The Cyber Chronicles VIII - Scorpion Lord Read Free Page A

then what?
Would Myon Two kill him rather than let an Overlord catch them with
him?
    The questions made her head ache, and she rubbed her brow.
There were simply no answers to be gained from pointless pondering.
There was still a chance he was off wandering somewhere, unaware
that she was going out of her mind with worry. She clung to the
hope that at any moment he would stroll into the castle. She missed
his husky laughter and gentle teasing, the way his silver-grey eyes
made her shiver and his shy hugs. The legacy of Myon Two’s torture
was written in the hair-fine scars on his pale golden skin, caused
by the cruel operations that had strengthened his bones with metal.
They ran along the sides of his torso and neck, down his arms,
legs, cheekbones and forehead to mid-way down his narrow nose, and
even as lines of white in his cropped dark blond hair. The black
crystals embedded in the golden-hued brow band that had once
enslaved him were usually filled with tiny multi-coloured
lights. It curved around his brow, no more
than three centimetres wide and fifteen centimetres long, its
rounded ends not quite reaching his hairline. She blinked, rubbing her stinging eyes. She did not want to
think about what the torturers on Myon Two would do to him if they
had taken him.
     
    ****
     
    Parvan glanced
up as his chief cyber tech placed a vidrecorder on his
crystal-topped carved desk and flopped into the pseudo-leather
chair that faced it. The department head had never liked Jorran,
whom he thought was an egomaniac and a bit of a sociopath. Most of
all, he disliked having the sweaty little man in his plush,
sweet-scented office. Parvan treasured the aroma of new upholstery,
and renewed his furnishings regularly to ensure his office always
smelt new.
    Jade-framed
masterpieces graced the patterned, pale blue walls, complementing
the woven grey blarri-hair curtains that framed massive windows
with a vista of the glittering glass and metal city. Parvan's was
one of the few offices that had a view, and he made the most of it,
with floor-to-ceiling mirrors on the far wall to reflect it. He
switched off a scrolling vidreport and steepled his hands.
    "Well?"
    "It's all in
my report."
    "Summarise."
    "He's above
normal,” Jorran said. “All his specs are at least ten per cent
better than any other A-grade ever tested. Of course, you have to
remember that he's Dorilan's finest. His last, perfect cyber,
hand-picked at birth and raised to be better than all the rest. He
was slightly above average before, now he's exceptional."
    "That's
excellent news. You're ready to ship him to Myon Two, then?"
    "If you're
prepared to risk it, and they are, too."
    Parvan nodded.
"They are. No sign of trouble with him?"
    "No, nothing
out of the ordinary."
    "Good, put him
in a casket and send him to Myon Two. They already have clients
eager to see the new prototype. You'll go, too, so you can continue
your research into the retrograde DNA splicing, and oversee the
introduction of his DNA into the generation programme."
    "Right."
Jorran rose and left the office.
     
     
    Seven days
later, Jorran stepped out of a company shuttle into the cool, muggy
air of Myon Two, glancing up at the perpetual cloud cover. Fifteen
layers of cross-lane air-car traffic whizzed past overhead, from
brightly coloured fun-cars on the top layers to heavy transports at
the bottom. Ahead of him, the sweeping, glass and steel edifice
that was Cybercorp's head office towered, the name proudly
displayed in four-metre-high silver letters halfway up it. Jorran
had visited head office several times, but still recalled his first
trip here, and how the glittering richness and awe inspiring
buildings had intimidated him. This was an empire built on advanced
technology and innovation, and its design reflected that.
    The floating
casket followed on its leash, and he approached a welcoming party
of eager Cybercorp techs who came forward to greet him, shake his
hand and gaze at the casket.
    "That's