Calara went to her quarters. Part of her felt guilty for running away, but Jonah had been right, they all needed a little space to let the dust from the bombshells Jade had accidentally dropped settle. And with the whole world feeling like it was spinning and about to fall apart, there was only one person Calara knew could fix it: her mother.
Calara grabbed the holo-console that came with her room, kept wirelessly charged at all hours so long as it was within range of the Invictus' Power Core. She pulled up the comm interface and, with the ease of having memorized the full code when she was only knee-high, sent a call to her family home. With her father and 3 brothers all in the Navy and often stationed on various ships or space stations, her mother was the one to hold down the fort.
After a few minutes for the signal to reach all the way to the Core Worlds, her mother's face appeared on the vid-screen. Calara heavily favored her mother, with the same hair and eye color and general bone structure. But Maria's skin was a shade or two lighter, plus the faint but unmistakable signs of maturity since she was nearing 50. And Maria always joked that while Calara looked like a Garcia maiden, her eyes and fighting spirit were pure Fernandez.
"Callie?" Maria blinked. "Are you okay, baby? It's almost midnight here."
"Oh, right, time difference," Calara shook her head, cursing herself for forgetting to account for the fact that planets had their own day cycle that didn't perfectly sync with Terran Naval Time. "Sorry, Mama. If you were headed to bed, I can wait until later."
"Nonsense, I'm not that old, I can stay up. Especially for you when you look so troubled," Maria rolled her eyes, before they turned oh so tender. In an instant, Calara was 6 with a scraped knee and Mama was hugging her and promising to kiss the booboo better. "What's wrong, Callie? Is it the court martial?"
Calara blinked before she realized what her mother was referring to. "Oh, that nonsense. Don't worry, that's all handled. The charges were bogus, a scare tactic by Grant to get back at me for not putting out for him. He's actually facing a treason charge, so he'll get what's coming to him. I completely forgot about that until you brought it up, actually."
"Oh, my. That sounds like an interesting story. But it can wait. What's got you so upset, baby girl?" Maria asked, her voice as soothing as a glass of hot chocolate.
Calara opened her mouth to explain, before she hesitated. Was it her secret to tell? Jade had let Alyssa enter her mind in confidence, albeit at John's command, and Alyssa had told them all as members of John's crew. And while Calara was freaking out on multiple levels, that information was still limited to the Invictus. Could Calara break that confidentiality? Plus, what right did Calara have to dump this on Maria's lap and ask her to make it make sense? She was 18, a grown woman, she should be able to handle her own messes by now.
Making her choice, Calara sighed. "It's classified. I can't talk about specifics. Sorry for bothering you when I know you can't help."
"If I closed my eyes, I'd swear I was on a call with your father. He's said that exact same line more times than I care to count," Maria said with fond exasperation. "And I'll tell you what I always tell him: tell me what you can tell me, and we'll work from there."
"That sounds about right," Calara chuckled. "So much has happened since my last call, I don't even know where to start."
"Let's start with something simple. Where are you calling me from? The comm code doesn't match Port Heracles, if I'm not wrong it's for an Assault Cruiser," Maria prodded.
"Oh, right. I'm on the Invictus. I transferred… 3 weeks ago? Wow, it feels a lot longer than that," Calara answered, struck by how dramatically her life had changed in so short a time.
"The Invictus? That rings a bell. Was involved in the Siege of Galon Prime, back when you were in primary school. The Marine Commander who led the boarding action of the rebel flagship got the Stellar Cluster if I recall. How'd you end up there?" Maria asked in surprise.
Calara blinked. *You have a Stellar Cluster?* she asked John through their private link.
*Uh, yeah. It's just a shiny medal, honey, no big deal,* John answered, most of his attention on showing Jade how to mince vegetables.
*It's a VERY big deal! That's the highest honor the Terran Federation has!* Calara fired back.
*I didn't fight any harder or better than any other Marine in that assault, Callie. I'm just the guy High Command decided to give all the credit. Now focus on your mother,* he gently ordered.
Refocusing on her mother's face, hoping she didn't notice the slight pause, Calara answered. "Well… remember John Blake? The ex-Marine who helped rescue me from the pirates?"
"Oh, yes, I can't wait to track him down and give him a hug for saving my baby girl's life! But what's he got to do with your new assignment?" Maria asked in confusion.
"He is my new assignment," Calara chuckled. "When Grant was threatening me with the bogus court martial, I called John for help. He showed up less than a week later, cleared up the whole mess, and offered me the position as Tactical Officer on his new ship. He bought the Invictus when she was decommissioned, he's my new Commander."
"Wow. How heroic. But didn't you say he's retired? How can you be assigned to the Invictus?" Maria wondered, brows furrowing.
"John somehow convinced Grant to give me an indefinite leave of absence. I'm still legally a Second Lieutenant, but I'm not AWOL or anything while I'm serving on the Invictus," Calara elaborated.
"Well, well. Seems I have even more reason to be grateful to Mr. Blake," Maria grinned. "So, what have you been up to since joining his crew, Callie?"
"So much, it's insane," Calara chuckled, the words starting to just pour out. "We went from Port Heracles to Karron, it's this out of the way asteroid colony practically on the Kirrix border. John bought 20 tons of Tyrenium for only 5 million credits, even if I only get a 1% cut I'll be set for life. Then we managed to track down the pirate gang that attacked the Griffon and put me through that whole nightmare. We got to their base, and you'll never believe this, but they were selling slaves to the Kirrix! We took out most of the pirates and stopped the Kirrix from escaping before John led the boarding action and saved all the prisoners! Then we chased after the pirate flagship when the captain fled like a coward, and we just finished taking him out and saving the hostages he kept. And now my head is spinning and I guess it's all hitting me at once," she finally finished.
Maria blinked owlishly. "Oh, my word. That's a very eventful 3 weeks, especially for a civilian crew, even if they're in a T-Fed Navy ship. And you said you're Tactical Officer, that means you were firing all the guns in those fights. Callie, baby, are you okay?"
"I don't feel bad about killing all those pirates," Calara rushed to explain. "They were criminals, they'd already more than earned the death penalty, I was just the one who happened to execute it. And I have to admit, it felt cathartic to get some payback. That's not why I was so upset and wanted to call you. I guess… it's more how 'surreal' it is that this is my life now. I always dreamed of having a big, exciting career like Daddy. And now I'm actually involved in ship battles out of an action movie and I have people who trust and depend on me to fire the weapons right… it's messing with my head."
While Calara had initially called because of the upset caused by the whole Mael'nerak issue, she realized the truth of her words as they came out. This had been bothering her, more than she realized.
"It's a huge responsibility, Callie, being part of the Bridge crew. I was only a Comms Officer on the Damocles, and I still felt the pressure to perform to standard lest I let my team down," Maria said with perfect understanding. "I know you're more than capable, no matter your age or experience. You're your father's daughter, after all. But you're allowed to be stressed, you're allowed to need time to adapt to your new role. And you're more than allowed to call your family for support when you need it, it's encouraged even."
"I guess I just didn't want to worry you with all my crap, that's why I didn't call sooner," Calara admitted.
"Calara Ramona Fernandez, I'm your mother. Worrying is in the job description. Keeping me in the dark instead of letting me help when I can just makes me worry more," Maria said in a soft but unmistakable scolding.
Calara winced. "How do you do that? You're lightyears away and you can still make me feel 2 inches tall."
"I'll teach it to you when you give me grandbabies someday," Maria chuckled. "So… what's the deal with you and this John Blake? Your whole face lights up when you say his name." Those familiar chocolate orbs felt like they were seeing right through Calara even through the vid-screen.
Calara blinked. *Okay, that's just scary. Alyssa, I'm so dead serious, if we ever visit I need you to check if she's psychic.*
*No problem, Callie,* the blonde Matriarch managed to say through a peal of mental laughter.
"Um… we're dating. Kinda," Calara managed to force out her mouth.
"How are you 'kinda' dating? If you're just friends with benefits, that's not a foreign concept to me, baby," Maria asked with a straight face.
Calara almost combusted on the spot. "Mom!"
"What? I did have a life before I met your father, Callie. And I've had to deal with your brothers' sexual misadventures and relationship woes since before you needed feminine hygiene products. I've heard it all before. Have you two not had the talk to define the relationship yet?" Maria went on, paying no heed to her daughter's embarrassment.
Calara was about to respond when she froze. *Wait a sec… Alyssa, when was your last period?*
*Are you seriously asking me that question?* her Matriarch asked in a kind of revulsion.
*Focus, Alyssa! When was your last menstrual cycle?* Calara pressed.
*... Karron. But that was over 2 months ago,* Alyssa realized as she actually thought about it.
A ripple of shock went through the chorus.
*I thought you said you wouldn't get pregnant if we had unprotected sex!* John thought in a near-panic. It wasn't at the idea of being a father, if anything he was ready to crow in victory from the rooftops, but he didn't like being lied to.
*I'm not! Believe me, I'd know if I were pregnant,* Alyssa rushed to reassure him.
*But you've had literal gallons of my and John's cum shot straight into your womb over the last few weeks. If you're not on birth control and you haven't bled…* Jonah trailed off.
*Um, just a reminder: the Change, DNA rewritten, all that bullshit? Who says female Angels are even on a 28-day cycle like normal Terrans?* Sparks chimed in.
*Alyssa, Sparks, go down to the Medical Bay and get scanned. Once we have a definite 'yes' or 'no' on whether you're pregnant, I want Alyssa to Spirit-Walk and ask Michael to see if this is part of the Progenitor instruction manual I locked away with Other John. Calara, keep talking to your mother,* John ordered at the speed of thought.
Calara blinked and found her mother was frowning at her. She knew immediately she was in trouble. "Callie… have you been having unprotected sex? You froze as soon as I mentioned female hygiene."
"I… cannot say no with any confidence. John and I didn't really discuss contraception before we started, um, our physical relationship. I guess we both just assumed the other had it covered," Calara said, distinctly aware that if her mother was in the room she'd have one of her customary flip-flops in hand and bashing Calara about the head.
"Ay, carajo," Maria groaned. "Callie, baby, you're 18 years old, I raised you right, it's 2779. What are you going to do if you test positive? Which you are going to do as soon as this call is over, by the way."
Calara took a moment to actually think about the idea of John's (or Jonah's, she'd had almost as much sex with him as John) baby growing inside her. And suddenly the world was golden and nothing could bother her as a joy like she'd never known filled her being. "Move up the wedding, I guess," she answered her mother with a small smile of pure happiness and peace.
Maria looked as if she wouldn't be more surprised if someone had slapped her with a dead fish. "Wedding?! Did I hear that right? Callie, you've only been together 3 weeks, if that!"
"I love him. He loves me. If I'm not pregnant right now, I will be eventually. He's the One, Mama," Calara said, meaning every word from the bottom of her heart. Even if the test came back negative, the certainty that she'd one day make John a father had her ready to walk on air. Suddenly the disapproval or judgment of her mother seemed so inconsequential.
As if from a great distance, Calara heard Alyssa say something like *Holy… so that's what they mean by 'love-drunk'.*
There was a knock on the door, and then John let himself in. Jade peered in through the door, but stayed in the hallway. "Calara? Are you calling someone?" John asked aloud. *Play along, honey,* Calara heard him tell her with Telepathy.
"Oh, yes, my mother. Mama, this is Commander John Blake. John, this is my mother Maria," Calara beamed as two of her favorite people got to meet, even via a vid-call.
John tucked himself on the bed next to Calara, shifting the holo-console so the camera captured both his and Calara's faces. "Mrs. Fernandez, it's a genuine pleasure to meet you. My name's John Blake," John said with his best manners.
"Mrs. Fernandez is my mother-in-law, call me Maria," the older Latina said, her face carefully neutral. "So, I understand you and my daughter are… involved?"
John hid a wince. "Um, yes. We started a relationship shortly after she joined my crew based on mutual attraction. It's early days yet, but she's an amazing young woman I consider it an honor and privilege to be with. I don't know what she's told you already, but I assure you I have nothing but pure intentions for your daughter."
"Uh-huh. Pure as the driven snow. Are you on the male pill? Are you aware Calara isn't on any form of birth control? She's already let slip that you two are sexually active and implied you never had this rather important discussion," Maria said, lifting an eyebrow just so.
John wasn't ashamed to admit he gulped at that look. Mothers could be utterly terrifying. "I am not, and I will freely admit I didn't properly ask Calara about that subject before we reached that stage of our relationship. But rest assured, while unexpected and much sooner than I'd prefer, if your daughter's pregnant then I'll take full responsibility. I always wanted a family, and I started things with Calara because I wanted to see if she would be the one to start that family with. This isn't just physical, Maria, not some quick fling. I'm very aware these aren't the best circumstances and you probably already have a rather poor idea of me as a first impression. But I can honestly say I'm in love with your daughter. And through some miracle, she seems to love me back. We were quick and reckless in jumping into things, and we may have to face the lifelong consequences of that. But if your daughter is indeed pregnant at this moment, rest assured that I am most likely the happiest man in the Milky Way right now," John said, putting his heart and soul into the honest declaration of love and commitment to Calara.
Maria regarded him, not changing expression at all, for the longest 10 seconds of John's life. Then she got a slight grin. "Well, you're a right sight better than her last boyfriend, I'll tell you that. Now, it's past my bedtime, and you and Calara have an important question that needs answering. Call me sometime tomorrow with the results and you can have a second chance at that first impression. Sound fair?"
"Thank you very much, Maria," John sighed in relief.
"And don't think you're completely off the hook here, Callie. Positive or negative, I will be telling your father about this. And your brothers," Maria directed at her daughter.
"That's fine," Calara shrugged. She wanted them to know. She wanted the whole universe to know that she would one day bear John a child.
"Good night, Maria," John said, before hitting the button to end the call. Sending the holo-console to the side with Telekinesis, John turned to Calara and carefully cupped her face. "Callie, honey, I need you to snap out of… whatever this is."
"Snap out of what, John?" Calara asked, still feeling like absolutely everything in her little corner of the galaxy was perfect. She was in love with a man who loved her back. He would be father to her children, and she would be mother to his. What could possibly ruin something as glorious as that undeniable truth?
John looked at a loss for a second, before he grimaced. "Calara, I'm never going to give you a baby."
In an instant, Calara went from one extreme to the other. Complete, overwhelming despair ripped her heart to shreds at the horrible words John had just said, the thought that she would never fulfill her one purpose in life…
… Hold up. That wasn't right.
Calara shook her head like she was trying to get water out of her ears. "Whoa… I feel like I'm crashing from some kind of high."
"Must be part of the Change," John sighed. "More conditioning to make a Progenitor's Thralls the perfect harem girls. You seemed to have a… powerful reaction to just the suggestion you could be pregnant with my child."
*That's an understatement! That hit harder than 2 tabs of Euphoria mixed with rotgut and I only got it secondhand through the Empathy link!* Alyssa added from Deck 7. *Sparks and I are in scanners by the way, we'll have a definite answer in 5 minutes.*
"Oh, dear God, did I mention a wedding to my mom?!" Calara asked in mortification as she mentally reviewed the last few minutes.
"Yes, you did," John nodded with a kind of wry resignation. "Still, that could have gone worse. It could have been your father you called instead, after all."
"Don't even go there," Calara shuddered. "He'd shoot your quad off and mount them on our door knocker as a warning to all future suitors. I'm not exaggerating, he has a whole complex about his baby girl."
"Well, one thing at a time. Let's all go down to the Medical Bay and find out what's what," John said, helping Calara to stand.
John, Calara, and Jade all took the elevator to Deck 7. They walked into the Medical Bay, which they'd had very little occasion to use or even visit. Alyssa and Sparks were both flat on their backs on special tables as multicolored lights ran up and down their bodies, the full-body scanner gathering all manner of medical data noninvasively.
"You too, Callie," John prompted. Calara put up no protest, going to a third scanner and initiating the process.
10 minutes later, they were gathered around a holo-console as John looked at the scan results. You needed a doctoral understanding of biology and medicine to understand the fine details, but the interface itself was fairly idiot-proof and John knew the basics of working it from volunteering to help the medics back when he'd been in active duty. "Ok. None of you are pregnant. Take that as you will. But you all seem to be in peak fertility. Hormone levels, pH balance, and endometrial lining are all at the perfect conditions for conception. That's all the scanner can tell us, what's Michael say?" John asked Alyssa.
Alyssa had gone on a Spirit-Walk to consult Jonah's Guide the second she was out of the scanner. "First off, he reminds you that you're due to have an Astral dream for adding Jade, but he and my Guide, who apparently has chosen the name Athena, have come up with a working solution so we'll come back to that. Anyway, he says that Thralls, or in our case female Angels, only ovulate on command. The Change resets us, as you noted, into the optimal breeding ground for any egg fertilized by one of your little swimmers. If we went over a month without a taste, we'd reset to a cycle. But as it is, we're functionally barren until you use your psychic mojo to trigger ovulation."
"That's… convenient, I suppose. Plus, none of you have to worry about PMS while you're with me," John mused.
"Seriously, mention that to the next female recruit, it's a major selling point," Calara tacked on.
"Also, just thinking forward, when you or Jonah or any male Angel knocks us up, with our cervixes and vaginas already so flexible, we'll probably dilate to 10 cm with one contraction and the baby will just slide right out in a couple pushes painlessly," Sparks chuckled.
"Hell, knowing how Progenitors tend to do things, they might even have made labor orgasmic to encourage Thralls to keep coming back for the next incubation," Alyssa giggled.
"So, in summary, if Calara is any indication then you'll all be luminous beings of light and contentment as soon as you realize you're pregnant. And then a good guess that labor will be little more than a splash, a few moans and grunts, and then we all will have a screaming munchkin to play with," Jonah said with his usual humor.
"All good to know," John nodded, though they all knew that he had visions of tiny fingers and toes going through his head. Before things could devolve into 'rehearsal' for the events preceding that moment, John focused back on Alyssa. "What did Michael and Athena come up with to stop the nightmare?"
"Okay, to understand their solution, we all need a quick lesson in Astral 101," Alyssa said, ordering her thoughts. "They actually don't know much more than we do, but here's how Michael put it. Say the Material Plane is everything above sea level, and the Astral is the ocean. A psychic can dip out of the Material and into the Astral Plane in a Spirit-Walk, like I do, and it's akin to a quick dive under the surface. And for reasons that they can't explain, the whole space-time continuum doesn't really apply the same to the Astral as it does to the Material Plane. That's what causes the time dilation when I'm in it. Also how our permanent Telepathic bonds from Bonding work. They're connections between our Astral bodies. So say John was at point A, treading water, and I was at point B on the opposite side of the ocean. Our Connection as Progenitor and Matriarch, which we all have recreated with the Bond between each other, is like a fiber-optic cable tied from his ankle to mine. So even though we're so far apart in the Material, as far as the Astral is concerned we can still stay connected in real-time as if we were right next to each other. With me so far?"
"Simple enough," Calara nodded. "Go on, babe."
"Ok. All that is for the Material Plane and the shallow end of the Astral Plane, closest to the Material," Alyssa continued. "For all we know, the Astral as a whole covers the entire universe, so we're only dealing with a very small part of it. But in the Deep Astral, miles below the surface of the 'water', is the Progenitor god thing that tried to brainwash and torture John the night we added Sparks. Apparently, John or supposedly any Progenitor making a new Connection is like a temporary beacon that lets it know where to reach out to drag said Progenitor down into the depths to do its nightmare thing as soon as he falls asleep. And it's not just going to pull John down to the midnight zone of the 'ocean'. Apparently, there's things called sub-planes in the Astral. Think 'bubbles', little pocket realities floating in the water. The Progenitor demon pulled you into its own sub-plane last time, that's where all the action you remember as the nightmare happened. Michael saved you by diving after you and yanking you out and back to the surface or Material."
"I remember it was like I was falling through mist, like I'd jumped off a mountaintop on a cloudy day, before I was in the nightmare," John recalled. "So, what's our solution? Make our own sub-plane?"
"We can't. Not shouldn't, can't. John, Michael didn't have an exact figure, but he said the energy requirement to create and maintain even the smallest sub-plane would kill us all as we are now and not make a dent," Alyssa said in a grave tone. "Give it a few years of heavy training, recruitment, hell maybe you can find a way to hack the Connection to allow a wider bandwidth for energy transfer. But a sub-plane is a major-leagues-only move, and we're just not there yet."
"Alright, but let's remember it's there if and when we're capable," John sighed. "So what did Michael and Athena come up with?"
"Before you go to sleep, you need to make a kind of psychic invisibility cloak. Make it so the Astral Big Bad can't find you to drag you down into its sub-plane. Mute your signal and go into stealth mode to avoid Interdiction, since you think in naval terms," Alyssa answered.
"Sounds simple enough. He showed you how to do it?" John checked.
"Yep, and I'll show you at bedtime," Alyssa nodded.
"Well, with that covered, I believe we all should adjourn to the Lounge. Good thing Jade and I were making chili, we left it to simmer this whole time," John grinned.
"Jade hopes you all enjoy Master's cooking. Jade helped as best she could!" the newest Angel said with a sunny smile.
"Is the third-person thing permanent? And while it's kinky, calling you Master in public will get us stared at," Sparks asked curiously.
"Jade, honey, can you please start using 'I' when you refer to yourself? And please call me John, not Master," John told the Nymph.
"Master John wishes to change Jades' name to 'I'?" Jade asked.
"Nevermind, Jade. Guess that answers that question," John blew out a breath. "Oh, and by the way, I think the scan also explained where our powers come from."
"Since when are you a doctor?" Jonah blinked. "How did you even get to that conclusion?"
"I'm not a doctor, but the program flagged all the girls as a unique species, not Terran. I checked why, and apparently all 3 of them now have triple-helix DNA, so safe bet you and Jade have it too. I already had it, it was part of the whole mystery of my parentage for me and my doctor when I was a kid. And last I checked, Terrans had regular double-helix DNA. We know the Change can alter DNA and give a normal person psychic powers. When I made you my Patriarch, my third-helix must have 'turned on' to unlock my powers and given you your own to get the Telepathy and everything else I gave you subconsciously," John explained.
"Hmm. I always was better with hard sciences than all the squishy bits of organic chemistry. But 3 strands instead of 2 binding together would allow for exponentially more information to be encoded into each cell," Sparks mused. "Which means there's a biological basis for all our psychic powers. Which means it isn't mumbo jumbo, they all just utilize proteins and metabolic structures that non-psychic species don't naturally produce. So psionics isn't supernatural, it's just another link in the evolutionary chain. Phew, that's been bothering me for a while now, good to have that sorted."
They all reached the Lounge. John and Jade went to finish cooking dinner, while Jonah and the girls all decided to grab drinks. "Tonight is a night to celebrate!" Jonah declared as he mixed a whiskey sour. "Sure, we almost got blown up and all, plus John's going to have a shitty night's sleep. But the pirates are wiped out to a man, we saved 15 innocent people, we've got 20 tons of Tyrenium in the Cargo Bay, and we have a Nymph on the crew now! I think, on the whole, this was a great day!"
"I'll drink to that," Calara chuckled, making her usual lime vodka spritzer. "Though my family is never going to let me live down the whole pregnancy scare thing. They'll still be teasing me about it when I'm a grandmother, I just know it."
"Remind me again who all is in your immediate family and what they're doing," Alyssa prompted. She remembered perfectly, but it always calmed Calara down to talk about her loved ones.
"My father, Jack, is Captain of the Damocles," Calara answered, her whole face lighting up when she thought of her role model. She really was a daddy's girl at heart. "He started out in Tactical, so I'm following in his footsteps. Mom was Comms Officer on the Damocles before she retired, that's how they met. They got a lot of flak from their Captain, two officers 'fraternizing' and all, plus the age difference. I mean, 10 years isn't that bad, especially compared to the gap between us and John, but people love to gossip. She retired a year after they got married once she got pregnant, and she's now a housewife on Jericho in Epsilon Eridani. He's still active duty, though."
"And your brothers?" Sparks prompted.
"Mateo's the oldest, he's a Lieutenant Commander. He's currently the Navigator on the Light Carrier Hydra. Dylan is a Medic stationed at Port Megara on the border with the Trankaran Republic. Eduardo is a Second Lieutenant like me, we were almost Irish twins actually, he's barely a year older than me. He's an Engineer on the Battleship Orion," Calara listed off. "That's our nuclear family, but all 4 of my grandparents are still alive, and neither of my parents were only children. I have more aunts, uncles, cousins, and in-laws than I know what to do with. We're scattered all around the Terran Federation, but we all try to come to this big reunion every 5 years like clockwork. Everyone chips in and all 200+ members of the familia descend on some poor beach resort or theme park for a week."
Sparks sighed and took a big gulp of her drink. "I don't mean to sound like a bitter shrew, but are you seriously complaining about your family being too big to a couple orphans?"
Calara's face fell as she realized her blunder. "Oh Alyssa, Sparks, I'm so sorry, I wasn't thinking!"
"Don't worry, Calara, Sparks and I both know you weren't trying to rub our faces in it," Alyssa rushed to assure the woman she loved. "It's just hard for both of us to hear how you had the kind of family life we both dreamed of having growing up. It sounds absolutely wonderful."
"It was. I guess I never really realized how lucky I was to have such a good childhood," Calara said, now a bit subdued.
"Hey, hey, no sad faces tonight!" Jonah interjected. "The family you're born with is a crapshoot, and it's no one's fault how much or how little they get at the starting line. It's the family you choose that you have a hand in. And I think we can all agree that agreeing to join John's family was the best decision in each of our lives, am I wrong?"
"Hear, hear!" Alyssa cheered, raising her glass in a toast. "To the future Messers and Missuses John Blake, both currently recruited and waiting out there for us to find!"
The four of them all drank heartily to that.
John and Jade soon came out with bowls of chili, and everyone began to tuck in. Given Jade was still digesting her first load, she didn't have a serving, but she positively preened as the crew gave her compliments for the food. She seemed to react very favorably to positive reinforcement.
Sparks was the first to broach a serious topic during the dinner conversation. "Ok, real talk time. We all got side-tracked with the pregnancy scare, but we all took a break to think about what we learned earlier. Are we all ready to discuss it?"
John set down his spoon and steepled his fingers in thought. "I am, but I can't speak for everyone."
"Let's get to it, already," Jonah shrugged.
"An ancient Progenitor named Mael'nerak made half the Galactic League. Having established this, what do we do with this information?" Calara asked, always logical.
"I really do want to take a longer, harder look at Jade's memories. But with her mind so disorganized, it'll be slow-going and I'll learn anything useful by random chance more than deliberately looking for it," Alyssa spoke up.
"Given my power to rewrite a person's mind, I'm sure I can help in that regard," John told her. "I'll actively try to strengthen her mind and memory, try to make it easier for you. Might have the added benefit of helping her develop a sense of independence outside her slavish obedience to me."
"Good plan. Plus it's a bit of a tradition that each new member gets 3 square meals from you for at least a week or two. Jade doesn't need the Change given she's a shapeshifter, but I'm very curious what more she'll be able to do with all the extra energy she'll absorb from you," Jonah mused.
"About Mael'nerak, I have a theory I want to bring up," Sparks said, drawing attention back to her. "Our best guess is that his primary Thrall species was the Maliri. It's called the Maliri Regency, right? Well, a regency is a government awaiting the appointment or return of the king or queen. And all of Jade's memories of Mael'nerak are older than dirt, according to Alyssa. I think Mael'nerak is either dead or fucked off for greener pastures. Thoughts?"
"That sounds reasonable," John nodded. "I'm friends with a Maliri trader, Ceraden. We got to talking about the Galactic League and government one night when we were half-drunk. He said there hasn't been a reigning monarch of the Maliri in over 10 thousand years. They rule themselves in 19 different territories each controlled by a Noble House. He got awful squirrely when I tried to get him to tell me more, though. Then again, the Maliri are well-known for their isolationism, maybe there's an actual law not to reveal too much to outsiders."
"I think the most likely scenario is that Mael'nerak did die in battle, from assassination, or otherwise just abandoned this corner of space," Calara stated. "The Maliri, left without a master when possibly their whole society was built on the foundation of serving Mael'nerak, fell into infighting and eventually settled into these 19 Noble Houses. Given 10 thousand years for history to turn into stories and myth or be forgotten, we can't be sure how much they remember about his reign. The same goes for the Ashanath, Trankarans, and Drakkar. We know the Terrans had no idea about him, otherwise John would have gotten major attention from High Command once they got a look at his DNA after he was born."
"Which raises a question I think's on all our minds: who did Jessica Blake run into? Did Mael'nerak come back to visit and bump into her? Did another Progenitor entirely meet her? Who's John's papa?" Alyssa asked the table.
"All I know for sure is that her ship, the Cora, went out to survey planets past the Outer Rim in 2737, before the Kirrix expanded into that sector," John sighed, thoughts going to the familiar mystery of his father, even if he now had a lot more context. "The Cora returned to Olympus in 2739, my mother almost ready to pop. Within 24 hours of my birth, she disappeared and the Cora exploded with all hands except her aboard. I tried to access the records from the voyage, but it was always above my clearance level."
"I could try to hack it," Sparks offered. "Thing is, I'm effective, but I'm not subtle. The T-Fed would know it was us who accessed the files."
"Let's hold off on declaring cyber-warfare on the Terran Federation for now, Sparks," John chuckled, though he was touched she made the offer.
Jonah was frowning. "We know that Progenitors, or at least Mael'nerak, have super tech compared to Terrans. We know Progenitors are formidable psychics. And we know that the Connection and Change comes with an obedience compulsion. It doesn't make any sense that Jessica could have 'escaped' from your father to rejoin her crew, and if they rescued her then why didn't he pursue them? Call me a conspiracy nut, but I'm thinking John's father wanted John to be born in the Terran Federation. Then he ordered Jessica to take out all the witnesses. Am I crazy here?"
John shook his head. "It rings true, based on all we know about Progenitors and what they're capable of. But… why? What possible reason would he have for wanting me to be born and raised in the Terran Federation?"
"You'll have to ask him yourself," Alyssa said gently. "But I feel this has to be said. If Jade's mind is any indication, extreme longevity can have negative consequences on the mind. I cannot overstate this, by all rights she should be completely insane from how fucked up it is in there. Of course, she's a Nymph, not a Progenitor, so maybe the same rules don't apply. But between who knows how old he is and the Astral monster torturing him since he activated his powers… he may not have a reason. He might be mad as a hatter and did it for shits and giggles. I'm sorry, John, but that's what I think."
John took a deep breath. "This is all speculation," he finally said. "You're right, I won't know for sure unless we can find him and get a straight answer out of him. Given his last known location is over 40 years old and that location is in what's now Kirrix Space, we can't exactly investigate any time soon. I've lived my whole life not knowing the reasons behind the circumstances of my birth. I can handle not knowing. Let's focus on the here and now and our next move, alright?"
"Sure, John," Calara nodded. "Ok, first things first. After dinner, Alyssa needs to show you how to handle the nightmare. Tomorrow, you and I will have to have an awkward talk with my mother. The day after, we'll arrive at Port Heracles and drop off the hostages. Following that, we need to head to Olympus to sell off the Tyrenium to Vice Admiral Harris, that was the original purpose of this whole voyage. Where do you want to go from there?"
"The plan was to go on a tour of the Galactic League to upgrade the Invictus with alien tech," John hummed in thought. "It still seems like a good idea, unless something more important pops up along the way. And while we're in each empire buying the upgrades, we can also do some investigating about the Progenitors and Mael'nerak's legacy, see what they all remember and can tell us. Any objections?"
"You're already giving me a kickass Engineering Bay and a military-grade ship to play with. Now you want to buy even better alien replacements for the major systems? Knew there was a reason I loved you," Sparks chuckled.
"Love you too, honey," John grinned back at the redhead.
"Still the same order you came up with before? Ashanath, Maliri, Trankarans, Brimorians?" Jonah checked.
"Yes, that's the best plan to my mind. The Ashanath's Power Core and FTL Drive upgrades will get us everywhere that much faster and give us the juice to run all that tech, plus whatever Sparks comes up with in the meantime. The Maliri have never sold their Laser tech to a foreign government, but maybe as civilians we'll get lucky and be much deadlier in fights like we got mixed up with between the Kirrix and Hitch's gang. The Trankarans have the best Engines in the League, we'll become much more maneuverable in combat and cut travel times in-system which will be nice. And Brimorian Shields will keep us alive, nothing wrong about that," John explained.
"And while we're on this whirlwind interstellar adventure, we'll keep fleshing out the crew and growing your power base… and number of willing holes," Alyssa added with a filthy smirk.
"Not a priority, Alyssa, I'm more than happy with just you 5," John groaned. Seriously, it was just so weird that his lovers wanted to expand his harem without any end in sight. He would have been perfectly content if he'd only had Jonah. Then again, he couldn't imagine life without each of his lovers now that they were in it. So maybe he should stop protesting and just enjoy the lifestyle his Matriarch and Patriarch so encouraged.
"Agree to disagree," Alyssa said loftily, having heard his every thought and knowing he secretly didn't mind.
"The next recruit must be male, I insist. We can't even do a proper triple penetration as we are right now!" Jonah chortled.
They returned to their food, finishing it while it was still warm.