Part Seventeen – Family matters

After that holiday was over and I returned home I wasn't in a much better position, what was going on with NJ was poorly defined, sure there had been lots of cuddling after the twenty-seventh of December, but I had been unsure if I wanted to progress more than that. I mean I missed the physical contact, but I didn't know by how much until I had gotten it again. Then came the words of Iowa, the ball was effectively in my court and I needed to figure out if I really wanted to open up to someone again and risk pain. Standing up from my desk and moving to look out at the port I ran a hand over my head and sighed out, "I can't keep NJ in limbo; it's not fair to her."

My attention is pulled from my thoughts as I hear a knock at my door before it cracks open and I hear Minotaur ask, "I've got a visitor out here Sir, I know she's not on your docket for today, but she insists on being let in."

I look up at the clock, it was nearing the end of the day and the start of the weekend and oddly I hadn't heard from NJ this week if she was coming up. Rubbing my head again I adjust my jacket and say over my shoulder, "Let's have her then, Minotaur, oh and you can pack it in for the day, I'll see you on Monday."

"Aye, aye Sir!" Minotaur chirped out, she had been a lot less of a klutz and much more chipper since her name was restored.

After a moment I hear the door close and some heels clicking around on my office floor just before a woman with a London accent in a very familiar voice speaks, "Nice office." I press my lips together and turn slowly to see my sister, Sovereign looking around at my office, her arms folded under her bust as she bent slightly at her hips to look at an under-construction model kit I had on my shelf. She looks at me out of the corner of one of her eyes before she puts a finger on the model and turns it slightly as she asks, "Going to turn it into a model of you?"

Leaning against the drawers below my window I ask her, "What brings you by?"

She rolls her eyes and sighs while standing upright as she says with a flick of her long blond hair, "Is it wrong of me to wonder how you're doing?"

"No, but the last time you and I spoke wasn't a pleasant experience." I counter as I give her a sideways look.

"Fair point." She starts before pausing and adjusting her white top before she adds, "Honestly, Conqueror asked me to stop by on my return to the Pacific."

Bobbing my head I agree, "That sounds more like it."

Her hands go to her hips as she says to me, "Look, we were all a little worried about you, alright? You were in pretty bad shape, not to mention you screwed your way across Europe."

Rolling my red eyes before pinching the bridge of my nose I say back, "I did not. I only slept with Vittorio and Bismarck, and that last one happened after a lot of drinks."

Sovereign blinks at me a couple of times as her mouth swings open, she closes it and opens it a second time like she's trying to form words. The third time she tried the words came out, "You did what?! That's two-thirds of your stops in Europe and you did a boarding action on two Flagships!"

Nodding and looking off to the side as I admit, "And yet, I felt nothing towards either of them after, all I felt was empty."

Sovereign's hands went up to her head and ran over her hair to her long ponytail as she walked in a little circle around my office and asked, "Please, please tell me you were at least careful."

"I was." I confirm to her.

She stops pacing around and runs a hand down her face as she asks, "Does your mother or Dominion know about that?"

"I think my mother has some idea I was in a compromised position with Vittorio and I'm sure Dominion has an idea about both, but nothing confirmed." was my answer as I moved over to my couch.

Sovereign ran a hand down her face before pinching the bridge of her nose as she sighed out, "Well, at least there is one saving grace, but now you've been shagging an Iowa sister?"

My lips compress as I snort out, "I have not been shagging NJ! What is with you and being so concerned about who I'm shagging anyway?"

Sovereign went bright red, made all the more apparent by her white jacket and she tried to avoid eye contact with me before clearing her throat and mumbling, "I'm jealous."

"I missed that, can you say it again?" I say with a slight smirk.

Her lips compress, nostrils flare out as she stomps a foot, and all but yells at me, "I'm jealous! Not that I want to do things like that with you, but that you get the chances at it!"

I place my arms across the back of the couch as I ask her, "Why? You're not missing anything really; it's actually kind of disgusting when you think about the mechanics of it."

Again she goes red as she folds her arms across her bust and says, "I understand that… lubricants are created and fluids exchanged." She pauses and looks off to the side, and I see her eyes soften as she says, "But when I held baby William during the holiday, I felt like understood what I was missing."

"So find a male to do it with then." I counter before pausing to add, "It's not like it requires an emotional connection."

"I understand that." Sovereign says before sighing and moving to sit down beside me and lean her head against my arm as she adds, "But when I look at how George is with Johnathan Hawker or Dominion and His Majesty…"

I sigh and give her a sideways look as I say, "You want the emotional connection as well."

She nods her head up and down against me, and I place an arm around her shoulders and rub her arm as she says, "Don't get any ideas, this is just a moment."

"It never crossed my mind." I say as I keep rubbing her arm.

After another moment, she got up and fixed her hair and jacket before looking at me and saying, "Not a word about this to either of our sisters."

"Worried they would think less of you?" I snipe back.

She goes bright red again and stomps forward as she shoots back, "Damn right!"

I was about to retort when I heard the handle of my office start to turn, Sovereign twisted to see the door open and I felt a smile on my face at the sight of the tall blue-haired woman in a white jacket as she crossed into the room and proclaimed, "I got movie passes, we got to," she pauses and sees my guest, blinking a couple of times before saying, "sorry Big Guy, I didn't know you had company."

Sovereign turned fully around and walked up to my new guest, looking her up and down before looking over her shoulder at me and saying, "Thunderer, you should go, I need to have a chat with this, chippie."

My eyes go wide and I get to my feet as I protest, "This is my office Sovereign."

"And I need it for a while." She says coldly.

I look to my guest and sigh before I start to leave, I pat her on the shoulder and say, "Don't let her push you around NJ, I'll be at my quarters."

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Following Sovereign

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Sovereign fixed her ponytail and watched as the door closed behind Thunderer before she turned her eyes on New Jersey and said, "I won't let you ruin him."

New Jersey blinked a couple of times, her head tilting to the side as she asked, "You're one of his sisters right?"

Tilting her head up to look down her nose at New Jersey, Sovereign said, "I am. Sovereign, second of the Thunderer sub-class of the Conqueror class of battleships of His Majesty's Royal Navy."

New Jersey extended a hand at Sovereign as she smiled and said, "I am battleship New Jersey, the indomitable Black Dragon of the Eagle Union."

Sovereign rolled her eyes as she countered, "No, you're just a chippie chasing someone who has suffered, a lot."

New Jersey pulled her hand back before placing her hands on her hips as she says, "I'm not chasing anyone."

"Yes, you are." Sovereign says pausing to look at the door before adding, "Illustrious hurt him badly and he is finally getting to a good place, I won't let you use him as a squeeze toy."

New Jersey went bright red as she put her hands up and said, "Now hang on! What are you going on about?"

Sovereign pressed her lips together before flicking her blond ponytail and said, "I saw you climb into bed with him Christmas morning."

New Jersey went a brighter shade of red as she stammered out, "Now… now hang on!"

Sliding her hands to her hips, Sovereign leaned forward into New Jersey's space as she said, "I'm sure you hung on well enough."

"We didn't do anything Christmas morning, I was even in my own bed in Momo's room!" New Jersey protested taking a step back.

Sovereign sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose as she said, "Not the twenty-fifth, the twenty-seventh."

"You saw that?!" New Jersey called out in a panic.

Leaning back a little, Sovereign had a smirk on her face as she said, "Not just me, the only three people off our family that missed it were, William, Dominion, and His Majesty."

New Jersey dropped down, bending at her knees and trying to hide her face with both hands as she looked at the floor and mumbled, "Oh god, that's embarrassing."

"So you're going to deny that you two did anything?" Sovereign almost gloated out.

"It's not a denial! Well okay, there was some cuddling, but that's it!" New Jersey protests at Sovereign.

Sovereign gave her a sideways look before going at sitting back on the couch, crossing her knees before saying, "Either nothing did happen, or you two have your stories worked out."

"What?" New Jersey asked as she stood back up and tilted her head at Sovereign.

"Don't act so surprised; my brother has been around the seas a bit, but he's never been one to lie about his conquests." Sovereign says as she spreads her arms across the back of the couch.

New Jersey took on a look that suggested she wanted to know more but bit her lower lip before looking off to the side and saying, "We all have a past, mostly. I don't need to know who he's been in bed with."

Sovereign raised an eyebrow and asked; "Really now? You wouldn't want to know about possible jilted lovers?"

New Jersey shook her head before folding her arms under her bust and shifting her weight from her left leg to her right as she said, "I know about how things turned out with Illustrious."

Sovereign smirked as she said, "That's been dealt with, I thought you'd rather hear about Vittorio Veneto or Bismarck." The color in New Jersey's face drained away and Sovereign leaned forward a little as her hands slid off the back of the couch and she took on a mocking look of accidentally letting that slip out as she added, "You didn't know about those? That he spent three months sailing around the world, making port in Italy, France, Germany, and Japan? I'd wonder who else he'd been with."

New Jersey balled her left hand as it fell to her side and she asked, "Why, why are you telling me this?"

Sovereign stood up and walked over to New Jersey, patting her left cheek as she said, "I'm protecting my brother, any way I see fit from chippies like you."

As she finished those words, Sovereign left the office, leaving New Jersey standing in the middle of it, a shocked expression on her face.

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Returning to POV

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I had honestly expected NJ to show up not long after I got home, but when nearly an hour went by I was starting to get a little concerned. Pulling me from that my mobile sent me an alert that I got a text message from Sovereign, telling me to call my mother, she worries. So that tells me she's done with her chat with NJ, so I bring up NJ's contact info and start to send her a message just as I look out and see the snow is starting to come down again, asking her if everything is okay.

When I don't get an answer, I start to wonder what happened, but I have to put that out of my mind as I hear a single loud knock against my front door. Moving to open my door, I see a snow-covered NJ, standing there, an empty look in her eyes. As soon as the door was open she walked right in, kicking off her boots and dropping her jacket on the floor, I watch as she moves to the living room and sits down in front of the fire, not a word was spoken, but I know something is wrong.

I spent a few minutes fixing her a mug of hot chocolate and when I returned to the living room she was still sitting there on the floor, looking at the fire, but not looking at the fire. I put the mug down beside her and place a hand on her shoulder as I ask, "NJ, what's wrong?"

She turns her head slowly to look at me, her eyes still seeming so empty as she asks, "What did they have that I don't?"

My head tilts to the side as I ask, "Who?"

That seemed to break the dam as tears started to roll down her cheeks as she bellowed at me, "Illustrious, Bismarck and Vittorio Veneto!" She paused and squished her bust together as she added, "I've got big boobs and I've got a great butt too! So what did they have that I don't?" she paused again and put her hands down on the floor, and started to crawl towards me as she continued to ask, "So what made them attractive enough to sleep with and not me?"

I fall onto my stern and start to back up a little as I ask, "NJ, what's gotten into you?"

She crawls into my space, placing her left hand on my right shoulder as she tilts her head to the side to kiss me. It was different from kissing Iowa, Bismarck, Vittorio, or Illustrious, this kiss had more emotion in it from her; she was being forceful yet also tender. When the kiss broke she blinked at me, going bright red as she back peddled and said, "I'm sorry! I… I…"

I sat there for a second and weighed my options, NJ clearly wanted to be more than friends, Christmas had made that clear. Iowa had been clear, NJ came to this on her own; no one was making her feel anything or pressuring her into anything. Looking at her as she sits on her stern, bright red and trying to avoid eye contact with me I know it's now or never if I want to open up to someone else again. I like being around NJ, maybe I could even love NJ, like real love that is built on more than just sex. She gets up off of the ground and starts to turn as she says, "I should go."

NJ starts to hurry to my door and I get off of my stern and follow her, just as she grabs her coat from the floor, I grab her wrist as I say, "Wait!"

She turns slightly to look at me; her eyes wide and I take that last step, placing my hands on her cheeks and kissing her deeply. I feel her drop her coat onto my feet moments before I feel her run her hands through my hair while she starts to make little noises of pleasure from the kiss. When that kiss breaks; we're both breathing heavily for a moment before she says, "We can forget about the movie if you want."

"What movie?" I ask as she slips out of my arms but takes hold of my left hand and starts to walk to the second floor where my bedroom is.

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I slowly come around to the feeling of something warm pressed up against my front and the feeling that the fingers on my left hand are laced together with the fingers on someone else's hand. I open my eyes and see a mass of hair and my mind floods with the memories of last night, how things had felt so different than any of the others I had been with, how when I think back on it quickly that it had felt more honest from her than it had with Illustrious in the beginning and how more present NJ had been than Illustrious had been in the waning days of everything. I close my eyes again and take a deep breath of her scent as I mumble to myself, "Maybe I could really be loved by someone."

NJ rocks her hips against me as she mumbles, "Maybe I could really be loved by someone too." I felt a shiver run down my spine as she squeezed my fingers with hers as she adds, "But for now, I want to explore this without putting a label on anything."

"Sorry if I woke you." I whisper to her.

NJ presses her stern against my crotch harder and rocks them in a circular motion as she says with a light laugh, "I think something was poking me before you said anything."

"Sorry, I don't get to control that." I say to her.

NJ lets go of my hand and rolls to face me, kissing me quickly while she slides a leg over my hip as she asked, "Maybe we should do something about that?"

I felt a smile on my face as I slid my now free hand along her thigh and hip and teased back, "We could."

NJ smiles at me and nods her head as she teases, "I'm sure we could come up with an idea or two," she paused and looked me in the eyes, and whispered, "Mitchel."

Hearing her say my name, the name I was born with made my chest feel tight, but in a good way. I slide my free hand up her side to stroke her cheek as I whisper to her, "I like hearing you say that."

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A/N: I know a bit of a short chapter, but this one covered a major building point for NJ and Thunderer, now she just needs to meet the rest of his family.