Page 132 of Claim Me
"Wow, and what if you slam your fingers in a door and the substance gets released inside your own body by accident?"
Blue smiles with a hint of superiority.
"Gabriel, you underestimate me. I developed a poison I’m immune to, the only person on the planet who is."
I stare at him for a moment. Right. It’s Blue. That should have occurred to me.
He tilts his head slightly and says,
"I have poison here too." He lifts his upper lip, exposing his gums.
"Besides my natural mating fangs, I also have metal fangs here," he says, pointing to his gum above his teeth. "If someone tries to hurt me and gets close enough, I can administer a dose of poison if I choose to."
"Wow.????????[14], and you hid all of that inside your body?"
"Yes. I’m aware I don’t have physical strength. It wouldn’t take much for someone to kidnap me, torture me… many would want to, many have threatened it. This isn’t even my last line of defense. The last one I have is truly… drastic."
"What does it do?"
Blue hesitates.
"When I was developing bionanotechnology, I was my own firsttest subject. I believe every good scientist should test their inventions on themselves if they want the moral right to test them on others later. Remember what I told you about the nanobots I carry inside me?"
"Yes."
"They have… a few very special functions. Highly defensive, you could say… so if someone tries to rape me, they’ll pay a high price."
Wow. Blue really is on another level. Determined and prepared. But being surrounded by so much hatred… it’s no wonder he armed himself to the teeth. Pun intended.
"Some kind of…?" I start, but trail off, my head completely blank. I have no idea how something like that would even work.
"All they need to do is touch me, and… you could say I’ll gain amassiveadvantage. Let’s leave it at that."
After a moment, I say, "The fact that you even had to resort to systems like that, embedded in your own body, that you have to live like this, constantly aware of the danger…"
"If you want to climb to the top, you walk a path above an abyss thewholetime. One mistake and you fall…"
I close my eyes. The weakness from coming out of fighting mode is really hitting me now, my muscles trembling more and more, but there’s something important I have to ask…
"Does that defense system also prevent you from, you know, being in a situation where someone doesn’t want to hurt you, but maybe wants to… make love with you?" Another thing I probably shouldn’t say, but I just do, sometimes words slip out, that’s the way I am.
To my surprise, Blue smiles sarcastically.
"In that situation, the person wouldn’t be in danger."
Silence falls, and I feel my heart pick up slightly. I want to add something, but then I hear a knock at the door.
Dimitri steps in and says, "Detective Arnold is here. He wants to speak with you."
"Of course."
Blue heads for the door, and I get up, slipping my jacket back on, leaving my torn shirt as it is. We step out into the hallway, where a sizable group of officers has already gathered. The attacker is being led toward the elevator, casting a grim look in our direction.
His face wears four red, bloody stripes from my claws.
Arnold is talking to Dimitri and Simon, who must have come up as well and look visibly shaken. When he sees Blue, he hurries over, hands clasped against his chest.
"Oh dear Fate, thank goodness Gabriel was with you. I’m so sorry I doubted you! But it happened again! This is insane! These people have completely lost it," he rambles, but Blue only makes a small calming gesture.
