Mirror Friend, Mirror Foe

by Robert Asprin

  Hosato pondered the point. “I never thought of it in quite those coldblooded terms, Suzi. Surely there are other ways to deal with humans, even renegade humans.”

  “There may be other ways, but there aren’t any better ways. Humans violate many of the laws of nature. They can kill without the usual motives, not for food or self-defense, but out of anger, greed, or even at random on a whim. That is why humans are the most dangerous creatures in the universe. That is why only a human can stand against a human. You could have passed this ability on to your machines, but you didn’t. We have our parameters. That’s why no machine can effectively guard anything—including itself—against a human.” “But—”

  There was a knock at the door. Suzi immediately darkened her viewscreen and floated off to a corner. Hosato swept the room with his eyes as a quick check that there was nothing incriminating in view, then opened the door.

  Sasha was standing silhouetted in the doorway. “Come on, Hayama,” she said. “I’ve decided to buy your dinner. Unless, of course, you were planning on doing something else this evening.”

  “No. Dinner sounds fine.” Hosato smiled. “Be with you in a minute.”

  As he retrieved his shoes, he watched Sasha out of the corner of his eye, remembering Suzi’s oration: “… the most dangerous creatures in the universe.”

  They lingered over coffee in a quiet corner of the employees’ cafeteria. It was a huge place with lots of alcoves painted in bright, cheery colors.

  Hosato had found Sasha’s company surprisingly pleasant. She had let her hair down off duty, both figuratively and literally. Her dark hair now tumbled over her shoulders, framing her face and contrasting with the beige dress she was wearing. The dress was obviously not a uniform; it was cut too low at the neck for that. It was some kind of jersey material, conservative in style but tight enough to be provocative.

  Hosato studied her in a leisurely fashion as she talked.

  “So there I was with eight years’ experience and not a black mark on my record. Well the fact I was willing to take the job for less pay than most probably entered into it, too.”

  Hosato smiled appreciatively.

  “Actually,” she said confidentially, “I think some of the people who signed the authorization were hoping I’d fall flat on my face. To this day I don’t know which ones resented me because I was young and which ones didn’t like me because I was a woman in one of the last fields dominated by men, but the bad feeling was there. They were like a pack of vultures waiting for me to stumble. Let me tell you, Hayama, it’s great incentive not to make a mistake.”

  “I know what you mean,” Hosato murmured.

  He meant it as a random comment, but Sasha zeroed in on it for some reason.

  “How’s that. Oh. Yes, I guess there isn’t much room for error as a duelist, either.”

  Hosato smiled and shrugged. He had not intended to turn the conversation to himself. In fact, he was anxious to avoid it.

  “It’s very impressive,” he said. “Shoplifter patrol to corporation security chief in eight years. There aren’t many people of either sex who have that kind of a success record.”

  “Well, I had a couple lucky breaks.” She shrugged. “I guess I’m just a little more stubborn than most about pursuing them. Darn ill There I go talking about myself again. We’ve gone through an entire meal, and all we’ve done is talk about me.”

  “I think it’s fascinating,” Hosato insisted. “I don’t usually get a chance to talk to someone in your line of work. Tell me, why did you go into Security in the first place?”

  “No,” Sasha said firmly. “We’re going to talk about you for a change.”

  “Why. My life is terribly dull compared to yours.”

  “Dull. A professional duelist. I find that hard to believe, Hayama.”

  “Really. People tend to romanticize the profession, but it’s quite a drab existence.”

  “So tell me a little about this drab existence of yours.”

  In the face of her persistence, Hosato changed tack. “Actually,” he said, lowering his eyes, “I’d rather not talk about it. I’ve fought a lot of duels and killed a lot of men. There’s no way of elaborating on that without it sounding like bragging, and I don’t think it’s the kind of thing one should brag about. So, if you don’t mind, let’s just drop the subject and keep talking about you. Okay?”

  “If you dislike dueling so much, why did you go into it in the first place?” she pressed.

  “Shimatta!” He shrugged, grinning wryly.

  “How’s that?” Sasha frowned.

  “I said, 'Shimatta,'” Hosato explained. “It’s an old Japanese expression, one of the few I use.”

  “What does it mean?”

  “It means 'I have made a mistake!'” He smiled, “In common usage, it’s an exclamation or a curse, usually just after a major disaster. That’s how I got into dueling. Shimatta… I made a mistake, and I’ve been trying to correct it ever since.”

  Sasha cocked her head at him. “You’re a strange man, Hayama. Most men Fve met would try to use their violent past to impress me.”

  “Don’t misunderstand me.” Hosato smiled. “It’s not that I don’t want to impress you. You’re a charming and attractive woman. I guess I was raised differently from most people as to what is included in polite conversation.”

  “Okay. Then let’s talk about that Your upbringing. You were raised on Musashi, weren’t you?”

  “That’s right.” Hosato felt vaguely uncomfortable. Sasha’s tenacity was disquieting.

  “That’s one of the colony planets, isn’t it. One of those where a special interest group established a colony independent of corporation or government sponsorship?”

  “I’m surprised you’ve heard of it. Yes, it was originally a Japanese-. American settlement, but it’s pretty homogeneous now.”

  “I have a confession to make.” Sasha smiled. “I hadn’t heard of it until it showed up on your personnel form. After we contacted them to confirm your records, I did a little research on the place.”

  “That must have been a chore,” Hosato commented, “checking my records, I mean. My family moved around a lot, so my records are pretty scattered, with several gaps in them.”

  There was another reason for his family’s frequent relocation and the sporadic condition of their records. Both Hosato and his sister had received their educa- tion under three different names. It added to the completeness of their covers.

  “Oh, it wasn’t that much trouble,” Sasha assured him. “I’ve always been fascinated by the old Japanese culture. It was interesting to see what had survived the relocation into space. Do you know much about old Japan?”

  “A bit,” Hosato admitted… “had to learn about it as self-defense. A lot of people on Musashi were big on retaining ancestral ties. Fortunately, my family wasn’t so fanatical on the subject as most.” “Do you know anything about Ninjas?” Hosato suppressed his reaction with difficulty. If this was a trap, Sasha had laid it well.

  “A smattering,” he replied casually. “I always considered them more folklore than history.”

  “Oh, they were real enough. The Invisible Assassins. The main problem is separating fact from fantasy. Even their name, Ninja, comes from the word ninjitsu, the 'art of invisibility.' You wouldn’t believe some of the things they were able to do. That’s how the folklore thing got started. They did the impossible with such regularity that people thought they were somehow supernatural.”

  “What I can’t believe is how much attention you’ve given them,” Hosato commented. “I somehow never pictured you as the sort who got wound up over ancient history.”

  Sasha shrugged. “Normally I don’t,” she admitted. “But the Ninjas fascinate me… professionally. I mean, security is my main field of expertise, but from what I’ve researched about the Ninjas, I’m not sure I could stop one.”

  “Oh, come now,” Hosato chided. “You just finished saying they were human. Surely today’s se
curity—”

  Sasha interrupted him with a wave of her hand. “You didn’t let me finish. Let me give you an idea of how the Ninjas operate. The invisibility thing—they had a lot of fairly inventive gadgets that let them move freely where anyone else would be stopped cold, but that wasn’t their main weapon. Their real strength was in their secrecy.”

  “They can’t have been very secretive if you’ve found out so much about them,” Hosato interrupted.

  “What I’ve found out is probably just the tip of the iceberg,” she retorted. “The Ninjas were very close, organized in clans or families. All their secrets were passed on from generation to generation within the family. Can you read between the lines what that means. The children were raised into the system, trained from birth. Can you imagine someone trained his entire life to be a spy and assassin?”

  Hosato didn’t have to imagine it. What was more, the memories were making him uncomfortable, particularly considering the current situation.

  “But they’re still just human,” he argued. “One thing I’ve learned as a duelist is that a sword or a bullet kills a highly trained opponent just as dead as an untrained opponent.”

  “If you know who your opponent is. Look, the average thug we have to deal with today is fairly easy to unmask. His idea of a cover story is to use a different name and list some phony references. Check his references closely—say, like we did yours—and he’s caught. The Ninjas were required to maintain three, sometimes four completely separate lives. That’s what I meant about the invisibility thing. Someone in town is assassinated, but no one new has been seen entering or leaving. Obviously the assassin was 'invisible,' coming and going without being seen. What actually happened was that the guy who sells you your vegetables every morning is a Ninja, and has been living in the town for five years. He’s not really invisible, just very well camouflaged. If someone like that popped up today, we wouldn’t catch him, no matter how many checks we ran on his background.”

  Hosato was now desperate to change the subject.

  “It is interesting,” he admitted. “But academic. As I recall, the Ninjas died out a long time ago.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Sasha chided. “There were reports the clans were active into the twentieth century. There’s no real reason why they should have died out. Remember, their strength is their anonymity. The fact we haven’t heard of them lately could mean they’ve died out. It could also mean they’re still around and very successful.”

  “If that’s a possibility” — Hosato laughed — “I’m glad it’s your problem and not mine. You make me very happy I chose the line of work I did. Incidentally, I think you’ve proved my point for me. Next to your job, mine as a professional duelist is drab and unexciting.”

  Sasha winced. “I did it again, didn’t INo matter what I try, we always end up talking about me and my interests.”

  “Don’t apologize,” Hosato insisted. “I get the feeling there aren’t many people here at the complex you can talk to.”

  “That’s the truth.” Sasha made a face. “All in all, the people here are a pretty grim crew,”

  The robot that had been servicing their table chose this moment to wheel up and present the bill.

  “Almost robotlike?” joked Hosato, nodding his head at the intruder.

  Sasha produced her employee card and started to feed it into the robot.

  Hosato slapped her hand lightly. “Stop that.” He smiled, producing his own card. “Allow me this one concession to romanticism.” He fed the card into the robot, charging the meal to his own account.

  “Romanticism?” Sasha leaned back, studying him with a cocked eyebrow. “I suppose you feel that entitles you to carry me off to your room for activities of dubious morality.”

  “Certainly not,” Hosato laughed. “In fact, that was the furthest thing from my mind.”

  As soon as he said it, he knew he had made a mistake. Something went out of his dinner partner. She seemed to shrink for an instant, and when she moved again, it was with the brisk, efficient motions of the security chief again.

  “What I mean,” he hastened to add, “was that I really found your thoughts on Ninjas quite fascinating. So fascinating, in fact—”

  “That’s all right, Hayama,” Sasha said, cutting him short. “It’s rather late, anyway.” She rose but motioned for him to remain seated. “Go ahead and finish your coffee. I’ll just…”

  She stopped suddenly, staring at nothing; then a slow smile crept over her face.

  “Since you’re interested, Hayama, you should be the first to know. I think I’ve figured out a way to catch a Ninja.”

  “Oh, really. What?” Now she was smiling directly at him. “I’ll tell you, once I find out if it works or not.” A wave of her hand and she was gone, leaving Hosato feeling more than vaguely uneasy.

  “Make that feint believable. If you don’t draw the parry, you’ll parry yourself by attacking into a closed line when you disengage.”

  James nodded his acknowledgment without looking at Hosato, settled into his en garde position once more and again launched his attack against Suzi. Extending his sword to threaten the manikin’s chest, he hesitated a split second, then dipped his point and circled it left to evade the anticipated parry, and lunged.

  The sword in Suzi’s single arm remained rigidly in place, refusing to react to the feint. As such, James’s final lunge met an unyielding wall of steel as the blades met, and his point slid harmlessly past the target.

  Hosato rolled his eyes in exasperation but regained his composure before he stepped forward to address his student.

  “First off, you’re too tense. Relax for a minute and loosen up your sword arm. If it’s tense, your movements are jerky. That slows you up and telegraphs to your opponent what you’re trying to do. Minus two points, and you lose. Loosen that arm.”

  James obediently stepped back and dropped his sword arm to his side, flexing and shaking it in an effort to reestablish its suppleness. Hosato watched for a few moments before nodding his satisfaction and continuing.

  “Now, then,” he said firmly. “From the top. A disengage attack the old one-two. What are we trying to do?”

  “Hit the opponent,” James replied.

  “Hit the opponent,” Hosato mimicked. “That’s what you’re trying to do with any fencing move.”

  James gave a small sigh of exasperation. “The disengage attack is intended to negate your opponent’s defensive speed,” he recited. “As the defender has to move his weapon only four inches to parry an attack, and an attacker has to move his point four feet to score a hit, the defender is able to easily stop a straight lunge. Therefore, to successfully complete an attack, we first feint, drawing the opponent’s parry, then evade or deceive the parry and launch the actual attack.”

  “Correct,” commented Hosato, picking up his own sword. “Now, watch.”

  He came en garde smoothly, facing the boy, hesitated a moment, then extended the point without twitching any other part of his body.

  James watched with rapt interest.

  Hosato withdrew his arm to resume the en garde position once more. “You didn’t react,” he said accusingly.

  “React to what?” the boy asked, surprised. “That’s what I’m trying to show you.” Hosato smiled. “Heeii!”

  He was suddenly a blur of motion. His foot hit the floor with a slap as he crouched, sighting down his arm and sword at James’s chest. The boy’s reaction was instantaneous and reflexive. He bounced back a step, and his sword whipped up to defend against the attack.

  Hosato relaxed and stood upright again. “That time you reacted.” He smiled. “Why?”

  “I thought you were going to hit me,” the boy retorted, cautiously relaxing his guard.

  “Look at the distance between us. Even if you hadn’t jumped back, I couldn’t have reached you with my longest lunge.”

  James studied the floor between them.

  “A feint isn’t a move, it’s a threat. The
first time, when I just pointed the sword at you, I made a move. You didn’t feel threatened, so you didn’t react. The second time, you felt threatened and reacted. That was a feint. It isn’t done with the sword or even the sword arm. It’s done with the entire body, and most of all with the entire mind. Now, let’s try it again.”

  James obediently took up his position in front of the robot again. Hosato’s practiced eye noted the tension still in the boy’s sword arm. Apparently his student was getting tired. They’d have to end this lesson soon.

  The boy feinted and attacked, better than last time but still clumsy. Surprisingly, Suzi reacted, moving smoothly to parry the feint. The boy’s disengage slipped under the parry, and his point thumped home against the manikin.

  “Good!” Hosato called. “Try it again.”

  To himself, he wondered for the hundredth time about Suzi’s circuits. If the Hungarian had not assured him time and time again Suzi had no emotional capacity, he would have sworn she was going soft, overreacting to give James confidence.

  He let James complete half a dozen repetitions before commenting again.

  “Much better,” he called out at last. “Okay, let’s call it a day.”

  The quick sag in the boy’s body betrayed his carefully concealed fatigue. Hosato pretended not to notice.

  “Tell you what, James,” he said. “When you get home, find a full-length mirror and practice your lunge in front of it, lunging dead ahead at your own reflection. Then alternate the lunges with feints. When you can’t see the difference between your lunges and your feints, you’ll be ready to fool an opponent.”

  The boy nodded weakly.

  “Okay,” Hosato concluded, turning quickly away to store his gear in Suzi. “Same time tomorrow?”

  “Urn… Hayama. Could… can we talk?”

  Hosato shot a glance at the boy. He was still drooping with fatigue, but there was something intense about his eyes.

  “Sure, James.” He smiled, wandering over to a folding chair. “What’s on your mind?”