RippedandRoar Read online

  Arkhov helped her to her feet and lifted her into his arms. "Come along, sleepy head. Time for bed."

  She didn't protest, merely let his warmth lull her back into a somnolent state.

  Inside their rooms, he set her on the bed, tugged off her boots and socks, peeled her from the sensor suit and tucked her between the sheets.

  She was too tired to be outraged or embarrassed. If she was lucky, she would be able to yell at him for his forward attitude, but for now, she enjoyed his warmth as he pressed against her.

  Hopefully, Fixer would have something for her soon. She could hardly wait until morning. She smiled as she remembered her first word, Arkhov.

  "Cila, a little help, please."

  Being woken by Effin's voice was a bit of a shock, but the doctor was standing at the side of the bed with Arkhov's arm around his neck, a claw pressed to the physician's throat. Cila hadn't even felt him move.

  Arkhov, let him go.

  The gold eyes didn't focus immediately, but after ten seconds, he released Effin and the doctor whirled free.

  "Thank you, Cila. I should have knocked but was so excited by the surgery, I wanted to see if we could get it done before Arkhov woke. A nice surprise, as it were." He rubbed at his throat and scowled.

  "I apologize, Effin. I should never have let you reach the bedroom." Arkhov was scowling, his arms crossed over his chest.

  Cila averted her eyes when she realized that her partner was naked. Her mind processed what Effin had said. She finished it?

  Arkhov grudgingly translated.

  "She did. Then she got six hours of sleep and now she is ready to work with me to put the implants in. If you are."

  She waved at the men to leave so she could get dressed. Arkhov sighed. "I have already seen you naked."

  Shut up and give me some privacy. When did you undo my hair?

  He grinned as he left, shoving Effin in front of him. "After you went to sleep. It is lovely by the way."

  She pulled a hank over one shoulder, the black of her hair so dark as to be almost purple. Frowning, she got out of bed and pulled on a loose jumpsuit. She skipped the boots and pattered barefoot out of the bathroom and toward the front room.

  Effin was waiting for her and Arkhov had obviously gone back to the bedroom, because he was in uniform once again. She stifled a mental sigh. She did so love him in uniform.

  Ready.

  They nodded and walked in a silent column to medical. The base was quiet. The skeleton crew of the early morning the only witnesses to their travels.

  "Now, Cila. We will be putting implants along your body at critical points as detected by the suit you were wearing yesterday. Once they are in place, we will be putting a master switch into the base of your brain, accessible by a pressure to any of the pressure points as long as you are in a mood to use your talent. It will be a two-fold access. Thought and pressure."

  She nodded. That was better than anything she had come up with. How many pressure points?

  Fixer came in with a tray full of minute specks. "Sixty-four. At no time and under no circumstances did we want you to be without access to your talent. After you hit the switch, you need only speak and you will be back to full power."

  Is that them?

  "Are those they. And yes, they are as small as I could make them. With Effin's help, we will get them exactly where they can do the most good."

  Effin nodded and Fixer added, "Oh, and you can't speak until we can take you to the test site."

  Cila inclined her head. Of course not. I don't want to risk anyone.

  Fixer put a hand on her shoulder. "Of course you don't. And you haven't. We are fine, we are merely operating with due caution. My husband would kill me if I didn't."

  Cila quirked her lips. Kill?

  "Fine. Nag. But he can nag with the best of them. Now, let's get you talking."

  That was all Effin needed. He asked her to remove her jumpsuit and lie on the surgical table and the moment she was on the cool surface, he covered her with a sheet.

  His comforting smile as he administered the hypo was the last thing she saw as Cila Wen, freak of nature and destroyer of everything.

  Chapter Seven

  Waking in medical with a full complement of staff and visitors was a little overwhelming. Cila scooted into a sitting position as quickly as she could.

  Effin looked exhausted and Isabi had his arm around Mala and was holding a selection of ration bars in a bandolier. Fixer was gone leaving Mala to stuff her face.

  Arkhov was next to her in an instant, "How are you feeling?"

  She flexed her fingers and did a personal inventory. Her body was fine. It felt a little dull but otherwise normal. I feel fine.

  Effin breathed with relief, his arm around a woman wearing a headpiece that smacked of Fixer's handiwork. "Good. That is what we were going for. Oh, this is the head of Morganti Base. Relay, meet the newest member of the Sector Guard."

  Mala swallowed and spoke. "Roar. Her name will be Roar."

  Relay arched a brow. "Usually it is the partner who names the new recruit."

  Mala grinned, "He was too slow. I win."

  Arkhov pulled Cila to him and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I like it."

  She smiled up at him. I like it as well. Very to the point.

  Effin cleared his throat. "Are you up to testing the implants?"

  She nodded and swung her feet off the bed. The sheet came with them and her back was exposed to the room at large. Cila held the sheet to her breasts and tilted her head. I don't feel different. I mean…I feel different, but still like I have power.

  Relay took one of Cila's hands and smiled. "That is how it is supposed to be. You are supposed to have control over your talent. We will discuss it later, when you can actually discuss it."

  The head of the rapidly growing training centre for talents winked at Cila, then shooed everyone out of the room.

  Mala held up one hand and reached into a cabinet. "She will need this. I think it matches her eyes."

  The fabric that tumbled from her fingers into Cila's lap was a swirling combination of smoke and fire. Reds and greys swirled across the surface in a hypnotic pattern. Tears came to her eyes as she ran her hands over the suit.

  Her fingers shook as she signed, Thank you.

  "You are welcome. The suit is fit to you and is rigged with a number of handy gadgets. We will get to them later. For now, I will leave you to get dressed and then we can get you back into the speaking world."

  Biting her lip, Cila nodded and then glared at Arkhov until he left her to get dressed.

  The suit went on with a few sharp tugs and the built-in boots were snug all the way up her calves to mid-thigh. Mala wasn't kidding when she said that the suit was fitted to her. By the time Cila had everything in its proper place, the supports within the suit held her breasts comfortably and wrapped around her ribs in a comforting manner.

  She took a few steps, bent, twisted and stood up again, nodding. It was indeed a perfect fit.

  Her hair was in a loose tail, bound at intervals from her shoulder blades downward. It wasn't her normal style and she guessed that she had been out for a while if Arkhov had been able to start hairdressing as she slept.

  Frowning, she promised herself that she would speak to him…as soon as she could speak.

  He waited with Mala outside the door and each Guardsman looked her over, each for their own reasons.

  Come on, Mala. I want to test your handiwork.

  Mala waited for Arkhov to translate and grinned when he was done, waving the way to the skimmer hangar. "Let's not keep you waiting."

  A shimmering anticipation started running through her. The closer they got to the testing grounds, the more excited she became. Arkhov took her hand and ran his thumb along her palm, an act that sent a completely different type of excitement through her.

  She stared into his dark eyes, idly wondering if her dark burgundy orbs were showing the dilated pupils that he was sporting.


  When Mala cleared her throat, Cila realized that they had reached their destination. She exited the skimmer and only then did she notice the lush forest in front of her. Sand dunes on the right, jungle on the left.

  "These are your testing grounds. We are going to come out here every day until you have complete control over the gravity waves. We will start with you trying to speak to the desert."

  Feeling more nervous than she had the first time, she whispered to the sand and rocks. "Hello, Morganti."

  Nothing happened.

  "Again."

  "My favourite day of my life is rapidly becoming this day." She looked down at her body and aside from the new uniform, she appeared to be completely normal.

  "Sing a song you have heard. Sit and sing to the desert. Or talk to it. But keep talking." Mala was checking readouts and sitting next to Cila on a large rock. Arkhov was leaning against the same rock with an encouraging expression on his face.

  Cila started to tell a story to the rocks and sand. It was the story of her first day on the relay station and all had not gone to plan.

  "Hello, Morganti. I am going to tell you of my first day on Stancha's station a few years ago. It had taken me years to find a job that I could do in the area near my home world that did not involve me speaking to anyone. I had filed nineteen appeals to get through the bureaucracy and finally was able to have a life away from the institutions where I had been raised.

  "The shuttle officer was not the chatty type, so I was able to read a book all the way to the station. He dropped me on the station and left me there. No instruction, no information, no introduction to the relay. Something wasn't right.

  "I hiked my bags on my shoulders and walked through the silent station. That wasn't right either. There should have been motors, whirring, all the sounds that were the symphony of my life. Feeling very uneasy, I ran to the control deck and tried to check the status of the relay. She was alive. Her tanks had recently been changed and she was humming along quite nicely.

  "The silence in the station didn't make any sense. A quick look showed me that there was no shielding up. I kicked myself for not paying attention to the docking. I would have known then that something was unusual.

  "There were no locks on access to the data stream and that worried me. I quickly raised the shields and brought the firewalls back online and that was when Stancha noticed me.

  "She sent an audio greeting to me, but I used the control panel to explain my situation. She was rather distracted, but we chatted through the computer system for half an hour before the station rocked under the impact of something large.

  "I checked the station identifiers and the item that had struck the shielding was explained as a meteor. A meteor made of metal with an electrical system. A second check into the debris determined that it was a small shuttle.

  "What I didn't know at that time, what I didn't find out until this was all over, was that the previous caretaker had been killed in a raider attack. That was why my pleas had suddenly gotten me the job."

  Cila was aware of her other audience, but she kept going. Mala had not told her to stop. "The ship had struck what it thought was an unmanned station and it was not anticipating the shielding. As the next hour passed, I tried to find out what was going on, contacting my people and attempting a coded message to the Alliance to indicate that the station had been attacked. No one answered me.

  "I was alone in a station under attack and the sensors were picking up additional raider ships. I had to make a choice. Prepare to be killed or to fight for my life and the life of the relay on the station. It really wasn't much of a choice.

  "Stancha told me which side of the station the ship was aiming for and I ran for the dock that had allowed me into the station just two hours earlier. A series of lights flared over a baggy EVA suit and I quickly put it on. I didn't know what to do with the faceplate, so I left it up.

  "Waiting for the raiders to come onto the station scared the hell out of me. They had the aspect of every devil in my people's history. They moved into the station and stood, laughing at me in my suit, my knees shaking.

  "One of them asked, What are you? A bribe? He had an unpleasant gleam in his eyes and he came toward me, sending my heart pounding in my chest.

  "I then heard, Please leave the station, or my caretaker will have to eject you. Stancha had let her mind leave the data stream and she was using the audio ports. I swallowed the lump that formed in my throat at her faith in me.

  "The raider laughed and said that he would like to see me try. I told them to, please leave, and they went.

  "The men were crushed at the impact of my voice, their bodies blasted back through the hall and into their ship. The seals were blown and the station's atmosphere started venting into space and even more disturbing, it was taking me with it.

  "I slammed the visor down on my helmet, providing me with breathable air. I had to wait until the station's systems were shut down by Stancha before I was able to stop fighting to hang on to the inside of the airlock.

  "Once the air was gone, I made my way to the control room and sealed off the doors necessary to keep atmosphere inside the station, and then I placed a maintenance call to the Alliance, curse words every other word. They showed up within the week to upgrade the systems and put in back up atmosphere.

  "Stancha and I had a conversation and she pronounced my almost ejecting myself into space as Cila One Protocol. It would take four more attacks before I finally got the hang of staying in the station and keeping the air in it. We talked via the data stream every day and I am fairly sure that she was the person who offered me to the Sector Guard."

  Cila stopped talking and looked over at Mala and Arkhov who were looking at her with a sort of horrified admiration. "Is that enough?"

  Mala blinked and straightened her shoulders. "Yes. It is working perfectly. Do you want to try to use your talent now?"

  Cila frowned. "Will I have to stop talking?"

  "No, of course not." Mala got up and stood next to her, touching her hand lightly. "Now, you can put your hand on your hip, make a fist or press your forehead. Any of those will trigger the failsafe. After that, you need to want to use your talent and when you speak, it should come to the fore."

  Dragging in a deep breath, Cila made a fist and said, "Bang."

  Nothing happened.

  "You have to want to release your talent. Look at that rock and imagine that sleazy raider coming toward you again." Mala's voice was soft, but it was implacable.

  She clenched her left fist, pointed her right hand and yelled. "Out!"

  The concussive blast turned the rock into sand.

  She unclenched her hand and said, "Wow." Nothing else happened.

  Tears started down her face, hard and fast. She covered her mouth until the sobs came and overwhelmed her, then the emotional storm came out.

  Arkhov's arms came around her and he held her as she released years of frustration and emotional pain in a rush that, two days before, could have flattened Morganti Base.

  Now, for the first time, she was a woman being comforted by the man she was sleeping with. It felt wonderful to be so blessedly normal at long last.

  Chapter Eight

  Mala was a hard trainer, but she was determined and Cila appreciated that. Four days after the implants were proven, she was walking through the jungle, carving a precise path through the greenery.

  "That tree there." Mala had a map on a data pad and she was using it to select Roar's targets.

  "Why are we doing this?" Roar clenched her hand, whistled and blew the tree with a flick of her fingers.

  "Because Gant is letting us blow stuff up as long as Kale gets a new garden path to use with the baby. Today, I want to do something a little different." Mala stopped and nodded at Roar.

  Cila was getting used to being addressed by her new designation, but she had ordered folks around her to practice it. "What do you have in mind?"

  "Try and use your energy without a
sound to carry it."

  Roar sighed. "It isn't as strong."

  "I know, but you might need a more delicate touch. Come on, I bet you a new outfit that you can do it." Mala winked.

  "You have already made me half a dozen uniforms."

  "No, not that. Something pretty from the l'nal seamstress in town. She is a miracle worker and you need something to make you feel a little more feminine."

  Roar shrugged and said, "Next target. We will see what I can do."

  Mala inclined her head and continued to lead the way through the lush, green jungle. "There. That tree on the right. Try and remove it without using your voice."

  Roar clenched her fist and aimed her fingers. She extended her hand, wiggled her fingers and kept her lips tightly together. She stamped her foot and flicked her fist toward the tree and was rewarded with a thrum of power.

  The tree bent, swaying as the force struck it. Roar repeated her action without the foot stomp. Somehow, she didn't think that it would be appropriate in a battle situation to look like she was throwing a tantrum. This time, the tree wavered and then exploded with a force that surprise her. Roar clapped her hands, jumping up and down at the proof of her increasing control.

  Mala came and gave her a hug, laughing at her enthusiasm. "Excellent, Roar. Now, do it again."

  They continued through the jungle, Mala coordinating and Roar blasting the plants with her mind. Her aim got better as she practiced and soon, she was able to use her talent without pointing or flicking any portion of herself at it.

  As they were on their way home, Mala turned the skimmer and aimed it at the small but bustling village near the base.

  "Where are we going?"

  "I promised you a new outfit. That means going to the village for a fitting at Zalbeeliyah's."

  Roar blinked. "We didn't have to do it today."

  "You won't be here much longer. We need to get it done as quickly as we can." Mala smiled.