Angels of Darkness

has a remarkably stable genome.”
    â€œBut my parents were normal people!”
    â€œThey may not have known who they were. Maybe only one of them was a donor. A donor and Subspecies 61 will produce donor offspring.”
    â€œBut what about this?” She held out her arms, speckled with brilliant red. “Explain this!”
    Lucas sat up. “When I fed on you, the mutation agent entered your bloodstream. In normal humans the mutation agent has grown weak over the generations. But I am carrying a near-full dose and I gave it to you during the feeding. You are changing.”
    â€œInto what?!”
    â€œI don’t know. I don’t know what’s in your DNA besides the donor genes. The mutation agent is an inhibitor. It will release the brakes within your body, short-circuiting your DNA repair, and let you develop into something that’s already there in your genotype, acquired over the centuries of crossbreeding with different human subspecies but suppressed. You could become Subspecies 61, but I doubt it. Chances are, it will be one of our subspecies instead.”
    They had taken her freedom, her home, and her dignity, and now they were taking away her body. “No! No, I am not doing it! I won’t! You hear me?” Karina surged to her feet. She managed two steps. Pain shot up through her bones. She cried out. The world went red and she crashed onto the floor.
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    I t hurt. It hurt more than any pain she could remember. At first she begged, then she prayed, then she screamed and whimpered, squeezing her eyes shut, opening them again, glimpsing Lucas’s face against the harsh light of the vault, and then sinking into more pain. If only she could pass out completely and be done with it, but no, every time she tried, he shook her back, into the place of hurt.
    â€œCome on, stay with me. Stay awake. Snap out of it.”
    â€œLet me be,” she snarled.
    â€œYou pass out, you die. Come on. Stay with me.”
    â€œI hate you! You did this to me!”
    â€œThat’s right,” Lucas snarled right back. “Hate me. Fight with me. Stay awake. You die, Emily will be alone. You don’t want to leave your daughter with an asshole like me.”
    She just wanted the torture to stop.
    Another bout of agony rocked her. When it was over, she was so tired, she could barely breathe.
    â€œThe other woman . . .” Karina whispered. Forcing the words out felt like trying to swallow glass. “Did she have to do this?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œDid you kidnap her, too?”
    â€œNo.” Lucas gathered her closer, holding her against him. “She was one of us. Her family were donors of Daryon.”
    â€œDid she hurt, too?”
    â€œYes.”
    Lucas’s eyes were so dark, they seemed almost brown.
    â€œTell me about her.” She wasn’t sure why she wanted to know, but she did.
    â€œShe was very smart. And she looked beautiful. Very graceful, fragile, elegant.”
    â€œNot like me, then?” Nobody would call her fragile. Or elegant, for that matter.
    â€œNothing like you,” he told her quietly.
    The agony burned through her in a crippling spasm. “Why does it sound like a compliment?”
    â€œBecause she only looked beautiful. In our world nobody has the luxury of doing nothing,” he said. “Everyone has a function. I protect. Someone else oversees mining. Someone else oversees stocks and finances. Galatea’s family had only one function: to provide Base Strain to the House. For that they were sheltered, fed, and protected. Galatea never worked a day in her life.”
    â€œMust be nice,” Karina whispered.
    â€œShe didn’t think so. She wanted the mutating agent.”
    â€œShe wanted this? Why?”
    â€œPower,” Lucas said. “She thought she would become something much more prized than a donor and she would be free of me. Her father was my first donor. She wasn’t supposed to become one, but he died, and she had to take his place. She thought I was an animal. She was convinced that once I fed, she would become a Ripper and could use it as leverage to be free of me.”
    â€œWhat did she become?”
    â€œAn Electric. She senses electric currents. It’s not an uncommon subspecies. A lot of technicians come from it.”
    â€œUh-oh,” Karina managed. Her lips were so dry, but there was no water. “Let me guess: it was your fault,