Hijacked by Lolita Lopez
Chapter Five
What is wrong with me?
Misko grimaced as he stormed away from Camila’s cabin. Inside his brain, he warred with his body’s reaction to her lush curves pressed against him. Ashamed of the way he had practically assaulted her on the floor, he vowed not to get close to her again. She was his hostage, not a sex slave! He would treat her with respect.
He glowered at his traitorous cock. It was still half-hard and ached. He shifted uncomfortably and ignored the heaviness in his balls. His heartbeat remained elevated, and the flare of heat in his gut had him second-guessing himself. Why the hell was this happening now? Why had his body chosen this moment to betray him?
“You okay?” Branko asked when he stepped onto the bridge.
Misko waved his hand, dismissing his brother’s concern. “Update?”
“Ship secure. Crew secure. Oona, Marks and Cable are finishing the sweep, but all of the crew have been accounted. There are thirteen of them on board including the captain and his second in command, a cook, some janitorial staff and mechanics and other ship techs. Gretta has the ship under control, and we’ve settled on navigation.”
“Our civilians?”
“We finished the manifest. We have fourteen children under the age of eleven. Five female humans, four in varying stages of pregnancy and one recovering from a recent delivery.” Branko eyed Gretta who was busy at the navigation table. “Some of them very close to delivery.”
Perfect, he thought sarcastically. Just what they needed.
“One female cyborg who is also pregnant. Seven weeks,” he clarified when Misko’s face contorted with worry. “Also, seven male cyborgs including you and me. The two with broken noses that we picked up during our evac are Kent and Lenox, both snipers, by the way.”
“Always good to have snipers on the team,” he reasoned. “Weapons?”
“We located a small cache in the crew berth and in the captain’s quarters.”
“Does anyone have advanced medical training?”
Branko shook his head. “If any of the crew members do, they aren’t telling us. I can have Cable or Marks dig through the personnel files.”
“Andro?”
“This way,” Branko said and led him to the captain’s quarters.
Seeing his youngest brother supine on the bed, his feet hanging off the end, filled him with dread. He crouched down at Andro’s side and connected with his processor. The medical readout didn’t offer any clues as to what was wrong. His vital signs were normal. His brain activity was normal but in a dream state. “Why is he still unconscious?”
“I don’t know,” Branko admitted. “My best guess? His medical emergency software may have put him into stasis to prevent more damage.”
“We need a cybernetic tech,” he growled. “Someone to diagnose and treat him.” Feeling a spike of stress hormones, he rubbed his forehead and ignored the alert warning him he was beyond the limits of accepted wakefulness. As if he had time to sleep!
“Mis,” Branko said, “you sure you’re okay?”
He felt his brother connecting to their shared closed network, probing and attempting to access his medical data. Annoyed, he said, “Stop invading my privacy.”
“You’re the leader of our little mission here. You don’t have the luxury of privacy, especially if it means we’re at risk of you collapsing.”
Knowing his brother was right, he allowed access. Part of him hoped Branko would be able to tell him what the hell was wrong with his body. He soon regretted his decision to grant that access.
“That was a serious jolt you took on the ship,” his brother said, reading the report. “All systems checks were clear except for a fault in a non-essential area of your brain. But—what’s up with your heartrate spikes and these hormone dumps?” Branko went quiet. “Wait. Did you—?”
“No.” Misko straightened and avoided his brother’s stare.
“But you had a reaction?” Branko fished. “An erection? Desire?”
He nodded stiffly. “I think the jolt I had back on the emergency shuttle messed with my sensors.”
“I think it fixed them,” Branko said, a touch of happiness in his voice. “I know it’s terrible timing, but this is a good thing!”
“Is it?” He made a face. “I haven’t had to deal with these urges or feelings since I was a teenager.” He wiped a hand down his face. “I accepted that the enhancements I signed up for as a cyborg had ruined that part of my brain. I learned not to feel most emotions, to not have sexual urges and desires. I grieved that I would never have a functioning organ. I made peace with the fact that I was never going to have an intimate relationship with a woman or father children.”
“Yeah, you did.” Branko squeezed his shoulder. “And now you can have all those things.”
“In the future, perhaps,” Misko agreed, “but right now? I need to focus on the mission, not these unwelcome and confusing feelings she’s evoking.”
Branko tilted his head. “The blonde girl? Our hostage?”
Misko shook off his brother’s hand. “I don’t understand why her.”
“She’s beautiful. She’s feisty. She’s whip smart,” Branko listed off some reasons. Gently, his brother said, “It’s okay to have these feelings, Mis.”
“Not if they make her feel threatened,” he hissed, his face suddenly hot with shame. Needing to confess his sins, he said, “We fell, and I landed on top of her. She tried to fight me off, wrapped her legs around me, and I...I...”
“Got hard?” Branko guessed.
“Yes.”
“Sometimes a good fight is like good sex. Even my body interprets the signals wrong sometimes. I’ve ended hand-to-hand combat with a raging hard-on a few times.”
“It’s different,” he insisted.
“Was she angry? Did she feel threatened? Upset?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “She seemed confused by my reaction. By the way I jumped off of her and apologized,” he clarified.
“Well, if you feel as if you can’t be near her, I can take over.”
“No,” he answered too quickly. "No, I can handle it.”
“Uh-huh.” Branko pointedly stared at his crotch. “Maybe you’ll get lucky and she’ll want to handle it.”
“You’re incorrigible.” He shoved his brother out of the way, ignoring his bark of laughter. “I’m going to make a schedule for watch rotation, check on the civilians and the provisions situation.” Out in the bridge, he found one of the snipers waiting. “Which one are you?”
“Kent, sir.”
“The nose?” He pointed to his own. “Is that squared away?”
Kent gingerly touched the bandage on his face. “Nanobots are working on it.”
“Good.”
“I have some piloting experience, sir,” Kent explained his reason for being there. “On a craft similar to this. My mother’s third husband owns the company that makes this line. When I’m on leave, he allows me to pilot. I don’t have as many hours at the controls of a spacecraft as she does,” he indicated Gretta, “but I can handle the ship.”
For the second time since coming onto the bridge, Misko noticed Gretta rubbing her lower back. “Take over so Gretta can get some rest. Get the elevators working again. We need to be able to move quickly if we run into trouble.”
“Yes, sir.” Kent joined Gretta at the pilot’s station where she started to fill him in on the situation.
Misko located the communications station and sat down in front of it. He accessed the program for the ship wide bulletin board screens and created a schedule of six-hour duty rotations for all of the cyborgs under his command. He left Gretta off the schedule, deciding she should be in control of her own movements depending on her health. He suspected her body was not reacting well to the constant stress, and he would prefer they not have her in labor on the ship, especially without medical techs.
“Find your bunk and rest,” he ordered when he found Gretta hovering behind Kent who seemed to have things under control. “Branko and Kent have things well in hand.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, reverting to her habits from her time in the service.
“Your health and that of your baby is your priority,” he instructed, noting yet again that she had her hand on her lower back and seemed tense with discomfort. Carefully, he asked, “Are you having contractions?”
“No.” She made an annoyed face. “My back hurts all the time lately. Being stuck in a prison cell didn’t help.”
“I imagine not,” he said, suspecting she wasn’t being fully truthful. Without an infirmary to send her to for a checkup, he had to accept her statement as fact. “Go. Rest.”
Her walk seemed more of a waddle as she left, and he wondered what it felt like to have one’s body shifting and changing in ways that seemed so unnatural and painful. For most human females, the childbirth process was as it had always been. The risks to their bodies was high, even on the most medically advanced planet, but here? In the middle of space? Without a doctor?
“If she ends up needing some kind of intervention, we’re fucked,” Branko said in that crass way of his. “Unless you have an obstetrical upgrade I don’t know about,” he added.
“I don’t.” He unleashed a heavy breath of worry. “Nor a pediatric one.”
That remark drew a tense silence on the bridge. None of them wanted to say what they were thinking. It seemed almost bad luck to even mention it.
“I’m going down to check on the civilians,” he said, needing some space to walk and think. “The schedule is up on the screens. Six on, six off.”
“Did you schedule recuperation periods for yourself?” Branko asked, already knowing the answer.
“I will take my recuperation time after the first cycle.”
“You can take my slot,” Branko insisted. “We need you at your best, Mis, if we’re getting out of this alive.”
There was no point arguing with his brother, especially not in front of a subordinate. He nodded stiffly and pivoted toward the exit. The elevators were working again, and he rode down to the deck holding the crew’s berth.
Oona stood guard near the elevator and gave him a quick rundown of the temporary housing situation. “We put the civilians in a block of empty staff bunks at the end of the hall, closer to the galley access stairs and elevator.”
“Are the families together?” Typically, crew spaces were small and cramped. He wasn’t sure how well a family unit would fare in one.
“We had no problem fitting even the family of four into one cabin.” Oona shook her head with distaste. “This whole ship is outrageous. Such a waste of resources. So much wealth and luxury for one woman.”
He didn’t understand his sudden need to defend Camila but didn’t deny it either. “If it wasn’t for that one woman’s vast resources, we would be suffocating to death on our crippled emergency shuttle.”
Oona smartly kept her opinions to herself after that. “We got them all fed. It's been quiet for at least half an hour. I think they were all exhausted.”
“And you?” He couldn’t access her system for a commander’s report. It felt strange not to know exactly how everyone on his team was faring. “Have you eaten? Hydrated? Are you okay to stand watch until your rotation ends?”
“I’m fine, sir. I had my meal and water. I may be pregnant, but I’m not an invalid. Not yet,” she added with a hint of a smile.
“Very well.” He nodded at her. “As you were.”
Leaving Oona on guard, he walked by the cabins where the crew had been secured. He paused outside one door, thinking he heard a strange sound, but after a few moments of waiting, he didn’t hear it again. Glancing back at Oona, he pointed to the door and made hand signals, silently telling her to keep an ear open for mischief.
Certain they were going to have issues with the crew, he reached out to Branko via their secure, closed connection and gave him an update. He wanted to know who was in that room and what their background was as soon as possible. An escape attempt or reverse hostage situation with the crew taking the women and children for leverage was a headache they didn’t need.
In the galley, he found Marks and Cable scarfing down a meal heavy in carbohydrates and protein. The smell of freshly cooked food caused his mouth to water. As if reading his mind, Cable shoved an empty bowl across the metal prep table. “Eat, boss.”
“Who cooked?” He took the bowl and grabbed a spoon on his way to the stove.
“Two of the civilians,” Marks said around his mouthful of noodles and creamy sauce. “The blonde mother and her daughter.”
“You remember the counter-terrorism task force we worked with back nine years ago?” Cable asked as Misko dished piping hot food into his bowl. “The Quionia campaign?”
“Vaguely,” he answered honestly. His team had been involved in so many campaigns they all started to blend together after a point. “Why?”
“There was an interrogation expert we worked with,” Cable explained. “Saddik.”
He ran through his memories and settled on a cyborg’s face. Dark hair. Dark eyes. Dark skin. No nonsense demeanor. Very skilled. Honest. Quiet. “Yes, I remember him.”
“The blonde woman is his wife. The daughter is his.”
“Is he still alive?” Misko rarely paid attention to the KIA lists. He found it was best not to dwell on things like that.
“As far as we know, yes,” Marks answered. “She said they saw him about a week before the emperor’s goons swept them up for that show trial.”
“We’ll keep them safe until they can be returned to him.” Misko would want the same thing if he had a wife and family. “What about the others? Do we know any of their cyborgs?”
Cable shook his head. “Not directly, no.”
“Well, whether they’re friends of ours or not, we’re going to do whatever it takes to get them to safety.”
“And then what?” Marks asked before shoveling more food into his mouth.
“How are we supposed to reunite them?” Cable wondered. “We can’t connect to the MainFrame any longer.”
“We’ll find a way,” Misko said, unsure himself. He sat down on a tall stool at the food prep counter and ate as if it might be his last meal. Like most of his cyborg brethren, he required a high number of calories to function. Their rations since arrest had been less than sixty-percent of their daily required intake, and he was feeling the gnawing ache of hunger in the pit of his stomach even after demolishing one bowl of the pasta, protein and vegetables. He filled another and ate it just as quickly before topping off his meal with a few glasses of water.
“Keep an eye on the crew cabins,” he instructed as he placed his dishes in the industrial dishwasher. “I don’t trust them.”
“That captain put up more of a fight than I expected,” Cable remarked. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he was former military.”
“That’s what worries me,” Misko replied. “If you need me, I’ll be guarding our hostage.”
He didn’t miss the amused looks both men exchanged but decided not to comment on them. The last thing he needed was those two mercilessly roasting him.
When he finally stepped off the elevator on Camila’s deck, he immediately heard her raised voice. It was muffled by the door, but she sounded upset and panicked. Thinking how reckless it had been to leave her tied like that, completely vulnerable and unable to help herself, he raced to the end of the corridor and threw open her door.
“Where the hell have you been?” she demanded angrily. “I’ve been yelling for help for, like, an hour!”
“What’s wrong?” He rushed to the bed.
“Unless you want to change my sheets, you better let me up now! I’ve been holding it as long as I can,” she whined, her face red with embarrassment at having to beg for permission to use the bathroom.
Feeling like an absolute wretch, he hurriedly cut the bandages tying her to the bed. In the back of his mind, he conceded she might be lying in an attempt to escape. The slight tremor to her legs, and the lines of pain around her mouth and eyes convinced him otherwise. When she was free, she shoved his chest hard. “Asshole!”
In an instant, she was off the bed and running to the bathroom, leaving him to wonder why her touch burned him like wildfire.
