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  CYBORG HEART

  CASSANDRA PIERCE

  Cyborg Heart

  Copyright © 2017, Cassandra Pierce

  Published by Painted Hearts Publishing

  About the Book You Have Purchased

  All rights reserved. Without reserving the rights under copyright, reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or any other means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. Such action is in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law.

  Unauthorized reproduction of distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  Cyborg Heart

  Copyright © 2017 Cassandra Pierce

  ISBN 10: 1-946379-49-2

  ISBN 13: 978-1-946379-49-8

  Authors: Cassandra Pierce

  Publication Date: September 2017

  All cover art and logo copyright © 2017 by Painted Hearts Publishing

  Cover design by E Keith

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  Chapter 1

  The buzzing of his bedside panel roused Brent Antiochus from the first deep sleep he’d enjoyed in several solar days. When he saw who was hailing him—again—he rolled over and hit the “accept” button on the trans-solar radio.

  “Brent? Is that you?” a raspy male voice barked.

  “Yeah, Dad. It’s me.”

  “I’ve been trying to contact you for hours. Didn’t you get my other messages?”

  “We’ve had some…uh…technical problems. Besides, I wanted to wait until I was in my quarters so we could speak privately.” Brent winced. No way would he have considered talking to his father in the com center, or any other place where the members of his five-person crew could overhear them. He was their captain, even if he was younger than most of them, and he needed them to think of him as an authority figure—not a wayward boy in need of a good chewing-out, as his father seemed to believe.

  “Technical problems, huh? Nothing too serious, I hope. The cargo’s all right?”

  “Dad, it’s under control.” Brent sighed, struggling to rein in his impatience. Zeno Antiochus needed to learn to trust his youngest son. Now was as good a time as any to start standing up for himself.

  “Don’t get snippy with me, young man,” Zeno groused. “This is your first run as captain, after all. You can’t blame me for being nervous.”

  “Yeah, Dad, yeah. I understand your concern, but I promise you I’m taking extra-special care of this load. I’ll get it there on time and in perfect condition.”

  Though he sensed Zeno wasn’t satisfied, Brent ended the communication and rubbed his forehead in frustration. He realized that Zeno had built his entire shipping empire on the foundations of his perfectionism and demanding attitude, and he wasn’t about to cut Brent any slack just because they were father and son. No doubt his two older brothers, who also captained Zeno’s transport vessels, put up with the same or worse on a regular basis. This time, though, both had traveled far away on longer missions, and Brent had been the only captain available on short notice to take command of the Lady Bountiful. He knew his father would have preferred anyone else to be delivering this sensitive cargo, but he was determined to complete his mission smoothly and efficiently.

  Rising, he showered and changed into the cargo fleet’s makeshift uniform—black shirt, tan trousers and jacket, and brown ankle-high boots. His father’s brusque words still stinging his mind, he headed up to the comm center and found Hari Baskar, his navigator, and Daras Ekma, the engineer, huddled around the sensor screen on the nav panel and speaking quietly to each other.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “Unknown object ahead, Captain,” Hari said, looking up from the screen. “We were just about to contact you. Scanning it now.”

  Daras moved aside to allow Brent a better view. When he peered into the viewer, he squinted at the odd object that seemed to be floating freely in space off their starboard side. He couldn’t tell exactly what it was—the shape was oval, though the size was far too small to be any sort of ship, unless it was piloted by aliens no larger than the dolls children played with on Earth.

  Most likely it was some sort of abandoned equipment or even some lost luggage off one of the luxury space yachts that sailed through little-traveled systems like this one on sightseeing expeditions. He wondered if it were something salvageable they could use or sell. His father had picked up some fairly lucrative items by keeping his eyes—and his sensors—wide open at all times. Even Zeno would have to praise his instincts if he pulled in a profitable piece of space junk.

  On the other hand, if it proved to be a space-mine or booby trap, they would need to avoid it and also tag the area for the benefit of future passing vessels. A third possibility was that it was some kind of buoy or beacon meant as a signal for another fleet—best left alone.

  Hopefully, the sensors would tell them how to proceed.

  “Any ideas yet?” he prompted Hari.

  “It seems to be some kind of…pod. I’m detecting life support inside. And the temperature reading suggests a possibly mammalian occupant. I can’t tell yet if it’s human.”

  “There’s definitely a pulse coming from inside it. It doesn’t read like a heartbeat, though,” Hari continued.

  “Someone’s in that thing? Way out here? What the…?”

  “Either that, or the pod itself is alive,” Daras said.

  “Might be someone who ejected from a shipwreck—or was jettisoned by someone else against his will,” Brent suggested, ignoring Daras’ farfetched conjecture. He was the same age as Brent, 26, but with far less experience in space, and it showed. “Either way, we’ll have to take a look.”

  “You think it’s someone who needs help?” Daras asked. “We’re a cargo ship, not a rescue vessel. We should notify the authorities.”

  “I think we’d better pull him in first. Border Patrol won’t appreciate us wasting their time if it’s space junk.” Brent pressed a console button. One of his cargo attendants, Zillah Qagg, answered the summons. “We’re going to use our tractor beam to pull an unknown object into Cargo Bay Two,” Brent explained. “Hari will give you coordinates. Exercise extreme care—there could be a life form inside.”

  “Yes, Captain,” Zillah said. Brent transferred her over to Hari’s station so they could work out the details.

  “Captain…there’s one other possibility,” Hari said hesitantly. “What if it’s some kind of trap…something put out there by, say, pirates who want to distract us and steal our cargo? I mean, this corridor isn’t known for being especially peaceful. It’s been a hideout for all kinds of outlaws going back at least two centuries. And considering what we’ve got stashed in Bay One…”

  “It’s a chance we’ll have to take,” Brent said, a bit more harshly than he’d intended. “If someone does need our help, we can’t just drift on by.” Briefly, he wondered if his father might be the type who would do exactly that—anything rather than endanger the cargo. “We’d always wonder if we’d left a sentient being out there to die.”

  He’d added the last bit for his own benefit, still trying to drown out Zeno’s critical
voice echoing in the back of his mind.

  Before he headed for Cargo Bay Two, he pressed one more button on the console and summoned their on-board, all-purpose scientist, Dr. Inya Ephivi, to meet him and Zillah there. A reptilian from the Odelisq system, Inya was brilliant and had studied everything from engineering to the biological processes of various species. If anyone would know what to do with the strange object, it would be her.

  The three waited outside the room and watched on a screen while the automated tractor beams sucked the object inside their small ship. When the hatch was sealed and life support reestablished in the cargo bay, they entered.

  The first thing that struck Brent was the pod’s size. Even though he’d already seen it on the viewscreen, it was still much smaller than he’d expected. The shape, too, wasn’t oval as he’d first thought, but curved like a man with broad shoulders and a tapered waist. In fact, it reminded him of a mummy sarcophagus of the kind he’d seen in books about ancient Earth. He understood Earth museums still had some of them, though he seldom visited Earth anymore and had never examined one up close, and they were made of painted stone and not grimy, space-weathered metal. That suggested the contents might be…no, not a dead body. There had been some kind of pulse, Hari had told him.

  He’d seen plenty of different styles of cargo containers over the course of his shipping career, but never anything like this. “How do we open it?” he asked Zillah and Inya, who moved forward to study it.

  “Good question.” Inya knelt down, examining the sides and applying a hand-held sensor, which would give a far more accurate reading than the distance sensors projected from the hull. “I do recognize the make. It’s an older model, of Earth origin, at least a century out of date. Either someone’s using salvaged equipment, or this thing’s been floating out there a long, long time.”

  “You mean it’s unlikely anyone—or anything—could be alive in there?” Brent asked.

  “I wouldn’t go that far. Some of these units, even back then, were equipped with what we would consider primitive cryogenic chambers. They might have used other kinds of life support I’m not familiar with.”

  While the three of them continued to gaze at the pod uncertainly, a high-pitched whining noise, like that of a gear engaging, issued from its interior. They jumped back in unison, and Brent worried for a minute that Hari had been correct—for all he knew, the whole thing might explode or emit some kind of knockout gas to enable a waiting band of pirates to swarm their ship.

  To his relief, nothing happened except that the noise stopped and the pod’s top panel split in half and slid sideways like an elevator. Brent, Zillah, and Inya crowded in for their first look at whatever—or whoever—lay inside the man-shaped pod.

  Brent felt his jaw drop. A human male, most likely of Earth origins, lay there, all right. But he looked like no man Brent had ever seen before. The fellow was enormous, his shoulders broad and lined with muscle visible even through the silver bodysuit he wore. His face, too, was stunning—strong-jawed and pale-skinned, with thick dark brows that matched the short-cropped hair on his scalp. The hard plane of his chest rose and fell slightly. He was alive.

  He seemed unresponsive, as though he were comatose or in some similar state of suspended animation. That made sense if in fact he had been floating in the pod as long as Inya suspected. Brent supposed the large number of wires crisscrossing the width of the pod and connected to metal disks on his chest, limbs, and forehead might have something to do with that.

  “What should we do?” Brent asked. He raised a hand toward the open section of the pod, then realized he didn’t know exactly what he was reaching for, and let it drop again.

  Inya’s lizard-like eyes widened. “Better not touch him. We don’t know how this device works. He’s survived for a while like this. A few more hours won’t hurt.”

  “I guess not. At least, I hope not.” Brent gazed at his face. The thought of being hooked up like that, a man becoming little more than a machine himself, filled him with a clammy dread that made his spine prickle. Yet the face looked peaceful. He appeared to be in his mid-thirties, most likely an Earthman or possibly from one of the many Earth colonies now dotting most of the nearby solar systems. Brent also couldn’t deny that he was the kind of guy he might have shared a drink with in a space bar or even on a pleasure station. “What’s the purpose of a device like this?” he asked Inya.

  “Most likely he put himself into it, connected himself voluntarily, and jettisoned himself from some disabled vehicle. It used to happen in the old days. People would eject from their ships and engage a homing device in the pods. His must have malfunctioned, because he’s still floating here.”

  “Maybe he can tell us when you extract him.”

  “I’ll go back to my lab and do some research. There’s got to be a way.”

  “Good idea. I’ll hang around a while, I think—and don’t worry, I won’t touch anything.”

  Inya nodded and walked out. Zillah remained behind, stationed in one corner of the cargo bay. Brent could feel her eyes on his back, but she didn’t say anything or interfere when he crouched down for a closer inspection.

  Just then the man in the pod opened his eyes. A pair of startling blue orbs flashed as he stared right at Brent.

  He opened his mouth to call Zillah over, but by the time he did, the guy was asleep again. Had he imagined it? He went closer and bent down, trying to detect breathing. He listened, not daring to touch.

  Then a hand rose and closed around Brent’s wrist. The fingers squeezed with surprising strength. That rugged mouth worked as if he wanted to speak.

  “Th-thank you,” he murmured, his voice so soft and rusty that Brent almost didn’t hear him at first. The words told Brent he was from Earth, or at least he’d spent enough time there to learn to speak Terran without an accent. “R-rescued me.”

  Brent heard Zillah’s boots slapping the smooth metal floor of the cargo bay as she raced over. He held up his free hand to keep her back. He didn’t want to startle the man, who seemed disoriented and confused.

  “Don’t try to speak yet. Let me get the doctor for you.” Brent hit the button on his wristband and summoned Inya. “I mean, well, to be honest, she’s not a medical doctor—but she’s the closest thing we have. Just lie still until she gets here.”

  “Not…much…choice…there.”

  Impulsively Brent brought his free hand forward and used it to pat the fingers that clung to him. “Hang on, we’ll figure this out. We’ll have you out of there in no time.”

  The man shook his head as best he could, given the various electrodes and wires attached to him. “No. Have to stay until…” he trailed off, seeming to lose consciousness again.

  Inya soon appeared with her medic’s kit and a portable diagnostic machine. She glanced at the patient, then back up at Brent skeptically. Zillah hovered behind them.

  “I thought something had happened.”

  “Something did. Watch his face.”

  As they peered down at him together, the man moved his jaw muscles and frowned. Eventually he opened his eyes again.

  “I’ve brought help,” Brent said. “This is Dr. Inya Ephivi, our resident scientist. She’s going to examine you and see if we can figure out what’s going on with your life support system.”

  The man nodded. He looked tired. However many years he’d been floating had no doubt taken a lot out of him.

  “I want to live,” he whispered. “Whatever it takes.”

  “Don’t worry,” Brent answered for her. “We’re going to make sure you do.”

  “His vital signs are much stronger than the last time I checked,” Inya confirmed after a few scans. “His system is slowly weaning itself off whatever has been keeping him alive.”

  “Is that good or a bad?” Brent asked, frowning.

  “I suppose it’s good. There are a few irregular readings, but we can worry about that later. He can hardly live in that thing for th
e rest of his life.”

  “Wrong. In theory, forever,” the man rasped. “But trust me, this kind of immortality you don’t want.”

  “Can you tell us anything about how you ended up this way?” Brent asked, bending over the pod again. He shivered, feeling like he really was talking to someone lying inside an open casket.

  The man moved his neck a little in an approximation of a head shake. “I don’t. Sorry.”

  “What’s your name? Where did you come from?”

  The man’s forehead creased as though he were thinking. Then he looked directly at Brent and Inya with wide, pleading eyes.

  “I was hoping you could tell me, friend. I have no idea about either.”

  Chapter 2

  “Don’t worry. Short-term memory loss is consistent with suspended animation,” Inya said. “Stands to reason, since most parts of the brain have shut down for a long time while the computer does the work. In some ways, our friend here is like a newborn baby.”

  “Do you have any kind of handle on what’s going on?” Brent asked, bewildered. At last, those powerful fingers slipped from his wrist and dropped back into the pod. He glanced at his skin, worried a bruise might develop, but at the same time he sort of missed the contact. He couldn’t deny feeling a connection with the man whose life he had saved.

  Inya continued to study her sensor pad. “I think when we pulled the pod inside, the change in pressure opened the lid the life support began to disengage. The pod probably has sensors that unseal it when it reads conditions favorable to human comfort. Luckily, the batteries still have juice in them. The pod seems to be auto-weaning him from its mechanical processes, if that makes any sense.”

  “I guess it does in a way.” Compared to the kinds of life support available in their own century, that used almost two hundred years earlier struck him as hopelessly primitive. On the other hand, the complexity and apparent longevity of the equipment impressed him.