"No, sir."
Joe said, "Well, Zen, go get yourself one and come on back and sit down.
Let's get acquainted."
"Well, yessir." Max disappeared back into the kitchenette to return
almost immediately. The little man slid into a chair, drink awkwardly in
hand.
His superior sized him up, all over again. Not much more than a kid,
really. Surprisingly aggressive for a Lower who must have been raised
from childhood in a trank-bemused, Telly-entertained household. The fact
that he'd broken away from that environment at all was to his credit, it
was considerably easier to conform. But then it is always easier to
conform, to run with the herd, as Joe well knew. His own break hadn't
been an easy one. "Relax," he said now.