A Conversation with the Management

A monk slunk through the tasteful, unostentatious archway, past three motionless sentries (of which an untrained observer would only have noticed two) and into the monastery courtyard, where he stood alone, a study in guilt. There was no need to announce his arrival, not verbally, just as there'd been no need for a verbal summons. The words "Get back here now" had simply turned up in his head.

The fish pool was close by and watching fish always made him feel better, but he didn't deserve to, so he didn't.

"Hey, are you the derelictor?" asked a passing slasher brother. Not someone he knew by sight. Almost all his fellow combat monks were younger than him these days...

Weft met the brother's eyes without flinching and signalled the affirmative. No, not good enough. He swallowed and, equalling the volume of the question, said "Yes, that's me."

He knew the score. No excuses and no trying to chulc your way out of it. Still, news got around fast, didn't it?

"Oh, wowl." And Weft found himself ocularly pinned and dissected. "Tell me, is it true what they say about long-term attachment missions? That you get corrupted and so on?"

"Only if you're an abnormally unworthy wretch," Weft told him. "So don't worry, you'll probably get killed before that could happen."

"Oh. Good." The slasher seemed to want to ask more, if Weft hadn't been rescued by the sudden thought that a senior brother wanted to see him now and he should be at a specific third-floor room immediately.

Rescued. One way of putting it. (He mounted the stairs with an unconscious elegance that had had to be painfully learned once upon a time.) Of course an agent who'd slacked off on the job would be a fascinating specimen to everyone. Slasher, dereliction; the two were impossible to connect together. Combat agents didn't wander off while on duty. You just didn't. Couldn't. Impossible. Except that he had. (Now along a hallway hung with embroidery representing the Virtues, which he most certainly wasn't going to let himself enjoy.)

Up until yesterday he too would have stared at a derelictor like some kind of mutant. Now that he was one, though, he didn't feel like he'd changed. Maybe that meant he'd been a potential derelictor all along, except that that would be to imply that the order's training could be flawed, which was impossible. Well, yes. Impossible, Weft decided, was a good word for the whole thing. Wait - no dissociating. He'd mucked up bigtime, nobody else, and he was jolly well going to make himself feel miserable about it.

At least his bosses, in their generosity, would almost certainly help. Weft pushed a door open and crept inside. He was in one of the empty lecture halls, but he didn't see any of it except the part directly in front of his feet.

"Have a seat, little brother," said his superior's voice.

They were going to drag this out, then? Well, he deserved it. Weft ducked obediently to sit on the nearest bench to the senior monk. "I... I'm... so sorry. I'm not going to try to excuse myself, it was unforgivable, and I know it doesn't count for anything, but I truly am... just really sorry."

"Have you quite finished babbling?" the senior brother enquired, managing to scoop Weft's gaze up from the floorboards and hold onto it.

"Y... sorry."

"Well then. I wonder what we're to do with you, Weft. The first combat fielder to go off against orders in I don't know how long; you're really making a habit of this individuality, aren't you?"

"What? No!" He hadn't had any idea what to expect, never having broken a rule before, but - definitely not that. It was like stealing some fish and finding you were charged with burning down the canning factory. Oops, and he'd just contradicted a superior. "I mean, I don't mean to, grandbrother."

"No, I'm sure you don't, otherwise this conversation would be much shorter." Pause. "We know your current assignment has put you under a lot of stress: is it too difficult for you?"

"It isn't. Nothing to do with stress or anything else, it was completely my own fault, being selfish and ungrateful and, uh, just really stupid."

"All right. Now we're going to try that again, and this time if you tell me what you think I want to hear again I will get very annoyed." The senior brother allowed this to sink in. "Is this surveillance attachment too difficult for you?"

Swallowing was too difficult for Weft just now. "No... I really think everything about it is within my capabilities. Spying on some primitive warlord and his riffraff excuse for an army, any surveillance unit's done that tens of times before. Keeping up with the target, well, he practically invites me to stay around. I think if he had to go somewhere quickly he'd even have a horse saddled for me. I don't understand it. Putting up with him is... maddening, except that when I think about it he's been nothing but friendly outwardly, and fielding sarcasm about our order is nothing we weren't prepared for in training. So there should be nothing I can't handle. Isn't anything I can't handle - it should be like cutting cotton. When I think about how difficult he could make it for me..." Weft vocalised a soft, bewildered sound.

"Oh yes indeed. The few times we've tried to send a different agent in, well, you know all about that. Your man wouldn't let him anywhere near. He honestly seems to trust you and yet distrust all the rest of us. As though there's any tangible difference one from the other." The senior monk laughed dryly.

No he certainly does not trust me, Weft thought, but he'd tried in vain to convince them of that too many times before.

"You understand, don't you, little brother, that this is why it has to be you and not another unit?"

"Yes... of course."

"If not for that reason, we would never subject you to a mission that's obviously a huge strain on you... what is it now? Oh, don't look so surprised. We love you, Weft, and of course we wouldn't put you through all that if there wasn't a critical need. We're the humane side, remember?"

"Yes."

"Not the savages."

"I know, grandbrother."

"So will you continue to fulfil your duties?"

"Of c... yes."

"With all your soul?"

"Yes."

"And you won't let your friend distract you?"

He cringed. "No."

"Pleased to hear it, little brother. Will it be a help to you if we have him killed?"

"No! Really. It wasn't his fault. He didn't know. He's harmless to us, not political at all, doesn't even care about the greater picture. Anyway, I'll never associate with him again."

"I don't think you need to go that far. It isn't as though friends outside are forbidden. We aren't cruel, Weft. If you say he won't be an impediment again then I believe you. Besides, I know you understand the liabilities of friendship, and its limitations, better than most."

It took Weft a second to realise what he was referring to. "Oh. Yes."

"Run along, then. Spend a couple of days around the monastery before you set back off again. And don't isolate yourself from your brethren. We are social creatures, not made to worry alone."

Weft stared at him, motionless.

"What is is now?"

"Aren't you even going to discipline me?"

"Hmm? Oh. A few hours going through the forms should suffice, don't you think? Now shoo."

Weft departed in disbelief. They'd been so nice... and purely a token punishment, because he would have taken the opportunity to sharpen his training anyway. He knew it wasn't his place to wonder what was going on - but he didn't deserve it, that was for sure.

The senior brother consulted briefly with his colleagues, who had been paying close attention through an open web. He was secretly a little disappointed; somehow, unreasonably, he'd expected more from the little slasher. Still, one of the most promising trainee diplomats had been expressing an interest in the case; he had asked for Weft to be kept around long enough to talk to him.

That should be interesting.