Three Square Meals Ch. 092

"I'm not going to hear the end of this, am I?" he asked, rubbing a hand over his face. "I thought it was bad enough with all the King of the Maliri jokes..."

Alyssa paused before they stepped into the grav-tube, stepping closer to him and reaching up to gently caress his cheek. Looking into his eyes with concern, she asked, "Does it really upset you when I make fun of this kind of thing?"

John hesitated then slowly shook his head. "Well no, but-"

"Great!" she exclaimed, tugging him into the blue anti-grav field. "Getting fucked by a King is hot; I can't imagine how sexy it's going to be getting boned by a living god!"

He rolled his eyes at her, and gathered the exuberant blonde in his arms. "Fine, have your fun, but I am worried about the impact this'll have on Trankaran society. They've revered Mael'nerak as their 'Great Maker' for over nine-thousand-years... the last thing I want to do is cause some kind of theological crisis amongst the Trankarans!"

Alyssa's smile faded and she admitted, "I actually had doubts too, but Niskera insisted; I just helped her come up with the name. She said that nothing will galvanise the Trankarans faster than a 'spiritual renaissance'." Her cerulean eyes had a hint of worry to them as she continued, "Niskera wasn't fucking around when she said she'd do anything to save her people from extinction. I thought Sakura was driven and focused, but she looks like she's half-assing it compared to Niskera..."

"Do you think it's something I need to be concerned about?" John asked, looking at her in alarm.

She shook her head but said carefully, "I think it'd be sensible to keep an eye on her though. I doubt she'll have much sympathy with anyone not fully on board with the 'save the Trankarans' plan."

"We'll need to keep close tabs on their fight against the Kirrix too, but the comm beacons are down in Trankaran territory," John replied, with a worried frown. "Even if the Trankarans can replace them all, we'll have to route the signal through Terran Federation territory and I really don't want the Admiralty snooping on that kind of sensitive information."

"How about via Telepathy?" Alyssa suggested, her expression brightening. "That avoids both problems in one go!"

"Yeah, but who do we send with the Maliri fleet?" John asked, his brow furrowing with concern. "The only women you have a full telepathic connection with are the girls on the Invictus and Edraele..."

Alyssa frowned and nodded her agreement. "Yeah, I don't want to be separated from any of the girls either, and we need Edraele's influence in Maliri Space to keep everything running smoothly."

"Exactly," John replied, hating the idea of any of the Invictus' crew being stuck with a Maliri Fleet for several weeks.

"Let me think about it," Alyssa said, giving him a reassuring smile. "I might be able to come up with a solution."

John nodded and turned to see how close they were to the Command Deck. He realised they had already arrived and were just floating in the anti-gravity field, while Faye waited patiently by the entrance to the grav-tube.

"I didn't want to interrupt, it sounded like you were having an important conversation!" the purple sprite said, looking at them cautiously as if to make sure they'd finished.

"Any problems?" John asked, stepping out onto the Bridge with Alyssa.

Faye shook her head, long purple hair swishing over her shoulders. "All the Trankarans have disembarked and we're loaded up with materials. The Anvil and the freighter have both detached and we're flying towards the edge of the Delta Corvus system as we speak."

"I better go plot a course," Alyssa said, striding up the illuminated steps to the Command Podium.

"Thanks, Faye," John said, before following his blonde XO. He watched Alyssa's slender fingers dancing over the console, her route appearing as a glowing green line that linked Trankaran Space and Maliri Space by snaking through Terran Federation territory.

"Just under five days until we arrive at the rendezvous point," Alyssa said, nodding towards the flight path.

John was quiet for a moment, carefully examining the route they were taking and focusing on the section of space that they'd be flying through on the third day of their journey. He pointed to a large orange star tagged on the map as Zeta Telescopii, which was just a short diversion from their current course.

"Would you mind altering our course a bit so we can stop at that system please," he requested, looking thoughtful. "There's a planet I'd like to visit there called Myra's World."

Alyssa darted a knowing smile at him and nodded. "That's a lovely idea..." She made the course corrections then activated the Tachyon Drive, launching the Invictus into hyper-warp. "The course change will only add another hour onto our journey. How long do you plan on staying for?"

"Two, maybe three hours?" John suggested, examining the Gaia classification world on the System Map.

"Then we should rendezvous with the Maliri fleet in five days, at about two in the afternoon," Alyssa said, relaxing back in her Executive Officer's chair. She raised an eyebrow and glanced at the black case in his hand. "How long are you planning on keeping that little secret from me?"

"As long as it takes, beautiful," John replied mysteriously, while avoiding any thoughts about the case's contents.

She groaned in frustration and muttered, "You're getting annoyingly good at this."

He gave her a teasing smile and asked, "Isn't it about time for lunch?"

Alyssa rose from her chair and nodded, joining him in descending from the Command Podium. "I'm hungry too. I worked up quite an appetite after all that psychic shaping this morning."

She rubbed her stomach in what would be an innocuous gesture, if it wasn't for the smouldering look she gave him at the same time. John immediately started thinking of just one thing, just as Alyssa knew he would, and he realised there might be consequences to getting into a teasing match with the mischievous blonde.

"Just another six hours to go..." she purred, gently stroking his taut quad through his pants. "Then we can make sure all that tasty cum ends up right where it belongs..."

John groaned at her delicate caress, realising it was going to be a very trying afternoon. He waved goodbye to a grinning Faye, then entered the grav-tube with Alyssa, heading for Deck Two. The rest of the girls had already gathered in the Officers' Lounge and they warmly greeted the late arrivals as John and Alyssa joined them at the dining table.

John took his seat at the head of the table, intrigued by the broad selection of sushi that their Head Chef had prepared. "This looks amazing!" he exclaimed, looking at the bright orange and reds of the fish, which contrasted with the stark white of the tightly packed rice.

"I hope you enjoy lunch everyone," Sakura said, with a nervous smile.

Picking up one of the Sake Nigiri, John took an experimental bite, enjoying the contrast between the salmon and the rice. "These are excellent! Well done, honey."

"I normally prefer hot food," Tashana said, as she examined the thinly sliced tuna on the half-eaten roll in her hand. "But these definitely break that rule! This sushi tastes delicious."

Sakura looked delighted and she turned to look at Calara and mouthed, "Thank you..."

"Mmm," Dana hummed happily as she swallowed a tasty shrimp roll. She looked down the table at John and asked, "So what do we call you now? Your worshipfulness?"

John rolled his eyes at everyone's good-natured laughter. "I had a feeling Alyssa wouldn't be able to keep that quiet."

"If it's any consolation, I tried really hard..." she said with a twinkle in her eyes.

"For about two seconds, I imagine," he replied, smiling at her. Turning back to the rest of the group, he continued, "I'm sure Alyssa filled you in on all the details, so there's no point me rehashing it. We're on our way to the Maliri now, but we'll be making a pit stop along the way."

"Really, where?" Irillith asked, her curiosity piqued.

He gave her a reassuring look. "Don't worry, it'll only take a few hours; I want Edraele back on her feet as much as you do. As to where; well, I'll leave that as a surprise for now." John waited until all the excited speculation from the girls had died down, before continuing, "Alyssa gave me a brief summary of what you've all been up to. Anybody want to elaborate further?"

Jade put down her glass of fruit juice. "I'm half way through a Reaper Cannon. I should be finished by this evening."

Dana saw John's momentary flash of confusion and explained, "When I put one together before the fight with the Kirrix, I stripped a bunch of parts from a Quantum rifle. Jade's building a new Power Core from scratch, along with all the rest of the components. She'll also need you or Alyssa to do some psychic shaping for the barrel and the gunframe."

"I'm happy to help," Alyssa offered. "I was going to fix our body armour after lunch, but I can do that first."

"I dropped all the runes on the Paragon suits and the Valkyrie, so you can repair all the busted armour," Dana said, looking at Alyssa then John.

"Great. I'll patch up the mech then," John volunteered, which earned him a grateful kiss from Alyssa. When she returned to her seat, he looked at the redhead again. "I heard you've already created the schematics for a new pistol?"

Dana nodded enthusiastically and grinned at Tashana. "It's pretty fucking cool. I think you'll love it!"

The Maliri girl's violet eyes gleamed with excitement. "When can I get my hands on a prototype?"

"I'll work on it first thing tomorrow morning," Jade promised. She glanced at Dana and tentatively added, "I think I should be able to get two built by... tomorrow afternoon?"

"Sounds about right," the redhead agreed. "You're getting really good at building this stuff now."

"How about Faye's body?" John asked, sharing a smile with the sprite.

"Three more days to completely finish her frame," Dana replied, before raising a cautionary hand. "But I can't finish properly until we meet up with the Maliri fleet. Luna's bringing me some stuff I can't replicate with the Mass Fabricators."

"I'll be finished with the software by tomorrow evening," Irillith explained, before turning to look at Faye. "You might want to spend a few days running a beta test before we meet with Luna. I can help work out any kinks you find."

Alyssa shook her head. "I don't know... It might be fun if Faye gets a bit kinky!"

Faye blushed a deep purple and she giggled as the rest of the crew laughed along with her.

Irillith arched an eyebrow. "Considering some of the functionality we've got in mind, and our favourite piece of anatomy that they apply to, I think a great deal of caution is in order."

"Don't worry, I'm being very thorough with mechanical safety features," Dana said, giving John a reassuring smile. "Even if there's a software screw-up, it won't be possible for Faye to hurt you." She gave the purple girl a flirtatious smile. "Or any of us for that matter..."

"Hey! I do not write screwed-up software!" Irillith protested indignantly. "She'll be absolutely perfect, I was just being modest."

Faye had an earnest expression on her cute elfin face. "I know how amazing your coding is, but I'll still do lots of testing anyway. I wouldn't want to risk hurting any of you!"

"Which seems like a decent segue into what I've been doing," Rachel said, before breaking into a wry smile. "The autopsies are proceeding well. I'll go through my findings with you tomorrow."

"Oh! That reminds me," Faye blurted out. "I fitted one of the maintenance bots with a holocam and sent it looking at the damaged turret well for the destroyed Heavy Cannon."

"Nice, thanks," Dana said with an appreciative smile. "Send the footage to Engineering after lunch and I'll check it out."

Calara glanced down the table at Sakura and smiled at her as she said, "We'll spend the rest of the afternoon practicing and prepping for dinner."

"How're you finding it all so far, Head Chef?" John asked, looking at the Asian girl.

"It's nowhere near as terrifying as I thought it was going to be," Sakura admitted. "Calara's a very patient teacher though, so she's been making it really fun and easy."

"I've been very impressed with the results so far," John said, which had her beaming at him in delight.

They finished lunch, with Calara and Sakura shooing everyone away when they offered to help clean up afterwards. John picked up the black case he'd placed on the table, drawing curious looks from one and all.

"Don't bother asking," Alyssa muttered indignantly. "I couldn't get a peep out of him. It's John's super-secret project..."

John could see the eager challenge in Dana's and Calara's eyes and he raised a cautionary finger. "Out of the three of us, who's most likely to win a tickling contest?"

Calara suddenly looked wary and Dana pouted as she said, "Fine... I'm too stuffed full of Sushi to be rolling around on the floor right now anyway."

While John knew he could hold his own against the redhead and the Latina, he didn't like his odds if the entire crew decided to gang up on him. Erring on the side of caution, he waved them goodbye as he strode briskly out of the room and said over his shoulder, "I'll see you ladies for dinner, I've got work to do!"

Nine pairs of beautiful eyes followed his tactical withdrawal, before they glanced curiously at Alyssa, who gave them a helpless shrug.

John travelled down to Deck Nine and collected a fresh cube of crystal Alyssium, then made his way to the mech's launching bay. As he strode through the Secondary and Primary hangars, Alyssa made a point of whispering seductive telepathic words in his ear, listing all the naughty things she'd like to do to him... and the girls.

He chuckled as she did her best to tantalise and tease him, while he attempted to focus on the battered Valkyrie. The cleaning bots had scrubbed all the green Kirrix blood from the mech, but most of the armoured plates had sustained some form of damage. In the end, he decided to strip the entire mech in one go, add enough metal to replace the lost mass, then carefully reform a new set of armour plating around the huge war-machine. He put aside the black case and separated out a small orb of crystal Alyssium, then took the larger sphere of metal and got to work on the mech. Removing the plating turned out to be easy, but he'd previously deca-shaped the armour and shaping it all for an eleventh time proved quite a strain.

John was panting with the exertion by the time he was done and starting to gain some insight into why Alyssa hated repairing armour so much. She paused in her litany of debauchery to thank him for his appreciative thoughts, before describing how she'd like to lather up Calara in syrup and ice-cream then lap away at her delicious dessert. John was surprised by the length of Alyssa's comprehensive list of lewd activities, which lasted all the way through the Valkyrie repairs, keeping him in a perpetual state of horniness. Left with a painful case of blue balls, he was finally forced to concede defeat and shut Alyssa out of his mind completely, much to her amusement.

Glancing up at the overhead cameras, John called out, "Faye, could I speak to you a secon-"

She appeared before he finished the sentence. "Hey, John! What's up?"

"Can you shut down all the cameras in here please. I'd like to work on something in private," he requested politely.

Faye's cute elfin features scrunched up with worry. "Are you sure? I won't be able to tell if you need my help!"

"I'll be quite alright, it's just for a few hours," he said reassuringly. "If I need your help with anything, I'll just head out into the corridor and you can see me then."

"Okay..." Faye agreed with some reluctance. She waved him goodbye with a forlorn frown on her face, then blinked out of sight.

John walked across to the crate where he'd left both the small orb of crystal Alyssium that he'd saved and the black case that Thandrun had given him. Alone at last, he placed his hand on the case's runed surface and flipped up the lid. Inside, embedded in black velvet cloth, were ten beautiful gemstones. There was a soft light behind each stone that illuminated the spectacular colours within each one and the clever way the gems were cut made them sparkle magnificently in the light.

What really impressed John as he brushed his finger over each in turn, was how close a match they were to the eye colour of each of the girls. Thandrun had assured him that the Forgemasters possessed a vast array of precious gemstones, but even so... He lifted a sapphire from its velvet bed, and angled it in the light. It wasn't quite as enchanting as Alyssa's beautiful cerulean eyes, but it came very close.

Returning the gem to the case, he gestured towards the block of crystal Alyssium and beckoned it over. Melting a tiny portion from the sphere, he lengthened the psychically malleable metal, then made it curve back on itself so that it formed a simple circular band. Sitting down on the deck, he focused intently on the slender band, working on the delicate filigree he had in mind. Setting the image in his mind, he manipulated the metal, matching it to the mental image.

After a couple of seconds the ring hardened and John plucked it out of the air. He turned it, examining the glistening white metal with a critical eye and frowned as he found a dozen areas he wanted to improve. Concentrating on the delicate band, he melted it back into a liquid metal loop and tried again. The second attempt was better, but still looked amateurish in his opinion, so he came up with several more improvements and began the process once more.

John had no prior experience as a jeweller, but being able to design, shape, and forge each new ring in only a few seconds, let him build up a tremendous amount of experience in just that afternoon. He didn't attempt to shape the metal beyond deca-shaping, simply discarding the ring and starting over. After several hours, the deck was littered with white rings and his orb of crystal Alyssium had dwindled to almost nothing, but he was finally happy with the design he'd settled on for the band.

He stood up and stretched, then reached for the gem case with a satisfying sense of accomplishment. John suddenly froze, looking down at the ring he held in consternation. He'd been so obsessed with getting the patterns on the band right, he'd completely forgotten about the setting for the gem itself! Flushing with embarrassment, he glanced at his watch, then let out a sigh of frustration when he realised it was six o'clock and he'd run out of time.

Placing the prototype band in the gemcase, he closed the lid, then gestured to the scores of rings scattered across the floor. They rolled together, melting into streams of liquid metal that pooled together, then formed a small orb of crystal Alyssium. He left it on the crate in the mech bay, knowing it would get used for patching up the Valkyrie sooner or later. With the gem case tucked under his arm, he left the bay, remembering to give the cameras a wave as he entered the corridor.

"Hi John!" Faye exclaimed as she appeared an instant later, a look of relief on her face. "Are you alright?!"

Doing his best to hide his sense of irritation at not being able to finish a single ring, he gave the purple sprite a reassuring smile. "Yeah, just a bit tired, but I'm okay."

Faye nodded, her expression sombre. "Alyssa requested that I ask you nicely to unblock her from your thoughts when you were finished..."

He chuckled and nodded. "Will do, thanks, Faye."

"You're welcome!" The sprite waved goodbye and flashed out of sight.

Unsure if he was really in the mood for more teasing, pent up as he was, John took a few moments to decide whether to let Alyssa back into his mind. He eventually relented as he stepped into the fore grav-tube.