Chapter 14
Farah
I smothered an elated whoop when Buzz gnawed through the binding around my right wrist. I pulled my arm free and rushed to scratch the little fellow on his head.
“Good job, boy! Good job! You did it!” He chirped in response and climbed over my hip onto my belly to regale me with the proudest look in his lavender eyes, his chest all puffed up.
With one hand free, I could undo the clasps on my other restraints and climb off the table without any issues.
My legs felt strong now, none of the wobbly stuff from the past week.
I felt like myself again, the Farah from before my fake execution.
Only, the strange glitter of pearly scales that covered the backs of my hands belied that feeling.
Something had changed about me, something huge.
I had no time to worry about any of those things, I was alone in this room right now. Buzz and I weren’t supervised, we were no longer captives. This was the perfect moment to escape. I had to find Zeidon; he was injured and he needed my help. It was my turn to take care of things.
The room I was in was far bigger than I first assumed. When we got here, I had been too scared to take note of much more than the bubbling vats, pipes, and that metal table. A table that reminded me a little too much of one of those coroner tables from the crime shows I’d liked to watch.
With Buzz on my shoulder, I inspected the room and tried the one door I could see right now.
I was fairly certain that was the door we’d arrived through, but it would not open for me, no matter what I tried.
I had pushed, pulled, tried the glowing pad of light at the side, but nothing worked.
It was a solid metal panel too, there was no way I could break it.
That left me no other option than to search for another way out, and I started to slink around the vats that lined one wall, following them deeper into the chamber.
Maybe there was another exit on the other side of the room, but a fear struck me that I could just as easily stumble over whatever place the robot Naga had slunk off to.
That would be just my luck—to find him docked in some kind of charging station rather than finding an exit.
I bit my lip as I fought those fears, I still had to try, there was no other option.
“Which way do you think the exit is?” I asked Buzz, who was perched on my shoulder, his claws digging gently into the fabric of my sweater.
He chirped softly in my ear, as impressed by the need to remain quiet as I was.
Though I felt stronger, I was still no match to fight that robot thing, I needed to avoid it.
“Is that another door?” I whispered, excitement thrummed through me at the sight of what was definitely some kind of doorway.
On the tips of my toes, I headed toward it, ducking under a bunch of fast-flowing pipes filled with something green, then around another pair of those metal tables to get there.
There wasn’t just one door, there were three.
I tried the first one, which had a glowing square pad at doorbell height right next to it; that had to be where you opened them.
Maybe that other door was not keyed to me, but when I touched this pad, it flared green, and the door slid open.
So, not a restricted door. Darkness stretched beyond it, but with light from the room behind me, I could still make out some of the details.
A square room, empty save for a round, bed-like thing and more medical-looking machines, like that robotic arm that had worked on me. Not an exit.
I tried the next door with my heart pounding in my throat, certain that the chance of discovery was going up with every passing minute.
It helped to picture myself as a warrior, riding to Zeidon’s rescue.
I only had to remember the sight of him bloody and injured to flood myself with more determination.
There was no way I could abandon him after all that he’d done for me.
My mind fluttered to memories of us at that lake, not to the moment I’d had a panic attack, but to the sensual bathing and the pleasure that had followed after.
Zeidon needed me, and I needed more memories like that with him, I wanted it all.
For the first time, I dared to stroke my fingers over the strange pale scales that doted the back of my hand like gemstone freckles.
If this hadn’t messed me up, I wanted to start that family I’d always dreamed about, with him.
“I would like that,” I whispered to myself, holding those dreams out in front of me to help me keep going when fear wanted to paralyze me.
“Babies with Zeidon, and lots of steamy sex.” Buzz hummed in agreement on my shoulder and I snapped my mouth shut and forced myself to focus.
I couldn’t deal with all those dreams and the spiraling thoughts that followed them.
Thoughts on how that was all too soon, too intense, too much.
I didn’t want to consider why I felt so strongly about him right now, I just wanted him to be safe, and for that, I needed to help myself first.
The next door didn’t open for me, but the one after was just another of those bedrooms. Maybe this had once been a hospital, or maybe those rooms were just there to keep their medical experiments.
I shivered and moved on, deeper into the lab.
And then it happened, just like I’d pictured earlier. I found the robot.
He was submerged in one of those bubbling vats, and cables had hooked up to his anatomy in various places.
Even as I hastily backed away, my brain took in as many details as it could.
A dozen plugs along its chest, and a handful of crab-like machines that scuttled over the fleshy parts of him, stitching his scales back together.
“Don’t wake up. Please stay turned off like a good little robot,” I breathed while I rounded a vat, glanced back at the three doors, and contemplated my options.
Either I had to pass the robot to explore the rest of the lab, or I had to try one of the two locked doors again.
The first one that we’d arrived through had to be my best bet, but I had no clue how to even try to open it without any kind of tool.
“Okay, forward it is,” I mouthed while I scratched Buzz beneath his soft suede-covered chin.
He didn’t lean into the touch but kept his lavender gaze laser-focused in the direction of the robot.
I needed a weapon in case that thing did wake, something that would work against a machine.
Looking around me, I took note of several containers with fluids that were small enough for me to pick up.
Except he was in some kind of fluid right now, water probably wouldn’t bother him.
Nothing looked all that promising but I had to move, I could not dawdle.
Sneaking past that thing was terrifying, I felt like at any moment it could blink open its red and gold eyes and lock onto me.
It reminded me far too much of some of the half-robot, half-flesh bad guys I recalled from some of the ancient sci-fis my dad loved to watch when I was a kid.
What were they called again? Something short and snappy with a B.
I shuffled on silent feet around his tank and breathed a deep sigh of relief when I could hide behind the next vat.
Okay, that was much easier than it had looked.
He hadn’t moved at all. It was almost like he was completely turned off.
Was he doing maintenance on himself? Repairing damage?
Was he just on a set cycle and did I have more time?
Or was he still aware of his surroundings while doing that?
I had no clue, and I wasn’t sticking around to find out.
Buzz and I raced deeper into the lab, eager to leave the robot as far behind us as we possibly could.
It was huge in there, and I was starting to get a little turned around.
My focus was on any sign of doors or tunnel exits, anything that could get me out of this macabre warehouse-sized room.
I also searched the cluttered surfaces of dusty workbenches for anything that I could use as a weapon.
My eyes lit on a door after what felt like at least ten minutes of searching.
I had actually started to relax a little, since there was no sign of the robot chasing after me.
This lab was really creepy, especially darkened as it was right now, but nothing was alive, nothing moved except the bubbles in the multi-hued vats.
The door I found was in the wall all the way at the back of the lab, definitely another exit.
I was just about to raise my hand to the doorbell thingy to see if it would open when a sound reached my ears.
The fine hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, my breathing hitched, and my heart pounded as adrenaline surged through me.
It was the robot, I was sure of it. I spun around on my heels and cast my eyes about for one last shot at finding a weapon.
The nearest workbench had several bundles of cables draped over them, and beneath that, a forgotten knife.
I leaped for that thing, my fingers curling around the hilt. It felt a little sticky and dusty, like that greasy dust muck that gathered on the hood above my cooking unit when I got lazy about cleaning. I didn’t care how it felt to the touch, as long as that knife was sharp enough to cut.
My hands trembled when I raised the blade in front of me, it was black, some kind of carbon alloy, and definitely sharp.
Lights flared to life all around me, they briefly blinded me with their brightness.
I heard something like the sloshing of water and I knew it was the robot getting out of its vat.
The door wasn’t far, I rushed it and took a gamble, stabbing the sharp blade into the panel next to it.
Sparks flew, stinging my fingers, but the handle insulated me from any shock.
Buzz hissed furiously from my shoulder, raising on his paws and curling his spine like an angry kitten.
I held my breath, ignoring the sharp pinch of his claws and the scary sound of something slithering across the floor behind me. “Open, damn it!”
The sound was getting louder and I turned to look behind me, searching for him, that freaky robot.
His red eye gave him away, gleaming malevolently as it curled around a vat of purple goo.
Half his face was still all metal, but some of the gaping scratches along the scale-covered side had vanished.
It didn’t make him look any less terrifying. “Oh fudge… This is going to suck…”
With a whoosh, the door behind me slid open and a cool draft of air pulled on my clothing.
Like it was a chimney, air funneled into the dark tunnel that the open door had revealed.
It might be my imagination, but it felt like cool fingers pulled on my clothing, my hair, and tickled along my bare skin.
My first instinct was to dart into that dark tunnel and just start booking it, I wanted to get as far away from that robot as possible.
Those cool fingers along my skin made me hesitate.
The robot was hissing and growling, waving with his arms. I did not know what he wanted or what he was saying, and I didn’t care.
I just wanted to get away. His tail whipped toward me so fast it was a blur, that moment of hesitation giving him just enough time to catch me around my ankle.
I threw myself out of the way, his tail tightening like a noose around my shin.
I landed on my hip, sending a wave of pain through my body.
Buzz launched into the air with a screech, but he’d learned his lesson and didn’t attack the robot.
He fluttered around me, circling and screeching, but uncertain.
“Go, get help!” I told him, waving my arm toward the tunnel.
I ducked and stabbed the tail curled around my leg with the knife.
It cut through the fake white scales that covered it, then bit into the metal vertebrae beneath with no effect.
He did not let go of me, but he did not pull on me either.
He was still talking, looking at me full of expectation.
Stumbling to my feet, I leaped for the thick bundle of cables that curled down along that nearby workbench.
It was a gamble, but the knife had protected me from a shock when I stabbed the door panel.
Doing something, even if it was risky, was better than just sitting there.
My hands touched the cables and I gripped them and pulled.
The robot either did not seem to notice or failed to comprehend my plan.
The knife cut through the insulation that covered the cables like it was nothing, then bit into the wire it exposed with only a little more resistance.
Sparks flew and the robot raised its voice, shouting something at me that almost made me think he was giving a warning.
With a yank, I freed the side of the thick bundle of cables I was holding and I spun, aiming the sparking, hissing end at the robot.
He approached, rather than avoiding it, and I feared that meant it wouldn’t harm him.
Only one way to find out. With a furious yell, I twisted the end of cable around and slammed it into his tail.
Electricity sparked and hissed, something burned.
And then pain burned up my leg, my muscles seized as the current arced through me.
Everything went black to the sound of roaring and a furious screech.