Clean Cut (flash fiction) in The Irresistible Urge to Write

"I wasn't expecting you back so soon." I lean down to the fire and stir the coals, flaring an orange light out into the room. "I take it things didn't work out."

"You knew this would happen?" You close the door and lean back against it.

"I... suspected."

"And you said nothing."

"The last time I told a student of mine things weren't going to be as simple as they expected, they set out to prove me wrong." I closed the stove door, dropping the room back into evening twilight. "They didn't come back in as good as shape as you."

"And you're never wrong?"

I roll my hand in equivocation.

"The odds are, shall we say, in my favour." I set the poker down. "Take a seat."

You do, eyes gleaming in the near-darkness.

"Since you know so much, you know Occam's Razor failed us."

"Always does."

"But you teach it."

"As a guideline, lass. Not a mantra, not a magic spell. Just a guideline. Would you like to hazard a guess as to why, or are you still recovering from your failure?"

"I oversimplified."

"Excellent." I slide the mug over to you, steam rising from the coffee I poured when I heard your footsteps on my garden path. "Continue."

"If you weren't expecting me back so soon, why is the coffee already made?"

I smile and pour myself a second mug.

"When you finish dissecting your error, try to work this one out."

"Do you ever stop?"

"Questioning you? Testing you? Teaching you?" I put my feet up. "You already know the answer."

"And you enjoy it."

"Like crack cocaine."

"Occam's razor failed us."

"When?"

"Second night of the practical."

"How convenient, then, that it's one of the four you're allowed to retake when you fail."

You give me a suspicious glance.

"We built up a description of the opposition and went in." You sip from your mug, sorting your thoughts. "The description was... wrong."

"Wrong, or incomplete?"

"Incomplete."

"And so, therefore, were the engagement plans you based on them?"

"Does this happen often?" Suspicion in your voice.

"I would estimate ninety-five percent of people taking this particular test get nailed the same way, and then the squad nominates a volunteer to come complain to me."

You set down your mug.

"Who set the test?"

"A certain sadistic trainer of young men and women, who sees it as his duty to prepare you for reality. I'm not going to name him."

"Reality."

"Where you never get all the information you think you have. Where the most basic fundamental assumptions about the other side-- whoever it is, whatever it is-- can turn out to be wrong."

"Then how do you plan?"

I wrap my fingers around my mug and stare at you in the dark.

"Think, lass. One day I won't be here, and one day you won't be here, and on that day any answer I give to you will be worthless, and every answer you ever found will be irrelevant, so think hard."

"You... can't plan for it."

I smile.

"Well done."

"The test isn't a test, is it?"

"Oh, it is. You still need to pass."

"It's also a lesson."

"I wouldn't know. I deny all knowledge of the syllabus."

"So you plan for your plan to fail."

"Every step of the way. Always have a way out. Act on strategy, not on tactics. The main priority of your strategy needs to be flexibility, so that you can respond to anything.

"Be prepared, not just to the situation you expect, but all the possible moves that the enemy can make. Take them all," I sweep my hand through the air, "gather them, crush them." I close my fist. "And do it all in the same movement."

"I thought you didn't give out answers."

"If you thought that was an answer, you're going to fail when take the retest next week. Call it a formula list."

You laugh and pick up the mug.

"I don't have to get full marks, do I? I just need to pass."

"Pass hard. Pass epically."

"What about the coffee?"

"Think flexibly."

"You poured one mug, not two. You weren't expecting me."

"I," I say, pouring myself a second mug, "do like my coffee."

For Mavis, who asked

Trigger words: Occam's Razor failed us