by John Scalzi
Harry reached up and grabbed the top of the Korban’s foot with his left hand; with his right he formed his fingers into a point and jammed them into one of the hexagonal depressions as hard as he could. As he did, Harry could feel something tear: the fleshy valve that closed to keep the water inside the Korban. It tore, and a spray of warm water pushed out of the Korban’s foot and splashed over Harry.
The Korban offered an unspeakably horrible scream as the unexpected pain obliterated any other focus and tried to shake Harry off. Harry hung on, jamming his fingers further into the valve. He wrapped his left arm around the Korban’s lower leg and squeezed, juicing the Korban. Water sprayed on the floor. The Korban hopped, frantically attempting to dislodge Harry, and slipped on the disgorged liquid. It fell backward, causing the entire floor to quake. Harry switched positions and now started pushing on the leg from the bottom, forcing even more water out of it; he could actually see the leg deflating. The Korban howled and writhed; he clearly wasn’t going anywhere. Harry figured that if the judges had any brains at all, they would have to call the round any second now.
Harry looked over to Schmidt. Schmidt looked at him with something akin to raw terror on his face. It took Harry a minute to figure out why.
Oh, right, Harry thought to himself. I’m supposed to lose.
Harry sighed and stopped juicing the Korban, letting the leg go. The Korban, still in pain, eventually sat up and looked at Harry, with a look that Harry could only imagine was complete confusion. Harry walked over and knelt down into the Korban’s face.
“You have no idea how much it kills me to do this,” Harry said, reached out to the Korban’s face and made a grabbing motion. Then he stuck his thumb out from between his index and middle fingers and showed it to the Korban. The Korban stared at him, non-comprehending.
“Look,” Harry said. “I got your nose.“
The Korban swung a haymaker straight into Harry’s temple, and the lights went out.
* * *
“That’s really not the way we expected you to do that,” Schmidt said.
From his bunk, Harry tried very hard not to grimace. Facial expressions hurt. “You asked me to keep it close, and you asked me to lose,” he said, moving his jaw as little as humanly possible.
“Yes,” Schmidt said. “But we didn’t think you’d make it so obvious.”
“Surprise,” Harry said.
“The good news is, it actually worked for us,” Schmidt said. “The Korban leader—who, incidentally, you caused to get drenched in fruit juice when you kicked your competitor into the stands—wanted to know why you let your competition win. We had to admit we told you to lose. He was delighted to hear it.”
“He had money on the other guy,” Harry said.
“No,” Schmidt said. “Well, probably, but that’s not the point. The point was he said that your willingness to follow orders even when winning was in your grasp showed that you could make a short-term sacrifices for long-term goals. He saw you almost winning as making a point about CDF strength, and then losing as making a point about the value of discipline. And since he seemed quite impressed with both, we said those were indeed exactly the points we had wanted to make.”
“So you have brains after all,” Harry said.
“We rolled with the changes,” Schmidt said. “And it looks like we’ll come out of this with an agreement after all. You saved the negotiations, Harry. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” Harry said. “And I’ll bill you.”
“I have a message for you from Ambassador Abumwe,” Schmidt said.
“I can’t wait,” Harry said.
“She thanks you for your service and wants you to know she’s recommended you for commendation. She also says that never wants to see you again. Your stunt worked this time but it could just as easily have backfired. All things considered, you’re not worth the trouble.”
“She’s welcome,” Harry said.
“It’s nothing personal,” Schmidt said.
“Of course not,” Harry said. “But I like the idea that I had choreographed having the crap kicked out of me down to that level of detail. Makes me feel like a genius, it does.”
“How do you feel?” Schmidt said. “Are you okay?”
“You keep asking that same very dumb question,” Harry said. “Please, stop asking it.”
“Sorry,” Schmidt said. He turned to go, and then stopped. “It does occur to me that we know the answer to another question, though.”
“What’s that?” Harry said.
“How well you can take a punch,” Schmidt said.
Harry smiled, and then grimaced. “God, Hart, don’t make me smile,” he said.
“Sorry,” Schmidt said again.
“How well do you take a punch, Hart?” Harry asked.
“If this is what it takes to find out, Harry,” Schmidt said, “I don’t want to know.“
“See,” Harry said. “I told you you were soft.“
Schmidt grinned and left.
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