an endless voyage continued ch 24
With her little fleet immobilized and running on auxiliary power while they worked to undo the damage the disguised Xians had caused, Maya used the opportunity to tour the fleet to boost morale. Karen was still busy, but the engineers had verified the fuel in Maya's fighter was safe,so that was her chosen method of transportation. Normally this sort of thing was Ashley's job, she was the morale officer afterall, but given the circumstances, Maya felt she needed to see this through personally. Her first stop was the CSS Lee, where she planned to speak with captain Jim in person concerning recent events, then walk amongst the crew, making her presence known and reassuring everyone she was doing everything possible to remedy the situation, and taking steps to ensure this never happens again. She would do the same aboard the Jackson and the mining vessel before the day was done, but for now she focused her attention on the CSS Lee.
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Several thousand gallons of Deuterium had veen verified safe so far. it was a drop in the bucket compared to the bulk of their supply, but it was enough to launch a few fighters in a combat patrol. Sarah, Melody, and Rena from Excalibur, and a pilot each from the Lee and the Jackson flying a loose formation around the fleet at reduced speed to conserve fuel. their ammunition had been checked out as well, and the sabotaged ammo belts had been replaced with fresh belts from the limited supply of munitions left over from before meeting up with the mining ship. five fighters wouldnt do a lot of good against an Xian battleship should one show up, but they could deter smaller ships as well as give the fleet advanced warning of any enemy presence.
.......................
After sharing another wild mutual climax, Karen finally pulled off Tom, and ''swam'' around the room in circles performing a very elegant ''orgasm dance'' in zero-g. Karen's uterine horns were so full of Tom's thick cum her belly swelled slightly as a result. When she finally came down off her euphoric high, Karen returned the gravity to normal, then shared another passionate kiss with Tom, and then said "Happy Birthday."
"Thanks!" Tom said, returning the kiss, then added; "I couldn't have asked for a better present."
They get dressed, then Karen restores the transporter room to operational status. Tom checks the time, and hurries off to Sick Bay as he was supposed to help Doc Natalie today. When he got there, he found Doc Grayden had come over from the CSS Lee and was busy performing Doc Natalie's colonoscopy which was what Tom had been sceduled to be doing today.
"Yoor late, lad." Natalie said over the noise of her own flatulence as Grayden advanced the scope. "I was with Karen....we lost track of the time." Tom replied. "Aye lad, it canna be helped now." Natalie replied. "I doont have anything else planned, so scrub in and perform Aisa's rectal ultrasound pregnancy checkup, then yoor free to go."
"Fair enough." Tom said. Then he set about scrubbing in, mentally recalling Natalie's lessons on ursine anatomy as he did so. He was a little concerned about doing this with Grayden present as he worried Grayden might feel jealous seeing another man shove his arm up his girlfriend's butthole, but he also found it curious, he wondered if Grayden was the father. Tom didn't know the human doctor that well, so it was no surprise he hadn't heard whether or not the doctor had chosen to get the injection, but given that he'd only ever known Aisa to be sexually active with Maya before the bear started dating Grayden, he reasoned Grayden had to be the father which meant he had indeed taken the injection.
Finally he asked Grayden; "Are you sure you wouldn't rather do this? I can take over for you if you want." "No, you go ahead." Grayden replied. "Its okay I dont mind I know its medically necessary, not anything sexual...just like when I did it for Callie." "Ok." Tom agreed
....................................
Pent up as she was, April climaxed many times before Hank finally blew his load up her butt. She was close to climax again, at that point, and the strange but good sensation of his thick human cum spattering her intestinal walls pushed her over the edge once more. It felt cool due to his lower body temperature. April was inexperienced with sex, and the strange sensation, pleasurable as it was, combined with the air pockets that resulted from her canine tailhole being much larger than his cock, the strange sensations made April feel like she neededto use the bathroom really bad. The rapidly building pleasure overwhelmed such feelings however, and she climaxed hard.
Hank pulled out when he stopped cumming, causing April to expell the ''air'' that had accumulated as a result of their lovemaking, and leaving her canine tailhole partially agape, quivering in pleasure and leaking cum. Hank began to get dressed, as a glance at the wall clock told him he was due to go on duty in fifteen minutes.
"How was it?" April asked when her orgasm has subsided. She sat up, but had not yet begun to dress. "You feel wonderful." Hank replied. "We should do this more often."
"Gladly." April said. "Was I as good as Karen?" "In a unique sort of way, yes." Hank said. "You feel very different, but equally pleasurable."
"Thank you." April said, and she began to get dressed. "May says you did her too."
"Yeah." Hank said. "You're certainly a lot cleaner inside, but May feels wonderful too."
Having finished dressing, Hank fastened his equipment belt, and left the room. He headed to the bridge to report for duty, but found Admiral Maya absent. As such he reported to Kayla, who sent him to the Armory to help separate the damaged munitions from the viable ones.
..........................
The combat patrol completed another pass around the fleet, and Sarah was about to report another 'all clear' when a blip showed up on sensors. It was at the extreme limit of sensor range, and could have simply been a sensor ghost, a rogue asteroid, or an anomalie, it was impossible to tell at this distance, but it could also be an Xian ship. Sarah wasted no time calling it in at any rate.
"Excalibur, Gunner, we detected a blip at the extreme limit of sensor range. could be anything at this distance though." "Gunner, Excalibur, copy that." Kayla replied. "Keep an eye on it, and watch your fuel." "Copy that, Excalibur." Sarah replied. "Request permission to check it out." "Negative, Gunner, conserve your fuel." Kayla replied. "We need you out there as long as possible. Take your stims, and we'll send you a tanker as soon as possible."
"Roger that, Excalibur, Gunner out." Sarah closed the comm link, then switching to teamcomm; "Let's tighten it up>' she said "Throttle back to idle to conserve fuel, keep all sensors trained on the possible contact, settle in, and pop your stims, we're going to be out here a lot longer."
"Roger that, Gunner." Melody said.
"Fuck that. I don't take stims." Rena said. "They blunt your reflexes." she paused. "You want to go after it don't you." "Yes if its an enemy we need to know it." Sarah replied. "Take your stims Rena, thats an order."
"Under protest, commander." Rena replied. "I take it command didn't bite?"
"Affirmitive." Sarah replied. "Our orders are to throttle down and sit tight."
.......................
Thus far Maya's tour of the fleet had gone without incident. She had landed her fighter aboard the Lee, and spent the next couple of hours in the captain's mess discussing recent events with captain Jim over breakfast and a bottle of Kentucky Bourbon. The human captain was quite the casual drinker, but by the time they had finished he was more than a little intoxicated, while Maya was just enjoying a light 'buzz'.
After that, Maya started on the bridge, and worked her way through the ship deck by deck, shaking hands, answering questions, and assuring people she had a plan in place to ensure no more Xians could infiltrate the fleet.
While Maya was busy, unknown to her, the Lee's fighter bay technicians were hard at work. Not only did they top off the deuterium tanks with verified-good fuel, but they also checked over the hydraulics, lubed all the fittings on the landing gear, and gave the entire plane a thorough wash and a fresh coat of high temperature paint, cleaned and polished the cockpit canopy, cleaned the interior, repaired the seat upholstry, and even topped off the batteries. They did so in secret, as Maya never cared for being pampered, but nonetheless everyone felt she deserved it.
Maya had saved the fighter bay technicians for last, as she knew they were busy checking fuel and munitions, and when she finally met with them, she got a pleasant surprise when she saw her fighter looked showroom-new.
"Y'all didn' have t' go t' all this trouble." Maya said. "The engines run fine, an' the systems were all workin, thats good enuff."
"Respectfully Admiral, its not." one of the technicians, a tall dark-skinned man named Ken replied. "You're our Admiral, you deserve the best."
"Yeah." A short stocky blonde woman named Vera added. "The least we could do is give your personal ride a good once-over."
"Looks like y'all did a fine job." Maya said. "Send me the bill an' Ah'll see t' it yer duely compensated."
"No charge, Admiral." Vera said. "Consider it a gift."
"Thanks." Maya said.
"Well go on, check it out." Ken said. "You're going to love this....We couldn't improve on your technology, but we did expand on it. Both your seat and the rear seat now have heat and massage functions, and we added a second O2 bottle to the life-support system, as well as installing a small APU generator in the emergency storage compartment in case the batteries go flat."
"Unnecessary comforts but thanks anyway." Maya said. "Reckon Ah better git over t' the Jackson now, see y'all later." She climbed into the cockpit as she spoke, and quickly strapped in, ran through the powerup sequence, and closed and pressurized the cockpit. When she saw the technicians were clear of her turbine exhaust she fired up the engines, snapped her mask on, and flashed the technicians a thumbs-up as she taxied around orienting the fighter to line up with the bay doors for takeoff. then she locked the landing brakes, and ran the engines up, before contacting the bridge.
"CSS Lee Bridge, Admiral Maya, Request departure clearance." she said. "Affirmitive Admiral, clear to depart at your discretion." Jim replied.
"Copy that." Maya said. She released the landing brakes, and her fighter accelerated smoothly across the flight deck before gliding smoothly into space. "CSS Lee Bridge, Ah'm wheels up an' clear a' the bay, all systems nominal." "Acknowledged." Jim replied.
Maya throttled back to cruising speed, and set course for the CSS Jackson.
............................ Detecting another fighter on sensors, Sarah immediately pinged its comm on teamcomm primary frequency. "Unidentified pilot, Gunner, that you, Death Angel?"
"Affirmitive Gunner." Maya replied. "Mah ship's bin refreshed, s' a long story. whats yer situation."
"We're throttled down and drifting about the fleet, ma'am." Sarah replied. "Unidentified possible Xian contact at extreme sensor range."
"Understood Gunner. Ah'm on mah way t' the Jackson, Death Angel out."
the comm ended.
...........................
Excalibur, Engineering
"With the main engines offline, now is as good of a time as any to implement my proposed modifications." Melennia told Tina. "We could really use the increased efficiency."
"To get the atomization as thorough as you propose would require running the n1 compressor turbines 30% above rated rpm. they weren't designed to spin that fast." Tina replied. "It'd be like running full afterburner all the time."
"Not if we enlarge the cooling system, and upgrade the n1 turbine blades with the alloys from that Canid colony we left a few monhs ago." Melennia replied. "simulations show the strain would be roughly the same as it is now."
"And if you're wrong?" Tina snapped. "Maybe you havent noticed, but we're a long way from any known friendly planets, deep in this expanse...we blow the engines, we're fucked."
"If we don't find X, and stop the Xians, the universe is fucked." Melennia said. "Its an acceptable risk...and if you won't approve the modifications I'll go straight to the Admiral with this."
"I've seen the data, ma'am. She's not wrong about this." Holly added.
"I've shown Karen my idea as well, and she agrees with my assessment." Melennia added.
"Fine." Tina grumbled. "We better get to work then."
..............................................
Hank was busy helping Callie in the armory.
Checking all the munitions and sorting viable rounds from sabotaged ones was slow going. It was hard enough with small arms munitions, mech and fighter autocannon belts, but the massive starship-grade autocannon rounds were too heavy for Hank to lift by himself, and Callie's pregnancy was too far along for her to lift them, so it required pulling munitions technicians away from loading new ammo to help with the starship autocannon rounds. Still, they were making good time all things considered. With Sarah's report of a possible enemy contact, Callie had insisted they prioritize starship autocannon munitions, and to that end they had managed to verify 50 rounds each for the 80" autocannons, and 200 rounds for each of the 40" autocannons. It didnt help that Callie had to sit down and rest a lot, and kept running off to go piss, but at least the ship wasn't defenseless.
.........................
Maya tested out the heat and massage functions as she flew toward the CSS Jackson at a leisurely pace. She had to admit the additions made her seat a lot more comfortable. It was nice to see the fleet, and the stars around them through a nice clear canopy too. She also noted the ship felt a little more responsive, which she reasoned was also a result of the work done by the Lee's techs.
When she saw the landing lights around the open fighter bay doors, she opened a comm link. "CSS Jackson, Death Angel, inbound bearin 180 mark 0 request landin clearance." she said. Her gruff voice and heavy drawl was made deeper by her pilot's mask.
"Death Angel, CSS Jackson CIC." Mike said. "We have you on approach, clear to land at your discretion."
"Copy that." Maya replied.
"Approach angle looks good>" Mike said. "You have the ball."
"Rogher that, Ah got the ball." Maya replied. "Landin' gear down an' locked, tailhook deployed, Ah'm 60 seconds out."
The "ball" they were referring to was the center strip of landing lights in the fighter bay designed to indicate optimal glidepath and approach angle, so when Maya said she has the ball, that meant she had her fighter allinged properly for landing.
Maya eased the throttles back as the nose of her fighter passed through the forcefield keeping the bay from decompressing, then cut power back to idle the moment she felt the thump of the landing gear against the flight deck. She held the stick firm, and applied the landing brakes gently at first, then locked them down when she felt the jolt of the tailhook snagging one of the arresting cables.
"Ah'm down." Maya said on comms. Then she shut down the engines, hit the cockpit release, and powered down the systems one by one before finally unstrapping herself and removing her mask.
When she climbed down from her fighter, Mike was waiting for her.
"Welcome aboard Admiral. Its an honor having you here ma'am."
"The honor's mahne." Maya replied.
"How 'bout a couple cold beers and lunch in the captain's mess?" Mike asked. " Its MREs and hydroponic vegetables, but if I'd of known you were coming I'd have asked you to send over a few pigs from your cargo-bay-6-turned livestock farm."
"Sounds good t' me." Maya said.