Space Odyssey: Spectre

He was right. As he blinked his eyes open and groaned while pulling himself out of the pile of bodies. All he could think was that he was absolutely right. He stepped right out of one problem and right into another.

He looked around for a moment before grabbing his underwear. He then moved toward the last woman that was conscious. She was smirking at him as she sat at a table. "Did you have fun?"

Jace groaned, "everything hurts." Jace then pulled on his underwear and sat in the chair opposite her. Focusing more on her face then the rest of her body that was clearly exposed and would just end up arousing him again. "We skipped over a bunch, but can you explain to me what exactly is going on?" Jace asked as he began moving his joints to make sure nothing had broken over the last six hours of fun he had just had.

"Certainly, I will answer all your questions. But first you should talk to your people. They seem to be quite nervous." The chieftess informed him as she slid open a golden orb. She then tapped it and he could see part of his squad on the bridge.

"Spectre Jace- Where is your armor?" Nila asked in surprise.

"Ehh…" Jace did not want to really explain that his armor, that could only have been removed by a specialized device. Was easily removed with the same equipment they used to remove their own armor. "It was taken off," Jace answered but then shook his head, "forget that. Are all of you okay?" Jace asked as he glanced at the chieftess and shifted uncomfortably as she licked her lips.

"Yes, we have just been waiting this entire time. Are you okay?" Nila asked.

"Perfectly fine, I think I will need an hour to wrap things up and then I will come back to the Discovery." Jace answered as he cracked his neck by twisting his head.

"Umm… new question?" Ulin was the one that spoke up, "are those hickies?"

Jace's eye twitched as he glared at the chieftess who smirked back at him. "Just wait a bit longer, I am almost done here." He then looked at the chieftess and she tapped the ball and the communication ended.

"I can not help it if we like the idea of marking our prey." The chieftess gave a fake apology that was accompanied by her smirk.

Jace sighed and rolled his eyes. "Fine. First question, how are we able to communicate when you are clearly using a different language?"

"We have a ship-wide translation system. It translates all speech." She then tilted her head and showed a small metal dot that was behind her ear. "We have implants that allow us to hear the translation directly while the ship has been using a voice displacement system to make it seem like that translation is coming directly from our mouths."

"Okay, that is definitely interesting." Jace nodded in understanding. An idea was already forming how they could get a similar function aboard human ships with a bit of tweaking on his part. "Next question, what was with the post battle test orgy? Is it a cultural thing? Or something else?"

At this the chieftess bellowed with lighter for a moment. He listened calmly and looked over at the bed. Actually it could not even be called a bed. It was more of a bunch of cushions and pillows. He could see their flesh rippling slightly with the pink color.

These centuria's skin color changed depending on their conscious mood. So when the orgy began they were all turning pink. Then after they were unconscious they stayed pink because they were not having conscious thoughts but their skin was rippling when they started dreaming.

While the chieftess in front of him was sliding between pink and a light shade of blue. As in a really really light shade to the point that it was almost white. "It is a cultural thing, it is also our method of reproduction. We typically take ships with people who strayed too close to our borders. Fortunately we do not have to hunt far and we do not have to do it an overabundance of times. Our lifespan is longer than most."

Jace tilted his head, "that still does not explain."

"We will typically test a new species when we meet them. Since your genetics are close to being different you are qualified to be your own unique species." The chieftess explained with a chuckle. "So when you completed the fight without harming our kin, you showed us your intent to be friends. But when you beat her, you also showed us your superior nature. Which is a giant turn-on for our species. Usually you would only have a claim over the woman you bested, but with such a showing the others wanted a piece of you."

Jace nodded his head in understanding. Then he felt the need to point something out. "You are aware that I am under a form of birth control. Correct?" Jace asked with a chuckle.

"Correction you were." The chieftess chuckled. "Remember that stream of light after your armor was removed?"

Jace had an ominous feeling. "Did you…?"

The chieftess smiled mischievously at him, "we did indeed. The post armor removal light bath, removes all anything detrimental to reproduction. It won't remove severe injuries but it can be used to help people regain the ability to reproduce. Which reminds me we do trade with various groups and people, which is another method which we do reproduction. Although we do prefer this post battle orgy as you called it."

Jace groaned and leaned back in his chair. He then looked over at the group of naked women and shook his head. "Okay, then would you be open to a cultural and informational exchange? From what I can tell your people have been very limited in your reach. I am sure you would like to know what is beyond the Victorium borders?"

The chieftess shrugged, "I am not opposed, but I will point out that our people have been around since long before the Victorium existed. We even existed when Xenar gracefully ruled over several other races in this galaxy. But we have not traveled that far beyond our borders since then."

"Xenar? I have never heard of them." Jace racked his brain in confusion.

"Hmm…" The chieftess tilted her head to the side and then nodded in understanding. "I thought you knew. Well in that case, I apologize for being presumptuous. The Xenar were the race that ruled over most of the galaxy, they had some very advanced technology, but they preferred to advance culturally. They were useless for reproduction. But I thought you might know about them since you have their nanobots coursing through your body, which was their attempt at adapting to adverse situations." The chieftess shrugged like it was no big deal.

But as Jace processed her information his eyes widened in surprise. He then whispered under his breath, "the Requiem?"