I’m sharing scenes from the first chapter of Raw Desires as we wait for its release on February 21st.
You can read the first scene of the first chapter here:
http://tasteofcyn.com/?p=10449
This week I’m sharing the second scene.
***
She turned and carefully navigated the spaces between the burial plots. Some of the mounds were heart-twistingly small. Her cousin’s daughter, Fana, had been born while Taytu was at the academy. She’d only seen the baby in images.
And she’d seen the infant in death. Taytu’s eyes stung. Fana had been clasped in her mother’s arms. One projectile had downed both of them.
Their enemy had no compassion, none at all. Her anger at the cyborgs flared once more, incinerating her grief, her sorrow, her guilt. She reveled in the hate. When she engaged her fury, she was spared the other, more difficult feelings.
It had kept her sane during the solar cycles of solitude, while she buried the dead and plotted the demise of those who had wronged her loved ones.
She continued to walk.
The land she trekked over was lifeless. No creatures scurried. No vegetation grew. There was no laughter of children or chirping of insects. Even the brook by the large rock was dry and silent.
The planet was alien to her. It bore little resemblance to her childhood home.
The Humanoid Alliance had destroyed everything.
Her shoulders rounded as she trudged into the small structure she’d constructed. To live in one of the dead’s homes felt…wrong. Her temporary living space was simple and shoddily put together, but it kept the rain off her face while she slept, and it ensured her few belongings remained dry.
Taytu extracted a nourishment bar from a storage container and took a swig of water from another container. While she ate and drank, she scrolled through the messages displayed on her handheld. Gezi and Kometa, two of her best friends from the academy, had both sent her multiple communications.
She sighed and plunked her ass on the fabric-covered vegetation she’d been using as a sleeping support. In twenty-one planet rotations, it would be exactly five solar cycles since she left the academy. She’d stopped talking to her friends that planet rotation.
Yet they continued to reach out to her. They didn’t know the being they’d known was gone forever, that her world now consisted of death and justice for the dead.
She didn’t respond to their messages, because she hadn’t anything to say to them. Goodbyes had been exchanged. She wouldn’t live through the implementation of her plans.
It was kinder to say nothing. She put the handheld aside.
Dirt covered her fingers and her flight suit. Even her short-cropped hair felt grimy.
Digging the grave for the boy had been messy work.
But he deserved that labor, that act of remembrance. They all did.
Seeking comfort and connection, Taytu skimmed her fingertips over the decoration on her wrist. It consisted of small polished stones held together by finely braided vegetation.
The heirloom piece had been handed down from generation to generation, had been restrung many times.
Her mom had been wearing it when she died.
Taytu often felt her mom’s presence in the stones. Her fingers stopped on a small rectangular one. It sported grooves.
That signified knowledge.
“I hear you. I hear you.” Her mom’s message was clear. Building her skillset should be her focus.
She swallowed the last bit of the nourishment bar, gulped some water, and rose to her booted feet.
There was no one around to view her filth. She could tidy herself later.
There was training to complete now.
This planet rotation’s session required weapons. She strapped three daggers and a modified gun to her form and marched out of the structure.
A mock cyborg was situated steps away from the door. It was constructed from branches, vegetation, and fabric.
She’d also located a set of body armor in the warship the Humanoid Alliance had crashed—the ship with two cyborgs trapped inside. The faux cyborg wore that protective garment.
Breaching that shield was one of her challenges. She drew the gun she’d altered, aimed, and fired.
The projectile struck her target. It shaved off some of the body armor, but it didn’t pierce that protective garment.
“What the fuck?” That wasn’t the result she expected.
She turned the gun to study it.
The weapon resembled the image of the other gun in the database. The modifications should work. The expert had boasted about downing cyborgs using it. He’d shown a set of body armor he’d blasted apart.
Taytu aimed at her target again and pressed the trigger.
The result was the same. The projectile merely grazed the protective garment.
“That expert was full of bovine shit.” She shook her head. “Maybe I need better projectiles.” She would research the possibilities and add a container of projectiles to her next order of supplies. “My daggers won’t penetrate the body armor either.”
The blades were solely for close-range defensive maneuvers, and even their effectiveness in those situations were in doubt. Cyborgs, according to her research, moved quicker than human eyesight could track. She’d likely be dead before she extracted her daggers from their sheaths.
“I’m back to relying on the explosives.” She’d mastered the ability to craft bombs. Those should blow up anything, including cyborgs and their irritating body armor. “I don’t like that. If the explosives fail—”
An artificial droning filled the air.
***
Read the next scene (available February 6th) here:
http://tasteofcyn.com/?p=10453
Subscribe To My Newsletter: http://cynthiasax.com/newsletter/
Raw Desires
His human female is attempting to kill him.
This cyborg finds that adorable.
Raw, a K model cyborg, is one of the lucky warriors who has located his genetic match. He hears his human female’s voice over the communication lines and immediately processes she is his.
Winning her affections will be a greater challenge. Battle has always been Raw’s focus. The rough-and-tough warrior has no idea how to engage anyone’s tender emotions.
Fortunately, he isn’t alone in the universe. His unmatched male friends help him craft a plan.
All Raw has to do is relay a few unsettlingly sweet words to his female and give her the thoroughly unfunctional wall decoration he has obtained. He projects she will then jump into his big, strong arms and beg him to claim her.
Taytu isn’t jumping anywhere. She has one mission—kill every cyborg in existence.
The huge, handsome male traveling to meet with her is her first target. His rough hands, firm lips, and sparkling, energy-infused eyes won’t save him from her vengeance. She has trained vigorously for this moment, and she won’t fail at her assigned task.
The cyborg will die.
Raw Desires is an enemies-to-lovers Cyborg SciFi Romance set in a dark, gritty, sometimes-violent universe.
Pre-order Today:
Amazon US:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BFG8W5JM
Amazon UK:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0BFG8W5JM
Amazon AUS:
https://www.amazon.com.au/gp/product/B0BFG8W5JM
Apple Books:
https://books.apple.com/us/book/raw-desires/id6443413750
B&N:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/raw-desires-cynthia-sax/1142255510
