Melia watched the damaged Elder ship jump away. It's FTL Drive generating a rather exotic energy field that allowed it to achieve FTL velocities. They had spent the last five hours exchanging information. At some point, Megumi just vanished and left her to deal with them. She said something about devising an adaptation of some kind and then just left the elders to her. Seeing them leave she turned from the viewscreen and focused her attention through the link on what Megumi was doing. She soon became aware of the fact that a few sections of the ship were no longer there. The modules having been deconstructed by the ship's Automated Repair Systems. Which actually surprised her. She thought they were supposed to fix modules not reduce them to their base components. What was more interesting was that she had turned on Main Power. Which was something she had been refusing to do for some time. All of the energy was currently being directed into the ARU, which was, in turn, focusing on whatever it was doing with the space in the now missing modules.

Through the link, she asked, “um, Megumi what exactly are you doing to yourself?”

“Reconfiguring my weapons, reducing space for troops in favor of drones and augmenting my sensor array. In effect, I am just swapping out modules for different ones in my database and exchanging gun mounts to fit a different mission profile. I should be done in about an hour, and on the plus side since I turned on Main Power, repairs will be completed in about two hours. Its nothing to worry about,” replied Megumi cheerily over the link.

“Wait you can swap your own modules in the field? Why didn’t you tell me about this ability?” asked Melia in surprise at this revelation.

“I can. It is a natural extension of the automated repair concept. It is not, however, something I can do for free. It requires energy, and if the new module requires more mass than the original I must supply the material. As for why I didn’t mention it. Well, it feels weird to change out modules. For you, it would be a lot like your organs were shifting shape inside of you, and your nerves were hypersensitive telling you each change and shift in minute detail. Trust me about that, the Soleans are capable of shapeshifting and they all told me that the sensations I get are a lot like the ones they get when they change shape. Albeit I feel a lot more than they do,” replied Megumi. Melia found herself thinking that shapeshifting may not be as cool an ability as she thought it was. Then her mind caught the mention of Soleans being shapeshifters. At first she wondered why it hadn’t been mentioned before, but she quickly realized that it wasn’t all that important, and right now there was something far more pressing.

“What are the changes you are making anyway?” asked Melia, as headed for the door of the room. Over the link, Megumi replied, “I’m reducing my tertiary batteries by half. I won’t need as many hellfire cannons as I used to since I’m not going to be fighting an enemy that relies on swarm tactics. Since I am not carrying as many troops, I am also removing a couple of my troop bays. This gives me space to increase my drone complement. I am also installing verticle drone launcher ports, and constructing impacter drones. I’m going to use impacters as they are basically reusable projectile weapons. The ships I have encountered so far with the exception of the ship that hit us are too fragile to actually damage the drones, and the energy requirements of impacter drones are quite low. The real advantage of impacter drones though is their range. I can fire a swarm of them at targets at far greater ranges than my plasma weapons. In fact, they are better suited for a swarm of targets than hellfires, but against the Darkations they weren’t that useful. The biopolymers of their hulls are actually quite tough, and regenerate at a fairly rapid rate. The intense heat of a plasma bolt is actually the most effective weapon we have at defeating it. Burns are actually far harder to heal than most other types of wounds.

That's one of the major disadvantages of organic regeneration. One I am not subject to. A plasma hit is no different to an impacter plowing a hole through my hull. The repair time will be the same regardless. Assuming the level of damage is similar. With organic regeneration, however, the amount of damage matters less than the type of damage. Certain types of wounds are far harder to heal. Mean that a large hull breach from an asteroid impacting the hull will close far faster than a burn half the size of said breach.”

Melia walked down the corridor and spent several minutes digesting the information. She then asked a question that seemed important to know, “Could you change out modules during a battle?”

“In theory it is possible, but in practice, it has never been done. Repairing something is easy. Replacing a component with an identical one is easy. Changing out the modules takes a large amount of energy and quite a bit of time to do right. Honestly I wouldn’t recommend attempting it. Even the Cylovans who were the masters of in-battle adaptation never attempted to change out modules during a battle.”

Confused Melia wrinkled her brows as she reached a lift she was heading for and asked, “who are the Cylovans?”

“A race only remembered by the Soleans. Who were also the ones responsible for their destruction. History records the Soleans first encountered the Cylovans late in the year 073 SDE. They were later dragged into what became known as the Cylovan Conflict. That conflict ultimately ended forty-three years after it began when the Solean’s left Oricala then known as the Milky Way galaxy. The Solean people ultimately didn’t encounter the Cylovans again until the year 10,000 SDE. Which is also the year the Soleans returned to the Oricala galaxy. Not long after that return were the two races embroiled in conflict. Ultimately the Solean race wiped out the Cylovans. By wiped out, I mean they hunted down every ship and reduced it to a cloud of dust, and glassed every colony,” replied Megumi. Melia was a little appalled when she realized what she meant as she entered the lift.

“You are talking about genocide,” whispered Melia while hitting a control. Megumi heard it however, and replied, “I’m not sure if it will make you feel better, but they weren’t an organic race. They were a race of machines hellbent on conquering the galaxy. Their creators had created them to force their idea of paradise onto everyone else, and their methods did include drugs and brainwashing to ensure cooperation.”

“I guess machines are better, but have the Soleans exterminated any other races?” asked Melia. As she stepped out of the lift and headed for her quarters.

“To my knowledge, the answer is no. The Solean people revere life and they prefer to avoid exterminating their enemies. Those enemies that are deemed too dangerous to go free are sealed away behind powerful energy fields, and then a Guardian is placed in orbit to keep idiots from releasing the shield. There is one such world just forty lightyears from here, and the Guardian is still there. Not that surprising since those worlds are one of the few the Darkations actually respect. Primarily since the Soleans seal them away for good reason. That world I mentioned, for example, is home to a very nasty strain of parasite. It colonizes in the brain, and produces a toxin that slowly liquefies the tissue. While it is slowly eating the brain it also stimulates the primitive parts of the brain, especially the part relating to mating. Effectively the infected are reduced to cavemen intelligence with extremely heightened libidos. No cure for this infection was ever developed, and with the war, it was rather low priority. So the worlds where it had spread were quarantined indefinitely.”

Melia shuddered. Brain-eating parasites didn’t sound particularly pleasant, and she was glad that her people stayed away from the shield worlds. It was nice to finally have an explanation for why they existed. Over fifty such worlds have been found by her people, and their neighbors had found some of their own as well. Fleets couldn’t get close without the automated defender tearing them to pieces with its arsenal of advanced drone weapons. Which meant research into said worlds was effectively impossible. She really didn’t want to know what other horrors were locked away behind those energy shields. She guessed the Darkation reason for not cracking those worlds open was that it was often not worth it. Then suddenly Megumi said, “of course not all the shield worlds are quarantines. Some of them actually contain failed creations. The Soleans are one of the most successful races at biotechnology, and they have created countless organisms as a result of their bioresearch. I didn’t mention it earlier, but the Darkations were created with stolen Solean biotechnology. Anyway, about half the shield worlds are actually disposal sites for the failed creations. They are simply dropped in pods from orbit, and left to fend for themselves. The shield and Guardian are meant to keep people away and the creations on the surface. These worlds can be extremely dangerous, depending on whatever the creations deposited were intended to do.”

Melia didn’t need that picture, and then said, “that is all fascinating, but now I am wishing you hadn’t told me about those worlds. I think I am going to take a bath and try to forget about them.” As she tried to banish some of the abominations she imagined might exist on such worlds. She really didn’t want to know what kind of creatures actually existed on those worlds. Megumi let her go, and focused on her task.

Kiru meanwhile was completely unaware of what was going on, and instead found herself naked and alone with an impressive male specimen. She already knew the Megumi had created him for her sexual training. It was scary how accurate he was to her preferences. He was tall and well-muscled. His features almost a perfect match to those in her fantasies. Only far more realistic than the ones she had pictured. She was most scared about what she knew was about to happen, and what scared her more was that it was turning her on. Her sex was already glistening with moisture declaring to the world her arousal. Her cheeks flushed red. Right now she knew Megumi didn’t have anything fancy in mind for her training.

She had been tossed in this room and told she wasn’t going to be leaving with her virginity intact. Well that wasn’t quite true. She had at least given her time to get to know this man with a fancy dinner. Well fancy compared to what she had been eating recently. Then she had been tossed in her with him. She was broken from her thoughts when he gently pushed her down onto the bed. With her small body, there was no way she could resist him even if she wanted to. Her enhancements didn’t factor as he had them as well, or more like he was grown that way.

He spoke gentle words to her as he pushed her down that felt oddly reassuring. Then one of his large hands cupped her left breast and began to massage it. He was very gentle as he manipulated the soft flesh, and heat began to build in her belly. As her fear started to disappear from her for front she pushed against him, and kissed him.

He returned the kiss, and their tongues intertwined. As they explored each other’s mouths. She felt one of his hands trace a line slowly down her side. The sensation felt electric, as she was more sensitive than normal.

They were still kissing when his fingers found her pussy, but he didn’t slip them inside. Instead, he gently traced the lips of her entrance. While at the same moment his hand groping her breast started to get a little rougher, as he began to play with the sensitive nipple. She broke the kiss for a bit of air, and then he took her over the edge by suddenly giving her clit the faintest bit of attention. Her back arched as her pussy flooded, and her vision went white. As she felt her first orgasm of the night, and the very first one since that AI decided to augment her.

As she was coming down from her high, she noticed he was now massaging her breasts with both hands. The sensations felt great, and then he looked her in the eyes, “Are you ready or would you like another round first?”

She knew what he was asking, but she wasn’t sure if she could be more ready than she already was. It was still a little frightening to her, but she didn’t doubt that the AI wouldn’t let her out until she had lost her virginity. Most of her fear at the prospect was already gone, and now all she felt were the normal anxieties that accompanied a girl’s first time. Looking down, “please be gentle,” she said in a quiet voice. While her ears flattened.

He shifted position, and she opened her legs. He positioned himself and she got a good look at his shaft. It was long and thick. She had never seen one before, so she had no idea if it was big or small. Regardless it looked big to her, and she was suddenly worried that it wouldn’t fit inside of her. She barely had time to even panic before he thrust, and she moaned as he entered her. Her flesh easily parting to allow him inside, and there was a slight resistance when he encountered her hymen but he easily broke through. All she felt was a slight tinge of pain, but that was quickly overshadowed by pleasure.

She lay on her back, and moaned with each thrust. Each one going deeper than the last, and by the third he was going balls deep into her. His tip reaching her womb, but stopping just short of entering her. The electric sensations of him inside of her, quickly sent her over the edge again. As she orgasmed her pussy clamped down on his dick, giving him a surge of pleasure. Not long after he came, and she felt a hot warmth poor into her belly.

A few moments later when she came down from the high of an orgasm, he pulled away from her with a popping sound. She could feel the mixture of cum and blood leaking from her pussy, as her mound twitched. She lay there for a few minutes, before getting up. Where she got a good view of the mixed fluids on the bed. Then he led her to the neighboring bathroom and helped her clean up.