The allure of an endless ocean, to which outer space could never compare, was heady. Especially to a shark.
Netto looked up when his systems finished, his nanobots at the ready to wear off the worst of it, to Janet staring at him. He couldn’t discern the look in her eye so he ignored it and prepared to jump overboard.
Montihan joined them, followed by Rylie—who looked at everything but him.
“This is our closest lot and one of the last ones to be affected. The stones here are our most viable this season,” Montihan said as he lowered a drop-off platform. “The outer lots aren’t in season.”
“Nothing is in season,” Janet murmured under her breath. She tugged off her shirt, revealing a wetsuit underneath that left nothing to the imagination. For a moment, a plume of lavender breezed by before it vanished into the fog. His nose twitched as his systems dispersed it. The smell of Earth on an alien planet, countless miles away, was strange to him.
“Why do you say that?” Zeph asked, his eyes narrowing on the blonde but her gaze was still on his partner. Netto tensed under her blatant perusal and felt relief when the girl looked away. He glanced at Rylie who seemed even more tense, her movements stiff as she pulled on a pair of water shoes.
“The swimmers have yet to arrive. They lay eggs in the jetties that pollinate the nuggets. There have been some, but not the enormous groups we usually expect. If their mating cycles are disrupted, it would affect our crops. And even if it did, if we have a rather stormy season, they move onto one of the other lots farther out. Our lots cycle with their cycle. Maybe someone is breaking the cycle?” Her question came out thoughtfully.
“I take it they cycle through all the lots up and down the coast?”
Montihan nodded.
“Has been that way since the EPED set up Kepler for colonization. There have been fewer groups throughout but we still get’em coming through. It would be a gargantuan effort for someone to harvest enough swimmers to hurt us, and I think we’d have heard about it by now. That amount of fish on the local market wouldn’t go unnoticed, not with how small our community is and not with how often my wife goes to the colony.”
The brume began to clear around them as broken rays of Kepler’s sun threaded through the mist. Their insular circle widened and as Netto looked around, he could see out into the water, beyond the rocks that encircled the inlet. He ran his tongue across his teeth, eager to transform within the waves.
“They’re good eating?” Zeph inquired, pooling information between them. They kept their wireless connection up.
“No. Not unless you like a lot of bones in your fish. The effort that goes into preparing ‘em isn’t worth the outcome.” Montihan sat down beside Netto. “So what’s the plan?”
“Check your lots and look for disparities. If the results are inconclusive, we’ll head out to the other settlements and find out what they know,” Zeph said. It was brief and vague. Netto nodded in agreement.
“So, nothing we can’t do ourselves.” Janet stood up and smiled, feigning sweetness with her blatant taunt.
Everyone looked at her. He even noticed Rylie’s head lift in his periphery. Janet walked over to her sister before descending the stairs to the lower deck; Rylie quickly disrobed down to her wetsuit and followed her.
Something shifted inside of him and it wasn’t his metal plating. A voracious need bloomed from his chest that affected every muscle, every fiber of his crafted being. It was more than the need to protect, though he couldn’t quite place what it was. But as his eyes drifted across the slim lines of her toned body, her skin bronzed to perfection under the ocean’s sun, he wanted to exert himself over her.
Netto’s heart pounded. It was primitive and visceral, consuming and dangerous. He pictured himself sinking his teeth into Rylie’s perfect skin, her blood flooding his mouth, as he claimed what he wanted.
Her.
The breathy, beach smell that she emitted called to his baser instincts. Both of his hands clenched into fists at his sides. An erotic image of her small body, exposed to his beast and under his command, flooded his eyes with red.
He heard the splash of water as the girls entered the ocean. He was barely aware of Montihan popping open a beer, ignorant of the danger both of his daughters were in.
It wasn’t until Zeph clasped his shoulder that brought him back to the present.
“You need to calm down.”
“She’s mine.” The words were a low but audible hiss through his teeth. Netto didn’t care if Montihan heard him.
“You’re going to kill her if you don’t find control.” Zeph’s hand tightened its grip on his shoulder. The words burned through his thoughts. The raw tension slowly eased. His partner’s hand lifted away.
When the red vanished from his eyes, apprehension took its place as Zeph came into view. “Thank you,” he grunted, glancing at their host, who was busy poring over his wristcon and a hologram of data.
“You’re welcome,” Zeph lowered his voice just enough for only him to hear. “If this was any other mission, I would encourage you to take her, but this isn’t. It’s diplomatic. And her father is sitting not twelve feet away. Fuck, Netto.”
“How do you control yourself?” Netto asked.
“Are you asking me for advice?” He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t tell me you’re a...virgin,” Zeph guffawed, and leaned forward, eyes searching him. “And here I was, about to rip you to shreds and plant your twisted head on a spike.”
The statement caught Netto off-guard. In fact, everything about the last several minutes unnerved him, from his loss of control to Zeph's amused rage.
