-One week later-

I woke up next to my beautiful human alien girlfriend. Having been officially in a relationship for a week now, things really hadn’t changed that much. Apart from Luna being just a little bit more clingy and that our conversations had shifted subjects quite a bit. But that was more related to the other discovery than to our relationship.

“We should get dressed and head to the bridge, Luna.” I poked her on her cheek as she lay on top of my chest.

“Mhmmm…. just a little bit longer.” That was one other thing that had changed. Luna had gotten a lot more at ease now that I knew her secret so she slept incredibly soundly. Though it might be related to the ‘clingy part’ too. I had become her main cuddle partner over Sharky after all. But don’t be too sad about that, Sharky still got plenty of attention.

“No, Luna, we really need to go. We were almost too late yesterday as well.”

“Urgh… if we really have to.”

“We do, come on now.” I poked her cheek again.

“Alriiiight…” She groggily got off of me and headed towards the dresser to put on her uniform. Of course, I did the same. “Don’t forget to take your pills.”

“On it.” I nodded and headed over to the bathroom once I had my uniform jacket on. Popping a couple of my pills down the hatch. And just like that, I was pretty much ready for the rest of the day.

We arrived at the bridge a couple of minutes before our shift was about to start. The others were already at their post except for Lieutenant Zu who walked in right behind us.

“Where are we headed today, Commander?” Lieutenant Zu asked.

“Same place as yesterday.” I replied. A couple of days ago, we’d spotted a huge cluster of metal holding asteroids at the edge of our detection range. Which is where we were heading. Our stocks of metals and minerals wasn’t anywhere close to being depleted, but stocking up on it while marking the area for future mining expeditions didn’t hurt.

We’d managed to get quite far away from the Empire’s border. According to Luna, there was almost no chance of encountering them here. And thanks to some extra intel we’d managed to get out of our prisoner, we’d also managed to plot out a safe route for everyone who followed us in our footsteps. We still needed to relay this safe route back to Earth, but at least they were aware of our hostile encounter. I did have the feeling that they were somewhat underestimating the severity of the situation, though.

Luna in the meantime was already sending off the coordinates for our new jump.

“XO, did you sleep well? You have pretty big bags under your eyes.” Zu asked before they went to her station.

“Oh, yeah, I slept pretty well. I’m just not good at getting up…”

“Did the Commander keep you up for too long?”

Luna blushed a little. “No, not at all…”

“Zu, get to work already.” I chuckled.

“Aye aye, Commander.” Zu gave me a wink and headed towards her station so we could start the first jump of the shift.

While the ship was zooming through space, Eva came onto the bridge.

“Commander.” She greeted me.

“Doctor.” I greeted her back. “Are you looking for something?”

“In fact, I am.” She replied. “I’m looking for Ensign Adams, have you seen him?”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“No, I haven’t seen him yet today, why do you need him?”

“He’s scheduled for his anti-space sickness shot. But he’s already half an hour too late.”

I shrugged. “And you’ve looked in his cabin?”

“I have.” She nodded. “Noone’s home.”

“Ellie, do you know where Ensign Adams is?”

“I have last seen him in corridor 12B, Commander.” Ellie replied. “He was heading towards the bathroom as he looked a bit pale.”

“Goddess, sometimes I still forget that we have an AI on board.”

“Did you or did you just want to come and chat with us?”

“Maybe a bit of both.” Eva smirked. “And now that I’m here anyway. How would you and our lovely Lieutenant-Commander like it to come and have dinner at my place this evening?”

“I’d definitely not mind.” Luna replied, she’d been listening in on the conversation.

“Looks like we’ll be coming then.” I gave Eva a nod.

“Great, I’ll be expecting you after shift then.”

“Mhmm, we’ll go take a shower first and then we’ll come over.”

Eva gave me a thumbs up and then looked behind her to the exit of the bridge. “Now, let’s go and relieve Ensign Adams of his problem. See you later.”

“Bye.” I waved her off as she left.

“Lauren?” Luna poked me in my side and whispered softly.

“Yeah?”

“Have you ever had space sickness?”

“I have, back when I was just a rookie. Physical exertion really doesn’t help.” I chuckled. “And let me tell you, being nauseous in a space suit isn’t fun.”

“I can imagine…”

“But I got used to it pretty fast so I got lucky with that. Some people never really grow out of it. At least there’s some pretty good medicine for that.”

“Mhmm.” Luna nodded and then we both went back to work.

We’d gotten within a day of travel from the mineral rich asteroid field when our shift ended. Luna and I proceeded to our cabin and quickly got showered so we didn’t have to let Eva wait for too long. When we finally got to her cabin, I knocked on the door.

“Coming!” Eva called out. “Give me a second!”

I looked at Luna and gave her a smile, after which I leaned against the door.

“Should we have taken a gift with us?” Luna asked.

“I got a box of chocolates with me.” I took out a relatively small red box. “It’s praliné. She likes these.”

“Oh, why didn’t you tell me? I’d like to have taken something with me as well.”

“I mean… it’s a gift from both of us anyway, right?” I winked. “It’s not like it’d have cost us money.”

“I suppose.” Luna pouted a little.

“Ah, c’mon, don’t be like that.” I poked her in her side to tease her a little.

Luna continued pouting but I could see a smile creeping through.

“Having a little lover’s quarrel in front of my cabin, are we?” Eva opened the door. “Sorry for the wait, I had to put away something first.”

“Don’t worry about it.” I offered her the small red box full of chocolates. “Here, this is from Luna and me.”

“Thanks.” Eva smiled as she accepted the box. “That must’ve cost you a lot of time at the synthesizer.

“Around two minutes.” I smiled.

Eva laughed. “Such an investment from our esteemed Commander. Now all the others are going to be jealous.”

“I know right.”

Eva then stepped aside to let Luna and me enter. Her cabin was smelling like tomato soup.

“It smells nice here.” Luna commented.

“Yep, I made some gazpacho as a starter.” Eva nodded. “It’s the tomatoes and herbs that you’re smelling.”

-I was so close, but I guess gazpacho technically is a kind of tomato soup.-

“Oh, I’ve not eaten that before.” Luna replied and sat down on one of the chairs at Eva’s table.

“Haven’t you? Then I hope I won’t destroy its taste for you.”

“I’m sure it’ll taste wonderful.” Luna smiled.

“Eva can cook pretty well, that much is true.” I smiled too and sat down next to my partner.

“Would you like to start immediately, or would you like something to drink first?” Eva walked to her small fridge.

“Something to drink would be fine.” I agreed.

“Still no alcohol, right?”

“Nope. Trying to be a responsible Commander.” I chuckled.

“You’re definitely doing a good job keeping her in line, Luna.” Eva laughed. “I got some juice made from apples and cherries, would you like to try that?”

“Sounds good.” Luna nodded. I did as well.

With a drink in our hands, I leaned back into the chair and sipped from my glass. While I could clearly taste the apples, the cherry flavor was a lot more subtle. I honestly wasn’t even sure if I could discern this from normal apple juice if you blindfolded me.

“Tell me if I’m overstepping my boundaries.” Eva started after taking a sip of her own. “But you two are a thing now, aren’t you?”

I looked at Luna before I gave Eva an affirmative nod. “I guess you could say that.”

“Thank the Goddess, finally. I was wondering how long it would take you two to be living together to figure that one out. I was starting to feel so bad for Luna.”

“I just needed to figure out some things first.” I replied. “I think the both of us needed to do that before agreeing upon a relationship.”

“Mhmm.” Luna nodded. “And the invasion didn’t help…”

“Not at all.” I agreed. “But at least we got through it in the end, and I think we are both stronger for it.”

“That’s nice to hear.” Eva smiled. “But just to be sure. How long have you two been together?”

“About a week now.” Luna replied.

“Ah fuck.” Eva pouted and looked away from us for a second.

“Fuck?” I tilted my head slightly. “What do you mean by that?”

“That means Zu wins the bet. I was two days off.”

-Wait… what bet?-