away, and you’re going to stay the fuck away from her.”
The midshipman didn’t respond. Up turned his back on
him. “Come on,” he said to Taz, who was still shaking, her
fists tightly clenched.
“I guess you don’t like to share your toys, eh
Lieutenant?”
Up stopped.
“Uh oh,” someone said.
Up was reprimanded for beating the living shit out of the
midshipman, but Taz was left alone after that. They
continued their late night fighting sessions. She got in a few
more hits, and Up didn’t have to pretend that they hurt
anymore. She was getting better.
So he started getting harder on her. “Get up!” he hollered
one night as she lay on the floor, stunned after a particularly
hard blow to the head. He pushed his guilt for hurting her
away. It was the only way to learn.
She looked up at him, and he could see defeat in her
eyes. “I’m never gonna beat you, Up.”
“Not if you stay on the floor,” he said. She took a breath,
then pushed herself up.
They sparred, and soon she was back on the mat. She
was tiring.
“Get up!” he said again.
“I can’t,” she said, and this time she wouldn’t look at
him.
“Taz,” he said, and he bent down so that she had to meet
his eyes. “The next time you meet those robots, and they
knock you down, is this what you’re going to do? Lay
down and surrender? Run away and hide?”
“No,” she said.
“If there is one thing that I teach you, Taz, it has to be
this: no matter what comes at you, no matter how tough it