The surface-level selling points of a story can often be all it needs. The premise of Hayate Kuku's BLACK BLOOD certainly lends itself to the potential of denser themes: the nature of the human soul, the validity of suppressed and manipulated emotions that make people who they are, and the very definition of life itself are all questioned and meditated on across this volume. "Teaching a robot to love" is a well-worn science fiction setup ripe for this sort of material, after all. But ultimately, perhaps wisely, there's a recognition that this does not need to be that book. BLACK BLOOD is the book about a hot mechanical guy and a cute human guy smoochin' and shaggin'. In this world, sometimes just that is enough.

Also, for the record, said mechanical guy is officially a cyborg—a human consciousness transplanted into a robotic body, rather than an artificial intelligence. Thank God we don't have to litigate the appeal of that in today's technocratic hellscape.

BLACK BLOOD is a presentation-minded piece, where the conceptual aesthetic appeal of the central relationship is the key feature. And Kuku doesn't just understand the assignment, she's teaching the whole damn course. This is something Kuku is a fan of. The strong cyborg bodies of main mechanical man Ethan and his cybernetic security cohorts are drawn with crisp, consistent details—these are lovingly rendered. Later in the story, squishy squeeze Mihail notes, "When he looks at me…I can hear the sound of his vision scope surreptitiously zooming in." Saucy shots of Ethan's sexy mechanical back are caught in the locker room. There's a pronounced height difference between Ethan and Mihail. Ethan is also, importantly, kind of dumb. It's funny, because Mihail's face shape strays off-model in a few places, but the mechanoids? They get all the attention to detail. If you are or have ever been a connoisseur of the clang-clang, rest assured that Kuku gets it, and has provided a book that delivers for fellow freaks.

The man-handleable machines are the main attraction, yes, but Kuku's artistic sensibilities afford themselves well throughout the parts of BLACK BLOOD that aren't completely catering to the robosexual readership. The planet of Peridot and the terraforming station occupying it enjoy a solid amount of layers as a setting. This is a single volume that's just lengthy enough to have the space to spend time simply having a character like Ethan walk into work in this world. There are cafes for civilian spaceport residents, workmanlike science labs, and outdoor alien landscapes for characters to tow Death Stranding-style hovercarts around. They hit the right vibes as a backdrop for this distinguished love story.

The visual and conceptual vibes bring that good background, which is about the most the writing shoots for in establishing its setting, arguably the most it needs to. Other, denser details are touched, but not lingered on. Some world-building dialogue in the beginning can lay on the "as you know," mostly in terms of getting readers up on how the cyborgs or the atmosphere of Peridot work. But other elements, like legal acts managing cyborg lifespans or the exact nature of the war Ethan was fighting in, are left pointedly undefined. This goes for some of the denser mysteries brought up, particularly the exact nature of the plants that Mihail is studying. It seems to be building toward a grander reveal, but as the focus hones in on Ethan and Mihail's feelings, it becomes clear that was never the intention.

The plant life is a subject simply meant to get readers to consider the definitions of life and consciousness and our inability to know all the myriad forms it can take. It can also serve as an allegory for the act of crushing on someone and interpreting their feelings: it might look like something special to the untrained, unassuming eye, but in reality, might not be what you think or hope it is. The planet of Peridot and whether it actually has life or not fairly parallels Ethan's unconfirmed feelings about the relationship between him and Mihail. The intent is meditations, not epiphanies.

The capsuled coupling of Ethan and Mihail carries the narrative of BLACK BLOOD as cyborg-snogging fans would hope for. Despite some of the marketing copy for the series implying there might be a "forbidden love" angle to the relationship, the actual story makes clear at crucial points that human/cyborg relations are accepted in this setting, to say nothing of people having zero compunctions about gay relationships. What follows is a distilled, effective entry in the old "jock/nerd" meet-cute courtship. Mihail shows Ethan the unknowable, intriguing natural beauty of the world around them. Ethan lets Mihail hold up his long, heavy…gun. The thicker page count of this volume gives these interactions a sense of breathing room, even as there are some skips that feel like they could benefit from a little extra time on dates between the two. Ethan's declaration of his intent to "protect what's precious to me" comes off only slightly accelerated.

That underscores the fact that BLACK BLOOD is an appreciated romance story where the courtship is only part of the telling. Ethan's repressed cyborg emotions act as a vivid metaphor for anybody who's felt like they were suppressing their feelings for the benefit of someone they didn't think they were worthy of being loved by them. And when the sparks metaphorically fly, the pair, as an actual couple, act out the core idea of how connections can teach us to feel again. It's hardly new ground for any romance story, science-fiction or otherwise, but that doesn't mean the emotions don't hit through their flavor of allegory, to say nothing of being capped off with cathartic clanging between metal and flesh.

BLACK BLOOD is an 18+ title, and as described, Kuku truly gets the appeal of the sexy robots subgenre. But this isn't porn, even of the "with plot" variety. Yes, Kuku is using imagined fantasies to cut to the sexy chase a few scenes early. And sex scenes are used as payoff to emotional buildup in the relationship—this includes saving the couple's properly spicy penetrative sex scene as a bonus-chapter coda so as not to interrupt a more serious, dramatic climax at the story's technical ending. The bionic boning is hot as anything else she draws, but she understands it's key to the communication of the relationship. Witness Ethan and Mihail's intertwined feet wriggling in pleasure. The writing details the sense of touch that accompanies Ethan's experiences of passions with Mihail even before they pick out a robot dick for him together. Kuku can draw the crap out of some big, enveloping cyborg hugs.

BLACK BLOOD is a story that knows precisely what it is, and that's not any accusation of a lack of ambition. The book is blessed in bringing the base bot-banging appeal, while seasoning it with sci-fi trappings that enhance that flavor without overpowering it. It's a story that gets readers thinking just enough about their emotional humanity to invest in the relationship and draw them into what might be an unconventional aesthetic appeal. BLACK BLOOD is thus a standout work in its particular subgenre, and I urge any spicy romance fans who aren't otherwise robo-disposed to check it out—it might just awaken something in you.