Cally's War

by John Ringo

His assistant, Wilson, had shifted his furniture again. Around the low table there were four chairs. Two Indowy and two human. At the moment, three of the chairs were full, and his assistant had just brought in a tray of coffee and mineralized water. He quirked an eyebrow at Aelool.

  "Should we wait for Roolnai, or should we go ahead?" he asked.

  "I think it would be better if we proceeded. Clan Chief Roolnai is indisposed. I will fill him in on what was discussed later." The tendrils of his green fur, really a photosynthetic symbiote, wavered slightly in the breeze from the air vent.

  Vitapetroni and O'Reilly exchanged a look. The doctor's eyes dropped and he shook his head slightly.

  "So, Doctor, what, precisely, are we dealing with?" The priest took a cautious sip of his coffee. Wilson was precise and efficient about so many things, but his coffee was erratic. Sometimes it was on the verge of too cold, sometimes piping hot, or anything in between. A too-hasty sip was apt to leave his tongue burned for a couple of days.

  "She's normal. Well, as normal for what we made her as possible. She's been working too hard. She's too involved in her job. She badly needs an extended sabbatical for marriage and kids. But beyond that, she performed exactly as she's been trained and conditioned to perform. I told you back when you made the decision to salvage Petane which agents couldn't know, and couldn't be allowed where they might come to know. She is what we made her; she performed as designed." The doctor looked at his hands and back up at the priest and the Aelool. He shrugged.

  "I am afraid that this example of a human operating as designed may be a problem for my people." Aelool's eyes were, characteristically for his species, but oddly for him, fixed on the ground.

  "Miss O'Neal says that she would not have killed the man if he had been either removed from the TOL, as opposed to inactivated on account of recorded death, or if he had been a more than minimally valuable source, or if he had shown any likelihood of being more than a minimally valuable source in the future. I'm inclined to believe her," Vitapetroni offered.

  "Yes, Al, but the fact is, she did kill him when she had ample reason to believe we didn't want him killed," O'Reilly said.

  "She doesn't have the organization's wants and wishes as a safeguard. That was a very deliberate decision for all the field operatives of her specialty, so that if the Bane Sidhe had to order a killing we were ambivalent about that ambivalence wouldn't compromise the operative's effectiveness. She found out he wasn't dead, she checked the TOL, he was on it, she killed him. She might as well have been a guided missile. We trained her to follow certain orders. She followed them. Without her personal feelings she might have checked back for clarification. Probably would have. But I can't emphasize enough that you don't tell one of our assassins to kill a man you don't want dead," the doctor said.

  "You humans have a phrase that I believe may apply. Something about lawyers that protect houses?" Aelool looked grave.

  "Guardhouse lawyer. She probably believes, in fact does believe, she was being one. But then she's been trained not to recognize some of the psychological aspects of her training. The traumatic stress dream cycle suppression, for example. She never seriously wonders why she doesn't have nightmares. Her free will not to kill someone on the TOL she encountered or became aware of and was able to kill without compromising a mission . . . well, I don't mean to say it was nonexistent. But it was considerably less than she believes it to have been, or than either of you obviously believe it to have been. I repeat, gentlemen, you must not tell one of these assassins that someone is a target if you do not want that individual dead," he insisted.

  "Team Hector's assassin knew about Petane for a couple of decades. He obviously resisted the temptation to kill him," the priest pointed out logically.

  "Team Hector's assassin was told Petane was alive and was ordered not to kill him," the doctor said.

  "If I recall correctly, you had advised us that we could not reliably expect Miss O'Neal to obey such an order and that she had to be protected from the knowledge of his status," Aelool said.

  "Yes, I did. She owed a personal debt of honor to Team Conyers, or believed she did, after they attempted to save her life when she was the target of an assassination attempt, and after they fought in battle beside the O'Neals when the Posleen attacked the O'Neal house. I wasn't certain she would disobey the order, but I was certain the stress of having to obey it would have done substantial damage to some of the very qualities that protect her basic mental stability despite her very demanding profession."

  "While we are always mindful of the great debt our people owe to Clan O'Neal, one of our concerns is that this particular problem has happened within that clan before. Even though there have been only two such incidents, the size of the clan is such that concern has been raised among the nonhuman associates of the Bane Sidhe that we may be seeing the beginnings of a pattern. Much as we regret to even broach the subject, we must wonder if we are beginning to see a flaw in the line." If anything, Aelool's eyes were even more firmly fixed on the floor.

  "What are your people seeing in terms of your interpretation of this possible flaw? It would help us to look for evidence that could either confirm or refute it, or to otherwise address your concerns, if we had more detailed specifics about the nature of those concerns." Father O'Reilly suppressed a wince at Aelool's facial expression. "Please, Aelool, I'm not saying that there's no cause for concern or that we don't have some understanding of why you're concerned. I'm saying that it would help us if you'd detail your people's concerns so that we can be sure we aren't missing any of the subtleties and finer points, so that we can do a better job of finding remedies together that will fix the problems to the satisfaction of all clans in the Bane Sidhe alliance."

  "This is hard to explain in human terms. It is not that an act for an individual or small set of individuals' good, but against the interests of the clan as a whole, strikes my people as dishonorable and disloyal, although there are overtones of that, so much as that it strikes us as . . . I suppose your best word for it would be insane. It comes across to us as having taken violent, crazed, uncontrollable carnivores into the very hearth of the clan itself." He held up a hand placatingly. "This is not how I see humans, but you must realize that . . . you have a saying about something that 'pushes your buttons.' It would not be an exaggeration to say that this one act pushes every button my species has about dealing with carnivores."

  "Okay. I can understand, given your species' culture and biology and social structure, why you would feel that way," Vitapetroni said, "but I'd make a couple of points that maybe we all need to keep in mind here. First, she is not uncontrollable. In this case the systems of control failed because they were not followed. Second, her readiness to kill is not natural human behavior. Each of our assassins has been very carefully manipulated to create a human who is both sane and able to kill on orders. That manipulation has to be done with precision. Third, she had a rational reason for not perceiving her act to be against the actual interests of the Bane Sidhe as a whole. The only actual harm it did was to embarrass the people who failed to revisit the decision to keep Petane alive. Fourth, she is still acting entirely consistently within designed control parameters, and has over thirty years done the Bane Sidhe far, far more good than harm. If the Bane Sidhe was willing to keep and use Petane for pragmatic reasons, how much more willing should it be to continue to make use of Cally O'Neal's training and talents."

  "That last point is one I can use to convince my people to go ahead with the next scheduled mission, given the importance of the mission and if you can assure me that Miss O'Neal is highly, highly unlikely to kill the wrong person or people on this mission. It doesn't address the long term issue of standards of loyalty," the Indowy said.

  "With respect, Aelool, we aren't going to have the same outlook as your people because, well, we aren't you. If your people expect us to be, well, Indowy that can be used for the violent missions, you're going to be disappointed. Any resolution is going to have to
take into account the differences between the psychology of our species," Vitapetroni said.

  "Al, you're supposed to be helping make things better," O'Reilly sighed.

  "I am. I'm not an expert at xenopsychology, but I do understand and appreciate that Indowy loyalty is one way. Totally. From the individual clan member to the clan. That won't work with humans. If the Indowy can't find some way to come to terms with that about us, this alliance will not work. They cannot think of human members of the Bane Sidhe as members of their clan. It would lead to . . . unrealistic expectations," he insisted.

  "We are quite aware that humans are not Indowy, thank you."

  "But not aware enough. Had you been, your people would have understood that loyalty down the chain from the organization to the individual is not some eccentric detail of etiquette, but is vital to dealing with humans in an organization. Petane's status would have been reviewed. I take some of the blame that it was not. I shouldn't have assumed more understanding on both sides than there was. I should have explicitly informed you of the organizational hazards of not periodically reevaluating the Petane decision to see if it was still justified to let the man live. That part, that I didn't make sure you understood that necessity, or that our base commander here didn't understand that he had to bring it up. That's my fault." The psychiatrist tapped his chest with a hand.

  "And you would then say that not understanding you was our fault?" Aelool's grip on his glass tightened.

  "Not at all. I'd say we learned to understand each other better. How we found out wasn't exactly pleasant." He grimaced. "Not to sound too much like a shrink, but I think both sides need to think a bit about how this knowledge affects our policies."

  "Or the arrangement itself," the alien sighed.

  "We understand that. At the same time, it is possible that we could use this understanding to revise our policies to pursue our mutual goals without having this kind of thing happen again," the priest interjected.

  "Yes, that is possible. I would like the doctor's assistance in exploring the ramifications and details and looking for anything related we may have missed. Meanwhile, I think I can make the case, given how critical the need for this particular mission is, and how good a body type match Miss O'Neal is for Miss Makepeace, for continuing with this mission. After that . . ." he trailed off.

  "I agree. We can discuss the other issues after we get Team Isaac in the field," O'Reilly nodded.

  "I think we must all hope that that mission goes well," the alien's expression was the Indowy equivalent of a deep and troubled frown.

  * * *

  Wednesday morning, May 22

  When the knock at the door came for breakfast, she looked over at the alarm clock. Seven-thirty? Ugh. She pulled on her bathrobe and trudged to the door, rubbing her eyes. I suppose sleeping in was a vain hope. They want to emphasize I'm in the doghouse. I don't care. The bastard needed to be dead—even if he was a pathetic schmuck.

  She opened the door and stepped back, blinking, as her grandfather walked in with the tray. It was set for two, with pancakes, eggs over easy, sausage links, orange juice, and coffee. It smelled like heaven, especially after a dinner of low-salt pinto beans in corn tortillas.

  "Okay, thank you. But . . . why? Yesterday you seemed royally pissed," she said.

  "I am. I am royally pissed that you are letting this job eat you. The guy you killed was a worthless asshole. Probably doesn't matter one way or the other that he died. Yeah, he'd earned it, but it probably wouldn't have hurt anything to let him live." He patted his pocket reaching for his tobacco pouch, looked at the tray and poured syrup on his pancakes, instead.

  "I can't believe you just said that. Team Conyers saved your butt, too, when the Posleen came up the gap. Doesn't that mean anything to you?" God, I sound shrill. I'm never shrill.

  "Sure. It means I think it's a crappy raw deal that they died so young—"

  "Were killed!" she interrupted.

  "Yeah, that tends to happen in this business, sooner or later. And I can tell you right now that if some bastard or crop of bastards gets me, that I do not want you to kill anyone you are not ordered to kill just because you think you owe me something. You're more than welcome to make the case that someone who was involved needs to be dead and take the mission if it's ordered, but I don't want you to do this again. I don't think Team Conyers would have wanted it either," he said.

  "That's what you want. We'll never know what they want, because they're dead, because of a fucking traitor, who is now dead, himself." It still made her mad as hell.

  "You have to let there be someone higher than you as the judge of who needs to be dead, or the job eats you alive. You have to have a life, or the job eats you alive. You don't have a life outside of the job, Cally, and that more than concerns me. It grieves me. I have been a professional a long time, I have seen other professionals, I've seen this job chew people up and spit them out and unless you get yourself some sort of meaningful life outside of work, and soon, you're setting that up to be you." He rubbed his head as if it was starting to ache.

  "Look, can we just eat before the coffee gets too cold?" She tasted it and made a face, stirring corn syrup and cream into it.

  "Sure. Look, I didn't come here solely to badger you. The mission is on, which means we need our mission brief tomorrow. Now, you can either brief me in now and I'll do the team brief, or you can get to work on it. You're no longer confined to quarters, or restricted in your computer usage, obviously," he said.

  "What, just like that?" She looked at him incredulously.

  "Oh, there will still be some kind of reckoning or resolution or whatever when we get back, but for right now they've decided that this mission is too critical to abort and that it's too late to assign it to someone else." He took a bite of his sausage.

  "Okay," she nodded.

  "Okay? Were you trying to get benched, was that what this was about?" He looked mad.

  "You know what it was about, dammit! Don't psychobabble me, Granpa." She took a swig of her coffee. Her lip curled slightly, but it was drinkable.

  "I'm not talking about killing Petane. I'm talking about the way you did it—without going up the chain and asking for his situation to be reviewed. Did you want to get benched?" he asked again.

  "Oh, of course not!" She ran her fingers through the brown curls and made a face at them. "Look, the last mission was pretty stressful, and maybe you have a point about the life thing. I'll think about it, okay? And after we get back, if the bosses don't shoot me or anything, I'll take a nice vacation. A real one, where I don't kill anybody, okay?"

  "And look for a man to date somewhere other than a bar," he said.

  "Hey, I promised to take a vacation, not settle down with the love of my life and pop out six kids, all right?" She looked at the corn syrup bottle again and shook her head, taking a bite of the bare pancake. Their idea of maple flavoring tended to suck out loud.

  * * *

  Vitapetroni took his lunch tray into the small side room and shut the door. Framed prewar travel prints of famous cities adorned the walls. He sat down with his back to Paris and let his eyes slide across Venice before settling on the young old man on the other side of the table.

  "Lisel, sweep for bugs, please."

  "My pleasure." The husky voice emanating from the doctor's PDA was not exactly what one would expect from a stodgy, respectable medical professional.

  "The only bugs here are me and Mr. O'Neal's AID, and I'm sure Susan wouldn't eavesdrop on us," it said.

  "Susan, don't listen until I call your name again," Papa O'Neal ordered.

  "Sure, Mike. What's say you and I run off to the Bahamas and you make an honest woman of me? Signing off." Then it was silent.

  "Lisel, shut down, please." Vitapetroni sat down.

  "Certainly doctor," she purred. "Goodbye."

  "You've got a Lisel loaded on top of your buckley? Doesn't that crash a lot?" he asked.

  "I keep the emulation turned way down.
I've just aliased my common commands so they sound like conversation if you aren't around me too much. I don't really trust AI. I know our AIDs and buckleys are clean, it's just . . . xenohistory is a hobby of mine, and I can appreciate the Indowy point of view." He took a bite of his taco, appearing to actually enjoy it.

  "And you haven't gone back to paper?" O'Neal joked.

  "I said I was mistrustful, not a Luddite." The doctor took a small bottle of hot sauce out of a pocket and shook some on his food.

  "Habanera sauce is cheating, you know. Okay, Doc, it's your dime," he said.

  "Dime? You just dated yourself as a fellow old fart." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "About Cally . . . and first of all understand I'm talking to you as her team leader, not her grandfather. Confidentiality rules let me talk to one, but not the other."

  "Yeah, I know the drill. Go ahead and say what you've got to say." He accepted the loan of the bottle and shook some hot sauce into his bowl of chili.

  "I have some concerns I didn't pass up the chain. She showed physical signs of feeling guilt after this kill." He swallowed heavily and glanced quickly towards the door. "That could be good or bad, depending on how she deals with it. I think she's okay for the mission, or I would have said something, but . . . I want you to keep an eye on her."

  "That all?" He buttered a corn muffin and looked up with it halfway to his mouth, waiting.

  "Yeah, it is. It probably won't matter a bit, but if you have to do some shade tree counseling on the spot, well, I thought you should know." The doctor shook a little pepper onto his creamed corn.

  "So, who do you like in the playoffs? I'm rather partial to Charleston." Papa O'Neal took a bite of the chili, considered it for a few seconds, then added some more hot sauce.

  "Hometown sentimentality. Their bullpen is weak. Indianapolis will clean their clocks."

  "Are you kidding? The Braves haven't won the pennant more than once since the war. My arthritic granny bats better than their lineup." He grinned.