Inside Man

by K.J. Parker

I’m halfway to the earhole when I stop and think about it. Remember what I told you about possessing an infant? Once you’re in, you can’t leave until they’re at least five years old, not unless you want to kill them. Do I want to kill the little horror? Need you ask? But I can’t. The prime directive of our order, Rule Number One: First, do no harm. (Actually, there are two schools of thought about that. One scholarly faction disputes the reading, blaming textual corruption in the manuscript tradition. What it should say, according to them, is: At first, do no harm. Wait a bit, get yourself nicely settled in, and then roll up your sleeves and start laying about you with the poker. It’s an entirely valid reading if you accept the textual emendation, and the philological evidence is ambiguous—a matter of personal choice, basically. Unfortunately, I made my choice a long time ago. I read first; no at.)