Director Ashwood considered the question with the same careful, calculating focus she'd applied to everything since their first confrontation. "Meridian will maintain a presence here, continuing our study under considerably more cautious protocols than our initial approach permitted. What you've demonstrated today — direct, survived contact with a guardian intelligence — is precisely the kind of documented result that justifies continued investment, regardless of whether we ever secure exclusive commercial rights to the phenomenon itself."
"And if I come back? To finish what I started?"
