Reunion.

The trip to Max and Tom’s place wasn’t that hard, or long. One of them—I think it was Tom, since he tends to think of things like that ahead of time—sent me a set of directions through the email system that would get Jill, Jack and me to their apartment without a great risk of being spotted. Still, it was painstaking and methodical travel, especially when Jack and Jill wanted to look at and draw/analyze everything new they saw. They’re like miniature energizer bunnies; they’ll keep going and going and having a fun time doing it.

Finally, though, we were able to sneak up to the apartment and knock on the door. Jill and jack hugged my legs, blinking around silently at the somewhat dingy hallway. Hopefully nobody would see us…or whoever saw us wouldn’t care enough to alert MNU…

“Who is it?” I recognized Max’s voice, but it sounded…different. Less stressed, with an almost laid-back tone; from those three words I guessed that the college life had been treating him well. The question was, how much had he changed since I’d last seen him?

I shuffled my feet uneasily; Jack and Jill disentangled themselves from my legs. “It’s Olo—”

It immediately flew open. “Olo!” A man with black hair stood there for a moment, blinking at me, then letting his eyes travel down to Jack and Jill. I blinked in surprise myself; Max had changed his appearance since I’d last seen him. He’d let his short Mohawk grow out and actually had a soul patch-of-sorts. Good old Max…his expression was the same as I’d imagined it—full of good-natured surprise and happiness.

“Hey man—it’s great to see you again! Come on in. Tommy’s just straightening out a place for you guys to sleep.” He pressed himself against the door frame, allowing us passage, and closed the door behind us. After a few moments of silence, he grinned. “So? What do you think? We’re still getting settled in, but we’re nearly there.”

“It’s…wow.” They’d quickly described their apartment in the various emails we’d exchanged in the past few days, but seeing it in person was so much different. The walls were a nice turquoise color, while a green carpet was halfway spread out on the floor. One side was still undone; grey cement winked at us like the sidewalk at the edge of a lawn. Boxes were scattered around the place, pushed up against the walls and stacked on top of each other to make makeshift tables and work surfaces. We seemed to be in some form of kitchen, but there was a sofa and a small coffee table in here as well. I remembered a remark from the last email: it’s not a huge place, so we’re combining some rooms. It should make for an interesting layout. It sure did.

Jack scampered away from me, heading towards another room that was adjacent to the one we were already in. he turned and fled back to me as a figure exited the space and stopped. “Yo.”

My mandibles twitched, then froze in surprise. This man…this man couldn’t really be Thomas, the same Thomas that had admittedly “tried to rock the nerdy look, and failed.” He’d gotten different glasses—these were rectangular frames, a far cry from his old circular ones—and he had to have grown at least four inches. He’d even gone ahead and dyed his hair…it was a brilliant orange color that contrasted with the blue sweater he wore. That at least hadn’t changed: Thomas had a knack for wearing warm clothing even when it was roasting out. The guy was permanently cold.

“Oh hey there. You’re Jack and Jill, right?” Thomas scratched his head and looked down at the two little poleepkwa.

Jill nodded. “You’re…you’re Thomas?”

“Yeppers.” Tom grinned and knelt down, so he could be at eye level. “You can call me Tom or Tommy, though. Thomas sounds so formal.” He made a face; Jill giggled and Jack smiled. Straightening up, he gestured with his head at the duffel bag I was carrying. “You want me to get that Olo?”

“Uh…sure.” I handed off the bag to him, and he walked off with it. Thoughts churning, I turned to face Max, who was still smiling. “We have an awful lot to talk about, don’t we?”

"Yup. You could say that."