Jordan Summers - [Dead World 01] (2 page)

I dip my head again. There must be no mistake.
Blood runs down my chin and onto my hairy chest,
burning my throat in an ecstasy unlike any other.
Hot, s
weet, sticky, and delicious. I
fight my instincts, but l
osing is inevitable.

Closing my eyes, I slowly release Lisa's lifeless
hands one claw at a time, and then proceed to gorge
myself, taking care to relish each tender bite. My teeth rip
and
masticate with ease as I feast upon her glorious
flesh.

This is how it should be.

How it will be again.

Soon.

The savorous overload sends my
body into an unex
pected
orgasm. My cock jerks above her body. Once.
Twice.
I shudder. Relief floods through me as my
essence
spills out, mingling with what remains of my
beloved Lisa.

I greedily lap them both, before
cleaning my mouth
and
claws afterward. Sated momentarily, I ponder the q
uestion that has been running through my mind for

months. I finally have an
answer.

Lisa
does
taste as good as she looks.

chapter
two

Gina Santiago jackknifed up in
bed, her body
drenched in sweat
, her heartbeat thundering in
her head. She gripped her laser pistol, her hand jerking wildly as she
searched for an immediate threat
in
the darkness. Shadows leapt from the corners of the
room, menacing her befuddled mind. It took a few
seconds
for her to focus and realize she was at home, in bed.

"Shit!" She dropped back onto her pillows,
the sound of her ragged breathing echoing off the sterile white walls of her
living quarters.

She set her gun back on her
metal side table with a
clank and shot a
quick glance at the clock. Damn, it was three in the morning. She'd only been
asleep a few hours. Gina punched her pillow and the top of the rest pad to try
to get comfortable, then turned to face the wall. Her feet came together with a
heavy thump. "What the—"

She glanced down.

"Lights on." Artificial intelligence
complied, bathing the dormitory room in a cadmium florescent glow. She looked
around the space, taking in the two-seater gray couch, her clothes locker, and
her personal food dispensing unit. A blank flat-panel screen blotted one wall
like a blemish on a baby's face. The viewer was off, just like she'd left it.
The twenty-by-twenty area wasn't big enough for anyone to hide.

Privacy assured, Gina pulled the
covers up with
trembling fingers until
she could see her feet. Why
was she wearing
her combat boots in bed? She shifted
to get a better look and sent red
clay dirt onto the
sheets. Confused, she
whipped the blanket off.

When had she gotten dressed?

Gina gasped, staring down the
length of her body in disbelief. Her clothes lay in tatters against her limbs
as
if someone had fed her through a meat
grinder.
Scratches and cuts marred her pale
flesh and her mus
cles ached from
overuse. Panic slammed her, squeez
ing her chest until it hurt to
breathe.

"What the hell?" she choked.

She replayed the previous
evening in her mind. She
remembered
filing tactical reports, watching the republic news, eating protein-enriched
synth-noodles, and then going to bed. The rest of the night was a
blank, an endless void in the darkness without
begin
ning or end. She'd assumed she had spent it in deep REM sleep, but
now ...

Gina looked down at her clothes once more. Blood
dotted her T-shirt. She frantically pulled the synthetic material away from
her stomach, ripping it over her head before tossing it onto the floor. Pressing
a splayed hand against her abdomen, she exam
ined
her skin. Nothing. She stripped out of the rest of
her clothes, adding
them to the pile destined for the incinerator. Her gaze swept her body. There
were no obvious signs of injuries. Naked and confused, Gina
swallowed a lump of fear, feeling its icy
tendrils claw
their way down her throat.

She curled her knees against her chest and hugged
herself as tremors racked her body. She didn't understand what was happening.
Where had she been? Gina strained to remember, but no answers came forth, only
nothingness. Her gaze strayed back to the crimson mosaic coloring her discarded
shirt.

If the blood wasn't hers, then whose was it?

The
vidcom chirped, disturbing Morgan Hunter's dream.
Go away.
He pulled the pillow over his head
and groaned, trying to ignore the call and get
back to
the dark-haired woman he'd
been about to fuck sense
less. He couldn't quite make out his dream
woman's face, but he'd know her body anywhere. His hips
moved restlessly against the covers, caressing his erection as he
sought the comfort of her moist warmth. The
vidcom buzzed again, this time louder, more insistent.
The dream
slowly dissipated.

"Shit." Morgan murmured under his breath,
then
blindly reached out and pressed a
button on a control
panel near his
rest pad. There had better be a beautiful
woman on the other end of the
line begging him for his body or else someone was about to get an earful.
"Who is it?" he rasped without looking
at the monitor
screen. "Make it good."

"Morgan, we have a problem," Jim Thornton
said, his voice low.

Why was the director of the dissecting lab calling? 
And why was he whispering? "Can't it wait until morning?" Morgan
asked, removing the pillow, before glancing blurry-eyed at the screen. The
image of the red-haired bespectacled man wavered before him.

"No, it can't." Jim's gaze darted from side
to side,
then he leaned into the viewer
until all Morgan could
see was two magnified eyes, a bulbous nose, and a
thick-lipped mouth. "You're going to
want to see this
right away."

"What's wrong, Jim? You look ..." He
squinted. "Scared." Morgan came awake in a shot.

"I can't tell you over the vidcom. Come down to
the lab immediately." Jim's pudgy face was drained of all color.

Morgan blinked. The hair at the nape of his neck stood
on end. What in the hell was going on? "I'll be there in fifteen." He
glanced at the clock on his side table. The number three glared back.
"Better make that twenty."

"Hurry." Jim abruptly severed the link.

Morgan threw back the covers and
sat up, scrubbing
his
hands over his stubbled face and through his hair
before glancing around. The
sound of his air-filtering system hummed in the background, comforting like a
heartbeat in the womb. No other noise penetrated his
living
space due to the added thickness of the rein-forced
tinted-glass windows and concrete walls.

The additional material in the
walls served twofold, to
protect his
home from assault and to make it sound
proof. Even in the darkness Morgan could still easily
make out his home's Spartan
furnishings, a table, two chairs,
and a couch. Standard republic issue. Morgan
jumped off his
bed and padded naked across the
sienna-stained concrete floor to the
cleansing room,
stroking his erection as he
went. The slabs were warm against his bare feet despite the built-in cooling
system
and the double-thick walls.

Pressing a button, Morgan stepped into the chemi
cal shower stall. Injected with a stimulating
essence to
wake him, the harsh lemon spray rained down upon his shaggy
head. He wrinkled his nose and nearly
gagged
from the odor, but continued to stroke himself
until he reached
completion, before hitting the shut-off button.

He despised the new A.I.
cleansing units with their
built-in biomonitors. He didn't need a goddamned machine telling him
when he should wake up or soothing
him into sleep. He was quite capable of making those
decisions on his own.

Sometimes he really hated modern amenities.

Morgan dried quickly and then threw on a pair of
black utility pants and a matching shirt. He
tugged on his boots, grabbing his gun and badge on the way out
the door.

Minutes later he stepped into his vehicle and
started it with the press of his hand. A low-level
growl
came from the engine. He always loved the sound a hydrogen motor
made when it came to life. Morgan eased onto the accelerator and the growl
turned to a roar. He smiled to himself and flattened the pedal.
The power of the car threw him back in his seat as
the
turbo kicked in.

At this time of the morning, if you could call the
middle of the night morning, Morgan could set the car at max velocity without
attracting heavy tolls from
the Republic of Arizona's automated speed control
system.

He pressed the button to roll
down the window, and it
descended with a pressurized
hiss, allowing the desert air inside. The warmth brushed over his face, sifted
through his hair, and cleared his head. Morgan
went over various scenarios as
he drove to Nuria, but
none could explain
Jim's frightened appearance or the immediacy of the situation.

His gut soured as he neared the
dissecting lab. Morgan
pulled into a
parking space and killed the engine with
the swipe of a finger. He pressed his palm to a scanner
on the dashboard, setting the doors to lock in
five
seconds,
then exited the vehicle.

Jim Thornton, a portly gentleman
with thick glasses and
sausage
-like
fingers, waited outside the door of t
he
dissection lab with a banned smoke stick protruding
from his mouth. He puffed heavily, causing wisps
of
smoke to swirl around his head,
before reluctantly thr
owing it on the
ground and snuffing its flame with the
toe
of his shoe.

"I saw that," Morgan chided, glancing at the
crushed
remains.

"Who's trying to hide?" Jim shuffled from
foot to foot
impatiently.

The man's nervousness sent adrenaline surging through
Morgan's body.
His shoulders tensed and he looked around suddenly uneasy. Normally Jim was the
epitome of laid
back. Nothing ruffled him. He'd seen
more death in his tenure as the director of the
dissecting lab than most biodweller directors see
in a lifetime. Morgan took a deep breath and released it as s
omething
dark and troublesome settled in his gut.

"What is so important that you needed to drag me
out of bed? I can't believe this couldn't wait until
morning. I'd just finished a twelve-hour shift and had
finally
managed to fall asleep." Not to mention the world-class dream sex he'd
missed out on. Morgan didn't bother to hide his frustration. It was a helluva
lot easier than worrying.

"I'm sorry." Jim wiped his beefy hands on
his dissecting apron. "But the situation warranted an immediate
response." He glanced around the deserted streets, his eyes searching the
darkness for unwanted attention.

Morgan tensed, following Jim's gaze without understanding
what they were looking for. "Jim?"

The director held his hand up, stilling Morgan's
questions. "Once you see
it,
you'll understand why I
called." The ominous words fell
like
ghostly shadows
in the night as Jim
stepped inside.

Morgan nodded, glancing around one last time, and then
trailed behind.

They entered the lead-lined
concrete dissecting lab.
The odor of disinfectant smacked Morgan in the face,
causing his eyes to water. He
blinked rapidly to clear
them. Bright lights hung above each gurney, illuminating death in a
kind of macabre showcase. Several bodies occupied the stainless-steel tables
in various stages of dismemberment for the recycling of parts. Disposal
chutes lined one wall, while cabinets containing dissecting
equipment took up another. Ten large drains dotted the floors in order to catch
and recycle fluids that escaped during the dissecting process.

Human remains made up 70 percent of the liquid mulch
used for plant growth in the industrial hydroponics chambers. Burials no longer
occurred, the practice considered too antiquated and wasteful in a world where
survival hinged on conservation and re-cycling.

Morgan missed the old days. There was something to
be said for
standing over a grave and paying your respects. How many funerals had he
attended during
the war? Fifty? One
hundred? More? The names were
a
blur in Morgan's mind. The years had sanded down his
memories until only the faces of the men under his old command remained. He'd
buried the last soldier a lifetime ago. The rest had stopped dying—thanks  
to   scientific   intervention.   With   everyone accounted for, Morgan burned
his captain's uniform and walked away. He hadn't looked back since ... until
now.