Kito (Galactic Cyborg Heat #91)

Chapter One

Galactic Cyborg Heat Series Kito.

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife" Jane Austin.

Sometimes life just sucks. The cards were just not in your favour.

Looking back, there were many times that a road taken or not, could have changed the course of her life.

Her beginning hadn’t started well. She didn’t know it. For others, it was simpler. Documented, registered and recorded, until you had choice of your own.

He’d given her that.

And then, it was the fate you allowed. The fate you chose. The fate you lived through and dealt with. Sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes seeming insignificant, a small thing, a big thing, making a choice. Or someone making it for you.

Left or right. Yes or no. A path to be taken or not.

So many unimagined impacts that would make up your life.

Not getting that school place. Not passing that exam.

Not dating that person. Not passing that interview.

Not taking that opportunity. Choosing that job.

Doing that training. Taking that re-educating.

Passing that qualification. Relying on that person.

Accepting that truth. Dating that person. Buying, that item.

Choosing not to. Choosing to.

So many turns in the road that could have led somewhere else. Maybe.

But her truth didn’t start with a choice she’d made at all.

It started with a choice someone else made for her.

Taking her choices from her. Leaving her abandoned.

It had been described by the best Cyborg medics as a memory lost to the event. She had no memory of it.

Only memory of being there, of living or trying to until he found her and in reality, saved her life.

The problem with looking back is that you don’t know where those different choices would have led you.

Not really. It could have been good or bad or just different with the same issues, same outcomes.

Same choices you were always going to make.

You were the same person and people tended to make the same mistakes.

You wanted to trust, wanted to believe.

You were who you were.

A product of your own life.

You just hadn’t chosen to live that different choice.

It was life. Fate. You live what you chose.

Or it was thrust upon you. When you have the choice, it was down to you.

You were the creator, the victim, the outcome recipient.

The person who had to come to terms with that.

Accept that. Unless you wanted to go insane, living forever doubting, living with uncertainty, looking for reason’s for why.

When why, had no answer. Just another whim, another choice made.

Being human was not all it was cracked up to be.

And that had to be good enough or you’d be forever searching, going mad, looking for more. Never settling. Never satisfied. Never at peace.

The outcome of different choices are forever unknown.

You can romanticise in retrospect, that it would have turned things out differently. The internal conversation of I should have, I shouldn’t have. Particularly when life turned out disappointing. Confusing. Strong emotion needing reasons.

All those human emotions that hurt you in some way. Levels of happiness. Wariness. Doubts. Pain. Regret. Imagining it could have all have been so much better, looking for comfort, for understanding. Something to accept or blame. And so much more, but who really knew that?

Life was choice. A choice leads to more choices along the road, more decisions to make and more outcomes that ultimately, could have been anything.

Left or right. Yes or no.

A different path, a different choice, a different temptation.

She didn’t believe in the words of Jane Austin. It made little sense to her. That stated dependency. And that, had left her abandoned.

Of course, she knew them. She loved them in fact. A classic that she had picked up from a waste bin was one of her first memories. Scrambling through the waste bin finding it when she’d been looking for food.

Her first real-life memory. At a time when she’d had nothing.

She’d been living in that ally.

Climbing out the bin, holding on to that book like it was a precious gift unable to believe that such a thing could be thrown away.

An actual book with pages. Technology was king on her world. If you had it. Books, actual paper, was a rarity. She could have sold it for food but a child looking at it, it seemed to hold magic.

She had learned to read by it. And it had become a treasure, a favourite of hers throughout her life. Kept. Hidden. Saved. It had been her go to place, for a lot of years. A place to lose herself in. To believe that different times, different places and different people, were real.

Anything could be possible. It now stood on her bookshelf as a reminder. Of everything.

But that was also a very different world.

And a very different time, a long time ago.

A story of want and need of denial and unrequited love. All very romantic. And although her world actively promoted connection, joining, pro-creation, to keep the colony healthy.

She’d never really bought into it.

Her history was one where her world had thrown her away.

And love? Well, she’d not had human love as a child. And didn’t want it as an adult. And she’d done just fine without it.

Being tied down by anyone, having to take someone else's thoughts and feelings into account when making her own decisions?

That was a risk. And not her thing. She was fearlessly independent.

Only one person was important to her. Really mattered to her, was family.

Family that had found her, in more ways than one.

The rest, just felt like a burden.

One she didn’t want or cared for.

That didn’t mean she was a nun. She wasn’t. She liked men, enjoyed their company, did what she needed, when she needed. And kept her private life, private. And anyone who didn’t get that was soon gone. And never anyone she worked with.

Or someone who wanted more than she was willing to give.

She was a private person. Didn’t let many in. And that was important to her.

Likely because of her start in life. She knew that. Accepted that. And she had no problem with that.

A knock at her door and she looked up from the reports she was reviewing. Zee standing there. She waved him in.

“Jane, we have a request from the Empire. They want to send in another team. The current Commander on-world reports that some of our trading worlds

have received the exchange goods shipments but, they have been light, with no explanation. The documentation changed.”

That was a problem. Their world relied on the trading exchange agreements with other worlds within distance. All in the Empire. And all requests for landing came to her desk. She ran the human side of on-world security.

“Did we know about this?”

“No. News to me.” He told her.

She nodded. “Me too. Ok. Give the green light to their arrival. I’ll speak to the Commander. If Councillor Frost doesn’t know, I’d best tell him to get his Sunday suit ready.”

Zee smirked. “You going?”

“Shit no. You can.”

“Still not doing the political thing?”

“Nope.”

“You know Frost will hate that. You’re head of on-world security; he expects you in person on these occasions.”

She snorted. “I’m beginning to think his appointment was a mistake. He wants me to suck up and grovel; can’t do it. You want this job?”

Zee laughed and walked out of her office. “Not a chance in hell.”

Chuckling watching him go. She had good men and women working in her teams. None of them looking to climb the greasy pole.

She’d been doing this job for over 20 years.

She’d not wanted the job either but been guilted into it.

She’d done her time on the beat, on the ships, given good advice, acted when action was needed, never shied away from difficult choices.

Been commended several times and somehow, found herself in this job offered by Frost's predecessor when her boss retired.

She’d liked Robbins. He was good people. Frost? Jury was still out.

Seeing the request from the Empire come up on her desk vid pad.

Opening it, she looked at the information, checked a few things.

Not happy with what she was looking at. It was a problem, a big one.

Contract ending with the Empire kind of problem and that was bad.

Informing Zee they needed to check all produced records on world, against delivery, the loading manifest and the ship's intake confirmation. Asking him to go back 6 months and to keep it quiet. Seeing his reply that he’d place a man on each section already and would collate it himself.

Good. No one to know there was an issue until it really was.

Then another report. Weather warning. Again.

They really needed to expand the weather net. Not have it delayed again.

Pulling up Frost's contact, she classed it as confidential, need to know, his eyes only. It would go directly to him, bypassing his secretary.

Good morning Councillor Frost. We have a security request which I’ve granted to the Empire.

They have some concerns regarding our world's delivery on trade goods that they need to investigate. They’ve had several reports from varying world sources of shortfalls.

So it does not appear to be an isolated incident.

The Empire wouldn’t come for just one incident.

It appears to be systematic. Trade and our Contract with the Empire being so vital to us, I thought you should know in advance.

A meet & greet will be required. I have already placed Zee in charge of our own investigation into the matter. So we are prepared on their arrival and he can present our findings. He will of course, update you directly before the meeting with the Empire.