Harsh Lessons (11 page)

What’s wrong with them?
  Did they really think she couldn't work out for herself when it was okay to kill someone?  What'd they think she was going to do – kill the mayor during a press conference or something?

Unbelievable.  Being told that when she was out, she was only allowed to "retire" the nominated target or targets.  She wasn't allowed to do
anyone
else except in emergencies.

"Probability of detection," "pervasive surveillance," "home and street spirits." 
Funt!
  She knew all that stuff!  She paid attention in her lessons.  And it wasn't like she wasn't careful!  The metrocops wouldn't have investigated the deaths of gangers and rapists.  No one would: everyone hated the RedSkulls.  It wasn't fair.

She'd worked out a whole plan: she was going to make the ’Skulls think some kind of supernatural monster was hunting them, like in
Eyes of Darkness
; with slime and everything.  It would’ve been so cool, too!  She'd even studied the old sewer system so she could sneak around their territory more easily.

And now, all that planning was wasted.

I bet the
other
agents are allowed to kill whenever
they
like
, she grumbled to herself.

But as she stomped past "soothing" woodland scenes of stupid chipmunks and swallows, a distant sound gradually penetrated her thoughts.  She slowed, then stopped, tilting her head to listen. 
Machine gun fire!

The sound had Leeth racing to the rec room, but even as she approached, the clipped frequencies told her it was only a recording, not the real thing.  Her eager sprint slumped to a disappointed walk, and she looked in from the doorway.  James was grimly watching a large holo-projection occupying fully half the space inside.

She'd had to watch the newsment shows every night for the last month, now.  But it wasn't the regular time, and the waif-like newscaster, Nina Summers, was doing the most serious pout Leeth had ever seen her achieve.  Leeth, frowning, tried pursing her lips the same way as she crept in, wondering what it was all about.

In the trid, people were running sideways and forwards, shooting as they went.  Nina and a gorgeous man with wavy golden hair, who towered over her, strolled through the center of the carnage like two translucent angels.  Leeth didn't recognize the man but he, too, was looking real serious.  So it had to be a news show.

The gunfire and background sounds damped down as he spoke.  'Yes, Nina, a shocking waste of life.  Corporate estimates place the death toll between ten and twelve thousand, after only two days of fighting.'

'Wow,' whispered Leeth, boggling. 
What could slay so many people so fast?
  A dragon?  Would they expect
her
to be able to do that, eventually?  Twelve thousand?  You'd have to be
super
fit.  She stepped further into the room.

'That's terrible, Dan.  Is the Vatican planning to send in reinforcements?'

'Hard to say.  The Big Guy could choose to send in more troops, although,' he replied, his voice sinking to a conspiratorial level, 'I've heard rumors he may deploy a crack squad of New Inquisitors.  I'd put money on that, Nina.  They'll need magical – or holy – assistance to locate these guerrillas.'

Huh?
wondered Leeth.

A hail of bullets flew through the two commentators, and camera angles shifted to move them out of the line of fire.  It was true, what Uncle said: with a nice outfit you really could set a good example, show people how healthy you were.  Nina was wearing a cute pink halter and a nanoskirt, revealing the sleek dragon-welt coiled round her belly button.  Leeth sighed.  The Department wouldn't let
her
get any scarwork: "No permanent distinguishing features allowed."  And Uncle thought scars were ugly.

'Can you tell us anything, Dan, about the reports of the Order of the Knights Templar re-forming?'

'Well, Nina, I can.  Reliable sources suggest the Knights are already back in action.  Whether they'll be given a role in this conflict, and whether that escalation leads to a full-scale Holy War…' he shrugged.  'Right now we can only speculate.'

'Well, that sounds pretty important, Dan, but I'm afraid that's all we have time for now.'

'No problemo, Nina.'  He turned to face the unseen audience.  'But stay tuned to Kroneco News for further details as the situation heats up, and don't forget
you
can participate in the action.  Just access the link below to guess the number of days this conflict will run,
and
the total number of casualties for your chance to win-'

With a vicious gesture, James killed the projection.

'What was
that
?'  Leeth asked.

James started in surprise, turning to face the girl.  'That was the flare-up of an old, old conflict.  Engineered, I would say, because of the recent discovery of deep oil deposits offshore from Istanbul.'

'But Dan said it had only been going on for two days.'

'Dan Jackson is an idiot, and a corporate puppet.  That war has been going, off and on, for centuries.'

'Oh.'  Leeth stood there frowning, digesting the information.  'But I thought you only had wars against violence, or skin cancer, or pollution.  That looked a lot more exciting than any of
those
wars.'

James narrowed his eyes. 'That's not funny, Leeth.'

She stared at him blankly.

Gradually, it dawned on him – she hadn't been joking.  'Surely, you must have seen other wars.  God knows, they rate well enough these days.'

'No,' she said, still puzzled.

'But… there are thousands of sites devoted entirely to war coverage.  Not to mention stimsenses, or even old 2D movies.  The Battle of Britain!'

Leeth shook her head.  'I've never seen anything like
that
on the trid.  We didn't use to get many newsments, though, at the- I mean, where we used to live.'

James stared at her.

'And I've not done any stimsenses – unless you mean VR simulations?  I've done some VR for stuff like martial arts, and athletics.  But Uncle doesn't like stims.  He says too much secondhand experience makes you soft.'

'Your uncle-' suddenly, James had the distinct impression he stood on thin ice.  Such a large blank space in her education could not have been accidental.  "They didn't get many newsments?"  Ridiculous.  But why in god's name would the man conceal from her that wars were a fact of life – still common?

'So what are they like, wars?  You're saying they're like a really big fight?'

James realized he was stuck now.  'Er, yes.  Basically,'

Leeth waited for him to go on.

He didn't.

'Well, juice!'  She sprang over the couch to face him.  'So, was this a
big
one?  Is twelve thousand people a really big war, or what?  Is that a record?'

'No.  Nowhere near.'

Leeth stamped her foot.  'Funt, James!
Unload!
  Would I
like
it?'

James's emotions ran from shock, to horror, to pity, but he tried to keep that from his expression as he stood to make a tactical withdrawal.  'I suggest you ask your uncle,' he said, and left the room.

She watched him go. 
What just happened?
Puzzled, she decided to do exactly as he'd suggested, and made her way to her Uncle's new office.

'Keepie?'

'Mmm?  What, Leeth?'

Leeth stepped inside, looking around.  Trailing her fingers over the familiar spines of his printed books on their new shelves, she felt a curious pang for the Institute.  What would Faith be doing, now?  Sighing, she let her fingers fall.  She dropped into the comfy visitor's chair in front of his work-desk, folding her bare legs up under her.  'What's the record for the most people killed in a war?'

'Mmm, oh… what?'  Harmon looked up from his work.  Put the stylus down.  Picked it up again and began tapping.  'What kind of war do you mean?' he asked carefully.

Leeth frowned at him suspiciously.  'A proper one.  With guns and knives and stuff.'

Well, that lets out d'Artelle's engineered apocalypse
, Harmon thought
.  And the
Great Conflict, too.
  'In that case, I would say fifty million.  Perhaps sixty.'

Her jaw dropped.  'Sixty
million
!'  She looked stricken.  Then brightened.  'But they would have been killed by lots of different people, wouldn't they?  Not just one or two.'

He blinked. 
Oh.
  'Certainly.  And they would have been using weapons of large scale destruction, and often against unarmed, helpless victims.'

She looked shocked.  'So they had no chance at all?  That's not fair!'

Harmon nodded.

For a while she was silent, thinking.  At last, slowly, she continued. 'Who does the actual killing?  Soldiers, right?  But aren't soldiers… are soldiers Hunters, too?'

'A few are.  A very few.'  For a moment the words 'but soldiers follow orders,' teetered on his lips.  Mother and Father would not thank him for drawing her to
that
conclusion, however: that a Huntress was different, and need not obey orders.  Yet how many times had he explained that
sheep
did what they were told?

She still waited, he saw.  And the more he thought about it, the more delicate he knew his answer must be.

'For a soldier, fighting and killing is like a
job
, that he does because he
must
.  For a Hunter, fighting and killing is a way of
life
.  Constantly testing herself against her opponents.'

Harmon held his breath, waiting.

And Leeth nodded.

He plunged past the danger point, and explained War.

Chapter 12 

Leeth was bored.  She'd had one session today on the pistol range with a new automated instruction program Nelson had designed.  She was certain he'd deliberately made it even more annoying than Preacher.  But after that she'd had a super training session with Dojo.  The idea of
deliberately
breaking your rhythms to confuse your opponent?  Genius!  Plus it tied in to the idea of pausing and assessing, moment by moment.

But then she'd had another session on body language with Keepie: who'd looked like he'd wanted to be somewhere else; then a lesson with Mother.  She shuddered, remembering. 
Ergh!

She was s'posed to be learning Mumbles now in her room.  But
she
wasn't a troll or an ogre, and
they
all understood English anyway.  Even if some of them couldn't speak it properly ’cause of their mutations.

She'd had to escape her room or go mad.

Wandering to the rec room, since that's where the agents hung out when they were available, her face lit up to see James there.  The 3D projector made the darkened room look like the inside of a derelict spaceship.  Whatever he was watching also had lots of subsonics, which she always enjoyed.  Right now, a heavily-armored male mercenary with a bandage on his head and an extravagantly-chromed plasma cannon was explaining they had to carry the fight to the creature.

Leeth crept in.  Uncle said too much
"
canned entertainment
"
was bad for you, but really, they were great!  They also gave her ideas to try out for herself.

In this one, it seemed an alien was hunting a small group of heavily-armed mercenaries on a maze-like spaceship.  While the creature hunted them, in turn.  Leeth was instantly engrossed.

It's been
ages
since I Pounced anyone
, she suddenly realized.  Sinking quietly down on all fours she began slowly sneaking into the room towards James.

But the trid’s tense hunt down dark passages was actually pretty good. 
No sense rushing
, she decided.

Now the creature was opening a cryo-storage unit where the mercenaries had put one of their critically-injured friends.  A shiny black limb opened and a purplish organ extruded, covering the dead woman's face.  Leeth's mouth fell open as the thing started absorbing the woman into itself.

It was budding another one of itself
, she realized.  She felt deliciously wicked as she settled down, just to watch for a little bit while she picked the perfect moment.  Uncle didn't like her watching “silly trids.”  But she wasn't watching, exactly.  She was just creeping up on James real slowly.

By the time the credits started rolling, she was practically burning with excitement.  She was also positioned right behind James's chair.

Arching her neck forward, she ca-a-arefully stretched out her tongue like the creature in the final scene, and slid it wetly behind his ear.

James
exploded
.  One hand smashed out, and she only just deflected it, taking the impact of his other arm on hers as he spun around.

James has cyberware!
she realized, recognizing the familiar burst of ultrasonics from powered muscles and the sudden increase in his speed.  But then he froze, recognizing her.  She saw him trembling, as if his automatic cybernetic systems fought his natural muscles.

From some of the tricks she'd played on Faith, Leeth recognized the signs, and ducked her head to hide her smile, finally looking up to shrug a half apology.

For his part, muscle and nerve augments online, body still vibrating with adrenaline and threat assessments still crowding his vision, James swore at her.  'I could have killed you!' he began, fists clenched, as the crazed animal trying to batter its way free of his chest changed slowly back into a normal human heart.

He could see the impish grin Leeth thought she’d concealed.

He spent several minutes succinctly explaining the error of her actions before seeing it was having as much effect as a literary criticism on an alligator.

The delighted grin still struggled beneath her more serious expression, and her next question only reinforced his assessment.  'What
is
the scariest thing you know, James?'