Page 1 of The Lone Cyborg
CHAPTER ONE
Mattie kept her hands steady on the controls of the vibro-drill, concentrating on extracting a promising chunk of rock from the side of the lava tube. The red dust, a constant companion, danced in the low gravity as she worked, settling on her skin and her coverall and working its way into her curly brown hair, but she ignored it as she continued the familiar process.
The whirring of tiny metal wings cut through the hum of machinery as Sylvester, her cybernetic canary, came to rest atop a nearby boulder, his bright yellow metallic plumage reflecting the dim sunlight that filtered into the mine. His inquisitive chirps punctuated the monotony of her labor, a comforting sound in the vast, quiet expanse of the Martian frontier.
“Find anything, Sylvester?” she asked without looking up.
He fluttered down next to a pile of discarded stones, tilting his head and peering at them with his specialized optics. They were designed to seek out any trace of desirable minerals and a series of rapid tweets immediately drew her attention.
“What is it?” she asked, crouching beside the pile.
He hopped closer, watching intently as she picked up a jagged pegmatite, turning it in work-roughened fingers. A quick survey revealed a pocket of embedded lithium—an increasingly sought-after prize. Mining the lava tube had been somewhat of a gamble—neither of the other sites she’d chosen had been particularly productive—but it already seemed to be paying off.
“Excellent,” she said, smiling at him. “What would I do without you?”
He chirped again, preening beneath her hand as she set the lithium-rich stone aside and gently stroked his head. These moments of shared triumph were a reminder of the bond they shared. While she had been perfectly fine working her claim alone, she had jumped at the chance to participate in the initial test program with the canaries, and Sylvester had rapidly become a companion as much as an assistant.
She stroked his head one last time, the metal cool beneath her fingertips, and returned to work. The only sounds were the hum of the drill, the scrape of metal against stone, and the occasional chirp from Sylvester, signaling another potential find. She made a note of each one but remained focused on her own work, following a promising vein of ore that snaked through the jagged rock in front of her.
The work was demanding but also monotonous and without anything to occupy her mind, she found herself thinking about her mother again. Mattie couldn’t have been more than two or three, but she could still remember the day her mother left, could still remember watching her walk away, ignoring Mattie’s cries. As she had grown older and realized how difficult life must have been for her mother with an unlicensed child she’d tried toforgive her, but it was a pain that had never truly faded, a wound that had scabbed over but never healed.
The huge government-run orphanage where she’d been left wasn’t the worst place to grow up—she was adequately fed, clothed, and educated—but it was a barren, impersonal place. Perhaps because of that early betrayal, she’d never really allowed anyone to get close to her. Instead, she had learned to rely on herself, to trust in her own strength and resourcefulness. But there were still moments when the loneliness crept in, when the weight of her solitude threatened to crush her. The canary had eased those moments.
Sylvester, ever attentive, cocked his head and trilled softly, pulling her away from memories of the past. She gave him a rueful smile, grateful for a presence to ground her when ghosts of the past threatened to take over, then forced the memories back into the recesses of her mind. There was no use dwelling on the past, not when the present demanded her full attention. She had a job to do, a life to build on this unforgiving planet.
As she tried to turn her attention back to her work, the distinctive sound of mechanical hooves echoed across the barren landscape. Sylvester fluttered from his perch, circuits whirring faintly, to land on her shoulder. She looked up, her eyes narrowing as she spotted a familiar figure riding towards her.
J-418, the cyborg ranger in charge of the territory where her claim was located, rode towards her on Trojan, his cybernetic horse. The horse’s dark brown metal limbs gleamed in the harsh Martian sunlight, his movements fluid and graceful despite his artificial nature, and J-418 sat tall in the saddle, moving easily with the horse.
Trojan came to a halt outside the entrance of the lava tube and J-418 dismounted with his usual fluid ease. The horse whinnied softly, his mechanical ears twitching as the ranger patted his neck before walking along the lava tube towards her while Trojan ambled at his heels like a loyal hound. As he drew closer, Mattie could see the determination in his eyes, the set of his jaw. She knew that look all too well—it was the look of a man on a mission, a man who wouldn’t take no for an answer.
“Damn it,” she muttered under her breath, her fingers instinctively curling around the handle of her tool. “What now?”
Part of her wanted to turn away, to return to work and pretend he wasn’t there. But another part of her, a part she tried to ignore, was drawn to him like a moth to a flame. There was something about him that both intrigued and unsettled her, a sense of kinship that she couldn’t quite explain. As he approached, she couldn’t help but notice the way his powerful muscles moved beneath his dusty, worn clothes. The sunlight slanting into the tube glinted off his cybernetic hand, a stark reminder of his otherness, but it did nothing to diminish his rugged good looks.
A familiar tightness gripped her chest at the sight of him, her gaze lingering a moment too long on the hard line of his jaw beneath the short beard and the dark eyes that held so many secrets. Her heart ticked up a notch, betraying her with its unsteady rhythm. She hated that she noticed how the sun also caught in the golden flecks of his irises or how his faded black shirt outlined the firm set of his shoulders.
She quickly masked the momentary lapse with a stern expression, tucking away emotions that had no place in her life. Sylvester flew back to his boulder and tilted his head, studyingthe ranger with a curiosity that mirrored her own carefully concealed intrigue.
“Miss Carson,” he greeted her, his voice roughened from dust or disuse. It reminded her of wind scraping against rock, a sound that was both unsettling and familiar. She straightened, brushing the dust from her hands.
“J-418,” she responded curtly.
The warmth that spread through her in his presence was a discomfort she wasn’t willing to dissect—not when loneliness was a constant companion, whispering to her in the cold Martian nights.
Every damn time, she thought, refusing to acknowledge the flutter in her stomach.He just shows up, stirs the dust, and leaves before it settles.
His visits were seldom without cause, but they had an unfortunate tendency to disrupt the carefully constructed routine that insulated her from the past she’d rather forget.
She sighed as she watched him remove his hat, revealing hair as dark as his eyes despite the silver sprinkled through it. His movements were purposeful, calculated, but not mechanical despite his partially robotic body. There was an undeniable humanity to him—a contradiction that she could appreciate but never allow herself to explore further.
“Got a reason for trespassing, or is your navigation system on the fritz again?” she demanded.
Masking her attraction behind a facade of annoyance, she folded her arms across her chest. The action felt defensive, and he raised an eyebrow.
“Am I interrupting you?”
“You’re always interrupting me, J-418. But I suppose that’s just your way.”
