neck underneath her right ear; then he took the syringe and injected the liquid directly into her neck. As promised, she barely felt it.
“You’re all set, Miss Carter. Use one of the carts in front of the building to transfer your luggage to the chopper on the landing pad. The helicopter will take you to the Alliance Starbase in the mountains. From there a space shuttle will take you to the passenger freighter waiting in orbit.”
“Okay, thank you Thanden.” Skye went outside and found the flatbed wheeled carts she hadn’t noticed when she arrived. As she wheeled it to her car, a young woman came running out of the building.
“I can’t do this!” she cried and flung open the door of a car two down from Skye’s. She watched as the woman started her car and backed out then sped away.
Skye shook her head. The butterflies that seemed to be having a party in her stomach reminded Skye that she was teetering on the edge of indecision herself. She drew in a cleansing breath and thought of Rader and the hope in his eyes when he asked her to be his mate. She had already decided, if it turned out to be a fiasco, she would find a way to leave.
The agency had verified that Rader was currently a law enforcer and former military man. The Narovian Interstellar Matchmaking Service had five-hundred years of experience mating humanoids by their DNA. They started before the Alliance ever sent people to Earth. Skye had burned her bridges so to speak.
Her business was gone, she’d sold her house and donated the possessions she couldn’t take with her. All her money was converted to Alliance funds, and the matchmaking service would donate her old car.
Admittedly, Skye had plenty of apprehension about what she was about to do, but she tamped them down internally. Rader was a wanted man, and she was going to have him.