Star Force: Instinct (Star Force Universe Book 49) Read online

“Why does that reference hold such importance for you? For all of you? It’s just a very unorthodox and illogical ancient cartoon.”

  “If you have to ask, you’ll never understand. This is worth going after, Vortison. More so than you realize. I’ll go as slow as I need to in order to achieve it, not because I promised you I would. Count on my greed for more power to fuel my patience.”

  He swiped away her finger with his hand. “You’re not going to leave, are you?”

  “Nope,” she said defiantly.

  “I could report you to the trailblazers.”

  “Do you want to experience broken bones too?”

  “Bluff,” he declared.

  “I’m doing this and you’re going to help me,” she said firmly. “If I die you’re going to feel horrible, despite it being my choice. If I succeed, I open up a whole new level of Archon advancement and give you a new playground of Human genetics to explore.

  “If we do this, you will no longer be Human,” he underscored.

  “That’s the point,” she said firmly.

  The medtech dipped his head. “I’m worried about you, not my feelings. I have no control over this. Medically speaking, we’re in the wilderness.”

  “That’s why you have to trust me to find the way. You know biology from the spectator’s point of view. I know it far better from the user interface, and that’s where the training effect happens. You know that.”

  “Fine,” he relented. “It is your ass on the line. And I haven’t been working on this for nothing. I just wished I could have gotten closer before hitting the wall. Someone has to break through to give me data, it’s just that you…”

  “If I get screwed it’s doubly unfair because it will be the second time,” she finished for him. “I know. I’m willing to risk it because this time I’m in the pilot’s seat. Not a helpless victim. The hard work has to be done by somebody, and in this case that somebody is me and you and whatever other staff you need. Just give me the push I need, and I’ll do the rest.”

  “Over there,” he said, pointing to a low pedestal set into a wall alcove. “Take off your clothes and get ready to stand still for a few hours.”

  “Thank you,” she said, eagerly stripping off her uniform while walking across the lab, leaving a trail of clothing that she telekinetically pulled into a ball and floated on top of a table as she spun around and stepped back into the alcove with her bare feet feeling tingly on the material that had to be energized in some way.

  “Anders,” Vortison said to another medtech across the room. “Get Carson and Neuroi in here. We’ve got work to do.”

  “On it,” the man said, disappearing to round up the other medtechs that would be needed for this project. There would be too many variables to monitor on his own, even with computer assistance, and he had to give Lara every advantage possible.

  He walked up beside her and tapped on a display screen that began waking up the new machine that the Archon was standing on.

  “How does the clothing interfere?” she asked. “Am I going to Jumat pulse?”

  “Please don’t. You’ll wreck the machinery. I don’t have a Jumat-proof shield.”

  “There is no such thing. So why no clothes?”

  “Because with all the stress you’re going to be putting me under these coming years, this is a tiny compensation. I am a guy, you know.”

  Lara smirked. “As long as I end up with yellow hair, I’ll live naked for you if that’s what you want.”

  “And there’s the small chance that you might set them on fire,” he added in a whisper.

  “Killjoy. I liked your first answer better.”

  “My staff and I are going to get to know your body on an extremely intimate level. You’re not going to be able to hide anything from us, physically or mentally, so why bother with pointless formality,” he said, pulling a small device out of a nearby drawer. “And then there’s this. I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to attach it directly to your cranium. I’ve looked for a better way, but with the things you do during training, it’s the only way to keep it from falling off.”

  “Where are you putting it?” she teased.

  “Nowhere fun,” he said deadpan, reaching up and gently affixing it above her right eyebrow. Lara felt part of her face go numb, then a few seconds later Vortison pulled his hands back and she felt a warmth return…along with what felt like a bone bump. She reached up and stroked the device, confirming it was melded to the bone with several heft jerks.

  “That’s what I mean. Aggressive by instinct,” he warned. “Patience, my naked one. Patience.”

  “So you’re going to try to distract my innate aggressiveness with flirtation? That won’t work, but feel free to keep trying.”

  “Something to do with why Archons don’t mate?”

  “We don’t like slipping out of combat mode. It weakens us.”

  Vortison froze, then locked eyes with her, totally serious. “Then you might want to try it. Combat mode will kill you if you can’t shake free of it.”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  “And if I insist?”

  “You’re cute, but no thanks. I know how to relax while in combat mode. It’s called sleeping.”

  “Actually…you’ve given me an idea. Hold on a second,” he said, running off and leaving her standing there alone. She waited patiently, having committed herself to this course a long time ago. There was no going back, no regrets, no matter how this turned out. If someone had to take the hit on this, it was going to be her…not the trailblazers. She was going to shield them, with her death if need be, though she knew if this came down to her skill in controlling herself, then she’d make it through.

  When Vortison came back he had a small cylinder in his hand. He touched it briefly to her new cranial piece then tossed it on a nearby table as he typed irregularly on a datapad…which was a sign of mixed input from his fingers and his telepathy.

  “Stand still, I need to test a theory.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” she said, then she clenched up in shock as a very unfamiliar sensation crept through her body and her mind flushed. “What the hell…”

  “Good,” Vortison said, ignoring her and focused entirely on his data, completely missing the look of shock on her face. “Very good.”

  “Did you just Lachka grab me?” she asked, not having sensed any Pefbar fields.

  “No, sorry. Nothing that crude. We haven’t made the technology public, because we know a lot of people would retreat to their rooms and never come out again, but we have the ability to induce arousal and unlimited orgasms through direct mental manipulation. The fact that you’re so unused to them is a plus here.”

  “Wait a second, what are you saying?” she asked, suddenly feeling naked for the first time.

  “How committed are you to seeing this through?”

  “Is this really necessary?”

  “If it keeps you out of combat mode, then yes. It could mean the difference between you living or dying, so don’t get shy on me,” he said, cracking a smirk at the end. “I’m serious, but I do appreciate the irony here. Your instinct is combat mode. You’re going to need that later, but most of the time you gotta scale down. If arousal keeps you out of combat mode, then that’s what we will use.”

  “Oh I’m so not ready for this,” she said, looking down at her naked body, the same as she had done many times, but now it looked different. Her combat mode was trying to reset itself, seeing her arms and legs and the musculature there as weapons…which they truly were…while arousal gave false sensor readings designed for one purpose and one purpose only. That being to reproduce. It was the one lie that the body told to the user, and because it wasn’t a real need the Archons avoided it, but it felt damn real now. But then again, an unconvincing mirage wouldn’t work, so of course it would feel real.

  “How long?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure. At least 18 hours a day, at various levels. A low level one while you sleep. Can’t h
ave any combat dreams throwing you off.”

  Lara’s mouth dropped open. “Do you have any idea what that will do to me?”

  “Not really. Other than making you very, very happy.”

  “It’ll made me very, very pathetic. I’ll lose my mojo.”

  “And you can’t get it back later?”

  “I…I don’t know. Probably. Maybe. Damn you, this isn’t what I wanted.”

  “No, you wanted to fight your way through this like a typical Archon. But if this will allow you to reach your greater power, what’s stopping you?”

  “You find this funny, don’t you?”

  “On a personal level, yes I do. But I’m not playing games with you, Lara. We gotta make use of whatever nullifiers we can. Including this, if it will work, and my short test showed a wide range of nullification.”

  “The increased heart rate isn’t a problem?”

  “Compared to what it is when you’re in combat? This is nothing.”

  “I hate you.”

  “We can call it off then.”

  “No,” she said firmly. “I just don’t see how I’m going to control this if you’ve got me in an uncontrollable state.”

  “The state will make it so you don’t have to control it. You just have to sit and let it happen. That’s exactly what your instincts will not let you do.”

  “And when I do need to go into combat mode? I’ll be so loopy I might not be able to.”

  “Sips, Lara. Small steps. You won’t have to go into full combat mode until years down the road. By then you’ll have adapted to this and it won’t be as effective. But you’re new to arousal, at least compared to the rest of us. You haven’t used it in so long…”

  “I get it,” she said, banging her head back against the wall in frustration, then sheepishly glanced back making sure she didn’t damage it. “Ok, I guess I just proved your point. I just don’t like feeling helpless like this when my life is on the line.”

  “You’re putting your life in my hands anyway. And I know you’re going to try and go super saiyan inside, and that will blow you up. I did watch the cartoon, you know. That’s exactly the wrong mental state to be in, and you really don’t know much else, do you?”

  “So we use the built in idiot switch,” she added. “Might as well get some beneficial use out of it, if that’s the only way?”

  “It’s the best way I can find. Actually, I’m more confident now that I was before. In order for this to work, you have to stop being an Archon for a long periods of time.”

  “That’s…just…not…fair,” she groaned.

  “Suck it up, cupcake.”

  She glared at him for a second, but it melted into a laugh. “You’re right. If I can handle pain then I can handle this. But if this is going take hours, then you’re going to need to mop the floor,” she said apologetically.

  “We’re medtechs. Biological fluids are normal around here.”

  “Are they? I thought the regenerator did everything unseen.”

  “The inside of a Dre’mo’don rifle would be unusual to me. Would it be to you, because you normally use them intact?”

  “Fine. Fine. I’m just feeling…off. Even though this thing isn’t turned on anymore.”

  “Mode change. I’m surprised you haven’t developed some training for that.”

  “We did. But I never got it because I was too old and I didn’t feel like it. I thought staying in combat mode was better than getting my buttons pushed. Unless someone captured me and put me somewhere,” she said, gesturing around her, “like this, it would never come up.”

  “When I start the procedure, you’re going to feel resistance. You’re going to want to push back. I want you to try it your way first, and then when your levels get too high we’ll go to the backup plan. In fact, we’ll do that every day, to help you learn control. Your punishment for failure will be unending orgasms.”

  “Now that is torture.”

  “There’s the door if you want out,” the medtech said, pointing across the lab as a side door opened up and Anders came back in with the other two assistants.

  “Lock the lab when I’m here and nobody tells anyone anything about this,” she said, staring laser beams at him. “Not until we succeed.”

  “That will be years…but we’ll keep this aspect out of the reports until you say otherwise. I promise, shy one.”

  “I don’t think I’m going to have the luxury of shyness much longer,” she said grumpily. “Alright, tell me what I have to do to avoid your punishment.”

  “It’s calibration. Your body gets altered wide scale, but in small increments. You have to adapt to the increments. This is going to be stressful in the extreme, but a low level stress. You’re going to want to stoke your healing…don’t. You have to let the effect soak in, and that means not fighting it. Merely enduring it.”

  “And then?”

  “And then I don’t know. That’s where we begin. Beyond that, we’re going to have to figure things out as you transition away from being Human and further into Super Human.”

  “Saiyan. We’re calling it Saiyan. And don’t forget to make my hair yellow when it works.”

  “We’re a long way from that, but the change is easy to engineer. I’ve already programmed it.”

  “Alright, hit me with it then.”

  “We’ll need some time to set up. Just wait where you are.”

  Lara sighed, then let them prep the machinery while she waited. This wasn’t what she had expected coming here, and she could sense the pleasure Vortison was getting at making her so uncomfortable. But his own discomfort was also evident, though he did feel this was a much better approach when he began connecting physical conduits form the machine to various points on her body and he made flesh to flesh contact for a second, which was enough for her to sneak a quick peak at his mind.

  Ok, Lara, she told herself. You’re about to fail, and fail miserably, then turn into a drooling idiot over and over again until you learn to control this. Fun times ahead. Best to just run straight into it than dilly dallying around. And if I can do this and Vortison can get his data, maybe none of the others will have to. If I have to take the pleasure hit for them, then that’s better than dying…right?

  Oh hell, why I am being such a wuss. Your body is going to be a wreck anyway. Why not have your mind one too?

  “Alright, we’re ready,” Vortison said some 18 minutes later. “Are you?”

  “Yes. Did you lock the door?”

  Vortison glanced back at the entrance and telepathically signaled it to lock, seeing a small indicator light shift from blue to green.

  “Locked. And remember, no Jumat. I can’t block it out and rework your body at the same time.”

  “If I’m sane I won’t. No promises when I go all…you know.”

  “Alright, stay calm and let the burn happen. Not sure what it will feel like beyond that, so just keep still, inside and out. Here we go.”

  Lara let out a deep breath then clenched up in anticipation, then caught Vortison’s eye and realized that wasn’t the way to go. She relaxed her shoulders and let her legs sag just a touch, then a spike of hot lightning shot through her that felt…wrong. Very wrong. Like it was eating her alive from the inside out.

  She wanted to fight it, but knew she couldn’t. So she just put her mind into Rocky mode, as if she was taking punch after punch and just shaking it off. It was almost too much for her, then it suddenly ended and a lingering burn was left behind.

  “Lara?” she heard Vortison ask, though it sounded like he was miles away.

  “Still sane,” she mumbled, her tongue feeling numb.

  “You made it through the first one. Now stay here for a couple hours and let it ride. You need time to adapt.”

  “I don’t…” she said, leaning forward and being caught by the machine arms that kept her from falling as she suddenly puked all over the front of the pedestal and out onto the floor once, then she just hung there limp still attached to the mac
hine.

  To her credit she hung in there, with her stress levels hanging just below danger zone all the way up to the next treatment. And the next one, and the next. She made it 6 days until she started fighting it too much and Vortison had to enact the backup plan, distracting her from the discomfort so she wouldn’t fight it.

  It worked in keeping her from overloading, but the efficiently level of the adaptation tanked. It seemed she needed to feel it to adapt the quickest, but if slow was the only way to get there, then slow and inefficient it would be.

  Vortison and the others took shifts sleeping over the next 22 days, with Lara staying attached to the machine the entire time and it handling her feeding and waste extraction internally until they reached the end of the first phase and she was released to fall into a pain stricken yet euphoric state that had made it hard to walk on top of the stiffness from her body being a scarecrow for so long.

  They helped Lara into a nearby tube that she laid down in and was sealed over top of her, then they had her body transported across the facility to a special training den that she had to herself. She was so weak she couldn’t climb out without help, then her wildly conflicted mind solidified somewhat as the training course before her signaled a start chime.

  She walked, still naked, one stumbling step at a time on the easiest challenge course imaginable…but it was damn hard for her to do. She tried to focus, but the low level arousal Vortison was keeping her in wouldn’t let her. It was like trying to control your own body by remote, as if she wasn’t quite in it and looking on as a spectator, but the farther she went the more control she gained. Enough, at least, to be able to walk in a straight line and stumble/fall over low walls.

  Lara only made it a third of the way through the course before her legs went out, then the dedicated handlers the medtechs had assigned to her picked her up and put her back inside the tube where she would sleep for the next 13 hours, then wake and try the course again.

  Another 11 days of that and she was able to complete the course with ease…which meant it was time to send her back to the lab for another series of treatments and repeat the process all over again.