Page 34 of Enslak

Niki.

That was her name.

I remembered now.

She'd told me. And I'd clutched it like a treasure. Turned it over and over in my broken mind.

Niki.

The female who'd saved me.

Pain flared again. My chest. My side. My leg.

And I welcomed it.

Used it to drag myself closer to consciousness. Closer to her voice.

I remembered the fight.

The guards surrounding us. So many of them. Too many.

I remembered moving.

My body doing what it had been trained to do for a century.

Kill. Efficiently. Brutally.

But this time had been different.

This time I hadn't been killing because the handlers forced me to.

Hadn't been killing because the collar would explode if I didn't.

I'd been killing to protect her.

Every guard who raised a weapon toward her. Every bolt that fired in her direction.

I'd put myself between her and them.

Used my body as a shield because the thought of her being hurt—of those bolts tearing through her—was unbearable.

I'd taken the hits.

Felt each one burn through fur and flesh.

Felt my body breaking under the assault.

And I hadn't cared.

All that mattered was keeping her safe.

The memory brought something that might have been pride. Satisfaction.

I'd protected her. Kept her alive.

Even as the bolts tore through me. Even as my blood soaked the ground.

I'd kept fighting because nothing was going to reach her.