Harsh Lessons (38 page)

'And you have to see that the Department could have made no other decision.  I am a recognizable figure, and if I were linked to Jane Baker, there are still people sufficiently interested in my research to be curious enough to investigate.  Besides, Marcie's father would not have permitted a strange magician to "interfere" with his daughter-'

'What if her injury got fresh again?'

'Eh?  How…?'

She saw his eyes widen in disbelief as he stared at her.  Saw his hand begin that twitching motion – and she threw herself across his desk and pinned his hand to the table.

Her other hand, poised over his heart.

'Don't you dare.  Don't. You. Dare.'

He opened his mouth.

Her fingers twitched, and he froze at the prick of invisible blades.  'No!  Not that either.'

He stopped.  And then, smiled.  But it wasn't a nice smile.  More like
he
was the one in control.  His lips parted, and shock shot through her.  He was about to say it.  Did he think she wouldn't kill him?

Time slowed down.  This was Keepie.

No. 
Keepie was gone
.

'Leeth-'

If she killed him, she'd never save Marcie.

If she didn't stop him
speaking
, she'd be lost, and so would Marcie.

Kill him.  Work something out later
.  She thrust-

'-Mo-'

Her arm didn't move.  She tried again.  It was like she was paralyzed.  What was
wrong
with her?

You may not kill any of them.

No!
 
She tried
again
to stab her hand down into her uncle's heart; but again, her arm locked rigid.

'-ode-'

No!

'-W-'

Her fist slammed into the side of his head.  She clung to the edge of sanity as the word "one" died on his lips, and he fell forward onto his desk.

She stood, heart racing and breathing hard, like she'd run a race.  Gradually, the panic faded. 
I can't kill
any
of them – including Uncle.
She stared in dismay from her hand, to her uncle.

Now what do I do?
  When he wakes up….

But slowly, a smiled formed. 
He made the Department turn off the cameras in our rooms!
  Her eyes lit up as she considered the situation.

And payback.

He groaned as he came round, and she saw him stiffen, the moment before he cried out: 'Eeh! Oh Uh. Ohh! Uh!'

She couldn't keep the delight from her face.  'Sorry, Uncle, I can't understand a word you're saying.  Not with that gag in your mouth.'

His arms jerked, and the fury in his face deepened.  His arms banged tight in the cuffs binding his arms to the chair.

But very quickly, that anger washed from his expression and he relaxed, looking quite calm.  Though his eyes
burned
into hers.  Promising her she would regret this.

Despite herself, a shiver of dread ran through her.  But she kept the smile on her face.

'That's better.  I just want to ask a few questions, Uncle.  Okay?  Just "yes-no" questions.'

His eyes narrowed.

'Okay.  First: you can't help.  Right?'

He nodded.  Once.

'And the Department won't
ever
agree to let you try, will they?'

She could see him thinking; could see him resolving to "teach" her a lesson for all this; but in the end he answered: he shook his head.

'You think you're safe, Uncle, even now, don't you?  Because you "programmed" me so I can't kill anyone here – including you.'

She saw she was right.

'But look at your left wrist.'

She saw understanding dawn in his face even before he rotated his arm and look down.  It must have been stinging.

Down his wrist, four very shallow, very sharp lines scored his skin.  He looked up into her eyes.

'That's right, Doctor.  I can't kill you, but I
can
hurt you.'

It felt kind of awful, but kind of satisfying, using his official "name."  And she saw something change in him, too, when she spoke it.

And for a moment, then, she wanted to cry.  Like she'd just killed a part of him.  Maybe a part of
them
.

She forced the feeling down.  She
had
planned to threaten him some more: something like "not wanting to find out just how much she could hurt him."  But suddenly, she couldn't bring herself even to
pretend
she was happy about any of this any more.

Instead, she just said 'Sorry, Uncle,' and carefully slammed her fist into the side of his head again.  He fell forward once more onto his desk.  But instead of the satisfaction she'd expected to feel, she just felt worse.

It took a while before she realized she was hunching forward, clenching her hands together, wringing them.  Like a baby.

She forced her hands apart, and straightened.

Pressing her lips close-shut, she considered her next steps.  Now, she had to get them both out of the Department.

Maybe I should have planned this out, first.
  She shrugged.  No time like the present.  For a while she stood, chewing her lip, thinking.

Then nodded.  Determined.  She'd only need a few things.

Just so long as they were still allowing her to come and go as part of her studies into the Hunters Point Dumps…

Chapter 46 

Dojo was in his room when the channel to Father opened.

'Dojo.  We have a problem with Leeth.  Take care of it.  Nelson is currently tracking her – she's en route to the level seven exit, with the Doctor in a wheelchair.  From the medical bay logs, we believe she has administered a sedative to him, and is attempting to flee.'

'Why?'

'Unclear.  No doubt the Doctor will be able to tell us when he revives.'

'I am on my way.'

Dojo jogged to the lifts; then frowned, and took the stairs down to sub-basement seven.  'Can she exit the complex?' he asked Father.

'No.  We assume she is unaware her permission has just been rescinded.  Bring her to lock-down two.  Avoid killing her.'

'Are you sure she cannot exit?'

'Quite sure.  We'll be observing, on camera.  Do you need assistance?  Only Little Brother is available, but I can send him along with tasers or tranqs.'

'That will not be necessary.'

-

Leeth skidded around the last corner, almost tipping her uncle from the chair.  She had to act fast – speed was her only chance, since she still hadn't worked out any way to bypass the Department's security.  She just had to hope they hadn't noticed anything yet.

The exit raced toward them; at the last moment, she clamped hard on the wheelchair's brakes, bracing her uncle as the wheels locked, to leave two trails of rubber on the polished concrete floor.

Hauling him up from the chair, she shrugged him over one shoulder, put her eye to the scanner, and pressed the Open button.

She heard the ultrasonics of a camera focusing.

And the exit did not open.

No!

She eyed the door.  The hinges.  Solid.  Strong.  Steel.

In the distance, the sound of sure footfalls, rapidly approaching.

Dojo.

Briefly, she closed her eyes.  Then dumped her uncle back in the chair and turned to face the end of the corridor.  The camera chirped again, and she looked up, straight at where it lay concealed in the ceiling.  At Nelson, no doubt, watching.

She smiled.  One leap, one vicious stab of slicing fingers, and she punched through the covering, felt the crunch and crackle of the spycam's death, and landed lightly, anger rising.

Waiting.

'Miss Leeth.'

'Sensei.'  She bowed.

'I have been instructed to bring you back.'

She shook her head.  'I need you to let me and the Doctor out.'

'Miss Leeth.  Leeth.  There is no need for you to escape.  You are doing well.  Return with me and explain your actions.'  He stopped; puzzled by the surprised smile that had blossomed as he spoke.

'No.'

He inclined his head.  'Then I will bring you back.'

'No, sensei.  You won't.'

If Dojo had found Leeth focused during training, today she had stepped beyond herself.  And he saw: in her face, in every sure movement – not fear or desperation driving her, but certainty and determination. 
She does not
escape, he realized. 
She runs
toward
something.

Then Dojo stepped forward and stopped thinking; forced, as a few times before by Leeth, to enter that state in which the fighter ceases to exist, and becomes the fight.

And as they
flowed
together, he realized his student had entered the same state, already.

He struck for her head: a hard, fast palm strike to end her challenge before it started.  But her neck rolled to one side, her body sliding to his left, and a powerful tap to his elbow smoothly deflected the blow.  She twisted in closer, avoiding his following knee strike while a slender arm blocked the elbow that would have broken her collarbone.

A series of one-two shots slammed in return at his chest, impossibly fast, but he'd read the tension in her arms and managed to interpose his forearms, though shocked anew by the forces he parried.

In staccato succession then, knee, elbow, palm, and wrist strikes followed, on both sides; the exchange of attacks and counters rising in a crescendo of violence.  Each onslaught met in turn by impeccable defense.

Leeth fought with controlled ferocity, her lips peeled back in joy, delighting in the symphony they wove with their limbs.  Close together now, bodies touching, each read the other's intent as it formed; each shifted instinctively to fit the answering move into their deadly contest.

Together, they soared.  Spinning and striking in a duet danced on a cliff's edge, where one misstep would collapse the edifice to splinter and fall apart.

Martial art encounters follow a pattern: a cautious circling, a probing for openings, punctuated by flurries of blows that shift the balance this way or that.  Each engagement lasting less than a second.

Leeth and Dojo's exchange had now stretched to twenty seconds without pause. 
She
fought with a hunger for this confrontation that bordered on the psychotic.  Time and again he hammered blows into her that rocked her.    They pounded into one another, every time they dared trade defense for offense. But each blow only steeled her; intensified her answering blow.

Thirty seconds.
  And Paul Kawatsu sensed Leeth lose herself utterly as she soared higher, unleashing a whirlwind of attacks inhuman in their speed and force.  From all directions, unrelenting. 
Accelerating
.

He blocked, and blocked, and blocked, but the tornado rose higher; and his stamina, unlike hers, had its limits.

Seeing his vulnerability, she
exploded
in a torrent of attacks impossible to withstand.

Chest heaving, Leeth collapsed forward, hands braced on knees, gulping air. 
Yes!

And heard lighter footsteps approaching –
Little Brother.
   But already, she was hauling her teacher to the scanner to peel back one eyelid.
 

Chapter 47 

'What do you mean, Dojo is
down?'
Father demanded.  'Where is Leeth?'

Little Brother looked helplessly around the empty corridor, his weapons re-holstered, checking Dojo's pulse.  'Well… gone.'

Nelson interrupted.  «I've got her, she's out on the street- 
Shit!
  The little bitch just prised open a drain cover.  She's folding up the wheelchair…  It's down.  Huh!  She just grabbed the Doc and jumped down with him.  Hang on, let me shift to another cam….»  There was a silence, then a breath that sounded somehow disbelieving.  «She just frickin' reached up and dragged the steel grate back in place, one-handed!  I've lost her.»

«Then get a drone down there stat, Nelson!  She won't be able to travel fast, hauling the Doctor and that chair.»

Three minutes later, Mother, Father, and Nelson were treated to the sight of Leeth plucking the drone from the air to glare directly at them, before stabbing it with her fingers.

Father swore.

-

'
You
don't want to hurt
us?'

In the dimly-lit tunnel, the man turned to his grubby cohorts, harsh laughter rolling and echoing around her.  As if she'd said something
hilarious.

'Think you got that backwards, sliv.'

She frowned, studying the rag-tag crew blocking her route.  Thinking. 
I still have to get into the hospital, and I didn't bring a change of clothes….

Jugular
, she decided
, for the one in front
.
Spin him down to set me up to gut the ogre…

Yeah.

'Reckon me and-'

Blood arced as her fingers swept his throat.  Her other hand grabbed his shoulder, shoving him aside, directing the arterial spray.  But the ogre was already moving, faster than she'd expected.   She had to angle her next strike diagonally up across his belly as she dived past, and barely avoided the spray of gore.

Crashing into the two drug-ruined human rats behind him, she broke the arm of one drawing a gun she hadn't seen.  Plucking it from his hand, she hammered it into the head of the other.

Then stepped delicately back over the bodies to her uncle's body and the folded up wheelchair.

'Sorry,' she said, waving the gun at the remaining group.  'Look, maybe we should start again.  Like I said, I don't
want
to hurt any of you, but we
need
to get past.  It's real important.'

Properly introduced, they were much more polite.

-

From the bedside where she found Dr Ranatunga, Leeth left a trail of unconscious orderlies and security guards on her path to Marcie's room.

Slapping awake her uncle, she pushed his chair to the side of the bed, dragging Dr Ranatunga with her.