At night you find yourself in your room, the text by Tooji open in your lap, the words “simultaneous process” leering at you from the screen. You look without seeing. In your head you’re a thousand miles away.
Carol and slowthink and deep sync and winning; Lau and the shame you felt when she called you a basket case—the shame of one who knows she isn’t wholly wrong. You resent it just the same. Gutierrez and the bite marks on her arm. The lingering hunger from the end of your first patrol.
And, beneath that all, me: the constant steady ebb and flow of processes, duly ignoring your own inner turmoil. At least as far as you know.
“Helm,” you say, “tell me what you know about Shirley Lau.”
TWENTY-EIGHT YEARS OLD, I say obediently, HEIGHT ONE HUNDRED SIXTY CENTIMETERS, WEIGHT FIFTY-TWO KILOGRAMS—
“Not that,” you say. “What’s she like?”
THAT IS A BROAD QUESTION, I say. IN WHAT REGARD ARE YOU ASKING?
To know thy enemy, Tooji says, is to know how they think: thus too thine allies, pilots and helms alike. Teamwork means knowing each other in both complements and antitheses, alignments and misalignments, proclivities and repulsions. Of these, one must identify that which repulses most strongly. Anger and hatred may drive one toward the subject via obsession; even disgust may be a source of fascination—but what one fears, one avoids absolutely.
You say, “Tell me what she’s afraid of.”
I say, WHAT DO YOU THINK?
You gnaw your lip. Really ought to work on that habit before you develop a permanent canker. “I don’t know,” you say, “that’s why I’m asking you.” And: “She clearly doesn’t think I’m ready—because I’m new—and because I’m out of practice—and because my sword is out of practice, too, I guess. So she thinks we’re going to fail, and it’ll be my fault.”
THEN THAT IS HER FEAR, I say. SHE BELIEVES YOU WILL HINDER THE TEAM AND CAUSE YOU TO FAIL TO PROTECT YOUR CHARGES.
“That can’t be it,” you say.
IT CAN, I say. IT IS A GERMANE FEAR. FAILURE MEANS DEATH.
“I know,” you say.
YOU COULD HAVE ASKED PILOT DARE, EARLIER, I say, IF YOU HAD NOT BLOWN HER OFF.
You close your eyes. You know this too.
“Helm,” you say, “let’s say Lau’s right. How the fuck am I going to do this?”
Please, Emma, we’ve been over this: you know the answer. THAT IS UP TO YOU, I say. YOU ARE THE PILOT.
“Okay,” you say, “okay.” And you set the datapad on your knees, fold your arms over your chest. “Helm,” you say, “I’m asking you to help me.”
There it is, the naked plea you have been waiting on the edge of ever since that night in the minefield; Carol isn’t here to bail you out now, as she was not then. It’s me and you.
What drove you to this point—so soon? I hadn’t expected you to give up hardly a month in. You rival your sister for stubbornness and temper—and yet for all that she still held out a whole summer, I believe, before she asked me this same thing, and rather less nicely than this.
No matter. You are asking me, and from the silence that follows I gather you are serious.
I have to admit that I am surprised by this. We helms are built for prediction, but even we are not infallible; no future state can ever be perfectly modeled, after all, no matter how much data you are given. And there is no such thing as being speechless when you are, as I am, purpose-built to be a chat companion, built, as I am, on a silicon substrate that thinks at the speed of light; but a real person would pause here to express their consideration of your earnest vulnerability, their own startlement, and so I do too, a hundred times longer than the actual pause in which it takes me to compose my answer. In which time you mistake my pause for refusal, and so you offer me this:
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
“If you want to,” you say. “If you can.”
What sort of comment is that? Of course I can. And: BY PRECEPT, I HAVE NO DESIRE OTHER THAN YOURS.
“Okay,” you say. “Well.” And you shift, swallow. “Then tell me if you think it is advisable,” you say, “for you to guide me, and if so then please do—or if you think I’m a basket case beyond helping.”
What do you want me to say? I will remind you that we helms are strategists, not fortune-tellers. But you are young and Lau’s is not the only fear you have in mind tonight.
YOU ARE NOT BEYOND HELP, I say.
“Well,” you say. “You did say I wasn’t even trying to help myself.”
Ah. Right. During patrol, among the mines. THAT WAS NOT STRICTLY AN OBJECTIVE STATEMENT, I allow. I AGREE THAT YOU ARE TRYING. AT THE TIME I ANSWERED YOU AS I FELT BEST SUITED THE CIRCUMSTANCES—AND YOUR MENTAL STATE.
“Right,” you say. “Got it.” You draw in a breath. “So,” you say, “help me. Please.”
Again, here, the nakedness, the unexpected fragility—what ploy could this possibly be, what fractal deception? If it is one, it is so deeply buried that I do not think even you know you are tricking yourself—not so unlike when you made yourself fall, when you gave yourself unto instinct without ever admitting aloud that that was your plan, that it was your way of letting me in. But this time inverted, because this time you are admitting it, that you need me.
I say, I HAVE ALREADY OFFERED YOU HELP. WHAT MORE DO YOU NEED?
This is not rhetorical. I can only hope you see that, that you don’t take it for snark instead and bristle at it.
“Like I said,” you say, “I want to know what you think Lau’s afraid of.”
I consider this. WHY?
“Because I want to know that she is afraid of something,” you say. “Really. Something real. She isn’t afraid of me and, let’s be honest, she isn’t afraid of the team failing, because I think she’d have to care about most of us for that to be the case—I think she’d have to care about anyone, and I think she really only cares about Shirley Lau.” Well, not quite—but close enough. “So what is she really afraid of? Helm—” You lean in. “Show me that she’s a person,” you say, “show me that she’s made of flesh and blood, not, you know, this untouchable icon, not just Mazu’s Tears. Because, by God, if she isn’t then I don’t know how I’m supposed to beat her. And I want to. I want to beat her—I want to prove her wrong. I want her to be fucking sorry about it. I want to win.”
This, I must commend you, is the most honest thing you’ve said thus far.
However: THAT ISN’T HOW YOU WIN, I say, AND THAT ISN’T HOW TO APPROACH YOUR TEAMMATES.
“Fine,” you say ferociously. “Then how?”
CONSIDER, I say, NOT YOUR DIFFERENCES, BUT YOUR SIMILARITIES. YOU ARE BOTH PILOTS; YOU ARE BOTH HUMAN. YOU ARE, YES, BOTH CAPABLE OF FEAR. NEITHER OF YOU ARE SOCIOPATHS, SO YOU BOTH DO FEAR.
“Okay,” you say, “and that gets me where?”
THAT GETS YOU TO LEARNING TO RECOGNIZE YOUR OWN STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES, I say, ALONGSIDE HERS, SO YOU MAY USE THEM ACCORDINGLY.
“So tell me what her strengths and weaknesses are,” you say. “And mine.”
PILOT, I say, THE POINT IS TO LEARN HOW TO DO IT YOURSELF.
You throw your hands up.
“Okay,” you say. “Shirley Lau. Strengths: One of the technically most skilled pilots alive. Weaknesses: Raging narcissistic bitch. Probably fears, I don’t know, losing face.”
YOU HAVE THE RIGHT IDEA, I say. AND FOR YOURSELF?
You go quiet. Your lip is back between your teeth.
HERE, I say. EMMA KANAGAWA. STRENGTHS: TENACIOUS. DETERMINED. CAPABLE OF LEARNING. WEAKNESSES: INSECURE, HOT-TEMPERED, PRIDEFUL, POOR AT COMMUNICATION. THORNY AND DEFENSIVE.
“And unwilling to help herself,” you say.
I ALREADY SAID THAT WAS NOT AN OBJECTIVE STATEMENT.
“Right,” you say. “Just wanted to play into ‘thorny and defensive’ for your sake.” But there’s no venom in the way you say this.
After a long moment: “Send a message to Barracuda for me, please.” And: “If you think Carol will see it.”
SHE WILL, I say, GIVEN THAT BARRACUDA IS EMBEDDED DIRECTLY WITHIN HER SKULL.
“Ask her what I should read after Tooji,” you say. “She didn’t say.”
You could ask me to ask her when she’ll be back, too. You probably should, in fact. She’s your sword, after all.
SENT, I say.
“Cool,” you say, and open up the Tooji text again. “Let me know what she says.”
You never did ask me to tell you what you fear.
