Miles in Love - Lois McMaster Bujold [120]
Nikki shrugged. "Dunno."
"Well, give me some guesses. You can't plan a strategy without good intelligence."
Nikki shrugged again. After a time he added, "It's not what they'll do. It what they'll think."
Miles blew out his breath. "That's . . . a little tenuous for me to work with, y'know. What you fear someone will think, in the future. I usually have to use fast-penta to find out what people really think. And even fast-penta won't tell me what they're going to think."
Nikki hunched. Miles regretfully gave up the notion of telling him that if he kept making those turtle-backed gestures, his spine would freeze like that, just as Miles's had. There was a faint, awful possibility the boy might believe him.
"What we need," Miles sighed, "is an ImpSec agent. Someone to scout unknown territory, not knowing what the strangers they meet are going to do or think. Listen carefully, watch and remember, report back. And they have to do it over and over, in new places all the time. It's bloody daunting, the first time."
Nikki looked up. "How do you know? You said you were a courier."
Damn, the kid was sharp. "I'm, um, not supposed to talk about it. You're not cleared. But do you think your school is as dangerous as, say, Jackson's Whole, or Eta Ceta? Just to pick a couple of, ah, random examples."
Nikki stared in silent and, Miles feared, justified scorn of this adult floundering.
"Tell you something I did learn, though."
Nikki was drawn, or at least, looked up.
Go with it; he won't give you more. "It's not as daunting the second time. I wished later I could have started with the second time. But the only way to get to the second time is to do the first time. Seems paradoxical, that the fastest way to get to easy is through hard. In any case, I can't spare you an ImpSec agent to check out your school for antimutant activity."
Nikki snorted warily, alive to the least hint of patronization.
Miles's grin twisted in bleak appreciation. "Besides, it would be overkill, don't you think?"
"Prob'ly." Grouchy hunching.
"The ideal ImpSec scout would be someone who could blend in, anyway. Someone who knew the territory like that back of his hand, and wouldn't make dangerous mistakes out of ignorance. Someone who could keep his own counsel and not let his assumptions get in the way of his observations. And not get into fights, because it would blow his cover. Very practical people, the successful Imperial agents I've known." He eyed Nikki meditatively. This was not going well. Try another. "The youngest subagent I ever employed was about ten. It wasn't on Barrayar, needless to say, but I don't think you're any less bright or competent than she was."
"Ten?" said Nikki, temporarily startled out of his surly knot. "She?"
"It was for a spot of simple courier duty. She could pass unnoticed where a uniformed mercen—where a uniformed adult could not. Now, I'm willing to be your tactical consultant on this, ah, school-penetration mission, but I can't work without intelligence. And the best agent to collect it, in this case, is already in place. Do you dare?"
Nikki shrugged. But his lip-biting stony look had faded into one of speculation. "Ten . . . a girl . . ."
A hit, a very palpable hit. "I put her down on my ImpSec expenditures log as a local informant. She was paid, of course. Same rates as an adult. A small but measurable contribution to speeding that particular mission to a successful conclusion." Miles stared off into the middle distance for a moment, with an air of reminiscence of the sort which usually preceded long, boring adult stories. When he judged the hook was set, he feigned to come back to himself and smiled faintly at Nikki. "Well, that's enough of that. Duty drives. I haven't had breakfast. If you decide to come out, I'll be here for another ten minutes or so."
Miles unlatched the lock and let himself out. He didn't think Nikki had bought more than one word of his in three, though for