***
“I don’t trust him.”
I already know who Dax is talking about, but I don’t want to let on that Gage has been popping in and out of my thoughts since I clapped eyes on him earlier, despite my attempts at changing the direction of my thoughts. Clad in only a bra and clean pair of pants after a shower, I’m rifling through my dresser for a shirt. Dax is reclining on my bed, his hair still damp from his own shower, his long legs propped up on my footboard. He’s watching me get dressed, but I take my time. I have no reason to be a prude around Dax; he’s seen a lot more of me than just my bra. Not on purpose, but that’s just kind of the way things are when you share a bathroom with a girl but don’t know how to knock.
“Who’s that?” I mumble distractedly.
I turn to face him, and Dax purses his lips and tilts his head. “Yeah, okay, like you haven’t been thinking about him?”
My cheeks get hot, and I tug on the hem of my shirt. “What? I have not! I mean… you know…”
Dax grins. “Relax, Blythe, I just meant that I know you’re curious about him and that little girl. A bionic left brain? It’s unheard of.”
I turn toward my mirror, plucking the uncomfortable contact lens from my eye with a relieved sigh.
“The Professor is going to love that one,” I say as I blink a few times, allowing my robotic eye to focus on my reflection. It gives me a reading of all my vitals and I blush when I realize my heart rate has spiked during our conversation about Gage. I let my wavy, damp hair down and run my fingers through it, feeling much more like myself now that I’m in my room, showered, and wearing clean clothes.
“Ready?” I ask.
Dax leaves his reclined position on my bed and stands, his head nearly scraping the low ceiling of my room. I’m lucky enough that I don’t have to share quarters with anyone, but Dax might as well be my roommate since he’s always here. He drops his pilot’s jacket over a chair and removes his sweater, revealing a gray, sleeveless undershirt that showcases his barrel-wide chest and powerful arms. I roll my eyes at the sight; now the girls will be mooning at him over dinner and asking me to introduce them to him when he’s not looking.
“What?” he asks with a shrug at my annoyed expression. “I’m hot.”
Fucking perfect.
“Let’s go,” he says, patting his empty belly. The sound of his titanium ribs echoes in his chest and the clanking of his footsteps are heavy. He’s taken off his boots and is walking barefoot, his prosthetics peeking out from under the cuffs in his cargo pants. The titanium echoes on the floor as we walk, falling in with the other members of our team who are leaving their rooms for the dining hall. Mosley Hall is a mishmash of outcasts, half-human/half-robots, who have all shed their disguises. Titanium gleams everywhere as the sound of hardware echoes from the walls. Eyes glow, cogs whiz and whir, and I feel more at home surrounded by these sights and sounds than I do anywhere else. Energy levels are high, and it seems Dax and I are the only ones who have come back empty-handed from our mission.
Olivia McNabb, a spunky blonde with bionic adrenal glands and a titanium right hand runs up beside me in a blur. Anytime I feel a rush of air whipping around or past me, I always look for Olivia. Her enhanced adrenal glands give her an extra boost of adrenaline, lending her lightning quick speed and reflexes. She’s removed her polyurethane glove and uses her robotic hand to push her messy bangs back from her face.
“Hey, how’d it go out there?”
Dax shrugs but cuts his eyes at me. I feel concern emanating from him, and I know he’s wondering about how I’m feeling after staying in that trashed house. It’s something we do while on missions, but nobody knows better than him how hard it is for me to be reminded of a past I’d rather forget. It feels even worse when we don’t get there in time to save the people we are there to save.
“No MPs, no Bios,” he answers simply as we leave Mosley Hall and cross the arcade toward the dining hall, which is situated right at the center of Restoration Resistance Headquarters. The grass beneath our feet and the blue sky and clouds overhead are synthetic, but I appreciate them. The Professor created the program to give us a sense of still living in the outside world. Without the changing weather, we’d just be living in a gigantic hole carved into the side of a mountain. I appreciate the normalcy of rain or snow every now and then. It follows the patterns of the seasons—at least, the seasons we used to have before the ruined ozone layer—so for now, we’ve got a balmy summer evening and a slight chance of rain.
“That’s too bad,” Olivia answers. She turns to me with an impish smile, and I already know what’s going to come out of her mouth next. “You get a good look at that Gage guy?”
I keep my gaze straight ahead, avoiding both their stares. I can’t afford to let them know I still can’t get those blue-gray eyes out of my head.
“Yeah,” I answer as calmly as I can. “What about him?”
Olivia rolls her eyes. “Okay, play dumb. I’m just going to go ahead and say it. He’s freakin’ hot.”
Dax frowns, and I see the corners of his mouth tense. I laugh at him, which only draws his dark, hawkish gaze toward me. I shrug.
“How does it feel to have to share the henhouse with another rooster?” I quip.
Dax doesn’t answer, but his lips tighten and I think he’s about to blow a gasket.
“Dax doesn’t trust him,” I offer, filling in the silence.
“Really? Seems all right to me.”
“Olivia, if you would think past how fast you can spread your legs for this prick, you might actually see the truth.”
Olivia flips Dax the bird with her bionic hand. “Fuck you, Janner.”
She’s pretending to be mad, but her wide grin says it all. Olivia is the Resistance Headquarters’ slut and everybody knows it. She and Dax have been friends with benefits for a while now, but I pretend not to know about it. For some reason, the thought of my best friend and the neighborhood hoe getting it on fills my mouth with bitter bile; it’s not exactly a topic of conversation I want to pursue.
“Come on, you two, use your heads,” Dax continues, stopping just outside the doors of the dining hall. “How many Normals do we have running around the place?”
“You mean besides Gage?” Olivia asks.
Dax nods once.
“Not that many other than the family members of the other Bios,” she answers. “Oh, well, and the Professor, but he doesn’t count. He’s practically one of us.”
“Exactly. There’s a reason we don’t let them in. We have no idea what he wants or why he’s here.”
“He’s a family member too. He’s protecting the little girl,” I argue. As soon as the words are out, I regret them. Dax is staring at me as if he’d like to shake some sense into me. Deep down, I know he’s right and I should be suspicious of Gage. After all, there’s a reason we are here. “Look, I just don’t think we should be crucifying this guy just because he stood up to Jenica, or because he’s not a Bio. There are other people here just like him who have brought their children, siblings, or parents to try to escape the MPs. You know the penalty for harboring a Bio is death in some states. This guy has nowhere else to go.”
“We don’t know what kind of connections he might have or what kind of information he might be feeding someone on the outside,” Dax argues, dropping his voice to a harsh whisper as a few more of our team and some of the refugees walk past us and into the building. “We have managed to stay hidden for years and letting this guy in could prove to be our most fatal error.”
“Well, what do you suggest we do about it, Captain-Fucking-Know-It-All? The Professor never turns anybody away unless they give good reason. So far as I can tell, all he’s done is rescue a little girl,” Olivia challenges, her hands on her round hips. Dax’s jaw ticks, and I know he’s about three seconds away from smashing her face in… that is, he would he if she were a guy… and if he could catch her first.
“Don’t you have someone you could be screwing ri
ght now?” Dax counters.
Olivia sways her hips and bats her eyelashes. “You offering, baby?”
“That’s enough!” I interject. I don’t like the way Olivia is looking at Dax, and I’m in no mood to watch those two get into it. Besides, I want to know exactly what Dax’s position is on Gage. We have always agreed on everything, but I have a feeling Gage is going to be one of those topics best not discussed by us.
“So, are you going to answer the question?” I ask once the two have stopped staring daggers at each other. “What do you think we should do about Gage if he turns out to be dangerous?”
Dax shrugs. “Simple. Kill him.