She nodded, “That’s probably smart. Be wary of them, they may not eat other intelligent species, but they are definitely a predator species as well as xenophobic…”

  He replied, “We will, and don’t be a stranger okay?”

  She said, “I won’t. I do love you Mike, I wish…”

  He knew what she wished, and he also doubted she’d keep in touch. It would be too painful, for both of them.

  She kissed his cheek, and then logged out.

  He felt her tears on his cheek and closed his eyes. He felt like his guts were being ripped out.

  His side cooled quickly, with her warm body gone, and he suppressed the surge of sorrow and pain that ran through him. He spent a few more moments wallowing in his loss, before he too logged out. He could fall apart later, right now he needed to say goodbye, and walk her to the airlock and scout ship…

  Chapter Eighteen

  “You’re a goddess.”

  Alyndra replied in a teasing tone, “I quite enjoy this duty, although I don’t think it makes me a deity.”

  The smirk while absent on her face, was definitely present in her tone of voice.

  “I beg to differ,” he said, as her fingers dug into his shoulders and back.

  He may have had an android body, and no need for a massage to loosen and relax muscles, but that didn’t mean it didn’t feel wonderful. He’d have considered this taking advantage, except it had been her idea. He knew he was in a funk, Nadia had left just hours ago, and he was kind of a wreck. As if the raven-haired beauty had taken a piece of him with her. A vital piece. But the close contact was actually quite comforting.

  He had no illusions it wouldn’t take a long time to get over the loss of Nadia, but it helped.

  Chrystal said, “No one followed, but I had her go out about twenty times our sensor range before turning toward the milky way anyway.”

  He didn’t want to think about that, so changed the subject.

  “If we get close enough Alyndra, I want you to check them out. I don’t trust our new friends, although I’m not sure my reasons for that are valid.”

  Alyndra rubbed lower on his back, and said, “I planned to already.”

  He wasn’t in the mood at all with Nadia gone just a couple of hours ago, but he couldn’t help his body’s response to her ministrations, and his cock dug uncomfortably into the mattress as her hands massaged even lower on his back.

  Chrystal asked, “What do you mean, valid?”

  He sighed, “I don’t trust them because they obviously don’t attribute value to lifeforms other than their own if they’re willing to commit genocide just to take away a resource from the Kascorix. On the other hand, that doesn’t mean they couldn’t be a straight forward people that don’t lie or betray their word. Still, it isn’t easy to not apply our morality on their actions.”

  Chrystal replied, “I suppose I can see that, but we can’t discount the idea that they’re waiting for an opportunity to get our tech. Not just the energy matter converter either, but our other technology is superior as well. They barely qualify for L2 subspace, and I don’t think there smaller ships can do it, just their carriers.”

  “Granted, that’s another reason why I don’t trust them, they agreed to ally against the Kascorix right after you demonstrated our abilities. Hopefully, I’m just paranoid.”

  Alyndra went even lower, and started to massage his lower back and ass, which felt really good.

  Alyndra said, “It should make tomorrow morning interesting.”

  He agreed, and then said, “I’ve given orders to retreat if they betray us in battle. If that happens we’ll have to reconfigure again. I’m hoping that isn’t necessary though.”

  Chrystal asked, “To what?”

  He said, “I’ve been thinking about that, and with a five mile reach we can make a carrier ten miles long, with room for five times the amount of craft we currently have. If we stuck with cruisers, we’d have two hundred and fifty of them, with forty or so Mirosians on each. Their small craft would outnumber us twenty to one, but with our shields and split second beams we could destroy them very quickly from a far range.”

  Chrystal nodded, “But that twenty-mile ship could hold more than just five thousand of those small scout sized craft. What if they have more?”

  He frowned thoughtfully, “Well, if we double the height of the ship, we could have five hundred cruisers each carrying twenty or so Mirosians. I’m reluctant to go too far into overkill, whatever we make will be Sol’s defender at the end of our campaign. I doubt the empire would be very comfortable with that many ships, this carrier and fifty yes, five hundred… not likely. I suppose we could scuttle most of them, and even the carrier.”

  Alyndra asked “Scuttle?”

  He said, “It means destroy our own ships. Well, originally it meant to sink our own ships, but the word evolved with space ships. Maybe we should do that, and just give fifty cruisers for the A.I. fleet, without the carrier. We’d have to remove the energy to matter converters as well. Once this is over I want to explore all the stars around Earth, see what we find and if there’s anything worth claiming. I’ll be happy when we can go back to just a single destroyer, and not worry about war.”

  Alyndra said, “That would be nice, but who knows what the future will bring.”

  She had a point, which was rather depressing.

  He was a senator in the empire, and one of the only A.I.s that could defend their home without reservations. He would just have to hope for peace, eventually he would get around to what he wanted to do, until then he had responsibilities.

  He replied, “True, for now though we need to focus on removing the Kascorix as a threat, while trying not to make the Canosians a new one.”

  He’d feel better about the latter idea once he got Alyndra close enough to read them, but he was also rather protective toward the Esari woman. He loved Alyndra, and she loved him. That she was also his servant and put his life before her own was almost beside the point, but not quite. He was still careful not to take her for granted.

  “That feels really good,” he said softly, in perhaps the understatement of the century. Her hands were magical.

  He felt her lips on his back, as her hand ran between his legs.

  She said, “Why don’t you turn over, and I’ll take care of the front.”

  A thrill of lust and desire shot through him, and he felt guilty for it, but he knew there was nothing wrong with wanting his other mates even though Nadia hadn’t been gone very long. He rolled over, and Alyndra stripped off her clothes, and he loved the look in her eyes, and the faint smile she gave him when he couldn’t take his eyes off of her. His cock was already rock hard as she straddled him.

  It was obvious that he wasn’t the only one affected by the massage, as her slick and already wet passage stretched and took him in. He enjoyed the view for a few moments as she worked him inside of her body, but then couldn’t see Alyndra anymore, as Chrystal straddled his head, and lowered her moist labia to his lips and tongue.

  He gave into his lust, and sighed in pleasure at her taste. Maybe his other mates needed the physical comfort as well, he was sure they missed Nadia too, perhaps as much as he did. They made love to each other late into the night, before they snuggled up. He was between them, and held them close as he went offline for full backup and optimization.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The next morning meant two more worlds to free from the Kascorix, this time with dubious help. After breakfast, they headed to the bridge, and he couldn’t help but glance at the empty chair where Nadia usually sat. He’d have to get used to that, he didn’t have a choice.

  “Come out of subspace at five light minutes, make sure we’re out of energy range of both the enemy and our new ally before you launch ships.”

  Chrystal said, “Will do.”

  Alyndra asked, “Should we coordinate with the Canosians?”

  He pondered that for a moment.

  “We probably should do that, but I’m not sure how touchy our new ally is, and don’t want to give the impression I’m trying to lead them or run things. They were rather short with us yesterday when agreeing to our partnership and who knows what their alien perceptions would interpret asking to coordinate our strikes.

  “Let’s do this, Chrystal, send them the coordinates we’re exiting subspace, and our general plan to launch the ships and move in at point four light speed. Let them decide what to do with the information. It’ll be interesting to know if they reciprocate or not.”

  He would have probably risked it if they were facing a large number of enemy ships, but from what he could tell they’d be facing the same number as usual. It was damned inconvenient that they didn’t have a psychological profile for this species, and very limited data.

  He sighed. When the time came to face hundreds of ships in the core there’d be plenty of action to share, and he’d be grateful for the Canosians presence. But right now it was a complication, he wasn’t sure what to do, and as the Xarans say he had no way to know the enemy or how they’d respond to virtually anything he did. He hated being unsure.

  “Suppose we drop in as usual, and cut their ships into pieces from extreme energy range. Any speculation on how the Canosians would take that?”

  Both Chrystal and Alyndra simply shook their heads.

  Chrystal said, “Wait, getting a transmission. They’ll be dropping out at three light minutes, launching and attacking.”

  He nodded, “So… what does that tell us, anything?”

  Chrystal shook her head, “Not really. It could be their way of claiming the kills and declaring their prey. If we match our plans to theirs it could be an insult, or a declaration of intent to steal their prey. On the other hand, it could be that if we don’t compete for the kill, they’ll see us as cowards. There’s just no way to tell.”

  Alyndra nodded, “Either way, they’ll be judging our response. Then again, it could also be they don’t care at all what we do, and their message is just informational so we don’t get in each other’s way, like what we sent them.”

  He laughed, “I’m overthinking it I think. Let’s just do what we do, rather than try to change to expectation we can’t know.”

  He looked at the time, they only had a little over two minutes before dropping from subspace. Still, he was nervous, the last thing he needed to do was create another enemy for his home and empire, and there seemed so very many ways for there to be a misstep. He tried not to show his doubts, it wasn’t that he lacked confidence in his abilities if the worst did take place with the Canosians, he just didn’t want to make a stupid mistake out of ignorance.

  They’d been very lucky, Mars and Earth that is, making first contact with a species that not only ran a stable empire, but that could learn the instincts and motivations of the human race. That had eliminated a lot of the questions involved in meeting a new race. He also had the benefit of the Kascorix database in dealing with them and their slave races.

  For the Canosians he was simply in the dark, and going into battle with them was a bit stressful.

  First contact was a hazardous endeavor under any circumstances, the opportunities for disastrous misunderstandings were numerous. That he’d made first contact with an unknown race at war, and with the military commander of a battle carrier larger than Manhattan, instead of a politician, made it even more unstable and dangerous.

  “Just stick with the plan as we sent. Our normal attack pattern holds if there’s anything left when we get in energy range.”

  He took a sip of coffee, and then frowned down at it. Coffee reminded him too much of what was missing, of glistening raven black hair, and intelligent, willful, and sexy green eyes…

  They dropped out of subspace.

  “Status?”

  Chrystal’s reply came a couple of seconds later as the data was parsed.

  “Launching ships and heading toward the planet, the Canosians came out where they indicated, and launched five thousand of their smaller craft. There are thirty-two Kascorix vessels, twenty-one of the two-mile kind, the other eleven are the smaller half mile vessels.”

  Of course, there wasn’t the usual three to five. He shook his head in disgust.

  He frowned thoughtfully, “That’s going to be a nasty fight, the Canosians will overwhelm them fast, in seconds, but they’ll lose ten percent or maybe more of their ships. Send an offer of support if they’ll hold back on closing for the extra few minutes.”

  Right then he could see them racing toward the enemy in a large swarm cloud of ships, it would take them seven point five minutes to close the distance from three light minutes, where it would take his ships twelve from five light minutes out. They might be insulted, but he decided without more information on their new ally, he would continue to act how he normally acted. If he was damned for his actions, they would be his normal actions, not some hesitant crap in the hopes of not causing offense.

  One thing was for sure, that extra five minutes would ensure the battle was over before they got there, if the Canosians didn’t accept his offer.

  Thirty seconds passed.

  Alyndra said, “They aren’t slowing down.”

  Pride? Or did they not care about their own lives either, glorious death in battle or some such crap? It could be that, or a million other things.

  He put his coffee down, and felt a little sick to his stomach, what exactly had he gotten them into?

  He shook his head, “Chrystal, request a cultural database, make it clear we aren’t looking for any stats, or where their civilization is, just wanting to gain an understanding of their motivations and how their society functions. Offer ours as well, stripped of any tech and our own locations. Being in the dark isn’t going to help either side relate.”

  He hoped it wouldn’t hurt to ask.

  Chrystal nodded.

  Dahlia opened a channel, “Those birds are taking all our fun,” she accused half-jokingly.

  He smiled, “Not all of it, you’ll still get to hit them on the surface.”

  Dahlia sighed, “True, I suppose that will have to suffice.”

  He nodded, “Have your people be wary and keep your distance. I offered our help, and asked for a cultural database to give us a clue how to act around them. They might take offense at both, neither, or one of them.”

  He wasn’t all that surprised they hadn’t replied to his latter request though, battle was hardly the time to exchange cultural data. Maybe he should have waited?

  Dahlia grunted, “We’ll keep an eye on them, and we all have the rendezvous coordinates if we need to bug out. Still seems like a waste, all that training in space battles…”

  She winked and cut the channel, and he couldn’t help but smile.

  A small reminder he dealt with more than one species different from humanity. The Mirosians loved battle, and didn’t fear death either. Though, they wouldn’t recklessly throw their lives away, as it appeared the Canosians were about to do…

  He sighed regretfully as the two sides came in range, he could only offer his help, not force them to accept it. He felt Alyndra take his hand as the both sides opened fire.

  The Canosians worked in pairs, over fifty of them for each Kascorix vessel to overload the stronger shields. They all targeted around the same area of the ship at different angles to maximize internal damage, and in an attempt to take out enough emitters to create a hole in the enemy’s shield coverage. Both objectives were successful in just one pass on twenty-nine of the thirty-two vessels as he’d estimated.

  In that same brief moment, the thirty-two Kascorix vessels each stabbed out with five separate one half second beams, and bisected a hundred and sixty of the small Canosian vessels.

  He clenched his jaw and winced as most exploded, some few drifted apart in two pieces.

  The twenty-nine Kascorix vessels with shield holes were finished off a moment later, as the small Canosian fighters flew within the shield, and then pulsed their shields, causing a powerful subspace sphere of energy to explode outward and eat the ship from the inside out. It was a tactic he hadn’t considered, and was rather obvious in hindsight that he should have been doing that with his shuttles instead of cutting them apart.

  The remaining three Kascorix vessels took out fifteen more Canosian vessels as a second attack finally opened up a hole in their shields, and three scouts flew in the breached ships and pulsed their shields as the Kascorix took out another fifteen Canosians in their last moment.

  The battle had lasted less than ten seconds after the first shot. The thirty-two Kascorix vessels were destroyed, but so were a hundred and ninety of the small scout sized Canosian attack craft. He supposed the trade had been worth it, the Canosian scout craft only had a handful of Canosians on it, while the Kascorix ships had many thousands.

  It was even better than he’d honestly expected, they’d taken just under four percent losses, instead of the ten he’d projected. Acceptable losses as far as war goes, but also unnecessary. He hated the loss of life. Still, he knew he had no right to judge their culture, as long as they didn’t judge his and attack them, it was none of his business.

  They were still four minutes out.

  “Go ahead and start the ground battle and build a destroyer as soon as we arrive.”

  He bit his tongue, before he unnecessarily reminded Chrystal to keep her distance and betrayed his nerves. She already had those as standing orders.

  He watched on the holo-table as the Canosian fighters headed back to the carrier and started to land. As soon as they landed, the Vengeance left the area at point four light speed.

  Chrystal said, “Receiving a message. Shirilla denied your request and said there’s no need. Stick to the ground fighting, and she’ll clear the orbitals.”

  He grunted when the large carrier jumped into subspace.

  Chrystal finished, “She also said right before she cut transmission and jumped into subspace, that she’d be waiting for us at the second planet.”

  He wondered what the hurry was, although maybe they needed to maximize their time after every other planet for rest and repair? Still, it was foolish, suppose they had three hundred vessels instead of thirty-two at the next world. He doubted they’d face those numbers until they hit the core Kascorix worlds, but it was possible.