Relief moved through Zade. He had wanted to get to work on this as soon as she arrived, but transplanting lab-manufactured Baylan tissues into a human patient was something that required serious debate on Earth, apparently. He had sent everything he could to them, without sharing technology that was forbidden by the Baylan Elder Council. His father was on the council dedicated to medical research andthere was no argument from Zade regarding how ill-equipped the humans were for an influx of alien influence.
As it was, Zade had issued a list of demands that needed to be met from Earth before he would treat the human woman. First and foremost was a promise that she would not be taken apart for reverse engineering purposes. You never could tell with humanity.
His two favorite assistants moved about the room, quickly preparing the space for Zade’s procedure. He would be building this woman a new leg. It was the closest thing he came to being an artist, he liked to think. Rebuilding what was broken in someone, making them as good or better than before, was one of the most rewarding parts of his position. Yoli and Pruk, had earned their places as his top assistants and would work alongside him.
With everything in place, Zade sat between the woman’s legs, gazing at the intact one. He traced the lines of her bones from her knee to the arch of her foot. She had beautiful feet: small and high-arched with pretty little toes. He frowned at his own subjectivity. All he needed to do was replicate those toes on the other foot, not form an opinion about them.
“Are you ready, Zade?” Yoli asked. He did not need to look at her to know she was tired, but alert and ready. She was the best. Of the two of them, Yoli was the first he called on. Pruk was newer, but showed remarkable promise.
Zade took a deep breath. He cleared his head and focused on the screens above him. “Begin.”
As his assistants worked on the female’s diseased limb, Zade wrapped his hands around the healthy leg. He closed his eyes and let his fingers press into her calf. All of this would be committed to his memory. The computers could replicate the shape and thickness of her muscles, tendons and skin, but he was the one who fine tuned it all. Who made it perfect.
But the membrane covering his hands was somehow causing him to miss something. Maybe it was the texture, he thought. This was not Baylan flesh, but human, which he was not as familiar with. With a grimace, he went back to theM-Clomachine and had the membrane removed. He set it to sanitize his bare hands. Zade loathed touching the actual skin of patients. There were simply too many pathogens to count, but he knew he would not get patient 33-H’s leg right any other way.
He returned to where she lay, still in her unconscious state and oblivious to the team of three bending over her. Zade closed his eyes again. He focused on the gentle, scentless air that filtered from the vents. On the blackness behind his eyelids. On the warm, smooth flesh beneath his fingers. He could feel everything now, from the silkiness of her skin, to her smooth muscles, to the strong bones beneath it all.
A shiver tickled over his skin. He ignored it. It had been a very long time since he had touched anyone’s skin. He basically lived with the membrane on, since the vast majority of his waking hours involved him handling patients. Of course, it was extra stimulation. He should have expected it. His sense of touch was usually dulled, due to layers of skin protection.
But now, as he molded his fingers to this female’s calf, his senses became attuned to every contour of her. Memorizing the shape of her leg became effortless. He moved down to her foot and again, the bones of her ankles, the shape of her heel, the shape of her toes down to her delicate toenails, felt so familiar, it was as if he knew what they would feel like before he even got to them.
Records proved this female had never before been under his care, but his instincts told him differently. His bodyknewhers. The thought skittered through his mind that he didn’t need to do any of this—he already knew these bones and this skin, and the leg he made for her would be flawless.
His hands slid up to her knee and his fingers brushed the silken skin just above. His pulse quickened and his mouth dried. Just a small shift in his gaze and he was staring at her sex, peeking pink and ripe from neatly trimmed hair. Full breasts rose above that, topped with nipples that seemed to harden and distend before his very eyes.
There was a wild impulse to know the rest of her, to learn if it all felt as familiar as this limb, to know her scent, and taste, and—stars! He dragged his gaze from her body, horrified with himself. How many naked females had he seen and touched since becoming a physician?Thousands. Never had he felt attraction to one. Never had he suppressed an urge to bury his face in the pussy of one.
He pulled in a deep breath, alarmed in a way he had never known. His heart pounded. Within the confines of his sterile gray operating suit, his cock stiffened.
Zade released her foot and stepped away. Confusion blurred his vision. He clenched his hands, more than alarmed now. This was full-blown lust, but why?Was he ill?
Another shiver slid down his back. Hands that had healed more patients than he could count, trembled. His assistants had completed their work. They stood to the side, watching him. Puzzlement showed in their features, but they said nothing. Zade moved his gaze to the female’s other leg. Yoli and Pruk had grafted new bones from a metal alloy that mimicked the feel of bone and was compatible with many tissue types. They had been generated from a scan of her intact leg, and grafted to below the knee.
It could work as it was. The computer scan did an accurate job replicating the shape of all those bones. They needed the waiting tissues to be grafted over it. His assistants were more than qualified to perform these next steps, but Zade knew this was an art as well as a science. There was some workleft to do. His skills were needed to shape these bones perfectly, so when the patient stood up and walked, she would not feel a difference in her stride.
Despite this…unnatural response of his body, the female deserved his best work. Sheneededhis best work.
He turned away from the curious eyes of his staff and placed his hands back in theM-clomachine to replace the membrane over his hands. He hoped they did not see his erection, which was contained within the restrictive suit. His palms still dampened beneath the thin covering. Zade grimaced as the skin covering his ribs began to burn. The sensation was set low, beneath his left arm and extending toward his abdominals.Great stars, perhaps hewasbecoming ill.
He glanced at the female, lying there, naked and unconscious, and utterly beautiful, and another possibility entered his mind.
This one frightened him more than the prospect of any illness.
Zade gritted his teeth and strode back to thereju. He focused his mind only on the task before him. The female would wake up with two functioning legs. He would deal with his own issues—whatever they were—later. The patient came first.Thispatient, especially.
He knelt before her legs, purposefully not allowing his gaze to stray to her exposed sex. After they were done here, he would have her covered up. Doing so now would utterly confound his assistants, who were probably perplexed by his behavior as it was.
He placed a hand on the gray, metal bones before him and began making the small alterations that would perfect her new leg. The raging attraction slowly eased away. Two things aided in this: first, the membrane prevented skin-to-skin contact, and the second was a ruthless work ethic he had honed overmany cycles as high physician of the Raplan-B. He pinned his assistants with a firm gaze. “Prepare for the next stage,” he said, and he gave himself to his work.
CHAPTER THREE
Ash
Ash floated in a soft cloud of black. Her body felt as though it was gently cradled in a pair of large, warm hands. The only sound was a gentle trickle of water. There were no scents, nothing to see. There was no pain, no fear. Never in her life had she felt so good and so peaceful. Ash knew this was not a dream.
She had been here before, one other time…
Her heart clenched at the memory. Waking up in a hospital room. Thirst. The dull haze of pain medication. IVs. Machines. Her parents’ red, swollen eyes as they gazed down at her. Her mother holding her hand as tears fell down her cheeks.I’m sorry, honey. I don’t know how to tell you this…he’s gone. He didn’t make it.
