Chapter Three:

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Kat stumbled out onto the airfield in shock. She glanced back at the Cyborg but he had already turned around and disappeared into his ship. The strange off-world animals in the snow-filled glass cube shuffled and hopped around. Three androids moved throughout, preparing the strange menagerie, importing and exporting materials.

She was determined to be hired as his assistant. Something in her gut, in her boring lifelong existence as a middle-class land-dweller, wanted to be on the spider-ship. She was curious about the Cyborg, the monster-man, and why fate would taunt her with overhearing this job opening, on this day, at that moment, where she had been standing?

Kat was a home-nurse, a hospice care provider before her grandmother got sick. She had been around death her entire life, first with her parents, then with her patients, only to end up closing the eyes of her nana.

Her parents had died from the same illness.

The one she was afraid of flowing through her very veins as she stood there gawking.

She knew what this man did for a living, and if she could be on his ship, be a part of the research of the specimens he provided. She might just find a way to save herself, where she could not save her family. Why else would the opportunity present itself?

Why else would I be here?

Kat picked up her bag and walked back up the ramp. I’m doing this. The Cyborg was nowhere in sight.

One of the androids stopped what it was doing and approached her.

“Please state your business.”

“I’m the new hire.”

The robot cocked it’s head while its face flickered. “There is no new hire. There are only resumes. Please state your business.”

Kat dropped her bag and opened it, pulling out her console, she projected the screen and pulled up her resume. “Here is my resume.” The android pulled it from her projection and into its own system. “I was just hired. I might not be in your system yet.”

“Very well, Katalina Jones. Your file has been added to the list. Our master has not authorized additional personnel but we are not cleared for takeoff until we have a new unit. It is possible.”

The android appeared to be thinking.

She had never dealt with an android before, not of this caliber at least. In the medical field, she had seen many operate and work med-slats and cryo-pods from a distance. She had been a lowly care provider with a certification to run the instruments and provide psychological relief. It had allowed her to take care of the sickly at homes and hospices but no more. Some people still preferred a human over a machine.

“I was hired by  voice contract, minutes ago,” she lied, watching the bot. “Why else would I have clearance to be on the airfield or on this spacecraft? Or why I have my luggage next to me?”

The android blinked with a series of numbers.

Kat rubbed the tiny key-chip in her pocket. She looked at the other two androids that were ignoring them.

“The ship is readying for takeoff. The probability is higher.” The machine stood there unmoving, undeciding.

A voice called out behind her, the man and the woman from before were at the end of the ramp. “Who are you?” the blonde with the tablet called out.

“The new hire,” Kat answered, beginning to sweat. Oh shit. I’m going to get arrested.

Her bag was yanked out of her hand for the second time that afternoon. The android walked further into the ship with her belongings. “Come this way, Katalina Jones. Takeoff is in commence.”

“He hired you!?” the blonde guffawed. Kat looked at her and then back at the android. The ship came to life with a buzz.

“He picked my resume out of the list,” she turned to the humans and answered. The man narrowed his eyes.

He spoke up, “You’re not an EPED employee. Your resume isn’t on that list. Who are you?”

The gate began to close.

“What the fuck, Mason? I’m supposed to be his assistant.”

“We’ll get to the bottom of this.”

The gate slowly made the sky disappear as it fell from the top of the ship. Kat had seconds to decide. Seconds.

Sweat soaked her shirt as she realized what she had done, as she watched the hatch tick away her choice, solidifying her actions. Find a cure. Go on an adventure. Get arrested. Deal with a monster of a man. One thought stood out amongst the rest. I’ve never left Earth before. The importance of her thoughts did not come in any order. Kat could hear the robots shuffle behind her.

The man yelled out, “You’ll be tried as a stowaway, a spy, if your resume isn’t on that list, you’ll never fly again!”

“Katalina Jones, you must follow me.”

She watched as the two people yelled and argued, only for a moment in time as the slit grew smaller. Her heart raced as she glanced at the glass overlook of the port.

No tea.

“I’m on the list!” Kat yelled at the last second. Goodbye chamomile.

Her fate sealed shut.

The ship hummed to life as the android with her bag led her out of the giant facility and into the tunnels of her new home.

After several turns through dark metal corridors, lights burned low to resemble an old, gloomy warehouse. The robot stopped at a door. A door amongst doors. Kat’s hand slapped the wall as the ship quaked under her feet.

The inconspicuous door slid open to reveal a room. So small it only fit a single cot, lifted high off the ground so a desk-like slat sat beneath it. There was an uncomfortable looking metal stool anchored to the wall. The other side was a blank steel-grey wall with several hooks lined across it and a small, circular fixture was on the low ceiling that cast a bright white, penetrating light across the space.

The android placed her bag on the metal slat.

“These are your quarters, Katalina Jones.”

“Call me Kat,” she mumbled, stepping into her new home.

“Registered.” The door zipped closed behind her, the android gone. She turned back toward it but it didn’t reopen. Her fingers slipped across the lukewarm panel and plastic material.

A quick gut-wrenching shock of queasiness punched her in the stomach. She all at once, felt heavy and lightweight. Kat moved away from the door and grabbed the bars of the desk, not knowing what to expect during takeoff. She held on as if her life depended on it, with her palms slick with sweat and her eyes wrenched closed.

It was over quickly. At least she thought so, never having experienced leaving the atmosphere, nor being able to see what’s happening outside her room. She only assumed.

All she knew was that she had made it onto the Cyborg’s ship. That she now had a job and that she didn’t know how to get out of her room.

Kat lifted to her feet and opened her bag, taking out her network device once again. She sat on the ground where her hand still held onto the bar and opened her console.

Network error.

I don’t have access? It was unheard of on Earth.

Kat tried to link to the ship but was denied. The lights flickered above. She glanced back at the door, got to her feet, and kicked her bag under the desk. She stepped up onto a ladder that led to her bed. It had no coverings or no mattress. Her hand slid across the rails.

She made a mental checklist as her eyes drifted across the room.

I need bedding. I need network access. I need a way to tell time. But first…Her eyes landed on the shut panel. I need to figure out how to open the door.

***

Dommik steered his ship out of Earth’s commercial airways, overriding the planetary defense system to allow himself off the world. The EPED had nullified his shield access until their demands were met. But it really couldn’t stop him, nor could it stop others’ from entering. It just marked the disturbance. Regardless, the defense satellites would trail him.

If he was a threat they would shoot him down. He could feel the link of dozens of them coming to life.

He ignored the hails as the reps from the EPED tried to contact him. Mia and her insipid begging came to mind.

His help with procuring the wild plants and animals from across the universe was contingent on one thing: he worked alone. He worked alone and unhindered. That was why he had a staff of androids on his ship.

Dommik peeled off his black vest and straps–the tiny weapons hidden within–all while kicking off his boots until he was wearing nothing but his worn leather pants.

The chilly, nearly scentless air of his ship breezed past his muscles and filled his nose, cleansing the pungent rot of industry and sweat still there.

He fixated on one scent in particular. The unidentifiable smell of the pixie that had hounded him just an hour before. The smell could only be described as something new, something fresh, much like many of the scents on the barely habitable planets he visited. He bunched his muscles, feeling the strain of his warped body tighten around him.

His mind wandered to the wild tendrils around her cute face and the piercing green eyes that matched his threatening stare. The dusting of freckles across her pale features. He hardened as he pictured his very own fairy trapped behind a glass cage.

Dommik looked down at his skin, almost perfect and so very much human. But beneath the outer layer was something wrong and monstrous. He grabbed his cock through his pants and yanked it, annoyed with the ever-insistent need to mate.

Because he was a fiend.

And it had nothing to do with him being a Cyborg. He was one of a handful of later addition Cyborgs that could shift. That had dozens of animalistic instincts from countless places and times coded into them. The shifter Cyborgs were different from his fellow brethren. Normal Cyborgs couldn’t shift, they always retained their humanoid shape.

The shifters remained in close contact with each other, designed with a pack mentality, but still kept each other at an arm's length distance.

Even now, as he watched the stars zip past, his ship on autopilot to the winter-world of the Molucs, he wanted to darken the mechanical lights of his bridge until he was covered in a blanket of darkness. Where he was the most alive.

His heavy hand still gripped his shaft between his legs, his fingers applying pressure, squeezing it through the thick material but his cock had a mind of its own. The thick mushroom head of it squeezed through the buckles at his pelvis.

A tiny bead of precum wetted the tip of his bulge. His animal instincts began to take over. His humanity faded away as he pictured the copper-haired girl stripped naked and waiting for him in his menagerie, panting and doey-eyed in her cage. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t function, moaning in heat and waiting for him to mount her hard from behind.

His little sprite, losing the ability to fly as he held her trapped under his body, pinned to the floor with his cock.

Dommik squeezed the head of his shaft, refusing to free it, losing himself in the fantasy. A terrible need to subdue came over him. His little fairy with the long legs cried helplessly for release.

His little fairy that was stripped of her wings.

The door swished open behind him. Dommik grunted and squeezed his crotch, mentally saying farewell to the girl in his mind, leaving her unfulfilled and breathless.

Bin-Two stepped into his stark bridge. He swiveled his seat and faced the robot.

“Dommik-One, the creatures in the lab have settled into their habitats. Moluc’s 1-8456 and 1-8457 melted the snow particles upon takeoff but have since fallen asleep with tranquilizers distributed by Bin-One. We have received numerous acquisitions from the Earthian Planetary Exploration Division. What is your request?” Bin-Two stood erect and uncaring that Dommik had his dick half out of his pants.

He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees.

“Keep the Molucs fed and euphoric. We’re headed for their homeworld before we stop off at Ghost City, access has been granted to you with the current coordinates. Ignore the Exploration Division, I’ll take care of them.” Dommik turned back toward his console to deal with the hails and defense satellites. He opened up his most insistent communication. Mia appeared flustered and angry on the screen. Anger looked good on her.

“Accepted. What should Bin-One do about the new hire?” Bin-Two asked.

Dommik stopped. Mia opened her mouth. He had opened a communication to soon.

“What the hell, Cyborg? You take a nobody over me!? She’s not even an EPED employee.” Mia’s sing-song voice raged through the channel. He didn’t hear it. “Why don’t you have a shirt on?”

He swiveled his seat to face the android. “What did you say?” His still-hard cock twitched.

“Dommik! Face me, dammit–” Mia’s voice disappeared as he cut their connection off.

“Accepted. What should Bin-One do about the new hire?” the robot repeated.

“New hire?” he asked slowly.

“Katalina Jones. Resume integrated. Placed in quarters room one. Needs to be integrated. The Earthian Planetary Exploration Division is requesting her credentials and network access for contact, verification, and onboarding.”

Dommik got to his feet and stormed out of the bridge, leaving the hails and Bin-Two behind.

He knew he couldn’t trust fairies.