Unit 77 stared at her. The little female doctor stirred him—stirred the little voice inside his head that whispered about shadows of the past. When he was close to her and the scent of her hair and skin wafted to his nose, he had the strangest sensations—mostly centered in his groin.

That part of him was still flesh, anyway. In fact, the only part that was all nonorganic metal was his left arm. He used it to lift her now, off the forest floor. She felt yielding and soft in his arms, but he forced himself to ignore that input…and the strange things it did to him. At the back of his neck, the CyBRG device was working overtime, trying to quell the overwhelming tide of emotions the little female raised in him.

She made me like this, he reminded himself. She admitted it. She turned me into the monster I am now. It is illogical to have any emotion for her but anger.

Squeezing her to him, he ran again, the underbrush crunching under his metal boots. There were hoppers nearby. He could sense them. But he didn’t say anything to Doctor Chambers. Because…

Because she nearly got killed by one and you saved her. Back when you weren’t Unit 77. Back when you were Drew, whispered that little voice in his head.

77 did his best to push it aside. He stopped a few hundred yards from the base he and the rest of the rogue cyber soldiers had established and set the doctor down. He was fairly certain that she was completely lost by now but he was taking no chances.

“N-now what?” Her voice shook a little but she kept her chin lifted, looking fearlessly into his face.

“You must be blindfolded,” 77 told her. “I cannot risk you knowing the location of our base.”

“Blindfolded? Does…does that mean you’ll take me back? Eventually?” The hope and fear in her voice seemed to do something inside him—something even the CyBRG device couldn’t completely repress.

77 fought it and frowned at her.

“That will be determined at a later date. For now, your vision must be obscured.” He reached into his side pocket, searching for the strip of cloth he had placed there for just this eventuality. Unfortunately, it was sharing space with the spine of the cyber soldier he had killed entering the compound. When he pulled it out, the ragged material was dripping with blood and lubricating fluids.

“Ugh!” Doctor Chambers recoiled from the filthy strip of fabric, a look of disgust stamped on her delicate features. Clearly she didn’t want it wrapped around her eyes, touching her face.

For a moment—just a moment—77 thought of forcing her to wear it anyway.

After all, whispered the little voice in his head, she forced you to wear your metal arm and the rest of your cybernetic components. Maybe she deserves a little payback.

But the inner part of him—some core that still remained of the man he had been—resisted the idea. He didn’t really wish to hurt her or disgust her, no matter how much she might deserve punishment for what she had done to him. Still, her eyes must be covered.

Since most of his body was covered in the hyper-strong, blast resistant silvery alloy of his cybernetic components, 77 had no other fabric to use, other than his combat pants, which he was not about to tear.

Doctor Chambers, however, did.

“Take off your blouse,” he told her.

“Wh-what?” She took a step back from him, a look of uncertainty on her face. “You…you want me to undress? Why?”

A whisper of the past woke in his brain, and 77 suddenly understood her fear.

“I do not wish to take you sexually against your will,” he growled. “But I must have something to bind around your eyes before we proceed further.”

“What…what about my lab coat?” She started shrugging it off.

Unit 77 frowned. “Too bulky. Take off your blouse…or I can still use the strip of fabric I brought for this purpose initially.”

“No, don’t do that!” She looked at the sodden strip of fabric lying on the forest floor and shivered with disgust. “All right, I’ll take off my blouse as long as you promise I can put it back on as soon as we get where we’re going.”

“I do not think that will be a problem,” 77 said. “Now hurry! Your medical expertise is desperately needed.”

She nodded and began quickly unbuttoning the silky gray blouse she was wearing. The color made her own gray eyes look almost silver, 77 thought, like sunlight reflecting off a lake. Then he wondered why he had thought such a thing.

There used to be a lake, whispered the little voice. Far away on Old Earth. You lived by it when you were a boy. Fished in it with Dad…

But then all the ghosts of his pasts were blown away like dry leaves in the wind when Doctor Chambers finally shrugged out of the long-sleeved gray blouse and stood there wearing only her skirt and a black lace bra.

77 shouldn’t have cared what she looked like. He had acquired her for one purpose only—to heal Unit 78 (Rich) and that was all that ought to matter. But he couldn’t help letting his eyes linger on her soft flesh and the creamy slopes of her full breasts, cupped lovingly in black lace. They were so full she seemed to be spilling out of the bra like ripe fruit, and he could clearly see the tight little points of her nipples pressing against the lacy fabric.

Without knowing what he was doing, 77 reached out—with his right hand, not the metal left one—and traced the curve of one full mound with his fingertip.

Beautiful, whispered the voice in his head. You always wanted to touch her there…to rub your cheek against those perfect breasts…suck her nipples into your mouth just to hear her moan your name…

Doctor Chambers shivered under his light touch.

“What…what are you doing? I thought you didn’t…didn’t want me that way.”

Her voice sounded high and breathless and her heart rate had climbed. Her pupils had dilated, just as they had when he’d asked her if she had been intimate with his body before he was…what he was now.

What you are now is a monster, the spiteful little voice in his brain informed him. Remember that fairy tale they used to tell—Beauty and the Beast? Guess which one you are, 77?

Abruptly he pulled his hand away, though her skin was so soft he wished he could touch her all day.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I was…calibrating my senses. Give me your blouse—I will blindfold you with it.”

Mutely, she handed him the silky gray material and 77 tied it roughly around her eyes. She gasped but made no protest when he knotted it tightly. After making certain she couldn’t see, he picked her up again and bounded off, changing directions several times just to be certain she would have no idea where they were going. If the CO found their lair—the secret place he and the other rogues had carved out for themselves—he would send a unit of cyber soldiers after them too large to hold off.

The result of that would be death, and 77 had no intention of dying a second time.

At last he reached the enormous tree where he and the others had established their base. The huge growth had rough, gray-blue bark that gave plenty of hand and foot holds, yet even the lowest branches were too high for the hoppers to reach. It was a safe place—as long as no one found it.

“I need you to cling to my back now,” he told Doctor Chambers, setting her down. “I will crouch so you can put your arms around my neck.”

“Can I take off the blindfold now?” she asked, sounding both uncertain and anxious.

Unit 77 considered. “Negative. It’s better if you don’t see where we’re going.” The heights they would soon be ascending would likely frighten her, and that hidden part of him—the core buried deep inside—didn’t want that.

He crouched in front of her and took one of her blindly seeking hands, placing it firmly on his shoulder. After a moment, she seemed to get the idea and clambered awkwardly onto his back, her arms gripped tightly around his neck.

When she felt secure, he rose smoothly.

“Hold on tightly,” he advised her and began to climb.

“Oh!” Doctor Chambers gasped in his ear and her grip on him tightened. 77 tried not to notice the soft press of her breasts against his back or the feeling of her lush thighs wrapped around his waist.

She is here to help Unit 78, he told himself sternly, even as the CyBRG unit in the back of his neck clicked and whirred, trying to damp the emotions of lust and desire that rose in him as he felt the curvy little female press tightly against him. There is no other reason for her to be here. No reason at all and no need to have any emotions about her.

But being so close to Claudia Chambers seemed to do something to him—to make the brokenness inside him worse. What was it that was broken or breaking? Was it the CyBRG unit…or something else?

77 had no answers, and he was relieved when he finally reached the broad branch he was aiming for and found the hollow in the tree’s trunk.

Inside the vast tree, he and some of the other rogues had taken what had been a rough opening and hollowed it into a kind of living cave. They had all donated various extra lighting components from their own cyber armor, which meant they had illumination inside the hollow tree as well.

He set the doctor down just inside the living cave, between the sentries who stood watch there, and removed the blouse from her face.

She looked at the two tall cyber soldiers on either side of the entrance with wide eyes, but all she said was, “Where is he? Where’s my patient?”

“This way.” Unit 77 nodded her further into the tree-cave. He approved of her courage. Any of the rogues around her could break the petite female in half with one hand—not that he would let them. A feeling of possessiveness not even the CyBRG device could quell swept over him at the thought. But despite her danger, the doctor thought of nothing but the one she had come to heal.

Unit 78 lay on a rough wooden slab they had been able to hew from a broken branch. His eyes were closed and he was breathing shallowly, the wound in his torso still leaking blood and lubricating fluid, which dripped onto the wooden floor.

Doctor Chambers gave a low curse and dropped to her knees beside him.

“Light—I need more light!” she exclaimed. “How did this happen?”

“He was shot by a pulse rifle,” one of the other cyber soldiers—Unit 80—answered.

“Yes, yes…” Doctor Chambers waved one hand impatiently. “I can see that. I meant, why did the other cybernetic Soldiers shoot at you in the first place? Why did you disobey orders?”

Unit 77 felt a wave of emotion even his CyBRG device couldn’t control. Anger…betrayal…fear…

“Because,” he grated. “The CO ordered us to eliminate targets. But they were not targets—they were people. People such as we used to be. Colonists who were only trying to farm the land.”

“Colonists…” Unit 78 began and then coughed weakly. “Colonists must…must be protected. First…order of business.”

“He ordered you to kill colonists? Right here on Hast?” Doctor Chambers looked confused. “But…why?”

77 shook his head. “Unknown. But we could not comply with his order.”

“I’m glad you didn’t. I just have no idea why he would have ordered it in the first place.” Her face went dark. “If I know Pike, it will have something to do with turning a personal profit. He’s dirty—I’m sure of it. But ordering you to kill helpless colonists would make him more than dirty. That would make him a sociopath.”

“We do not know why he ordered what he ordered,” 77 told her. “We only know we could not comply.” He nodded at Unit 78 who appeared to be unconscious now. “Can you heal him? Can you fix my broken comrade?”

“I’ll try, but I don’t have any equipment.” She frowned, her brow furrowing. “You should have let me bring my kit! I had it right there in the med shack.”

“I should have considered the fact that you would need instruments. I will go back at once,” 77 said.

“No, wait!” She put a hand on his arm. It was the first time she had touched him on purpose without him touching her first. 77 couldn’t help noting that it caused his heart rate to increase considerably for some reason.

“Is there something else you require?” he asked her, trying to keep his voice level.

“I just…I don’t want you to leave me.” She bit her lip, an expression of anxiety crossing her delicate features. “Can’t…can’t someone else go for it?”

77 considered. Why did she want him? Because she used to be friends with the one who inhabited his body? With the one he used to be?

“Please, Drew,” she said softly. “Please don’t go.”

The sound of his old name seemed to stab at his heart but 77 ignored it.

“Well, I suppose, if there has been no alarm about the sentry I deactivated, sending someone else should not be a problem…”

“Deactivated?” She shivered.

“Killed,” 77 said harshly.

Her reaction bothered him for some reason. He felt as though he had been weighed in her scales of judgment and found wanting. It was not a pleasant feeling.

“The unit I deactivated—killed—was one of those who didn’t mind shooting colonists,” he reminded her. “In fact, I believe he was also the unit who wounded 78 here.”

“I…I see.” She nodded hesitantly. Their eyes locked and for a long moment, neither looking away. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“I can get the med kit,” Unit 80 said, breaking in at last. “If no alarm has been sounded, it should be simple enough to slip in and get it, Captain.”

77 nodded his ascent. “All right.” He looked at Doctor Chambers. “Is there anything else that you require?”

“Well, let’s see…” She thought for a moment and then rattled off a list. “All of that should be available in the med shack or the supply shack right beside it,” she added. “Can you carry it all, do you think?”

Unit 80 grinned and made a muscle at her, curling one bicep to make it bulge. 77 wondered if his comrade’s CyBRG device was also malfunctioning, allowing some emotion to seep into his system. Though, if the memory in his head was right, 80, who had once been called Jake Wilkins, had always been…

A fucking show-off, whispered the little voice.

“I am capable,” 80 boasted.

“All right, thanks—go get it, then.” Doctor Chambers smiled a little—the barest quirk of one corner of her lush mouth. The expression brought a wave of emotion that even the device in 77’s neck could not control.

You always loved to make her smile like that—that soft little almost-smile that turns her from pretty to gorgeous…whispered the voice of his past—the unquiet ghost that lived in his head. You wanted to make her smile like that and then kiss her…

77 frowned. Kiss? What was that? There were still huge gaps in his memory—holes he couldn’t explain—words he couldn’t define. He couldn’t remember the meaning of this one but when he looked at the petite doctor, leaning over Unit 78 with a concerned look on her face, he wished he could. It seemed…important somehow.

80 was back in record time and he had thought to bring some MREs—self heating meal kits—too. A good thing since the organic parts of the cyber soldiers’ bodies still relied on human food for nutrition. And of course, Doctor Chambers had to eat.

Not that she would.

Though Unit 77 asked her several times to come and eat to replenish her energy, she refused. Once she had the medical supplies in her kit, she worked tirelessly on 78 for hours, her hands stained red and pale blue with the mixture of blood and lubricating fluid.

Once, in the middle of the operation, 78 jerked and groaned, his entire long frame going stiff with pain.

“Oh no, I’m sorry!” The doctor looked horrified. “I must have hit a nerve! I wish I had better anesthetic here.”

“No,” 77 grated out. He too, felt the pain—another agony wave, coming from the damn CyBRG device. “Not…your fault. Agony…bolts. Punishment for not…coming back to base.”

“What? That asshat Pike is still sending you remote shocks? I told him pain wasn’t the answer!”

“Doesn’t seem…like he listened,” 77 groaned. Goddess above but the agony was intense! Like fire rippling down his spine and spreading to every nerve in his body.

“That son of a bitch!” Tears of anger stood in her eyes. “I never even knew these damn devices were capable of sending out pain like that. I never should have let Pike make me implant them in you—in anyone!”

“We were dead—corpses,” Unit 80 said quietly, all his previous bravado gone. “The CyBRG device brought us back to life. Maybe some pain is worth that.”

“What kind of life though?” Angrily, she dashed tears from her eyes with the back of one forearm. “This is no good—you can’t go on like this. You should come in. Pike would stop the pain, at least, if you did.”

“And let him send us on another mission to butcher the innocent?” 77 asked harshly. “I don’t think so.”

“Oh, I’m sorry…I…I didn’t think.” She shook her head wearily.

Glancing at the chronometer built into his metal left arm, 77 realized she had been working for hours without food, water, or rest. No wonder she was exhausted.

Against his will, the thought…and the weary look on her lovely face…sent a wave of emotions through him.

He tried to name them as they overcame the device in his neck and flooded him…Pity for her weariness…admiration for her bravery and tenacity in working so hard to save Unit 78…and something else—that feeling, whatever it was, that made the flesh between his thighs harden and swell.

The emotions made him feel strange…broken inside again. What was it about this little female doctor that affected him so strongly not even the CyBRG device could stop the feelings she gave him?

“Are you almost done?” he asked roughly, trying to cover the emotions that threatened to drown him. “You’ve been working for hours. You need rest and food.”

“Almost…” She armed sweat off her brow. “I think he’ll heal cleanly now. I’m going to give him something to help him sleep and a shot of antibiotics for his human system.”

After suiting actions to words, she sat back wearily and looked at her blood-stained hands.

“Goddess…any chance of a bath around here?”

Unit 77 could tell she was joking, but he answered seriously enough.

“Actually, there is a place I can take you. Do you wish to eat first, though?”

Doctor Chambers shook her head, her wheat-blonde hair swaying around her shoulders.

“Bath first. Or whatever it is you have. Probably a cold shower from some collected rain water, I guess.”

“It is…somewhat more pleasant than that,” 77 told her. “Come.”

He offered her his hand and she took it, despite the blood on her palm and fingers. But when she came to her feet, she swayed with fatigue and nearly fell.

77 caught her quickly and gathered her into his arms, a wave of protectiveness washing over him.

The little female didn’t even try to argue or object—she simply laid her head against his shoulder and relaxed in his arms.

“Thank you…Drew,” she whispered.

Drew…The name echoed in the hollow chambers of what had once been his heart and it hurt…hurt to hear her call him that.

“I am…not Drew any longer,” he told her stiffly. “I am only Unit 77.”

Claudia—Doctor Chambers—looked up at him, her eyes blinking tiredly.

“No,” she whispered. “I don’t fully believe that. I think…I think Drew is still in there…somewhere.”

“You are wrong,” 77 informed her. But inside his head, the unquiet ghost of his past whispered, Really? Are you sure?

77 hushed it with some difficulty and carried the doctor up the interior of the tree. This was a pathway they had found when they had first holed up—literally—in the mostly hollow trunk. 77 was able to hold her in his arms, tucked against his chest, and climb one-handed since they were on the inside of the tree-cave.

After a few twists and turns, he came out onto a branch that held a nest. A nest for what kind of creature, he didn’t know—it was old and abandoned but also huge—as large as a small swimming pool from Old Earth.

Why he could remember what a swimming pool was and had no memory of what a kiss might be, 77 had no idea. The holes in his memory seemed to have no rhyme or reason.

Rainwater had collected in the vast abandoned nest, just as the petite doctor had predicted. But a glowing, pale blue fungus, which lined the inner walls of it, generated enough heat to make the water steam in the cool night air.

The fungus also acted as a kind of glue, holding the sticks and branches of the nest together and keeping the water from seeping out. Yet it didn’t cloud the surface. The makeshift pool was so clear it was easy to see straight to the glowing blue bottom, a couple of meters down.

Doc Chambers had become more wakeful at the sight before them and she half-sat up in his arms.

“What is this?”

“We found it when we made this tree our base,” 77 explained. “I have tested the water with my bio-hazard detection sensors. It is clear of any kind of contaminant. The blue, glowing fungus appears to act as a kind of natural decontaminant so the water it grows in is safe for human flesh.”

“It’s like a natural hot tub,” she said, wonderingly. “That’s amazing!”

“You can wash your hands here. And…the rest of your body, if you wish,” 77 murmured.

Even in the pale light of Hast’s binary moons, he could see the pink blush staining her cheeks. But then she seemed to shake herself and lift her chin.

“Well, I guess since you’re so determined that you’re only Unit 77 and you have no interest in anything…uh, sexual…I shouldn’t be afraid or ashamed to undress in front of you. Should I?”

The idea of her naked…of seeing her breasts again, completely bare this time…of seeing the warm, soft place between her thighs—her pussy, whispered the little voice—seemed to do something inside him. The images grew in his mind and wouldn’t be pushed aside. The waves of emotion—desire, lust, need—went through him again, stiffening his shaft and making him want to groan.

But 77 refused to be ruled by these emotions—even if they were so strong the device in his neck couldn’t control them. He set her down carefully on the broad tree branch, as wide as a road, and took a step back from her.

“You are perfectly safe with me,” he told Doctor Chambers, Claudia—she told you to call her Claudia… “As long as the repairs you made to my comrade, Unit 78, are successful, I will not hurt you.”

Her face went pale. “And if…if he dies? That was a pretty nasty wound. I did all I could but…” She shook her head. “Look, can’t you just take me back to base now? I swear I won’t say a thing to Pike about you. He might not even have missed me yet. No one even has to know I was gone at all.”

Unit 77 thought about taking her back…and felt everything inside him rebel at the notion. A wave of possession so deep it threatened to drown him rushed through him.

Mine, whispered the voice. She’s mine. Now that I’ve got her, I’m never letting her go!

But of course that was ridiculous—an illogical emotion. The only reason he needed to keep her was so that she could watch over 78’s progress and healing.

“I’m afraid not,” he said, careful to keep his voice steady and mechanical, refusing to allow any emotion to enter it. “Unit 78 may need aftercare. You must stay at least until we are certain he is well.”

Claudia frowned and appeared to be thinking.

“Well then…I guess I have no choice. But if you’re making me stay, I want to study the CyBRG device. Now that Corporal Hardgraves is patched up, I’ll have nothing else to do except check on him from time to time. I want to see exactly what it was they were making me implant in you guys.”

77 frowned. Earlier he had been certain that she wanted the device for nefarious purposes. Now, after seeing how deeply she cared and how hard she had worked to save 78 (Rich), he wasn’t so sure.

“Very well,” he said at last. “You may study the device I brought with us when I acquired you.”

“Oh, that’s not the only one I want to study,” she objected. “I need to study the way it works in a living subject too. I want to study you.”

“Me?” 77 frowned. “I do not think—”

“It’s possible I can find a way to turn off the pain sensors,” Doc Chambers said quickly. “So all of you don’t have to feel it every time that bastard Pike decides he wants to send out the agony waves.”

That convinced him.

“Very well—I will allow you to study me. After all, I have already been your study subject once. Why not again?”

She winced, her face betraying pain and guilt.

“I’m really sorry about that,” she said in a low voice. “I know it’s no excuse, but Pike threatened to have me court-martialed if I didn’t implant the devices. And since all the…the subjects were already…” She cleared her throat. “Already deceased I thought…”

“I don’t wish to speak of this,” 77 interrupted her. “Do you want a bath or not?”

“I…yes. Yes, I do.” Turning away from him, she finished undressing as quickly as possible. Then she stepped into the nest…and promptly slipped on the slick blue algae.

Unit 77 heard her choked gurgle and saw her go under, and a cold fist gripped his heart. He’d been thinking a moment before that the nest wasn’t that deep—just about two meters deep in the center at its deepest point. But now it occurred to him that Doctor Chambers was less than two meters tall—considerably less—and he wasn’t at all sure she could swim.

With a low curse, he shucked his combat trousers and boots and jumped in after her. Thankfully the silver metal alloy that comprised his components was fully water proof.

He got to her quickly and came up holding her in the center of the nest, his own feet planted comfortably on the bottom while his head and shoulders rose above the surface of the water. The diminutive doctor, on the other hand, would have certainly been underwater if he hadn’t been holding her.

“Oh!” she gasped and shook her hair back. Her eyes were wide, the thick, dark lashes matted to her skin as though she’d been crying.

Goddamn, she’s beautiful!

77 couldn’t be certain if the thought came from the little voice in his head…or from deeper, down near the core. Either way, he had to agree with it.

Claudia Chambers, sleek and wet and naked in his arms was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen and even the CyBRG unit implanted in his neck couldn’t make him immune to her beauty.

And it wasn’t just the way she looked…it was the way she felt in his arms. So soft and giving, her luscious curves pressed against the hard planes of his bare chest…

“Drew?” she whispered, looking at him with those wide, gray eyes. “Thank you for saving me but you…you can put me down now. I actually know how to swim—I just slipped.”

He started to release her and then came to a startling conclusion.

“I…don’t want to,” he said. “I don’t want to stop touching you, Doc Chambers.”

“Claudia,” she whispered. “I told you once to call me Claudia…after you saved my life.”

“Claudia,” he repeated, his voice a rough and low. “When I touch you I can feel…feel…”

You feel your cock getting hard is what you feel, sneered the little voice in his head.

“I feel my senses calibrating,” 77 said. It sounded better.

“Your senses calibrating? That…that’s what you said when you touched my breast out in the forest.” Her eyes were still wide and uncertain. “I thought for a moment you were going to…going to kiss me.”

“Kiss…” 77 whispered. “What does that mean exactly? I have a memory of the word but not its meaning.”

Doc Chambers—no, Claudia—cleared her throat.

“Do…do you want me to tell you? Or show you?” she asked in a low voice.

The shaft between his legs throbbed and he pulled her closer, liking the feel of her soft, bare breasts with their tight nipples rubbing against his chest.

“Show me.” His voice was a soft growl of desire. He couldn’t help it.

“Like this,” she whispered. Cupping his face in her hands, she slanted her mouth over his and pressed her soft lips to his. “And this…” She nibbled his top lip. “And this…” She sucked his bottom lip into her mouth provocatively before once again, claiming his mouth fully with her own.

For a moment, Unit 77 just stood there, letting her do what she wanted with him. He liked the feeling of her in his arms. She was so fragile, yet so daring. He could break her in half but she dared to be close to him, dared to show him this intimacy that the deep part of him—buried so far down it was almost forgotten—hungered for and needed.

Drew, whispered voices in his mind, shadows of the past. You were Drew…still are Drew. You loved football and fishing and sad movies, though you would never admit it. You were a damn good soldier and you wanted her—wanted Claudia—so badly it made you crazy sometimes. You would have done anything to hold her like this, to feel her kissing you…to kiss her back…

Suddenly the feeling of the soft, intimate touch of her lips to his was too much. Somehow, 77 (Drew) found he was kissing her back, his hands sliding over her wet, naked flesh. He tasted her tongue and then drew it between his lips, crushing her to him with one arm wrapped around her waist while he plundered her mouth, wanting more, craving the taste and feel and touch of her like a drug…

It took him a moment to realize she was struggling from fear instead of pleasure.

“Drew,” she gasped, pulling away from him, breaking the kiss. “Drew, please…can’t…can’t breathe.”

With horror, he realized he had been holding her with his metal left arm and squeezing much too tightly.

He let her go at once but in the pale glow from the phosphorescent algae he could already see a dark marks forming on her pale skin. Goddess, what had he done to her? He’d hurt her—bruised her—when all he’d wanted was to bring her closer…to taste her.

To love her.

Well what did you expect? hissed the nasty little voice in his head. Did you really think you could kiss her without hurting her? She’s fragile, Drew—human. And you’re not anymore. You’re hard and cold and nothing like her. You shouldn’t be anywhere near her.

Pain and shame swamped him and he turned away quickly, feeling sick, feeling wrong.

“I…I must go and check on Unit 78,” he said in a low voice. “He may…may need me.”

“Drew? Drew, wait!” she exclaimed. But he was already climbing out of the water and finding his combat trousers to pull on over wet flesh and metal.

It didn’t matter that the deep part of him yearned for her or that her body seemed to fit to his like she was a missing piece of his heart, 77 told himself.

For her safety and his own sanity, he needed to leave the little doctor the hell alone.