Free The Syn-En Solution by Linda Andrews Page B

up so the clear face form looked at the ceiling.
    Nell’s heart picked up tempo and for a moment she had a hard time catching her breath. The admiral couldn’t be more than forty. Although gray had yet to touch his short black hair, lines at the corners of his almond-shaped blue eyes and full lips told of his age and experience. Stubble sprayed his angular jaw, deepening the dimples in his cheeks. Holy mackerel, she’d been rescued by a hunk.
    Nell shook herself out of the stupor his appearance caused. “So the masks were just because that nutjob injected me with peroxides? I’m okay, right? I’m not going to blow up?”
    He nodded once. “How did you get on my ship?”
    Ship? That’s right. She was on a ship. But that didn’t explain the floating unless… Unless, it was a spaceship. It explained so much. Still, her brain slammed against her skull. “I think I came in that coffin. Look guys, I know this is weird. You have no idea how weird it is, but we’re all on the same team, right?”
    His nostrils in his flattened nose flared. “We are Syn-En.”
    With her free arm, she covered her breasts. They may not look as good as when she was twenty, but that didn’t mean she wanted them going boom. “What does Syn-En mean?”
    Syn-En stands for Synthetically Enhanced human. Typically referring to those children abandoned at birth or through parental negligence are made wards of the state. The wards are indoctrinated; their limbs, skin and most bodily organs are replaced by genetically compatible upgrades from toddler to adulthood. The wards are reclassified another grade of human and trained for combat, search and rescue as well as peacekeeping missions .
    An ache built at the base of Nell’s skull. Removing her hand from the admiral’s shoulder, she rubbed it. Okay, that did not come from any Discovery Channel show. And since when did her mother/conscience sound like an encyclopedia entry?
    “It means I retain very little organic tissue. It is ill-suited for combat.”
    Her brother was a soldier, stationed in Germany when the first outbreak hit. He’d disappeared two years before she entered the Save the World’s corporate office in 2012. Her mind replayed the admiral’s words. “What do you mean organic tissue isn’t suited for combat? You can’t change your skin like you do a uniform.”
    Something glittered deep within the admiral’s eyes. “Becoming a Syn-En is irreversible.”
    The hair on the back of her neck rose. She was missing something here. “I—.”
    A woman’s sing-song voice drifted in the air. “Oh, Lieutenant Bei. Come out; come out, wherever you are.”
    The ebony face and white teeth of the Grace Jones wannabe surfaced from Nell’s memory. She squeezed the admiral’s arm. “That’s her.”
    He plucked her hand off his arm, set it on the doctor’s, then strode away. The metal parted before him like curtains rising on a stage. He stopped in front of a television screen embedded in a wall. “Yes, Sir.”
    Nell drifted higher, watching his progress. Would he punish the woman for what she’d done?
    “Naughty boy.” Grace’s raspberry lips puckered above her pointy chin. “I told you not to search for me.”
    Why had his men called him admiral, but that woman called him lieutenant? Letting go of the doctor, she tied the blanket sarong-like around her, caught the hem between her knees to keep it from floating up, then pulled herself closer to the admiral in a hand over hand action along a minivan sized piece of metal.
    “With the com system down, we needed a visual on the status of rooms to hold the others.”
    Grace tsked. “I don’t believe you. You know what that means, don’t you?”
    Nell’s blood chilled at the other woman’s tone. Whatever it meant couldn’t be good. Heck, the woman was threatening to kill people. Tension thickened the air, confirming Nell’s instinct.
    Only the admiral seemed not to react. “Bringing that many civilians aboard requires space. As