Redux Vol1 Ch8: Uninvited guests...

"Huuuu," with a sigh Jack sunk down into the couch, hoping that it would swallow him whole in its relaxing soft cocoon of cushions. He glanced over at Hethuk, who seemed to be completely engrossed in his game and wondered if the man had even noticed that he was no longer alone in the room. He doubted it to be honest, what with the way Hetuk was leaning forward and staring intently at the screen. Jack turned his head slightly and looked at it, only to find Hethuk still on edin prime, his character conversing with miners and the renegade and paragon options glowing red and blue on the screen. "Having trouble deciding what to say?" he asked with a smile if Hethuk was thinking this hard about a small decision like this then what was he going to do when he got to Vermire? Hethuk tore his eyes away from the screen and looked over at Jack.

"It is a tough decision, I need more information, and I need it quickly so I can press them hard for it, but some people don't do well under pressure..."

"You just have to make a choice," Jack shrugged.

"You are right. Honestly, I must say I am surprised that this game of yours can present such a moral quandary..." he said turning back towards the screen. Jack just chuckled to himself, before settling back into the couch a little further, and just as he started to drift off into blissful sleep, he heard that sound, that truly hateful, sleep denying sound.

The doorbell.

With a groan and a handful of words murmured under his breath that would have made a sailor blush he opened his eyes. He must have drifted off to sleep for longer than he thought, because Hethuk was now on the citadel, he had thought he had just closed his eyes for a second, but- shaking his head to clear the sleep he pulled himself up and shambled to the door. And who did he find on the other side but two of his coworkers; Jean and Jessika. He raised an eyebrow at the two of them and didn't say anything.

"Well shit, it looks like I owe you ten bucks Jean, he actually does look like he is sick." Jessika looked truly surprised at his appearance.

"Told you he wasn't playing hooky." except he totally was, it was awfully sweet of Jean to think the best of him, but in this case, she was dead wrong.

"Oh I never said hooky, I clearly said he was playing something else," she laughed, pushing him out of the way and marching in like she owned the place. "Now where is this ridiculously attractive fiance I keep hearing about?" her eyes fell on Hethuk still engrossed in the game and she turned to look at Jack "Who is-"

"Who's there honey?" Hisra called out from the guest room before she could finish her question, she was currently helping her younger sister, who had definitely packed way more than what was needed for a short trip.

"Jean and her sister are here" he called out. And almost broke out laughing when he heard Hisra scrambling to get to the door, and seemingly hitting everything in the room in her haste if the sound was any indicator. The door opened and out tumbled Hisra, and a mountain of clothes, which she promptly shoved back into the room.

"Get rid of all that crap! You don't need more than four sets of clothes we are only going to be there a day or two!" she yelled into the room before slamming it shut with an exasperated sigh. She stood there for a split second collecting herself before she turned around with a big smile, and Jack thanked God she had her tail hidden again as he doubted he could have casually explained that one away. In fact, they all had their tails and eyes hidden, it was something Jack had demanded of them if they were going to be visiting earth.

"Nice to meet you I am Hisra". She put on her best smile and extended her hand, it was good to see her trying to act normal. Jessika looked between her and Jack a look of disbelief clearly in her eyes.

"Wait, wait, wait, are you saying you are engaged to this loser? Girl you can do so much better than this guy." She said, before grabbing and shaking Hisra's hand.

"Wow, I don't know if I can take those burns at least not right now," Jack said as he slipped back down into the comfort of the couch. Hisra likewise flopped down beside him. "Remind me why exactly did we invite your relatives without planning and preparing for it? Oh yeah, that's right it was your dad who did that." He shot a look at Hethuk but it would seem as though the man was in his own world at the moment and didn't even respond to his name being said, not so much as the slightest of twitches.

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"You don't have to remind me," she said with a sigh as she flopped down sideways and leaned up against his chest.

"Ehem" coughed Jean to get their attention, she then presented a crockpot she had been carrying. "Brought some soup since you're sick."

"Em, well, I" Jack stumbled a little.

"Your sick?" Hisra asked a look of worry on her face, before rolling over and straddling him and leaning down to touch her forehead with his. "You don't feel sick," she murmured" Should we put the trip off for now and go some other day?"

"No, I am not sick, and no, let's go today, I didn't lie to my boss to not get this day off..."

"Hah, told you he wasn't sick!" Jessika shouted, pumping her fists in the air in a short victory dance before sticking out her hand and asking for her ten bucks. "So, where are we going?" she asked as she folded the ten-dollar bill and slipped it into her short's pocket.

"We?" he asked warily.

***

"What is that?" for the thousandth time since they had started this car ride he had heard that question asked, it was honestly getting on his nerves. The first hundred times or so it was kind of cute, after all, Tirs's curiosity was exactly what one would expect from a ten or eleven-year-old girl in a new place, and it was nice to see that though they were a different race, children were still children.

"Tirs, if you don't stop asking questions ill, I don't know, but I do know you won't like it." Hisra hissed as she turned in her seat and fixed Tirs with a glare.

"But honestly this planet is pretty amazing, how many of your people live here Jack?" Arka asked. She was the older sister, and apparently she was already married. She hadn't been asking as many questions as Tirs but she did have a few, and as she asked them Jack got the impression that she was not only going to remember what they were but also exactly how he said them, honestly she reminded him a bit of a librarian or secretary or something, like she categorized knowledge just because she might get the chance to use it at some point in time and she wanted it easy to access at all times.

"Ah, don't remember off the top of my head but I think it was somewhere near 7 billion or so," he answered, as he kept his eyes on the road.

"7 billion people and you still have resources to use precious materials in money and trade items, must be nice..." she said, looking at the green pine trees as they whizzed past the car, with a calculating air of all the things around them.

"So I am guessing that you all don't use physical money then huh?" he asked.

"No, we don't have resources for that" Arka answered, as she reclined in the back seat. "All money used by the united council races are digital, we are given a chit, it is a small disk that we can place on a reader and have the money sent from our accounts to the seller's."

"We have something similar, called credit and debit cards, they do much the same thing, and most people now don't ever actually see the real physical money, but should they want to they could go to a bank and pull the money out, get the physical version instead,"

"Interesting," she said, and he had the sense again that she was categorizing what he had said.

"Don't have resources because there are too many people or something else?" he asked, changing the subject away from earth.

"I like it here, it's so peaceful," she sighed and returned to looking out the window," The reason we don't have the resources are because of the war with the Naadian Empire, we were in a 2,000 year war with them, we ultimately won, but not without suffering massive amounts of casualties, damn Naa." she growled.

"You can't say it is entirely their fault, and you know it Arka," Hisra said, she was acting as Jack's copilot, or rather she was pretending to know how to read an atlas, he didn't have the heart to tell her she had it upside down.

"How is it not there fault, they massacred huge civilian populations, then there were the slave camps, it is very clear that they are at fault." she snapped back, it was obviously a topic that they both felt very adamant about.

"Internment and slave camps huh?"

"Sounds awful right?" Arka said, looking into his eyes with the help of the rearview mirror.

"How long ago was this war? Did it just end or is it a thing that ended long ago and you are still trying to recover?"

"It ended roughly 300 years ago," said Hisra, "The people that did those things are long dead, and even their children are dead, and yet we feel it is socially acceptable to bully their descendants." she shot a look at her sister.

"Here on earth we had a group of people called Nazis, the came from a place known as Germany, and were led by a real scumbag of a man known as Hitler, they did much the same thing, but likely on a smaller scale. That was a long time ago, however, and while we remember the past, and use it to teach the future generations, I don't think you can blame their children for crimes done by the parents, each person should be judged on their own merit if you ask me."

"Now you sound like Hisra, the truth of the matter is they are unrepentant and cause terrorist incidents, the death toll from there insurgents is much too high."

"Wouldn't you fight back if you weren't allowed to get a good living?" Hisra snapped, turning around in the seat.

"This is going to be a long car trip..." Jack muttered, as he kept his eyes on the road and attempted to not listen to the bickering of the two sisters.