But it must have originated from the entrance to the chamber.
Awareness swept over her. Her nipples tightened and her pussy grew wet.
There was only one being who could make her horny while teetering on the edge of death.
Malice, her cyborg, had arrived.
Her lips curled upward. Picton would die. Her hate-filled warrior would kill the guard, would deliver that vengeance after her death.
Her diversionary tactic, the prolonging of her lifespan by a few moments, had worked. Malice would be safe. Valor would survive. The two cyborgs, her male and his friend, would free themselves and find joy, peace amidst their own kind.
A shadow fell over her.
“Time to die, cunt.” Picton slammed the reprimand stick down on Illona’s face.
Pain exploded over her. Colors burst in her brain.
And then everything went black.
She slipped into unconsciousness with the knowledge she’d helped as many beings as she could.
Chapter Twelve
Malice had been 95.2358 percent certain he’d experienced, over his lengthy lifespan, the worst torture a human could inflict upon a cyborg warrior. He’d been taken apart, stripped of skin and flesh, isolated from his kind and other beings, abused in all the ways a male could be abused. There wasn’t more that could be done to him.
He realized this planet rotation he had been wrong.
When he watched, though Valor’s visual system, his female being brutally beaten, and he couldn’t move, couldn’t go to her, protect her, stop her pain, he encountered an entirely new level of torment.
He howled through the transmission lines, feeling every blow as though it had struck him. She was small, fragile, human, his, and she was fighting courageously for her life.
Alone.
He wasn’t by her side, couldn’t tear her enemy apart from limb to limb as his primitive nature pushed him to do. All he could do was yell encouragement she couldn’t hear, rage against the universe, strain against his invisible bindings.
The impact of the stunning was dissipating quicker than it had in the past. But that was still too slow to prevent Illona from being damaged. His little medic was waging a losing war against their shared foe. She wouldn’t survive for much longer.
And he wouldn’t survive without her.
Malice roared with outrage. Harnessing all of his enhanced strength, he flung his body upward. Agony ripped at his big form as he pulled himself away from the sleeping support.
He fell, hard, landing with a thud on the floor. Slapping his palms against the tiles, he pushed himself to his feet. He moved with great effort across the chamber, fighting the remnants of his immobility, needing, seeking to reach his female. That was the only goal in his processors.
His agility and speed increased with each painful step. By the time he had remotely accessed the Humanoid Alliance systems and opened the door, he was fully functional once more.
There was no time to spare. According to the relayed footage, the enemy had caught his female, had downed her.
Malice ran along the hallway, propelling himself forward faster than he’d ever moved. His muscles burned. His heart pounded.
The guard waiting outside Valor’s chamber didn’t see him coming. Malice snapped his neck so hard, so quickly, the male’s head separated from his torso.
Before the skull hit the floor, he was blasting through the door. A second guard turned his head. His eyes widened. He raised his gun.
Malice ripped that arm from its socket, caught the gun, ignored the male’s screams, and stunned Picton. The male had raised his reprimand stick, had planned to strike Illona again in the face.
A growl rose in Malice’s throat. That torture tool was painted red.
With his tiny female’s blood.
His fury overcame him. All logic ceased, leaving only the primitive need to hurt, to kill, to make his little medic’s enemies hurt as she was hurting. Malice grasped the second guard’s remaining wrist and yanked. The arm snapped off.
Arcs of crimson spurted from that wound also. The male dropped to his knees, kneeling in a puddle of his own blood. The sound coming from his mouth didn’t resemble anything Malice had ever heard from a human.
“You do not touch my female.” He slammed the severed arm down on the guard’s skull, beating him again and again with the male’s own limb, wielding it like a club.
The guard pleaded for mercy, cried in pain, babbled incoherently. Malice didn’t stop until there was nothing left of the arm and the enemy was lying unconscious on the floor.
As his female was.
Fraggin’ hole. Malice straightened. What was he doing? She was in pain.
His priorities shifted from vengeance against their foes to caring for his damaged human. Seeking to end the confrontation quickly, he grabbed the guard’s head and twisted it.
Bones snapped. The male’s form gyrated.
There was one less threat to his female.
Satisfaction filled Malice. He glanced at Picton.
The guard remained frozen in place.
The male would die but not now.
“If he moves, stun him again.” He tossed the gun to Valor. “I have to repair my female.”
Malice rushed to his little medic’s side. Her chest rose and fell. She was alive, would remain that way. He lowered his ass to the floor, pulled her as gently as he could onto his lap. But she was so still, so silent, so damaged.
His heart ached.
“Can I tear his legs off?” Valor shifted his body, seeking to align himself with his detached legs.
“He’s mine to kill.” The pain he planned to deliver to Picton would eclipse anything any being had ever experienced. The male had targeted Illona, had hurt her. “You can have the rest of the beings in the structure.”
Malice unstuck some of his female’s hair from her bloodied cheeks, brushed those strands back, gazed down at her face. It was battered. Her nose had been flattened. The lacerations and bruising were extreme.
“I failed to protect you, Medic.” That shredded him. She was his and he hadn’t safeguarded her. “But I won’t fail you now.”
Her wounds were closing. She wasn’t losing more blood. The nanocybotics he had previously relayed to her were trying to repair her damage.
But they weren’t enough, not nearly enough.
“I have to transfer more nanocybotics to you.” He carefully removed his female’s jacket. The fabric was stained red, and he was tempted to shred it. But that would emotionally damage his medic female. Wearing the garment gave her confidence, pride. It was a symbol of her role and she valued it.
Her flight suit, however, held no meaning. He tore it to pieces, baring her form, every revelation adding to his horror, feeding his anger toward their enemies.
The bones in one of his female’s arms poked through the skin. A rumble rose in his chest. She was covered with dark bruises. There was an imprint of a boot on her back.
“The being who did this to you will die…slowly, painfully.” He skimmed his lips over her forehead, tasting blood, salt, her. “I will pound him into mush, brand the soles of my feet all over his form. His screams of agony will echo in this chamber. He’ll beg me for mercy, and I’ll show him none as he showed you none.”
He spread her legs, opening her to him, revealing her pussy lips, her snug entrance. The scent of her teased his nostrils. His female was severely damaged, was unconscious, in pain. His form didn’t process her state. His cock was hard, and desire coursed through his circuits.