18 Hours

[kaige68.livejournal.com]

Your challenge (should you choose to accept it) is to crank out 100 words or 1 graphic inspired by the word:
Project

Comments

Project, wonder, reporter, classify, related, unlawful

[agdhani.livejournal.com]

Though he wondered what Lowell had started to stay and left unfinished, Geary nodded. “Business is a good way of getting our minds off of less pleasant matters.”
“Indeed.” Sipping at his glass as he sat too, Lowell stared at the other Laedan for several seconds before putting the glass down, clutching it between his hands. “It is good you’re here. My reporters have brought disturbing news…”
“What sort of news?” Geary’s tone of phrase was both curious and nonchalant at the same time.
“Of HOPE labs within Kennedy’s borders…for the manufacture of plasm.”
Well-schooled in diplomacy, with a lifetime of practice at hiding such negative emotions as surprise, Lowell nodded once. “It is so.” Few knew about that lab’s discovery, only Jia Marrock and her companions, and a handful of individuals in Geary’s employ. Who the traitor was, who might have taken, or sent, the news to LaGuardia’s Laedan, would need to be determined eventually. But he could not spare the manpower now.
“I recently learned of it myself but I assure you, the facility has been dismantled, all others related to plasm production are being sought, and I am scheduled for a summit with Grand Mas Lord within a fortnight. If they think they can do whatever they want in Kennedy…”
“Of course they can.” They were HOPE, after all. Treaties and territorial agreements aside, the members of HOPE Lowell was familiar with were prone to believing their affiliation with that organization meant that they could do whatever they wanted, wherever and whenever they chose, without consequence.
Lowell’s primary concern was whether Geary had been involved, or known about it beforehand.
“That shart nearly cost me a son. If I learn you had a hand…that you let them…”
“I’ve no desire to poison my own people,” Geary scoffed. “Addiction’s as much of a problem in Kennedy as in LaGuardia. As you know, I’ve made it one my cabinet’s primary projects to eradicate the manufacture and distribution of…”
“And how is that working?” It was difficult, he knew, to label the manufacture and distribution of any addictive substance as unlawful when the personal use of them was permitted without consequence. In the grand scheme of life since the Undoing, such usage, such substances, were less important to address than the every day survival needs of the people they ruled. Lowell faced the same challenges himself. Despite Nik’s propensity towards addiction, Lowell had made no serious efforts to counter such substances until the one called Juice had nearly claimed Nik’s life the last time.