"You never need an argument against the use of violence, you need an argument for it."

Noam Chomsky

Jacob Trials drove in silence, his thoughts swirling on the things The General had told him, was still telling him. The General sat beside him in the passenger seat of their compact black rental, speaking even as his eyes took in the view of the Italian countryside racing past. This was the scenery of the movies, green pastures extending beyond view over rolling hills dotted with rustic, low-slung brick farm houses and open barns. The weather was warm and the sun bright despite the time of year.

They had moved off the wide tarmac roads and were now driving down narrow country lanes, blind curves meaning it was a slower drive than Trials would have liked. They saw no other vehicles on their way, though, and the journey passed without incident, allowing Trials and The General to speak.

"I followed a few of those mercenaries of his coming out this way a few times. There's only one villa out here that they could possibly be keeping your friend in; it's secluded, remote, and quiet. Unfortunately, I can't tell you how many people are going to be there, so we're going to have to take this slow and steady," The General was saying.

Trials felt a flare of anger at The General, at himself, for the way in which they had both settled quickly back into the roles they had so often used; he the follower, the tool, The General the leader, the guide. Trials told himself it was just for the moment, just until they got Mike out, and then there would be a reckoning. He would not forget what had happened to Lt. Cooper. Whoever she was, whatever she had done, she didn't deserve that kind of death.

He was aware The General had asked him a question.

"Sorry, what?" Trials asked.

"Weapons, Jake. What weapons do you have?" The General sounded impatient.

"None. You know I got out of there as soon as I could. I didn't have time to pack anything and certainly not something I could feel safe taking across Europe with me."

The General harrumphed in what sounded like annoyance. There was a brief silence, until he spoke again.

"That is a pity. I'm quite sure that whoever is at the villa will be armed. How are you at stealth these days?"

Trials wandered why he was asking. He knew Trials was one of the best. He could hold positions for periods of time that even a talented contortionist would struggle to hold, the nanites in his blood regulating fluid flow, numbing pain and micro-flexing static muscle fibres. When he had to move, he could move smoothly and silently, not a single twitch out of place.

"I'm still good," he answered.

"Then I am afraid this will have to be an up-close-and-personal confrontation, Trials. I know you don't like them, but..." reaching back as he spoke, The General grabbed a tyre iron and held it out, "...I fear you will have to."

The Villa stood atop a hill amongst terraced gardens, overlooking the city a few tens of kilometres away. Birdsong and the buzzing of insects filled the air, the occasional blur of sudden movement hinting at life in the bushes. The villa itself was bright white, its stuccoed front almost blinding. Squat and square, it had only two floors and must have held no more than a handful of rooms, yet it had somehow been designed to give the air of a much larger structure. Every approach to the building ran up a steep siding that meant visitors were forced to crane their necks to see it, and would be easily visible on their approach.

Trials was thankful that the gardens hadn't been designed with observation in mind. He crouched low behind an ivy-strewn wall no more than a few feet in height, legs spread and spine bent at an angle that would have caused massive cramp to almost any regular person, and, he had to admit, at an angle that looked frankly ridiculous. He was frozen in position, listening for the sounds of human motion.

Hearing was another sense Trials was coming to realise had been enhanced by the nanites. He was able far more readily to distinguish between separate sources of sound than he had ever been before, readily recognising and filtering out the background noises of wildlife and the gurgling stream running close by. He thought it had to do with his pulmonary system. He'd read of isolation rooms so silent you could be driven crazy by the sound of your own pulse, so surely blood flow was a constant, unrecognised source of interference to the auditory nerve. Trials' pulse, though, was amongst the lowest and steadiest anyone had ever possessed, and it dropped even more at times such as this, when he fell unnaturally still. He was literally clearing his head.

Footsteps.

They were coming from up ahead, towards the house, perhaps 6 meters away. He closed his eyes, visualising the area around him that he had memorised as he crawled to this point. A white, armless statue a few degrees to his left, a curving bush with wide gaps directly to his right that led to a small, colonnaded square with a stone floor. The footsteps were coming from... a few metres before the square, leisurely heading towards it. The smell of tobacco wafted into his nostrils, at the same time as the footsteps stopped.

So... someone was taking in the view with a quiet smoke. Trials didn't think it would be a problem if he moved slowly over there, swung himself over the wall just here, and then...

The guard collapsed at Trials' feet as he released the choke-hold, eyes rolled upwards and breathing shallow. Trials looked at the tyre iron in his left hand. He knew he should make sure this guy wouldn't get up again. Leaving an unconscious body lying around was a promise of trouble later on. No one stayed conveniently out for the length of a final showdown like they did in the movies. People who had been knocked out tended to soon groan, shout, and start looking around for whoever the hell had knocked them out in the first place. Trials knew what he should do. He'd done it before.

For some reason, he didn't have the stomach for it this time.

He rolled the man face down and slammed the tyre iron into the back of his head, as lightly as he could whilst still feeling it served some purpose. From the jacket he had worn for just such an occasion he drew out a long length of cable, wrenching the man's legs and arm together behind his back and binding them. Then he drew a length of cloth and stuffed it between the man's teeth, drawing a cord around it and the man's skull to hold it in. Quickly lifting his head above cover, he checked his surroundings. No-one. Good.

He hefted the man easily onto his shoulders despite the unconscious form being so large and muscled as to be twice his size, and paced quickly back down the garden, taking care not to expose himself from cover for too long. He dumped the body close to the exterior wall, wedged between it and a small rise. The man wouldn't be comfortable, but he'd be alive.

"Who the fuck are you?"

The voice made Trials spin around in alarm, and he was already rolling before the figure had a chance to raise his rifle. Instead of rolling away, he rolled directly towards the figure, reaching out with his hand to force the barrel of the gun back down towards the ground, which a bullet smacked into as the man desperately pulled the trigger and the rifle fired with a loud report.

Trials flung his other hand up, balled into a fist, catching his attacker on the chin and sending him flying back, feet actually leaving the floor for a second. Trials didn't allow him time to recover. Throwing himself forward, he smashed into the other man and forced him further back, knocking him down among the leaves and twigs of a dry, thorny bush. The tyre iron came up of its own accord.

A minute later the deceased man lay atop his unconscious comrade, his automatic rifle now slung over Trials' shoulder.

Trials wiped a splatter of blood from his forehead, succeeding only in spreading it in a smeared line across his temple. He shuddered involuntarily as the unconscious figure stirred below, hands twitching in gradually regained lucidity.

Trials looked down at the gun. An Israeli Tavor 21. Modern and very efficient.

The man on the ground groaned, and his eyelids flickered open. With a sigh, Trials put a bullet through his head.

There were two more men on the ground floor of the villa. The first one was easily taken out as he stood by the window, holding back a curtain likely to look for his two missing fellows. This time, the sound of the gun and breaking glass must have been audible throughout the building, because there was an indistinct movement through the windows of the next room and returning fire pattered into the ground several feet from where Trials was. Clearly the remaining guard wasn't sure where the attack had come from.

Trials eventually got him by simply crawling up to the wall and unleashing a flurry of bullets through it, turning the room inside into a storm of piercing metal. He lay still for a while afterwards, listening for movement, but hearing nothing he stood and clambered through the broken window, glass crunching underfoot.

The General was already standing inside.

"Excellent work, Trials. I see you haven't lost your edge these past few years."

Trials glared at him.

"How the hell did you get in here before me?" he demanded. "It might not be safe."

"It's clear," replied The General. "He was the last one."

As The General spoke, he gently kicked the body of the unfortunate mercenary, rolling him face up. He lay, open eyes staring unseeing at the white ceiling.

Trials stared down at the corpse, breathing heavily. He was angry at The General's attitude, he knew, but more than that, he was unsettled. He had heard nothing. There was no way The General could have got into the room that quietly, that fast. Yet here he was, standing as if nothing was out of the ordinary, surrounded by blood and carnage.

"Where's Mike? You said he'd be here."

"And I believe he is. They must be holding him somewhere in this building. Perhaps the master study, or the wine cellar."

Trials paused and stared at The General. He opened his mouth to speak and...

"Jake!"

Mike came swinging out of a door further down the hallway, his weight forcing it to crash back against the wall with a loud thump. He was staggering, clearly exhausted and badly hurt, face a hideous mosaic of blues and purples.

Trials ran up to him and offered a shoulder for support, hardly registering the person following behind until he had successfully brought Mike to a small couch, where he fell and lay bleeding onto its opulent fabric.

Trials stood back up and turned to see The General in a tense stance, rifle held straight at...

"What the hell is she doing here?" Trials exclaimed.

"It's alright, she's ok. She got me out of there. She's trying to get away from that psycho Matterson. Gods know what he's got to do with any of this crazy shit, though," said Mike, forcing himself up for long enough to speak before collapsing back onto the couch.

“Lucy Lawntie?” asked a stunned Jacob. “What are you doing here?”

“I have to get away,” she said, eyes flashing around the room as if expecting to be attacked at any second.

“It’s ok,” reassured Trials. “There’s nobody here now but us.”

The General had not lowered his gun.

“She is not to be trusted,” he said.

The General had an expression that Trials had never seen on him before. His eyes were narrowed in sharp distrust, but in the set of his shoulders Trials saw unease, worry. The barrel of the gun wavered as his hands swayed, circular motions that Lucy followed with her eyes.

“Jesus, I said she helped me get out of there, didn’t I?” moaned Mike from the couch. “Jake,” he said, rolling onto his side to focus on Trials, “are you going to get us out of here?”

Trials nodded in what he hoped was a determined way.

“We’re going. Can you walk?”

“I’ll need… some support,” panted Mike, forcing himself up but swaying precariously.

Trials offered him his shoulder, and they began to walk as fast as Mike could hobble out the door and down the driveway to the car.

The General gestured with the barrel of his gun for Lucy to walk ahead of him. She stared at the gun with disdain, moving nonchalantly to the front as if to say this was her choice, not his. They left the house.

The sun was bright, and in stark contrast to the events of the afternoon it was a beautiful, calm day. Trials found himself shielding his eyes as they made their way to the car.

Mike, panting heavily at the exertion, said nothing. The silence was palpable.

"I'm sorry..." said Trials. Mike stopped suddenly, his weight pulling Trials to a stop as well.

"Sorry? You think that's..." Mike's hands fell to his side, fists clenching in suppressed anger. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

Now, Trials thought, the damage to his throat was obvious. Each breath wheezed; only a little, but relentlessly.

. When Mike spoke again, it was in a carefully neutral tone.

"Anna told you, then?" Mike asked.

"Yes," Trials looked at his old friend. "I... I don't know what to say."

Mike's eyes were cold, bitter.

"You stole all my work. Our work. You stole it, and you left us there to breathe in lungfuls of poison."

Trials looked down, unable to meet the gaze of his friend.

"If I had known..." Trials tried to say, but Mike's anger had not yet subsided.

"If you had known!? Known what? Known that I worked there? Trials, you assaulted me, my colleague, my place of work."

"Assault? No, I..." Trials' words trailed off. They stared at each other for a moment, and then Mike sagged forward, almost pitching off his feet. Swinging his arm around Mike, Trials made for the car.