ag.”
a’t think is the place to talk about this,” she tried, came to find me,” he said. “This is where I am.” ybe we could go to my cabin,” she said. I don’t think so. I think maybe we don’t be so … 1, if you know what I mean. We can talk business the conference room, someplace, but not your || don’t like the way it smells mere now.” ‘ dumping her?
decided. He was miffed. His manhood was in- y. He could pout for a while if he wanted, but a’t ready to give her up yet. She couldn’t believe be had too much power that way, it was her ti. Men never walked away from her until she was them to go. Never.
‘ she said. “But next time you leave the ship : telling me why and when, you might as well stay i won’t have you compromising our mission. If you into trouble, been picked up by the police for , where would that leave us? This is more im; than just you, Roberto.”
^smiled. “So you say.” He went back to selecting his ave.
: a flash of anger so hot she wanted to kill him, I where he stood, was going to pay for this. Dearly.
18
Washington, D.C.
Toni held the training kerambits she’d made, traced from her real ones onto a piece of stiff leather, then cut out and the edges rounded off to make them relatively safe. Relatively safe, because a hard hit with one could still leave scrapes and bruises. The points and inside edges of the leather blades were coated with lipstick, so that any place they touched left a red mark. Both she and Alex wore old white T-shirts and gray sweatpants that would show the marks if they were touched with the red.
Alex himself had a longer plastic knife, one that came from a G.I. Joe toy set, the rounded point and dull cutting edge also coated with waxy red.
Toni circled him in the empty garage-the Chevy convertible was finally repaired and sold, and he was without a project car at the moment. Gave them room to work out on rainy days such as this one.
“You have the longer weapon,” she said. “And in a knife fight, size does matter. But I have two blades to your one, so you have to be extremely careful. Slashing
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defensive,” she said. “Slashing can kill you, but longer. Your advantage is, you can stab for a
killing stroke, but these knives are so short that I’ll rip out a big blood vessel to do you any damage Mng.”
it’s comforting,” he said.
held his right hand, with the knife, in front of his j; kept his left hand under his right elbow. She could hear his thoughts: high-line, low-line. High-line,
owing what you can do with a weapon, or what I opponent can do, is vitally important. Against an with any skill, you will almost certainly get cut (life fight. The trick is to limit where, and how bad. ^ might have to take a nasty cut to end a fight in your But better to be stitched up in the ER than on life
inthelCU.” fe’d heard her say that often enough. He nodded.
she came in, she did it fast, and his slash and | was right on the edge of desperation. She got in, but aware of being touched on the arm and body by She jumped back as he flailed away at her missing.
ay, what do you see? Take a look in the mirror.” > moved a couple of steps so he was in front of the mir- y’d picked up at a garage sale. There was a red strip side of his neck, and three other less-defined ruby
i on his chest, belly, and inside his left elbow, if ell. Looks like I’m dead, Jim,” he said. fes, you are. Now, look at me.”
did so. Toni had a red long line on the outside of right arm, and a small spot under her sternum. Ton see?” she said. “I’m your teacher. I have been ng and practicing this art for more than a dozen times ng as you have. With real knives, I would have cut
carotid and probably the radial artery in your ante- fossa-inside your elbow crook there-plus slash-|xyou in the gut and chest. But even so, you would have
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opened my arm-which I could have survived-but also stabbed me in the heart.”
She touched the spot on her chest.
“Without quick first-aid care, one or both of us would probably have died after that trade, but we’d both have bled. A weapon changes things.”
“Yeah, so I see.”
“Against a knife bare-handed, you are in deep trouble. Even with a knife of your own, you can get chopped down.”
“And the moral of this story?”
She smiled. “If somebody comes at you with a knife, run. If you can run, don’t attack unless there are several of them, in which case, you take one out, then run. If you stand your ground, you have to cover your centerline, that’s your advantage.”
“But maybe we both die? That’s an advantage?”
“Everybody who carries a knife doesn’t have great skill with it,” she said. “You have to assume they do, of course, and move as if that were the case, but the truth is, most people who might attack you with a blade wouldn’t have gotten any of those hits I did except the arm. They wouldn’t have gotten me, either. And don’t forget, I have two knives, short though they are.”
“Bad for my wardrobe, though.”
She smiled. “You can always buy a new sport coat, sport.”
He smiled.
“Okay, let’s try it again. This time, block with your free hand, dorsal side, and sector to the outside of my attacking hand when you do. Getting out of the way of an incoming knife is usually a good idea-if you miss the block, at least you don’t get skewered. After that, we’ll switch, you attack and I’ll defend. That’s when the kerambits work the best.”
Later, when they were hi the shower washing off lipstick marks, Toni said, “There’s an exercise I want you to learn.”
CYBERNATION 165
i game,” Alex said. “Come closer.”
: that kind of exercise. A mental one.” t*
n’t sound so disappointed. It’ll be a couple of hours “ore Guru and the baby get home. It won’t take
: kind of exercise?” hypnotic suggestion.” ubbed her back with the bath sponge. “Uh-huh.
ok, I know you don’t think a lot of the spiritual and sides of silat. You think it’s all mumbo jumbo.” n’t say that.” 8ve me the sponge, I’ll do your back.” soaped the sponge and began scrubbing between ilder blades. “You don’t have to say it for me to But hypnosis is a perfectly valid tool, and you ‘ it yourself. It’s nothing more than autosuggestion i focus. You visualize things, practice them in your land it improves your skill.”
sound like Jay.” , listen. Take athletes. At the Olympic level, nearly “them use visualization to help their performances, practice their exercises-whatever they are, from ng to downhill skiing-in their imagination.” ill, I’m ticklish there,” he said. , you aren’t. Shut up. You ever practiced your djuttile sitting at your desk, just thinking about them “: of actually moving?”
”
: thing. Tests on athletes show that mentally prac- i lay down nerve memory channels just like do- (for real. Not as much, but some.” squatted, and soaped up his butt and hamstrings. > practicing mentally is useful,” she continued.
So?”
it’s your biggest problem with silat practice?” ; from you?”
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“I’m serious.”
He looked over his shoulder. “C’mon. How serious you expect me to take this while you’re rubbing my ass with a soapy sponge, Kemosabe?”
She smiled. “Think of me as your teacher and not your beautiful naked wife in the shower.”
“That’s hard.”
“It better be. But try.”
He nodded. “I’m too tense,” he said. “I haven’t learned how to relax when I move. I use too much muscle.”
“Right. So what we do is, we take you to a state of relaxation and suggestibility, and teach you how to get there posthypnotically.”
“You can do that?”
“To a degree, yes.”
“Okay. Is that before or after we make love?”
“Before.”
“Aw, come on.”
“Maybe instead of, if you don’t hurry up.”
He hurried.
When they had finished showering and drying themselves, she had him lie on his back on the bed. She stretched out next to him, but not touching him. “Okay, close your eyes.”
He did so.
“You comfortable?”
“Yep.”
“All right. I want you to imagine you are in the hallway of an office building. It’s an older place, but well- maintained. To your right is an elevator. Walk to the button that calls the elevator-it’s an old-style mechanical one. You push it, and it lights up.