***

GUNNER CARRIED ELODIE back to his ship. Cagley had released her into his care as soon as he returned to the room. He paid the doctor a small ransom in credits, knowledge, and various other goods he still had stored on his ship. It was enough to set him back, but he would’ve gone into debt for Elodie’s procedure.

She squirmed in his hold and hooked an arm around his shoulder, hefting herself further against him. Her other hand clasped the side of his neck.

“What’re you looking at?” he asked, looking around at Ghost City himself, trying to see it through her eyes. All he ever saw was a whole lot of the same old shit.

“Why are all the hatches open? All the docked ships have their hatches open and unguarded.”

“It’s law. Ghost City’s captain demands a show of trust. If we’re allowed into the city, the city is allowed into us.”

“So...we can just walk onto any one of these ships and... I don’t know? Steal things, steal them?”

Gunner chuckled. “Only if you want to die. Or worse, be imprisoned. Just because the hatches stay open doesn’t mean others are welcome. But yes, if we were so inclined, we could board one of these other vessels and do what we pleased.”

“My dad would like it here.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” They had found Chesnik, after following his escape pod’s trail to a nearby port after they left the Peace Keeper battlemass. From there, Gunner followed his nose to the slums of the port where Chesnik was hanging out with some of the other escapees from the pirate freighter. They had changed their names and were working off the payment for those new identities.

To his utter horror, Elodie asked her dad to join them and help rebuild his ship. Gunner would’ve suffered it, suffered him, if it meant keeping Elodie happy, but the nano gods were on his side that day and Chesnik stoically refused.

Elodie paid off her father’s debt, since she still had access to their funds from her previous job, and got him the best treatment a Cyborg’s ship could afford for his wrenched shoulder. They split ways after Chesnik signed on to another crew, a small mercenary vessel, one that he could manage alone without having to worry about hiding his daughter’s identity in the close proximity of others.

He learned something fundamental about Elodie then. That she wasn’t good with goodbyes. Of any kind. And to his chagrin, he now kept tabs on Chesnik’s whereabouts that brokered onto stalking.

“Why do you say that?” she asked.

“Because there’s nothing for him to do here.”

Elodie looked around. “You’re right. It’s all too perfect. I expected more.”

“Oh?”

“Ghost City... The name seems dreary but also fun? Maybe grungy machines, smoke, and glitz. I didn’t expect it to be so...”

“Ghostly?” He laughed. Several Cyborgs eyed them from a distance, and he flared his eyes.

“So boring.”

“There’s a bar and nightclub,” he argued but he also agreed. “And a gladiatorial pit.”

“There’s also a lot of Cyborgs,” she stammered as they came upon one standing outside his ship. “A lot of male Cyborgs.”

“Yeah. It sucks, doesn’t it?” He stopped and looked down at her. “I received another job.”

“What is it?”

“To capture a criminal, dead or alive.”

She sighed and looked from the ship and back at him. “That sounds about right. I’m staying with you.”

“You are,” Gunner agreed and started walking again. His hold on her tightened as he approached Cypher.

Elodie pressed her lips against his ear, her breath tickling it and sending a spark straight to his cock.

“Who is he?” she whispered.

Gunner turned his face toward her. “An asshole who can hear you,” he whispered back.

Cypher narrowed his eyes.

“Tell him I just got out of a procedure and that I’m mutating and tickling, and flustered,” she huffed another sultry breath, “and frustrated.”

“I think he wants to talk to us.”

Elodie shifted in his arms, clutching his neck and shoulder with both hands. Gunner hefted her closer. “Tell him it’s not a good time. Tell him to leave.”

“Leave.” Gunner looked at the man.

If Gunner was utterly horrified with the prospect of Chesnik living on his ship. Cypher was utterly bored.

“I scanned your ship for trackers,” Cypher said unfazed. “I didn’t find anything.”

Elodie sighed again and he gripped her tighter. “I never asked you to check.”

“You didn’t, but Stryker made the rounds and told the others. I found one on Dommik’s ship so I thought I’d better take a look.”

“And? Can you trace it and find out its origins?” Gunner already had a hunch, but didn’t have any proof.

Cypher smiled, a toothy smile with dimples and all. The Cyborg was a big guy, stocky, like a man who lived to lift weights and eat. No one would ever expect that the Cyborg slept at least six days out of every seven day Earth week.

He pulled out a small bug, no bigger than a pinky nail—or Elodie’s tiny pink clit—and handed it over. Gunner released Ely’s legs and held her tight against his side as he surveyed the piece.

It was exactly what he’d expected.

“What is it?” Elodie asked, taking it from him.

“A bug. An extinct one from Earth. But this one is made of metal and enhanced, like me.”

Her eyes widened. Gunner wondered how many drugs Cagley had given her. “It’s a Cyborg?”

“It was. But it’s dead now,” Cypher answered.

“Can we keep it?” Gunner asked.

“Sure thing.”

Cypher moved out of the way and Gunner picked Elodie back up, walking into the hatch. He called over his shoulder, “I’d search Ghost City if I were you.”

“Already have,” Cypher grumbled, somewhere far off.

He closed the hatch and ordered APOLLO to disembark. By the time he carried Elodie to his armory, they were already thousands of miles away from Ghost. She was rubbing her body up against his, shivering, pulling at his clothes and grazing her skin with her nails all at once.

“Cagley told me something interesting.”

“Oh?” Gunner set her down among his weapons and grabbed a belt from the cabinet, taking her wrists and tying them together and attaching them to the wall at her back.

“What’re you doing?”

“What did Cagley tell you?”

“That jackals mated for life.”

Gunner smirked. “And I’m keeping you restrained like the good doctor ordered.”

“Gunner,” she deadpanned. “I itch everywhere! I can’t stand it. It’s like I’m being tickled under my skin.” Elodie twisted on the table and tried to get loose. He grabbed her waist and sat her back upright to face him. “Let me go,” she breathed. Gunner rested his hands on the table on either side of her, caging her in, a smile twitching his lip.

“Not until it’s over.”

Elodie’s nostrils flared, her brow creasing. Her body squirmed. He relished it until she jumped forward and ran her tongue straight over his cheek, licking his tattoo. She slid back languidly, clearly satisfied with herself for catching the Cyborg off guard.

Gunner leaned into her and ran his nose from her shoulder to her ear. He didn’t touch her otherwise.

“You never told me,” Elodie whispered, shaking under him. “Why you have tattoos of guns on your face...” Gunner could smell her arousal. It was building and thickening the air by the second. His back stiffened and he bowed over her, moving his nose from her ear and into her hair. He could hear her skin prickle with goosebumps even though his fingers remained stiff on the table.

Every moment, his ship drove them deeper into space. Every moment, his patience was poked with a hot iron. Every moment, what he had in the cage of his arms became more real.

Gunner gripped the edge of her pants and stripped them off her legs.

“Some people refer to their arms as guns because that’s the best weapon they have. My tattoos point toward my best weapon, and I don’t intend to use it for talking.”