Warden Bisset clapped her hands twice, clearly excited about something. “I have been dying to get a chance to do this.” She pressed her fingers to the tablet, and the wall next to my chair opened to reveal a large blue pool surrounded by soft lighting. It looked like the inside of an expensive spa.
“Just relax, Miss Gray.”
My chair moved, sliding to the side, and I noticed the tracks on the floor would take me directly into the blue water, chair and all.
A few seconds later I was neck-deep in the warm, blue liquid, and a sense of contentment and relief filled me at once.
“That’s it, Miss Gray. Relax. The NPU will be placed now. Hold still.”
A strange robotic arm moved toward me, the tip touched my head directly behind my ear. A sharp burst of pain made me startle. “What was that?”
“Your neural processing unit. By the time you arrive on The Colony, the NPU will have integrated with the language centers of your brain and will help coordinate real-time language translation on every Coalition planet.”
Wow. But, ow!
“That’s the worst of it. Go to sleep. When you wake up, you will be on The Colony with your new mate.”
“Now? Right now?”
“Of course.”
“I’m not ready.”
“You are. Your processing will begin in 3…2…1…”
The world went black.