Three Square Meals

"John..." the soft voice murmured, penetrating his subconscious. "Lilyana wants to speak with you..."

He opened his eyes and found himself looking up at a dazzling view of the stars, the crystal dome in the Observatory so clear he could have been floating out there in the black. The next realisation was that he was buried under a pile of girls, with his ravished harem sprawled over him on the oval bed. They'd all been especially loving and affectionate after the orgy, wanting to be as close to him as possible as they dozed off for a nap. He craned up his neck to look over the tangle of lithe limbs and saw Faye's cute elfin face light up in a grin.

"I would have preferred to give you a more tactile wake up call," she said with a giggle, her luminous eyes roaming over the sea of luscious flesh. "But I couldn't actually reach you under the girls!"

John briefly considered trying to extricate himself without waking his nubile bedmates, but knew it was an impossible task. He turned and gave the blonde beside him a big kiss, which she quickly responded to when she stirred from sleep.

"I'm a bit stuck," he said with a smile, glancing down at the girls crisscrossed over his body.

She swept her mane of golden blonde hair from her face and grinned back at him. "I'm not surprised. After that epic performance, we all wanted a cuddle afterwards."

The girls started to awaken, prompted by Alyssa's telepathic nudging, and they smiled at John as they reluctantly untangled themselves. Jehanna was the only exception, remaining fast asleep, her body eagerly absorbing the huge load of cum rounding out her stomach. John brushed her lustrous black hair to one side, so that he could see her more clearly and was relieved to see that she was already fully-healed. Her cuts and bruises had faded away as if they were never there, her beautiful coffee-coloured skin flawless once more.

John turned back to the girls and gave them a rueful frown. "I'm sorry to disturb you; I would've let you sleep the afternoon away but I need to speak with the Maliri before they leave."

"Don't worry about it," Dana said with an amiable shrug. "I've got a ton of stuff to do anyway."

The rest of the girls nodded their agreement and started to get up.

John stood as well, then had a good stretch. The girls had given him a strenuous workout, but his tired muscles had already recuperated during his brief nap. "Thanks for this afternoon everyone, it was a lot of fun. That was a first for me, having sex in zero-gravity."

"It was actually Tashana's idea," Rachel said, giving the twin a look of admiration. "I didn't know she was so naughty..."

"I did," Irillith said with a grin, hugging her sister.

They laughed as they headed out of the Observatory, no one bothering to dress as they were all eager to get a shower.

John scooped Jehanna up in his arms, then followed the girls over the bridge across the Lagoon. "I'll make dinner for everyone after I talk to Lilyana. We can have a quick meal together while we head over to Olympus."

"I'll make a start on it now," Calara immediately volunteered. She glanced at Sakura and added, "Want to be my assistant?"

Sakura gave her a sharp salute. "Yes, Chef!"

John paused at the junction, greeting Helene and her Nymph entourage with a smile as they walked up the path from the beach to join them. The aquatic girl looked starry-eyed as she smiled back at him, walking on unsteady feet with Jade's support.

"You look like you had a good time," he said, trying not to chuckle at her dazed expression.

Helene blushed furiously and giggled, averting her eyes.

Jade winked at him and said, "I think we overdid it a bit, Master. After Leylira mentioned how good she tasted, we all wanted to sample her."

"Oh!" Helene suddenly gasped as she stared wide-eyed at Jehanna's rounded stomach. "Is she...?"

John shook his head, "No, she's not pregnant. I just fed her for the second time."

Helene placed her teal-skinned hand on Jehanna's hugely swollen belly, a look of reverence on her face for the dusky girl's gravid form. "I don't understand... you fed her?"

"Her tummy's full of his cum," Alyssa said, putting her arm around the shocked young woman. "You looked just like that when John fed you last night, that's how he was able to heal you."

Placing her other hand on her own stomach, Helene looked at John in astonishment. "I don't remember that!"

"For the first few times, you'll sleep while your body absorbs my cum," John explained, glancing down at Jehanna. "This was her second time... the third is when you start remembering."

"When can we do that again?" she asked eagerly, her baby-blue eyes sparkling with excitement.

"A few hours," John said, smiling at her enthusiasm.

The Nymphs gathered around, all wanting to caress Jehanna too, and the looks they were giving John made it abundantly clear just how much they longed to be with him.

He gave them a kind smile. "Come on, let's head up to the bedroom. I'll put Jehanna to bed while she sleeps this off, then we can all have a shower."

They proceeded to do exactly that, filling the enormous shower cubicle to capacity with the recent influx of new girls. John managed to get every inch of his body scrubbed without lifting a finger himself, which was very fortunate as his own hands had found lots of fascinating curves to explore. He reluctantly left the girls to their soapy fun, despite a chorus of playful calls to stay, then dried himself, dressed, and headed up to the Command Deck.

Faye was waiting for him by the grav-tube when he stepped out onto the Bridge, her luminous eyes brightening at the sight of him. "John, what do you want to do about Tartarus?" she asked, falling into step as he walked towards his Ready Room.

John glanced up at the holographic Tactical Map which had the battered fragment of Ganymede in focus. "Destroy it," he said without hesitation. "It was a cursed place long before Buckingham started using it and it's been the site of appalling atrocities since then. Please record it being obliterated; that footage might prove useful if High Command are uncooperative tomorrow."

"Will do!" Faye cheerfully replied.

The weapon loadout hologram showed the Invictus' weapon batteries coming online as Faye diverted power to the ship's guns. Plasma-scorched armour plating juddered back to reveal those massed ranks of heavy weapons and the sprite took careful aim at the massive asteroid. John paused to watch the opening salvo, the Nova Lances carving a huge trench through the surface of the moon fragment. That was followed by a blistering array of vivid blue laser beams and bolts, accompanied by the rhythmic impacts of Singularity Driver slugs. Each and every second, huge explosions rocked Tartarus, massive fissures opening up under that relentless barrage.

He gave Faye a grim nod, then walked through into his Ready Room, where he sat behind his desk and activated the comms interface. Searching for the Galaena Serine in the local system list, he swiped across and waited for a few seconds as the crossed blades of House Valaden appeared before him.

The Maliri Fleet Commander appeared, her jewel-encrusted golden armour glinting in the soft light of her office. "It is good to see you, Protector. Thank you for returning my call."

"You know we're on first names now, Lilyana," John said with a warm smile.

Even though he couldn't see her blue face behind the opaque faceplate, he could hear her smile in her reply. "My humblest apologies, John."

Leaning forward, he said earnestly, "Thank you for everything you did here today. You commanded your fleet with great skill and saved countless Terran lives with your intervention. If you could pass on my thanks to every member of your fleet, I'd really appreciate it."

Lilyana inclined her head in acknowledgement, but she hesitated before replying. "In truth, I've never seen destruction on this scale before... The inter-House warfare I've been involved with consisted of small fleet skirmishes; several dozen ships involved at most. This was... eye-opening."

John nodded, his expression bleak. "You'll be facing a lot more large-scale battles in the future I'm afraid, starting with the Kirrix. I'll ask Faye to transmit you the recordings of our fights against them, as well as the data we compiled from our review of the Battle of Terra; hopefully both will give you some useful guidance for the fighting to come."

"That would be most appreciated, thank you," the Fleet Commander replied, sounding relieved.

"How are you getting on with the Brimorian Shield Generator salvage?" he asked, relaxing in his chair.

"That was actually the purpose of my initial call. I wanted to inform you that we have completed our salvage operation." Her tone turned to amusement as she continued, "Admiral Caldwell raised objections to us picking over the wrecked Kintark battleships, so I had my fleet relocate to the Praetorian capital ships in orbit around Terra. As those ships were single-handedly disabled or destroyed by a Lioness, we staked an indisputable claim, much to his frustration."

John bristled in anger at Caldwell's interference. "Sorry you had to deal with that, I'll have words with him tomorrow." He smiled in approval and continued, "That was great thinking on claiming Sakura's kills! Did you get what you needed?"

Lilyana grinned at him behind her mask. "Half that fleet were obliterated by Power Core explosions, but she crippled the rest by simply executing the Bridge crew." Pausing for a moment, the awe in her voice was obvious as she added, "I still find it astonishing that a single vessel of that size could reap such incredible destruction. I am truly glad that you are a friend of the Maliri, John."

"The feeling's mutual," he replied, his answering smile just as heartfelt. "Did you get everything you needed from those wrecks?

She nodded, sounding delighted as she replied, "The Praetorian vessels were an incredibly lucrative source of salvage. We stripped five battleship-class Shield Generators from the hulks, three of which we intend to install in our own battleships, the other two I thought would make a fine gift for the Trankarans."

"Excellent work, Lilyana," John said, impressed by her initiative.

"We also removed huge numbers of heatsinks, which are greatly superior to our own; there should be enough to upgrade our entire fleet. My Fleet Engineer has informed me that we cannot make the upgrades in hyper-warp, but the moment we arrive in Trankara, I will order the refit. We should see a significant improvement in firepower and survivability once all the components have been installed." She tilted her head to one side as if lost in thought. "We received your transmission for the shield schematics. I plan to liaise with the Trankarans to ensure all our vessels are upgraded as quickly as possible."

"Ideally, I'd prefer you not to commit your fleet to battle until the refit is complete," John said, his brow creasing with worry. "I want you to fight hard for the Trankarans and help them liberate their worlds, but you and your forces are precious. We can't afford to lose you, Lilyana... I want you to promise me that you won't take any excessive risks. There are billions of lives at stake here and we can't afford to make any mistakes."

"I promise, John," she said solemnly.

He gave her a teasing smile. "I know Alyssa wants the three of us to spend some time improving our... working relationship. I'll look forward to your return to Maliri Space."

"As will I," she replied with a breathy sigh.

"Have you got Almari and Ilyana there?" he asked, suspecting the two assassins would be close by.

Sure enough, the two white-armoured bodyguards stepped into view, standing behind the Maliri Fleet Commander. They bowed to him and Almari said, "Hello, John. Edraele thought it would be more efficient for us to be present while you debriefed Lilyana to save you repeating yourself."

He nodded, thanking his Maliri Matriarch telepathically. Addressing the two assassins, he said, "Everything I just said to Lilyana applies to the two of you as well. I was impressed and proud of your efforts to defend the Citadel today, but please avoid ground combat unless absolutely necessary. You're there to provide a link with Edraele and to act as bodyguards to Lilyana... no heroics, okay?"

"We'll be on our best behaviour," Almari replied with a smile.

Ilyana also grinned at him as she agreed. "We'll be good girls. No putting ourselves in excessive danger."

"Perfect," he said gratefully. With a sigh of regret, he continued, "I'd love to give the three of you the send-off you deserve, but unfortunately we don't have the time; you need to depart for Trankaran Space and we're heading to Olympus to make repairs. Liberate the Trankaran Worlds and hurry home, I'll reward you properly then."

Almari's hand drifted to her stomach in a subconscious gesture and he could see her fellow Maliri shifting, their body language giving away their excitement at that offer.

"Safe travels, ladies," he said, giving them a respectful salute.

"Goodbye, John," Lilyana replied, the three of them bowing in reply.

With that they ended the call, the House Valaden symbol appearing for a few seconds before fading away.

Faye appeared in a purple flash, then hopped up onto his desk. "Hi John! I compiled all the combat footage you mentioned and also included data from the battles at Regulus and Ashana; I thought they might be interesting for Lilyana too. I've started transmitting everything to the Galaena Serine."

"Nice work, thanks honey," he said, rising from his chair. "Good thinking on the Regulus and Ashana data. Hopefully she'll be able to learn some things from watching Calara in action."

As he walked towards the door, Faye flitted along beside him. "I blew Tartarus to bits and recorded the whole thing. I've also plotted a course for Alpha Centauri and we'll jump out of the Sol System in seven minutes."

John opened the Ready Room door then put his arm around her physical avatar when he stepped onto the Bridge. "I don't know what we'd do without you, Faye."

"You know I'm always happy to help!" she replied, beaming up at him. "It's a shame I'm limited to twelve avatars, or I'd be able to do even more!"

He paused for a second and looked down at the chirpy sprite. "Is that even possible? Could we just build you more servers and give you more avatars that way?"

Faye shook her head and frowned. "Sadly, it doesn't work like that. My central processing core drives all my avatars, so we'd need to upgrade that to expand my capabilities."

"Well, I guess that's something we can look into for the long term," John said, continuing up the ramp. "In the short term... are you planning on joining us for dinner?"

"I'd love to!" she enthusiastically accepted, slipping an arm around his waist and giving him a friendly squeeze.

When they walked into the kitchen at the back of the Officers' Lounge, they were met by laughter, the sound of conversation, and the smell of spices. Calara and Sakura were there already, tipping sliced vegetables into the two large pans simmering on the stove.

"What's for dinner?" John asked with a warm smile.

"Chilli con carne," Calara replied over her shoulder as she stirred the minced beef. She returned his smile then added, "We've got everything in hand. If you want to be helpful, why don't you two set the table?"

He gave her a quick kiss, then tickled Sakura, making her giggle. "Just give us a shout if you want a hand serving dinner," he replied, collecting a sizeable stack of plates and heading out the door to the dining area.

Faye scooped up a huge pile of cutlery, then followed him out, the knives, forks, and spoons nestled in her arms. John started putting out the plates, then watched in fascination as Faye started setting the places with deft, uncannily precise motions of her dexterous purple fingers. Her hand moved back and forth to the pile of cutlery she held against her chest, setting each place with a strangely unnatural rhythm and speed. She worked in a blur as she circled the table and when she finished, John realised that Faye's jumbled pile of cutlery had contained precisely enough knives, forks, and spoons for fifteen settings.

"How did you get fifteen?" John asked, marvelling at the sight.

Faye turned to look at him with a bright smile on her cute elfin face. "Let's see, there's you, me, Alyssa, Calara, Dana, Rachel, Irillith, Tashana, Sakura, Helene, Jade and her four sisters. That just leaves Jehanna and Lynette who are still sleeping, but they won't awaken until 10:30pm and 4:00am respectively." She cocked her head to one side, a hint of worry furrowing her brow. "I don't think I missed anyone!"

"No, I meant how did you get precisely fifteen knives, fifteen forks, and fifteen spoons? It looked like you just randomly scooped up a big pile of cutlery before we left the kitchen! Then when you started placing them down on the table... it was like watching an automated production line!"

Her worried frown deepened when she saw his startled expression. "I didn't have a program pre-prepared for setting the table... Did I just freak you out?"

He hesitated for a second and when Faye looked more alarmed he quickly replied, "No, no, I wasn't freaked out exactly... I was just fascinated watching you work. We haven't really discussed the capabilities of your new body before."

"Do you really want to know the specifics?" she asked, sounding wary as she studied his face. "I'm worried about breaking your sense of belief that I'm a normal girl..."

"I'm surrounded by exceptional women," John replied with a smile. "I think I can handle it."

Seeing his calm reaction, Faye relaxed and grinned back. "Well, for the cutlery I was able to perform a precise count by taking an optical snapshot and running that picture through an image-analysis subroutine. After that, it was simply a case of calculating the precise length of lateral movement of my fingers to gather fifteen of each utensil. The processing was simple and took 14 nanoseconds." She glanced at the settings themselves. "If I'd prepared a program for this beforehand, I would have incorporated a speed-limiter to slow my hand movements and incorporated a number of errors to make my actions appear more authentically organic."

"Errors? What do you mean?" John asked, while continuing to put the plates down on the table.

"A series of small mistakes to make me seem more natural," she explained, glancing back at the table. "Perhaps a pause, as if to decide whether the knife or fork go on the left or right. Maybe include a tiny variable with the placing of each utensil, to ensure they weren't at a perfect ninety-degree angle to one another. I could have also planned an 'accident', like dropping a fork on the table then quickly moving it into position... that kind of thing."

"I didn't realise setting the table could be so complex," he said, shaking his head in amusement.

Faye gave him a wry smile. "It isn't. Each setting only requires a certain number of finger, hand, and arm movements, which could then be repeated fifteen times in total. Pretending to be organic is the exhausting part... you guys have a knack for making mistakes look easy!"

He laughed as he put down the last plate. "Thanks... I take particular pride in screwing up."

She blushed and quickly corrected herself, "No! I didn't mean that as an insult, I just meant th-"

"Relax, honey," John interrupted, putting his arms around her for a hug. "I was only joking."

Faye rested her head against his chest and sighed with delight as she snuggled under his chin.

He glanced down, tilting his head to one side so that he could look into her big luminous eyes. "Isn't all that just a huge waste of processing power? Wouldn't it just be easier to be yourself and not worry about making pretend mistakes?"