The sun was just starting to set when Vyken and Danya returned to the Starfire. The air was growing cooler as the clouds over the western horizon turned pink. They were still holding hands as they went into the ship and took the lift to level one where their quarters were located.
Going straight to the bedroom they stood beside the bed and stripped off their clothing. Vyken had scented her desire for him before they had finished that long slow kiss in the back field. Danya had felt the hardness of his desire against her belly as their bodies pressed together.
When they were both naked, they paused to admire each other’s bodies in the midst of their arousal. Vyken had been thinking all day about how he wanted to make love to her, savoring her delightful body. She had filled out some in the months since he had rescued her and her father. Her breasts were fuller, and her ribs were no longer prominent beneath them. It was a healthy weight gain as she had been undernourished for a long time before she came to the Enclave.
Her hair was longer, and she wore it in a single braid down her back. It was also thicker and shinier. Before Vykan pulled Danya against him again, he reached out and cupped her breasts in his large hands, flicking his thumbs over her taut nipples, eliciting a soft hum of pleasure. He changed his mind about what he wanted to do next as she leaned her head back, pressing those lovely breasts into his hands.
Vyken scooped her up and laid her on their bed, spreading her legs apart so he could kneel between them. From the scent of her musk, he could have taken her immediately as he had other times, but that wasn’t the plan. He leaned over her and started kissing her in the middle of her forehead then planted butterfly kisses over her eyes, her cheeks, her chin and finally fastened his mouth to hers and slipped his tongue between them to slow dance sensually with hers.
Danya made that sweet little mewing sound in her throat, caressing his face and running her fingers through his hair which had also grown out a little from his severe military cut. He kissed her at length before he finally went on working his way down her body to pleasure her breasts, kissing them, massaging one while he sucked on the other nipple. She continued caressing him as he pleasured her.
He was telling her with his kisses and caresses that he loved her. He loved her, and she had taught him how by her loving him. She had only told him with words a couple times in the heat of passion, she had told him without words many more ways---most often by how happy she seemed just to be with him.
“Vyken, please,” she whispered, squirming beneath him. “I need you inside me.”
He lifted his lips from her breast and moved to comply because tonight was all about pleasing her. She pulled up her knees and opened her legs wider to welcome him into her warmth. She murmured a long, “Ooooh,” as he filled her and pressed his weight onto her.
Framing her face in his hands, he looked into her eyes and whispered, “Danya, I love you. I never really understood what I was missing until I found you. I love you and always want you with me. We will have a home where we can live together with the children we will make.”
“And I love you. I loved you almost from the beginning…”
Vyken claimed her mouth with his lips and his tongue, staking his claim with his mouth and his cock. Mine! My female!
His plan to take her long and slow escaped from him as desire drove them into a frenzied crescendo; she asked for more, harder and faster, and it wasn’t in him to deny her anything he could possibly give her.
Vyken had grown weary of his life of making war with pleasures few and far between. Now, he had known pleasure every day he’d had with Danya, and it was far more than the hours spent in carnal pursuits. Just her presence lightened his mood. She brought pleasure back to his life, and he realized he could be happy wherever they could be together.
They made love for hours, and Danya finally fell asleep wrapped in Vyken’s arms spooned against him. He didn’t care that sleep didn’t come for him. Holding her in his arms took away his stress and frustrations of the day. Thinking back over the last few hours he rested his cheek against her sweet smelling hair and smiled, something he rarely did before Danya came into his life.
Not one to evade the distasteful jobs, Vyken made sure he was on hand for Jacob Black’s eviction from the enclave community. He and Agare Jax were taking the dart to carry the former administrator to a site they had located 100 miles from the Enclave.
With Black under round the clock guard, Vyken had felt comfortable letting Danya come without a cyborg bodyguard to the Enclave to assist her father in helping the incoming refugees adjust to the change in their circumstances and the culture of the community. Because of his experience living in the city and being one of the those rescued by the enclave and the way he pitched in to help the newcomers adjust, the Council voted to have James Hill join them. James graciously accepted.
The council woman and Assistant Administrator Gwen Fielder, who had questioned Vyken on calling Danya his female, was made Administrator and James Hill filled her spot as a member of the council. Unlike Jacob Black, Gwen admired the cyborgs and their superior capabilities, as well as the fact that they were probably the best looking males around.
No one suspected anything was amiss until they opened the door to Jacob Black’s apartment and discovered it empty. A thorough search of his quarters revealed a secret passage, not on the blueprints of the underground facility. The bottom of his shower stall lifted up to reveal a vertical tunnel with a ladder that led to level three opening into the lab where the three hundred cyborgs in stasis were found. From that point, he could access all four levels of the building.
Vyken immediately pinged Danya’s microdot to locate her. She was on level three on her way to show a new family one of the apartments there. He jumped into the passage in Black’s apartment half sliding and half jumping down the metal ladder from the first level to the third. It led into an occupied space, and a woman screamed at his sudden emergence from their bathroom.
“I’m sorry,” Vyken said in a deceivingly calm tone. “Did you see another man come out of here?”
“Y-yes. It was Mr. Black. He had a gun, and he ran out the door,” she told him.
“Thanks.” Vyken rushed out the door after him. He ran out into the hallway just in time to hear Jacob call Danya by name. “Nooo!” he roared.
Danya turned around, Jacob shot her in the chest, and she went down. Hearing Vyken behind him, Black pivoted and emptied the conventional 9mm Glock at Vyken hitting the cyborg at least five times. The hits didn’t slow Vyken’s advance at all. He reached Black before he could load another clip. Grabbing Jacob by the head, Vyken twisted it with such force he ripped it from his body.
Spattered with blood from the kill and his wounds, Vyken threw down the head as the body fell to the floor and ran to Danya who was on the floor gasping for breath in a pool of her own blood. Vyken scooped her up and ran to the elevator to the surface. It wasn’t there, so he carried her up six flights of stairs signaling Kydel what had happened. He met Vyken in the block building with a hover-stretcher and an injection of packed nanocybots to repair her injuries. As soon as Vyken laid her on the stretcher, Kydel injected them directly into her jugular vein. These were made specifically for Vyken to augment the healing process should he ever become gravely injured. They were the same strain as the nanocybots that Vyken shared with her in his semen and saliva when they kissed and mated.
The bullet had nicked her heart and exited through her right side via her lung. Were it not for the nanites Vyken had shared with her over the past weeks, she would have bled out before Kydel could inject her with enough to repair the damage---if he’d done so in time. They would know in a few hours.
Vyken and Kydel accompanied the stretcher to sickbay. Her bleeding is already slowing, but her volume is down.
Even with five bullets in him, Vyken held out his arm and open a skin flap in his forearm. Give her mine.
They both already knew it was compatible. It would weaken Vyken temporarily, but he would risk death to save her. She meant that much to him.
Even with all the advanced tech at their disposal, the only way to make the transfusion was to run a tube from Vyken’s access through intravenous needle access into Danya. Because of her depleted fluid volume, Kydel had to go deep, but with his onboard scanner, it only took one attempt.
Vyken wouldn’t let Kydel stop the transfusion until he had completely replenished Danya’s blood, almost two liters. Once the transfusion was finished, he stayed at Danya’s side, holding her hand and sipping large energy drink to replenish his fluid level. Finally, Kydel convinced him to go back to his quarters to shower and change because he was splattered with blood from head to foot. He didn’t want Vyken to shock her with his appearance after her grave injury.
He was back in ten minutes showered and dressed in clean clothes, with a set of fresh clothes for Danya. Kydel got him a second drink and left him sitting with Danya as her father arrived. She was out of danger, and Kydel assured James she would make a full recovery.
James knew as well as Vyken that Jacob Black shot Danya to get even for being evicted and removed from his position. He just didn’t count on Vyken getting to him before he could escape. After the fact, Vyken thought however grisly Jacob’s came too quickly.
Hurting Danya was the worst pain he could have inflicted on Vyken. It hurt him more than the bullets he took. It was the closest to tears he had been in all his eighty years. He life wouldn’t mean much if she died. But he couldn’t rest for a moment until she finally opened her eyes and whispered his name.
“Oh, Baby. You scared the hell out of me!” he murmured huskily and kissed the back of her hand.
“What happened?” she asked
“That motherfucker Jacob Black shot you right in front of me. Then he shot me, but that didn’t stop me from killing him,” Vyken growled.
“Are you, all right?” She frowned in concern, her eyes flicking over him, searching for signs of injury.
“I’m fine,” he assured her. “My nanites fixed the damage. You didn’t have enough of mine yet, so we gave you some more and some of my blood. You’re going to be fine in a couple days.”
Danya’s father came to the other side of the treatment lounger and stroked her forehead. “That vicious bastard deserved everything he got. He blamed me for revealing his sick master plan.”
“His only problem with her is that she became my mate,” Vyken said.
“He didn’t know about Maree or her might have gone after her as well,” James said.
“How are things going with her?” Danya asked. “I really like her, but she doesn’t say anything about you.”
“We’re taking it slow,” her father said.
Momentarily, Kydel came in to recheck Danya’s vitals. She was still weak from her ordeal, but the Medic pronounced her well enough to go back to hers and Vyken’s quarters, providing she stayed in bed for at least twenty-four hours---no hanky-panky.
Vyken wasn’t exactly up for it himself after giving a third of his blood to Danya. He had been hurt even worse than Danya during the war and lost close to half his blood and recovered. Now, he just felt tired for the first time in a long time. That didn’t stop him from carrying her in his arms back to their quarters wrapped in a sheet from sickbay. He didn’t want to bother helping her on with clothes just to take them off again when he put her on their bed. For once he didn’t even feel like breeding; he just wanted to feel the warmth of her skin against him.
Once he had her in their bed snuggled against him spoon fashion in his arms, she felt quickly asleep. Vyken couldn’t make himself fall asleep. As close as she had come to death that day he realized that every breath she took was precious. For at least that night, he didn’t want to want to miss a single one.
This was love. Vyken was thankful he had told her he loved before she was hurt before he was terrified that he was going to lose her forever. That one small word seemed so inadequate to describe the petrifying magnitude of his feelings for her. It was like nothing he had ever felt. He had loved and lost far too many brothers and sisters in arms over the years and his good friend Admiral Gregor. But that emotion paled compared to his love for Danya.
He couldn’t even speculate on a future without her. Vyken could only hope that the mass infusion of nanites that saved her life, would also extend her life for many years to come. Theoretically, it should, and he would give her more every time they mated or kissed.
Less than six months into what he expected to be a two-year mission, Vyken wished he could take Danya away from the chaos and violence on Earth. He knew he wouldn’t abandon his mission, and he knew Danya wouldn’t want that. It would never be any different if he didn’t help change it.
He certainly didn’t regret taking this mission, because it brought him to her. Vyken knew now, she was his soulmate, and he was hers. One day they would have the life together he’d hoped for in his wildest dreams.
Vyken Dark had been genetically engineered and born to kill enemies of the Federation. He had killed many, and he would kill more if necessary, but he now knew there was more to life than killing.
There was love, and her name was Danya. It might have been minutes or hours. Vyken pressed his lips to her hair, then closed his eyes and finally slept.