“Are you sure about this?” Whip asked uncertainly, her fingers gripping the bottom of her shirt and twisting the fabric. “I bet they’re busy right now. There’s probably a lot going on with the new heightened security after the attack on the penthouse. We could always come back another day when things are a bit quieter.”

“Things are plenty quiet,” Kat replied, leaning forward to press the buzzer. “The housing is new and more secure, but other than that, everything is the same as normal.”

“I just don’t want to impose,” Whip mumbled, not meeting Kat’s smiling gaze. “The second I step in there I’m going to put my foot in my mouth and it’s going to be super awkward.”

Kat put a hand up to cover her mouth. After all, it would be a little unseemly for her to openly laugh at her girlfriend’s discomfort. Instead, she adopted a faux stern tone.

“Now if I didn’t know better Whippoorwill, I’d say you’re nervous about meeting my family.”

Before Whip could say anything, the steel door in front of them threw itself open to reveal Michelle, a mad grin on her face. Behind her, a stricken looking man in a suit that Kat remembered from one of Heather’s security details looked on.

“Kat!” Her sister squealed, throwing herself at Kat. Whippoorwill twitched, but Kat was able to suppress her instincts as the younger woman threw her arms around Kat’s neck.

“Good to see you too,” Kat replied, reaching up with a partially pinned arm to tousle Michelle’s hair. “I take it you’re excited to see us?”

“Of course,” Michelle bubbled, turning to Whippoorwill. Whip extended a hand to Michelle only for the younger woman to dodge past it and throw her arms around the pink haired woman as well.

Whip froze, eyes wide and with her hand hanging empty and stiff in the air. Kat could only shake her head and chuckle as her girlfriend silently mouthed the words ‘help me.’

“Come on in,” a male voice called out. “No need to dawdle in the hallway. The facility is as safe as anywhere, but the suits get all stiff and bothered when the people they are guarding stand out in the open for too long.”

Another man ambled out into the entryway of the suite. He was bearded and wearing a thick shirt that advertised a thrash rock band that Kat had never heard of. She immediately recognized it as one of the camouflaged armor weaves that her research teams had reverse engineered from Stallesp tech. At a moment’s notice, it would switch from listing tour dates for ‘Corporate Dysentary,’ whoever that was, and into a modern camouflaged tactical suit capable of taking a dozen rifle rounds before it began to show any wear or tear. It couldn’t exactly compete against the heavy armor worn by powered infantry, but it would give him an edge above almost anyone that hadn’t passed the Wierzbeck limit.

“Kat,” he said, nodding at her as he casually removed his hand from the reverse engineered magnetic accelerator at his hip.

“Jeffrey,” she replied, stepping behind Whippoorwill and Michelle and pushing the two women gently until Michelle disengaged from her remora-like grip and darted inside.

He was one of the senior 3445 survivors, and like many of those who had made it through the NeoSyne work camps, he had excelled when given a chance to prove himself in combat. Kat had been quietly feeding Baker and the rest of the 3445 subscriptions to the Tower along with instructions to cooperate with any of the aliens they found inside. On their own it wasn’t enough to change the negative perception of humanity, but given enough time she was hopeful that at least a couple of the races of the Consensus would start to see Earth as something other than a preserve for savage backstabbing barbarians.

“Anything to note in the last week or so?” She asked, following the others in and closing the door behind her. “I don’t think anyone would be foolish enough to try something this quickly while we’re on high alert, but one thing I’ve learned over the last couple of years is that not all enemies are terribly smart or competent.”

“A blessing and a curse,” Jeffrey replied with a smile. He stepped aside to let Michelle drag the unresisting Whippoorwill past her toward the dining room. “Baker hasn’t noticed anything and Bill is settling in just fine. He’s still a little stiff, but for a suit he’s pretty decent.”

“Is that true William?” Kat questioned the corporate security guard. The man’s back was ramrod straight and his face was still blanched of blood from when Michelle had ran past him and out into the hallway. “Are you pretty decent for a suit?”

“I like to think that I excel at my job, ma’am,” the man answered, squaring his shoulders while he addressed her. “Miss Penelope generally takes my suggestions seriously which is a relief given the recent attacks on your family. Miss Michelle on the other hand, well. I’m pretty sure that if I yelled ‘bomb’ and pointed at a suspicious briefcase she’d respond ‘where’ run toward it.”

Kat and Jeffrey broke into a chuckle together. She leaned forward, patting the man on the shoulder.

“That sounds about right William. Michelle is more than just a handful. All you can do is your best.”

“Thank you ma’am,” he replied uncomfortably.

“Now let’s find Mom and Michelle before they manage to strap Whippoorwill to a chair and start interrogating her,” Kat responded, walking past the two guards and into the suite’s mud room. “At a minimum, we should probably stop them before they manage to pull out the hot irons.”

She passed her family’s living room and game room before turning toward the voices filtering out of the kitchen. When Kat stepped inside, Michelle had Whippoorwill backed into a corner while their mother stood in front of the stove, a pot of soup bubbling away happily while she pan-fried some meat and vegetables.

“Leave the poor girl alone and grab some more peas from the refrigerator honey,” Penelope called out, not leaving her spot by the stove. “Now that they’ve absorbed the oil they don’t look nearly as big as they did when I first threw them in the pan.”

Reluctantly, Michelle disengaged and went over to the stainless steel refrigerator, letting harsh white light spill into the kitchen as she fiddled around in a drawer. Whip breathed a sigh of relief as Kat slipped in next to her.

“Kat?” Her mother asked, grabbing a familiar faded salt-shaker that looked like a teddy bear. “Is that you?”

“Yeah mom,” she replied. “I got held up for a second talking with Jeffrey and William.”

“I’ll be with you in a second,” Penelope replied, motioning with her spatula toward a nearby counter covered in plates and silverware. “Until then, could you make yourself useful and set the table? Dinner is almost done and I want us to eat it while it’s still hot.”

Kat walked over to the table, grabbing the plates and nodding her head toward the silverware.

“Come on,” she directed Whippoorwill. “Scoop up the silverware and let’s head to the other room. Unless of course you want Michelle to pin you to a wall and ask what your favorite flavor of candy growing up was?”

Whip shuddered, darting to Kat’s side and snatching the silverware and placements before she hurried after Kat. The dining room was fairly large, a luxury in the cramped space deep inside the heavily secured research institute.

The table and plates were a strange juxtaposition with the cheap and chipped silverware in Whippoorwill’s hands. Mahogany and fine whisper thin ceramic that a diner could see through. Kat knew exactly how much they cost, easily enough for a samurai to buy a pair of mid-range cyber arms, because she had been the one responsible for authorizing them.Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

Just as they finished their tasks, Penelope called out from the kitchen.

“Dinner’s ready, if you haven’t washed your hands, get to it.”

Kat and Whip left the room, slipping past Penelope and Michelle as the two other women exited the kitchen with the pan and pot of soup respectively. Kat walked over to the stainless steel sink, turning a handle and letting a jet of warm water spray into the basin as she began soaping up her hands.

“Why don’t you just have a servant set the table for you?” Whippoorwill asked quietly. “You’re a shareholder. Frankly, I’m surprised this place isn’t crawling with helpers. From what I’ve seen, there should be at least a cook and a couple of maids. Hell, it’s not unheard of to have someone to pour drinks and cut meat for you.”

“I might be a shareholder,” Kat said with a chuckle as she stepped away from the sink to dry her hands, “but I’m a daughter first. If my mom tells me to set the table, I’m going to set the table.”

“As for the rest of it,” she shrugged as Whippoorwill finished washing her hands. “None of us have big heads about our position. Dad bought Mom that silverware and salt shaker before he died in an industrial accident. We’re never going to get rid of it. I’ll pay to have it renovated until every scrap of original material is replaced like a poor woman’s Ship of Theseus. The three of us grew up just above the ground floor in Schaumburg Arcology. We shouldn’t forget that and God knows that the rest of the shareholders won’t forget it either. I’ve seen credits change people. I’m not going to let that happen to my family.”

Whip nodded thoughtfully, following Kat back into the dining room. Penelope was finishing ladling the soup into the fifth bowl as they came in. She shot the two of them a beaming smile and nodded with her head toward two chairs on the left hand side of the table.

“It’s good to see you Kat,” she beamed. “I have you and Whippoorwill seated together. I swear, every time you come back you look bigger and more fit. At some point, you’re just going to end up larger than life.”

“And it’s nice to meet you Whippoorwill,” Penelope continued, setting down the pot of soup and pulling out a chair next to Michelle. Her happy expression flickered for a moment as she noticed that the younger girl was already happily tearing into her meal.

“Manners,” she hissed before turning her attention back to her two guests. “Sorry about that, Michelle seems to be convinced that she was born in a barn despite everything I’ve tried to hammer into her. Anyway, as I was about to say Whippoorwill, Kat has told us so much about you.”

“Yeah,” Michelle chimed in, eyes bright. “That you’re a real life hacker and that you help her by taking control of cameras and security systems and stuff. I’m studying computer architecture right now because that sounds so cool.”

Whip froze and turned beet red. Kat gently put a hand on her back and steered her toward her chair.

Jeffrey sat down at the table’s near end, the holster of his pistol clearly visible for easy access. Meanwhile William took position at the other end of the room where he could watch both of the entrances as well as all of its occupants.

“Don’t overwhelm Whippoorwill Michelle,” Penelope chided. “She’s clearly a little shy. Remember what I told you about having dinner with guests? You’ll learn all of the rules for executives later, but in the meantime you should slow down enough that you can taste your food.” She finished with an apologetic smile toward Whippoorwill.

“You said you’re studying computer architecture Michelle?” Kat asked, swooping in to rescue her girlfriend. “I focused mostly on biology when I was in school so I don’t know much about that other than what I need to operate my equipment. What’s your favorite part?.”

Next to Kat, Whip relaxed slightly even as Michelle’s eyes lit up.

“The normal stuff for modern systems is interesting because there is so much you can do,” she gushed, “but what I really find interesting is the new crystal designs they’re making based off of stallesp technology. Obviously we can’t get access to high end equipment because it's all locked behind twenty layers of security blackouts, but our instructors are introducing us to some of the new experimental analogue computing languages, and they’re fascinating. Transmissions travel so much faster and data can be transferred and stored easier. It’s like we’re the first astronauts heading to the moon. Everything’s cutting edge and we don’t even really know what can and can’t be done yet. Scientists today are exploring and blazing trails that researchers will be using for decades if not hundreds of years to come.”

Kat blinked, trying her best to stop her eyes from glazing over. Of course, something that small didn’t even phase Michell as she kept up her onslaught.

“Cryptography, adaptive problem solving, artificial intelligence. All of it is evolving right before our eyes. Within five years, tech that was state of the art now will be used in playrooms to amuse babies.”

“Crystal based systems are pretty useful,” Whip said quietly. “I’ve rigged up one of the stallesp microcomputers and reworked it as a codebreaker. It probably took a month to figure out how to translate the input/output and fix the variable energy power supply, but it slices through most security networks like they’re made of wet tissue paper.”

Michelle’s eyes widened and she practically lunged across the table toward Whippoorwill.

“Oh my GOD,” she squealed. “You have one? Tell me its specifications, no tell me how you figured out the variable energy power supply problem. Rumors are that company researchers have figured out how to keep a crystal motherboard online continuously but they haven’t bothered to tell anyone. My professors are still trying to figure that out and our test systems keep crashing every ten minutes or so when the power fluctuates.”

“Errr,” Whippoorwill began, casting a beseeching glance in Kat’s direction. “I think that the system I’m using is a bit more advanced than anyone but the researchers that are directly working with stallesp artifacts have access to. They’ve got a fairly inefficient setup that solves the problem for all of the rigs they’re making, but one of the big problems with crystal analog computing is that almost every piece of hardware has its own unique needs and tolerances. My workarounds will only really work on my specific microcomputer.”

“Oh,” Michelle replied, deflating slightly. “Still, I bet you know a lot more about how analog computing works on the high end than my professors do. Do you think you could walk me through some of it? That’d be beyond cool.”

“Sure,” Whip responded, her shoulders finally relaxing slightly as she found familiar ground. “I can walk you through some of the more traditional programs I’m running too for infiltration. They’re based off of commercially available models, but no electronics specialist worth her salt goes into a gig without modifying them. I have all of them tuned to a razor’s edge, but you just have to promise not to tell anyone about the algorithms I’m using.”

“Oooh,” Michelle squealed, all of her depleted vigor returning in a fraction of a second. “It’ll be like the episode of Chrome Cowboys where Red Eye Rick teaches Jenny the Digital Hobo’s Code so that she can ride the Rainbow Railroad and get to Corrupted Packet Gulch before the BlockChain Bandits in order to rescue her CyberCows.”

Whippoorwill leaned over, touching her fingers to Kat’s forearm as she whispered in her ear.

“I think I understood all of those words individually, but I have no idea what your sister’s saying. It’s like she’s speaking a different language.”

“Michelle said that it would be a secret and that she would swear an oath not to reveal it in this world or in any afterlife, digital or divine,” Kat whispered back. “At least that was what Jenny promised Red Eye Rick in that episode.”

“I swear,” Whippoorwill replied with a roll of her eyes, “that show is more dangerous to neurons than any street drug I can think of. The way it erodes brains, you’d think that you were sniffing gasoline.”

“No more business talk at the table,” Penelope interjected, motioning at the three of them with a fork. “I’m sure that Whippoorwill and Kat have enough of that kind of conversation every day. Right now, we’re here as a family so we’re going to have a nice conversation over dinner. All right?”

“Yes Mom,” Michelle responded, but Kat could see the gleam interest still burning in the younger girl’s eyes.

“Tell you what,” Kat cut in through a mouthful of cooked vegetables, “I’ll talk with some of the researchers after this and see about giving you access to some of the new experimental models and someone to explain them to you. You’ll have to sign a confidentiality waiver, but the least I can do is abuse my power to give you access to some cutting edge toys and gizmos.”

“Thanks Kat!” Michelle exulted. “That’ll be super cool”

“After dinner we’ll all take Haz for a walk,” Kat continued. “If you have questions for Whippoorwill, you can ask them then. Until then, let’s just focus on trying to figure out whatever it is that Mom put in the soup to make it taste this good.”

Penelope’s eyes twinkled, but she didn’t say anything. No matter how many times Kat asked, she never did. Instead, things rapidly settled into the normal hubbub of a family dinner, and Whippoorwill finally relaxed fully next to Kat as the dining room was submerged in the sound of clinking utensils and pleasant conversation.