Break the Mold (Mechanical Advantage Book 3) Read online

  Programming nanites isn’t a hobby; it is in her blood. Time to break the mold and see what she can do.

  Lucky was holding the bomb that blew the staff of Adaptation Base to pieces. Instead of suffering from the blast, the acid in the device consumed her soft tissues.

  From the moment she came out of medical on a new base, she has been working to assist the cyborgs of the base with customizing the fit and flex of their new adaptations. When her friends come for her, she is relieved, but the station isn’t interested in parting with her quite that easily. The resulting hostilities drive some wedges in the two factions, but a Splice attack has everyone seeing sense in no time.

  Nervous around human men, her friends assign Lucky a bodyguard with large wings and rainbow eyes. He is polite, charming, a biologist, and very attentive. If he plays his cards right, he just might get Lucky.

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Copyright © 2019 by Viola Grace

  ISBN: 978-1-987969-65-8

  ©Cover art by Carmen Waters

  All rights reserved. With the exception of review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the express permission of the publisher.

  Published by Viola Grace

  Look for me online at violagrace.com, Sea to Sky Books, Amazon, Smashwords, Kobo, B&N, and other eBook sellers.

  Other books in this series

  Assessing Survival

  Altered Design

  Break the Mold

  Mechanical Advantage Book 3

  By

  Viola Grace

  Chapter One

  Lucky flexed her fingers and wished that her surgeon had had a bit more talent for reinforcement. The dexterity that she longed for was hidden behind the scars and twisted bone.

  “Active scan of open systems, seeking maintenance and repair requests.” She spoke to her voice-activated system and watched as it searched for her.

  Every time she looked at her twisted hands and moved her broken body, she wished she could get a hold of the homegrown terrorists who had blown her up along with her entire birthday party.

  The surgeons had done what they could, but the ladies were a strange size for implants. They had been stabilized, and most of the others had been put in stasis to wait until all components were ready for them. Lucky had worked on programming for the smaller pieces, but because she was in charge of the subroutines, she wasn’t able to get any of the advanced implants that would have made her body hers again.

  She got up and used her crutches to move from her desk to her tiny kitchen. She balanced and got herself a cup of coffee, checking the guard roster on the display behind her dispenser unit.

  Her life was focused on the displays that showed her what was going on in the world outside. It was those displays that had let her see when Stitch and then Alphy had regained the living world. She wasn’t allowed open coms. The guards that surrounded her made sure of it.

  Khiron Station was her home now, and it was the most fortified human outpost, completely run and controlled by cyborgs or, as she liked to think of them, recycled warriors.

  They had learned what she could do for them very soon after her arrival. Her programming skills helped them move faster, helped their nanites provide all the enhanced performance that they could manage. The men on Khiron Station trained all day, every day unless the Splice came by, and if the alien attackers had the bad taste to set one engine in their space, all weaponry on the station was released to blow them into small chunks.

  Lucky was fortunate that she was in a heavily fortified base; she just wished that she was able to see any part of it other than her quarters and office.

  Lucky grinned at Alphy’s request. “I can do that. I think, I mean, I am pretty sure.”

  She frowned and opened the data centre, searching for arousal indicators and translation of sensation to neural activity.

  Lucky had been looking into the details of what human females felt when aroused for two hours when there was a knock on her door. She looked up and back at her data screen. They had been watching.

  She got to her feet and hobbled over to the door, opening it and looking up at the officer who had come calling. “Yes?”

  “Captain Hesker, there has been an unusual information call. Is everything all right?”

  She hopped back and waved him in. “Come in, Sergeant Winks. I am doing research for some control-unit programming. One of the administration women has been woken, and she is missing certain mind and body connections. I need to figure out how to translate the touch into a sensation her mind can interpret. Doing it the old-fashioned way is out of the question.”

  He stepped into her quarters and looked around at the neatly arranged furniture and her few possessions. “Which member of your team was it?”

  “Alphy. She suffered catastrophic damage.” She moved awkwardly back to her desk.

  “As opposed to your damage?”

  She glanced at him. There was concern on his face. “My damage can be repaired by a specialist, but we don’t have one on Khiron. If we did, everybody here would be a lot more heavily armed.”

  “Do you require pain medication?” He gave her another concerned look.

  She shuddered. “No. I am off it now and have no interest in returning to my stupefied state. I have work to do now, and I am not going to jeopardize it.”

  He paused. “How are you communicating with your friend?”

  “Alphy is at a secured location where all of our data packs are sent. When she needs something, she sends out a broadcast, and I snag it and send her what she needs.”

  “Can she help you?”

  Lucky gave him a bland look. “Me? No. Not Alphy. Stitch could if she had surgeons with her. I have to wait for that. Her subroutines went out weeks ago.”

  He frowned. “They know you are here?”

  “Alphy probably has access to all personnel records. My transfer here was officially sanctioned before the bastards on Earth stranded us out here.” She flexed her fingers and started to break down the sensations of arousal, including physiological responses. It was difficult to do with the hulking male behind her, but she kept her focus and ignored him.

  Sergeant Winks left her alone, and she sped the coding along. When she finished, three days had passed, and she was exhausted. She sent her data pack to the warship’s location and crawled into bed. Work was excellent, but rest was a requirement.

  If she played her cards right, she could wake up, and the whole thing would just have been a nightmare.

  Lucky was working on some tattoo subroutines for other bases when there was another knock on her door. She picked up her crutches and walked over slowly. When the door opened, she blinked. “Is it Wednesday already?”

  Harkon and Kinsey stood there and nodded. “It is time for your therapeutic treatment.”

  She grunted. “Fine. Let’s go.”

  She took a dozen steps outside her tiny kingdom and hands carefully lifted her. They formed a chair for her and walked her through the halls. Lucky was mortified, but at least she had made a dozen steps this time.

  They carried her past the crew of Khiron Station, and as they passed the men, they all flattened themselves against the wall so that they wouldn’t impede her progress.

  “So, Nannies, what temperature will I be treated to today?”

  Harkon blushed. “It has been warmed to slightly above blood heat in a standard human.”

  She c
huckled. “Thanks. Last week was an eye opener.”

  They had placed her in the fluid and walked away, not realizing that it was cool enough to take her body temperature into dangerous zones. The thing was, as she was covered with scar tissue, she didn’t feel it until her head began to sink below the surface. She had one patch of skin on the back of her skull that had let her know what the problem was, and she had fought to get to the alarm.

  Last week was the closest she had been to death since the day of the blast.

  They walked her to the treatment unit that was theoretically set to help her gain a larger range of motion in her legs and arms. She blushed, humiliated, as they took her ship’s suit off and slowly lowered her emaciated, damaged, and rail-thin body into the fluid.

  Harkon held her by the shoulders until she settled on the bench while Kinsey took her uniform and went to get it cleaned.

  Harkon hunkered near her. “The temperature is correct today, and we have gotten some authorization for nanites in the solution. Your damage has finally stabilized.”

  She gave him a grimace, her twisted features less than happy. “Yay. If I had known, I would have programmed it.”

  “You need a new module, and we are not set up for that.”

  She winced. “I know. I have hope, though.”

  He shook his head. “You still think your team will come for you?”

  “I know they will. They are awake, and they have transport. They need me, and I need them. Stitch can get me up and running.”

  “You have a lot of faith in them. They were in the same blast you were.”

  She chuckled and shifted on her bench, her legs at the weird angle they had been frozen in after the blast. “I know, I also know that Stitch can do the best assessments in the entire Earth force. She can find out what I need, and Alphy can file the requisitions to get it.”

  “What about the other mechanic?” Harkon asked it politely, but it was obvious that he had researched her team since her last event.

  “Cracker is exceedingly close to the front line. She has her work cut out for her, currently.”

  “What about the other one? The one who keeps sending you parcels.”

  “Ah, you don’t want to mess with her. She is doing excellent work for cyborgs trapped in weird places.”

  Lucky didn’t mention the last of her team, Windy. The messages that she got in the bulk transmissions were keeping her apprised of what the other ladies were doing and that they were on the way.

  The anticipation of a properly outfitted medical crew nearly brought Lucky to tears. The moment they had gotten her speaking, they had her coding for the station’s systems. After that, their priority was to get her hands moving.

  Once they had her able to do her job, they ceased all attempts to get her back to full function. She had no idea which asshole made the order, but the med teams were allowed to give her pain killers and carry her around but not let her regain what had been a comfortable body. She had had curves, hair, and skin that wasn’t lumpy and rigid. She wanted that body back. Hell, she would settle for eyelashes.

  Harkon kept her company for the remaining hour of her treatment, and when Kinsey returned with her clothing, Harkon lifted her out of the fluid and dried her with careful movements.

  Being treated like a statue was annoying, but when they had to lift her and tuck her into her suit, she tried to close her eyes and think of bright open meadows where light streamed in and flowers bloomed. Her nannies carried her back to her quarters with her crutches.

  She was exhausted and headed for her gel bed but saw a flashing icon on her private terminal. She wobbled over to the screen, and a timer was counting down. A very slow smile spread across her lips.

  Five hours from now, she would see her friends again. She had better grab a nap the moment that she set the proximity fields to lower their defenses. Humming to herself, she wrote the code to let her friends in, and then, she went for a nap.

  * * * *

  Alphy looked to Lexo. “Are you getting docking authorization?”

  “No, they are telling me to fuck off. I think they are actually aiming their defensive weaponry at us.”

  Alphy watched the display as the warship glided forward. When they reached maximum effective distance from the station, the station powered down, and the defenses were down.

  She chuckled. “Yeah, Lucky is in there. We just have to go and get her.”

  Stitch spoke on interior coms. “I have the med beds ready and a new control unit. When I meet the asshole who has kept her from getting proper treatment, I am going to put my hand through his chest.”

  Alphy chuckled. “You will have to get in line. My ship, my rules.”

  Stitch’s voice was grim. “Race me.”

  Alphy looked at Lexo and gave him a wink. “It seems your sister is up for a bit of a fight.”

  “That sounds like her. Why is this woman so important?”

  She walked up to him and stroked her hand across his chest. “Remember how I crawled into your bunk and made your eyes roll back in your head.”

  He smiled slowly. “Vividly.”

  She patted his cheek. “She wrote the subroutine that let me enjoy it as well.”

  He gave her a long look with his dark gaze. “Preparing to treat the station as hostile, locking on to docking coordinates.”

  She grinned and headed down to the docking link. Alphy was going to find her friend and carry her back to the ship where she could be made whole and functional again. If anyone knew how important a working body was, it was her.

  Chapter Two

  The power dipped in the station, and Lucky grinned. Her friends had arrived.

  She sent a signal through the internal systems, hoping that Alphy would get the hint.

  The words Where are you? Appeared on her screen.

  Lucky gave her the coordinates, and she got her crutches. When the door opened without her authorization, she lifted one of the crutches and stunned the crewmembers who were pouring into her quarters.

  She recognized them all, and they were all familiar to her. Alphy and Stitch were coming for her, so there wasn’t going to be a lot of confusion when they showed up.

  The feminine voice called out. “Lucky, where the hell are you?”

  Lucky focused, and she called out. “Here. Look for the unconscious guys.”

  Alphy barreled around the corner and looked at the pile before slowly looking up. “Your sex life is always more adventurous than...”

  Lucky knew the moment that her friend saw her. “Alphy, you can be shocked and remorseful later. Can you carry me out of here?”

  A familiar voice came from around the corner. “I will carry you.”

  Harkon poked his head around the doorway, and he nodded. “I can move through the station faster than your friend, and I know which parts of you can bend.”

  She paused. “Right. Fine. Please. Time is a factor here.”

  Alphy was still staring. “What can I do?”

  “Take my crutches. The ligaments in my body don’t flex, so I am pretty much stuck in this one position. Harkon is right. He knows where I don’t bend.”

  She stood and waited while her nanny lifted her against him and nodded to Alphy. “We will follow you, Captain.”

  Lucky watched the bodies on the floor as Harkon followed Alphy at an increasing pace.

  Tears flared in Lucky’s eyes. Part of it was the breeze from the pressurized systems, and part was relief. She was being taken to competent doctors with all of the med systems that she had lived to program before the blast. She wanted to get back to making the human cyborgs better, faster, and prettier. Designing nanite tattoos was her favourite decompressing routine.

  Alphy fought a few of the crewmen who tried to stop their escape, but they made it onto the warship twenty minutes after her first query on the com.

  Alphy said, “Take them to the med centre. She needs more than some time in a bed. This is a major overhaul.”

  Stitch
’s voice came to her, but Lucky couldn’t turn to see her.

  “Fuck me.”

  Lucky chuckled, and her voice rasped, “I keep telling you, you are not my type. Now, Stitch, do an assessment, and get to work. You are on the clock.”

  Stitch chuckled, but the sound was weak. “Right. I will have you so set up that you will be able to hover.”

  “I will settle for being able to close my legs. The splayed look is a little too obvious for me. I like to maintain the mystery a little.”

  Harkon was chuckling slightly as he walked, and Lucky had to admit that it was nice to have someone with her who wasn’t appalled by the fact that she had taken a concussive and acid-based incendiary blast to the front of her body, melting skin, burning muscle, and leaving the surviving ligaments in rigour. Her voice was trashed, and her face looked like a scrotum with a friar’s fringe. Sure, she was a great programmer, but it was hard living life without a mirror because they made you scream.

  Stitch was calling out orders, and she told Harkon what to do. “Can you get her out of her suit and put her face down on the gel bed? We are going to start with a new nanite unit and work from there.”

  Lucky muttered, “Yay!”

  Stitch laughed. “I know, you want to reprogram yourself, but first we have to get you to baseline function. All of your internal organs seem to be intact and functioning, but you must be in agony. There are no traces of pain control in your system.”

  Lucky was set on the edge of the bed, and Harkon carefully removed her suit, causing Stitch to gasp once again. There were masculine voices that were expressing concern in the room, but she ignored them. She also couldn’t see them. Her field of vision was about ten feet—the same size as her quarters on Khiron Station.

  “Thanks for your help, Nanny,” she murmured as Harkon removed her slippers and completed her disrobing.