The Romulan War_ Beneath the Raptor's Wing (Book 1) - Michael A. Martin [80]
A look of confusion abruptly wrinkled the teenaged Asian girl’s otherwise unlined countenance. “You want my thoughts about the what now?”
This response brought Naquase up short. The last time she had met the one tagged with Buddhism’s most revered title, the person in question had been a wizened old man whose quiet, studious manner had made his status as the carrier of seventeen lifetimes worth of experience and wisdom genuinely plausible, even to a nonbeliever.
The current Dalai Lama, however, had not only just placed Naquase’s admittedly tenuous regard for Buddhism’s axiom of reincarnation in serious jeopardy, but had also made the journalist speculate that the teenager might be living proof that the universe was ruled by a supreme being whose wicked sense of humor included a penchant for practical jokes. After all, hadn’t Voltaire once said that God was merely a comedian playing before an audience that was afraid to laugh?
“The Romulans,” Naquase repeated with a patience that she hoped did not yet sound as labored as her breathing felt.
A look of recognition suddenly crossed the young holy woman’s face, and she chewed her gum again several more times, making loud smacking sounds in the process.
“Oh. Yeah. Romulans. Sorry,” she said, still chewing. “Spiritual enlightenment and stuff doesn’t leave me a whole lot of free time to look at the news, y’know?”
Easy, Keisha, Naquase thought, casting her eyes momentarily upon the dignified and beautiful gilt-roofed structures that dominated the center of the ancient, twenty-five-thousand-square-meter temple complex. This place made it through the reign of the Bönpo king and the Mongol raids. It’ll survive until the monks find Dalai Lama Number Nineteen.
“That’s perfectly understandable, Your Holiness,” Naquase said, not wishing to risk alienating either her interview subject or the billion-plus Buddhists who might hear her words.
“You’re talking about those new aliens or whatever that nobody’s actually seen yet,” the Dalai Lama Lian said, just before loudly cracking her gum once again.
Naquase nodded even as she struggled to avoid staring in appalled fascination. “The Romulans, Your Holiness. They’re already keeping the United Earth government and Starfleet intensely busy right now making war preparations. Even sight unseen.”
“Oh, yeah,” Her Holiness said. “By the way, could you just call me Lian from now on, instead of using all this ‘Your Holiness’ stuff?”
Naquase paused to swallow. It seemed to be getting harder to keep her breathing under control. “All right. Um, Lian. How will the Romulan threat affect you and your... adherents?”
“You mean, how will the Romulans affect us as pacifists?”
Naquase quickly concluded that this girl was a lot smarter than she appeared to be. Of course, she’d almost have to be. “Exactly,” she said.
Dalai Lama Lian Hua An Gyatso put her hands together before her, her neck and shoulders bobbing in a motion halfway between a bemused shrug and a prayerful bow.
“My take on these Romulans is probably quite a bit different from yours,” she said at length.
“Really?” Naquase said, once again surprised. “You’re familiar with my work?”
Lian popped her gum. “Well, like I already told you, I only get to, you know, take a peek at the news every once and a while. But it’s not as though the monks keep me walled up in a tower someplace. Does that surprise you?”
Naquase shook her head. “Not really. But I am surprised to hear that your take on the Romulans differs so much from mine. Are you endorsing United Earth’s policy of sending our Starfleet and MACO forces to build garrisons across the galaxy?”
The Dalai Lama coughed and sputtered, then paused for a moment to recover her breath. “Sorry. You almost made me swallow my gum there. No,