The kid came to me today, hiding behind Witherspoon’s skirts. (Now there’s an image-Witherspoon in a skirt. Do they make them that big?) He, (the kid) has bought the scuttlebutt about big white cats coming to destroy the planet. Bought it hook, line, and sinker. Wants to drag my engineering staff away from their work to build an unworkable “planetary defense system” mostly from recycled antique military surplus. Well, he can’t have them. OK, one, maybe. If I don’t give them somebody that can add two and two, I’ll have Witherspoon nagging me about “security.” It may be his job (security, not nagging) but he takes it a bit too seriously. Seriously. Feline space pirates? Be…serious.
The nerve of that snot-nosed, semi-human kid! I felt sorry for him, OK. His father was killed, he got slammed around pretty good, then his mother died; I gave him a year with his bride even though I really need Phyllis here. No one can predict if the colony can survive this shorthanded. So he thanks me by suborning five more colonists to leave–to sever all ties. At least he failed to get Tom Kennedy. Tom’s fully human and knows where his loyalties lie. When the kid’s penniless and hungry, that pack of mongrels will turn on him. Damn, I’m out of coffee.