Reunion 144 / 0918 Ken Shardik turned the corner and stopped, surprised.Reunion 144 / 0918 Ken Shardik turned the corner and stopped, surprised. "Hi. I didn't know you were still here." "Yeah." Furry looked up from her book, a thick tome entitled Memetic Assumptions In Civil Archeology. "I thought you were going sailing with Garth and Kiza yesterday." "I didn't want to." "You're worried about Nickolai, aren't you?" Ken slowly eased around the table and, dropping the bag he had slung on his shoulders, sat down in one of the wicker and wire chairs. "He'll be okay." "He was right here, Ken. It's no fair that I could hold him for just two days and then he vanishes again." "It's just for a week." "I know. It's just hard to be enthusiastic while he's away." Ken nodded. "I know." Furry registered exhaustion in Ken's voice and wondered about it. Ken opened up his bag and took out a thermos and a sandwich on thick slabs of rounded bread and began eating. She finally decided to ask about it. "Something wrong?" "If being at war is 'something wrong,' I guess you could say yes." "What? War? With who?" "Terra." Ken took a bite of his sandwich and smiled in her direction. Furry waited for him to swallow, expecting an explanation. Ken finally gave her one. "They didn't like my press conference yesterday afternoon. They seem to think that disabling the morphing technology is some sort of threat to their sovereignty." "It is," Furry said. "You know it is." Ken nodded. "But a threat is not an action. Assault is not battery. They have to understand the difference. Citizenship should be a matter of declaration, not biology." Furry put her book down on the table, being sure to fold over a page. "So we are at war?" "Not yet," Ken replied. "They're talking about it in economic terms." He laughed harshly. "As if they could survive without us. |