Net Force

condescension had to be high on her list, since she got so much of it. She was only twenty-seven — that got comments, a woman — more comments, and Italian — that one was usually good for three or four Mafia jokes. She wondered why it was men felt the need to behave with her as they sometimes did. Not all men, not all the time, but enough so that it was sometimes a chore dealing with them. More than sometimes, it seemed to her.

Another day, in a better mood, she'd have smiled and shaken her head and turned away, let the boys have their fun. But right now, she didn't much feel the milk of human kindness flowing through her. It had been a long, crappy night, and was shaping up to be a long and crappier day. She didn't need this. And know what? She didn't have to take it.

So she said, 'I'm sorry your education has been so narrow.'

Spandex frowned. He knew an insult when he heard it. 'Excuse me?'

She smiled wider, as sweet as she could make it. 'Which part didn't you understand?'

'Look, ma'am, there's no reason to get snotty.'

'Oh, I agree. So, you're a black belt, is that right?'

'That's right.'

'Tell you what. Why don't you come over here and see if you can hit me? And I'll show you how my little shuffle works.'

Spandex and Eyebrows exchanged glances. Spandex hesitated, and she knew why. This was a no-win situation for him. If he whacked her, he was a big bully picking on a little woman. If she whacked him, his manhood would be in great jeopardy.

'I don't think so, ma'am. I am an expert. I wouldn't want to hurt you.'

'I wouldn't worry about that,' she said. 'I don't think it's likely.'

She knew this was not a good thing to be doing. Her guru would be irritated in the extreme to know she was egging this guy on, but she couldn't seem to help herself. The trainee was so arrogant it rose from him like steam from a fresh-cooked hot dog on a winter's day in the Bronx.

Eyebrows waggled the hairy bar at Spandex. 'Hey, you don't have to hit her hard. You can pull it. Just show her a couple of your moves.'

Spandex grinned. A chance to shine? How could he pass that up? 'All right, ma'am.'

He walked closer. When he was about three meters away, he stopped. Bowed. Dropped into a narrow horse stance and edged forward, hands lifted, one high, one low. 'You ready?'

She almost laughed. Might as well send her a telegram. 'Oh, yeah.'

He was fast — and he was smarter than he looked. He didn't try one of the flashy and stupid high kicks. He scooted, stepped in, and fired a quick, hard right punch at her chest, right leg leading. It was a good shot, in balance, aimed where it wouldn't cause her any great damage if she missed deflecting it. Kept his other hand up to cover.

Perfect.

He probably expected her to step back and parry, but that was not how it went in her version of silat, not in this situation. She double-blocked with both hands open, stepped toward him, set her left foot down in a front stance and ducked under his outstretched arm as she swung her right elbow into his ribs under the armpit. Made a nice hollow thump when she hit him. Stopped him cold.

Surprised the hell out of him, too.

Her feet were already in place. Base—

She reached up behind him fast, caught his left shoulder with her left hand. Angle —

At the same time, she reached up and across with her right hand and laid it on his forehead, elbow down. Leverage—

Those things done, she pushed forward, then tugged down and back at his shoulder at the same time she swept his head backward.

Base, angle, leverage. If you had all three, the technique always worked. No exceptions.

She had all three.

Spandex went down like a chainsawed redwood, hit the mat flat on his back. She could have followed up with elbows, knees, whatever, but instead she moved back two steps. She didn't want to hurt him. Just embarrass him.

The entire sequence, from the time of his punch until she stepped away, had taken just under two seconds.

He rolled up and started for her. 'Bitch!'

Well. So much for 'ma'am.'

He probably had a sequenced attack planned, a favorite combination of kicks and punches, fakes, sweeps, before the killer shot that usually worked for him when he sparred for points. If she stood there and let him get to it, it could be dangerous.

She didn't let him get to it.

As he launched a left jab to set her up, she stepped outside with the two-handed block, alligatored his arm with both hands just above his elbow, pivoted, dropped all her weight to one knee and pinwheeled him. Some of the boxing styles did teach their students how to do a little grappling and how to fall, but apparently Spandex's was not one of them.

He did a half-flip, and slammed into the mat on his upper back again, hard enough to knock his wind out. This was all simple stuff, right out of the first djuru. Why work any harder than you had to?

Toni came to her feet, waiting to see if he was going to try a third attack.

Spandex was not so foolish. This time when he got up, he held out one hand in a no mas gesture. Lesson over. He knew when he was overmatched.

Toni felt pretty good, despite knowing she should not have felt that way. Then she glanced at the entrance to the gym.

Alex Michaels leaned against the wall, watching her.

* * *

Michaels walked over to where Toni stood. He was in decent shape. He ran three or four miles most days, did a little triking and had a Bowflex machine in his condo for resistance work, but it had been a long time since his hand-to-hand training in the military, and later when he'd joined Net Force. Computer geeks didn't spend too much time in real-world hot-field situations. He thought he could handle himself in most one-on-one situations, but he would not have particularly wanted to take on the big guy just getting up off the mat, and after watching Toni toss the poor joker around like a Frisbee, he sure wouldn't have wanted to take her on. He knew from her file what the fighting system was, though he didn't know much about it. Amazing.

'Very interesting,' he said. 'It's called silat. Where did you learn it?'

She wiped at her face with a towel. 'There was a little old Dutch-Indonesian woman who lived in my neighborhood when I was about thirteen. Her name was Susan DeBeers. She was in her sixties, retired, her husband recently dead. She liked to sit on the stoop of the building across the street, smoke a small carved meerschaum pipe and enjoy the spring sunshine. One Saturday, four gang-bangers decided they wanted her spot. She got up to leave, but it wasn't fast enough for them. One of them tried to speed her up with a kick.'

Toni slung the towel over her shoulder. 'These guys were eighteen, twenty, had knives and sharpened screwdrivers tucked into their pockets. I was waiting for a bus, I watched the whole thing. It took maybe fifteen seconds, and I couldn't tell you to this day exactly what she did to them. Here was this little old potbellied woman smoking like a chimney who pounded and threw four thugs around like tennis balls, kept her pipe in her mouth the whole time, didn't work up a lather. She put all four of them into the emergency room. I decided I needed to learn whatever it was she knew.'

'She had a school?'

'No. I walked across the street a couple of days later — took me that long to get my nerve up — and asked her if she would teach me. She just nodded and smiled and said, ‘Sure.' I trained with her until after I graduated from college and moved to Washington. Whenever I go home to visit my folks, I work out with her.'

'She must be getting up there,' Michaels said.