Page 17 of Agrippa's Acceptance

She had to run to keep up with him. “Slow down, I can’t walk that fast.”

To her surprise he slowed down.

“You know, a thank you would be appreciated.”

“Why should I thank you?”

She stared up at him and almost tripped over her own feet. “I looked after you, sped up your recovery and stayed by your side for months. I read to you hour after hour until my throat ached and my back was so sore from sitting in the position you wanted me; I could barely walk when I got up.”

“It is your duty to do all those things for me.”

She was without words and then she noticed they were getting closer to the mess hall.

“You should stick to eating past. For now, it is the best option for you. Your digestive organs had fully regenerated, but sticking to what you used to eat would be best for a few days.”

“I am not helpless or a natural infant.” He sneered the word, natural infant.

Hurt and angry, Agrippa glared at him, but bit back the words she wanted to blast him with. She was a prisoner on a ship filled with cyborgs that hated anyone from Tundra that was not cyborg. Most of them probably wanted her dead. On top of that she was tired from working on the hybrid ship systems with Anatu. She’d also helped Anatu with the Rising Sun because the ship showed some strange behaviours and Anatu couldn’t figure it out. Neither one of them have been able figure it out.

The mess hall was empty and he led her to a table close to a dispenser. He sat down and ordered, “Bring me food.”

She glared at him, went to the dispenser and got a tube. She was glad the other were not there to see him order her around. But Aurora had told her about the cook that banged around the kitchen and pulpified everything. She would’ve liked to see that.

“Feed me.”

She was tempted to shove it so deep into his mouth that he would have to regenerate his eyes. “I thought you are not a helpless natural,” she said sweetly, but sat down next to him.

He didn’t answer and with a sigh she opened the tube and raised it to his mouth. It was very intimate, felt like she did something forbidden. She watched him swallow, looked up and found him watching her while he drained the tube. It was empty before she could blink. He spit the tube onto the table and motioned to the kitchen. “The human cook leave food for females in the galley. You may fetch some for yourself.”

She got up and went to the galley. After all her secret forays into the kitchen while they were in stasis, she knew her way around it. She went to the storage unit and found some earth sandwiches. She was partial to those, though her stomach was taking its time adapting to the strange food.

Back at the table she ate and drank the water he’d gotten for both of them out of the dispenser.

“You will not feed any other cyborgs.”

Her day suddenly brightened again. She wished she dared tease him or try to make him jealous, but cyborgs did not have normal emotions. From what she had observed, they sometimes reacted immature to situations. “I do not wish to feed other cyborgs.” When he was rude and demanding she did not particularly want to feed him either.

When she finished eating, he stood and took her arm and her heart melted. This was what she’d dreamed of all those lonely nights when he’d been regenerating. Her arm had felt bare without his hand gripping her.

“When do you start your duties?”

“I must stay in the infirmary for two days. I can move around the ship, but I have to check in with Hamurabi and sleep in the infirmary.”

In the infirmary he sank down onto the bed. She studied him, but he didn’t look tired or ill.

“Read human to me,” he said with such arrogance her palm itched.

“Someone should clone you into something with better manners.”

“Just get the book,” he snarled.

She took the reader and read the rest of the story to him. At least he remained quiet while she read and did not interrupt her. An hour later she looked up and he was asleep.

She studied his handsome face, even without ryhov he was striking. Like she’d done all those years ago, when she’d worked on the space project, she simply sat and watched him. Why this cyborg? Why did he fascinate her so much?

She was almost falling asleep, when Balthazar walked in three hours later.

Agrippa got to her feet and turned to face him, she didn’t like any of the cyborgs at her back, but definitely not this one. He was the scariest of the lot.

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