Into the Shadows

by Jordan Weisman

  We stood concealed a short distance from the condoplex, and watched through the glass as George exited the elevator and moved toward the door. He was slipping on his mirror-shades when Janey moved.

  She’s a hell of a lot faster than I am, so I let her run the cues. Before I realized it, she shoved me out into view, grabbed the briefcase I was holding, and darted off toward our prey. George turned in surprise as I yelled, "Stop, thief!"

  Turning toward us, the first thing George saw was Janey, all neon bangles and frills, grinning like a madgirl. I was dressed in a black satin, double-breasted William Rouche suit, quite obviously on my way to some downtown executive suite when I’d been snatched by a crazy punkergirl. Janey played it just right and gave the guy her patented "Stop me if you can, chummer" grin and ran straight at him.

  He took the bait. As Janey closed and darted left, the man’s foot shot out and caught Janey just under the ribs. I saw her lift up into the air and then come down hard, bouncing off the nearby macroglass. She fell to the ground, rolled clumsily once, and then was up and away at a staggered run. The briefcase lay at George's feet.

  Before he could react, I was up next to him, grabbing the briefcase with my left hand, and his right hand with mine. I shook it hard and vigorously. "Thank you so much!" I gushed.

  He looked at me and smiled lightly, pulling his hand away and instinctively wiping it on his thigh. "You should have a wrist-lock on that," George said in the same deep, slightly accented voice I’d heard at the Cafe Seventy-Seven. I glanced down and caught a glimpse of the back of his right hand. A long scar stood out plainly against his dark skin. Before I could say anything else, a car pulled up at the curb and a man jumped out. He was below-average height and build, light-skinned but with some Amerindian blood, and younger than George. He shoved himself between George and me. "Problems, chummer?" he asked.

  "I was just thanking this gentleman for rescuing my briefcase from the trash that snatched it," I said quickly.

  The newcomer turned slightly toward George, who nod ded. The young guy looked back at me and his expression softened. "Well, that's all right then," he said, offering me his hand.

  Instead of being gracious, I stepped back. "I have to go."

  I said, spying the Seattle Sonic taxi cab rounding the corner and heading toward me. Nodding once again at George, I yelled loudly and flagged down the taxi. Its gull-wing door popped up, and within seconds, we were off down the block. Behind us, I could see the young man watching, confused, and George absently rubbing his hand against his thigh, apparently amused by the whole situation.

  Beside me, Aliyce smiled. I'd argued against letting her drive so soon after the brain-burn, but Raphe insisted she was fine. The first few moments of setting up the sting had been uncomfortable, but she’d finally come up to me privately, patted my shoulder, and said, "Next time, pull the plug." And that was that.

  We turned the first corner and pulled up to the curb. Janey darted out from a nearby doorway and climbed in beside me. As usual, she was grinning. "The bastard’s wired," she said. "But he ain’t quite hot enough."

  I laughed and carefully began removing the polymer skinflint from my hand. It was chemically sensitive and it had taken a permanent etching of George’s finger and palm prints when I shook his hand. We were about to find out who the mystery man really was.

  Maybe.

  * * *

  Electronic eyes see everything, as do the men who control them. FastJack broke the MegaMedia system six hours ago. He owns it, and is now watching Witt ply his trade in the cavernous Post Studio 3b.

  "No, no, no!" said Lipton, waving his hand madly. Across the room, three technicians glanced at each other and sighed. Grudgingly, they keyed in a full-track restart and waited while the optical chips realigned at the beginning. Above them on the wall. Honey Brighton’s smiling visage hung motionless for a moment, only to be replaced by a flickering "re-racking" message. "At twenty-two zero-zero, I want a plus point four-five attack." continued Witt, "with an EC modulation twist of about one-half."

  The assistant programmer shook his head and bounced his light-stylus off the desk. "Witt," said Jake, "If we punch the EC at one-half, everybody who’s sensing this is gonna blow their brains."

  "No they’re not. We’ve already desensitized them with the quarter-pulse during the rappelling sequence, and I think they'll be ripe for nailing right now."

  "No way. You're just going to freak them, probably spin about 3 percent on a negative response."

  Lipton stepped in close to Jake and all but shoved his finger in the junior programmer’s chest. "Don't give me this negative-response drek. Download me one micropulse of proof and I’ll buy it. Until then, I'm paid to call the cues and you to press buttons."

  Jake stared down at him for a few moments. "What’s the matter. Witt?" he said finally, his lips pulling back over his teeth. "Not slotting enough deck lately?"

  Lipton’s eyes widened, but before he could muster a response or throw a punch, his anger was yanked short.

  "Excuse me," said Honey Brighton, coming into the Studio's doorway. "Witt, can I talk to you a moment?" Her hair was spun platinum and her eyes the color of the twilight sky. Witt forgot Jake and led her to a nearby lounge.

  Jake laughed at their retreating backs. One of the technicians moved up alongside him. "Better be careful. Lipton's got pull."

  Jake laughed again, throwing his hair back and letting it dance. "Witt Lipton’s old-tech, chummer. I’m directing the next Rhea Blackwrath gig, and that’s gonna make the boys upstairs realize who’s got the talent down here. And it ain't that damn dwarf."

  Behind him, the tally light darkened on the security camera. A moment passed, and a high-priority pulse rifled through a logic tree in the central processor. Codes were given, commands sent, and a rumor linking Jake Winter to a series of prostitute mutilations shows up in the corporate news-sifter files. He’s fired the next morning.

  Another tally light brightened as Witt and Honey entered a nearby room.

  ". . . needed until tomorrow, Honey," Witt said saying. "We just need to do some sense-looping."

  Honey nodded without answering and moved over to one corner of the room. She slid a chair into position, stood on it, and then ripped the security camera from the wall.

  A moment later, the microphone on the table-phone activated .

  "Don't want anyone listening in, eh?" said Witt sheepishly.

  "You’re leaving, aren’t you?"

  "What? I don’t know ..."

  "You’re skipping, going out of house."

  "Honey, why would I want to—"

  "Cause Wakeman treats you like a wage-slave. Cause they need a new sense-chip for the July sweeps, hell or high water. And cause you haven’t done anything worth drek in over a year."

  She paused, waited for his response, but none came. "And neither have I."

  "How do you ... I mean . . ."

  "Come on, Witt, hell. We probably know each other better than most twins. You've recorded and tweaked probably every damn emotion I'm capable of, and I’ve watched your reactions to them. You’ve hated this place since at least the year before last. So I know. I’ve suspected for a couple of weeks now. Where are you going? New Sense? White Lion? Fox?"

  "Brilliant Genesis."

  "Chip-truth? I guess they've changed their minds about paying the big bucks."

  "You better believe it."

  "When?

  "Tomorrow night."

  "You’re not even going to finish the gig ..."

  "It is finished. Believe me, I wouldn’t leave you half-done. By tomorrow night, only secondary dubbing will be left to do, and Jake can handle that. After all, he's going to be a big stick once he does the Rhea Blackwrath chip."

  "Tomorrow night? Oh, Witt, I don’t know ..."

  "You've got to promise me you'll stay quiet. Honey. Please, for all we’ve done together."

  "Stay quiet? Dammit, I want to go with you."

  * * *
r />   Night touched the city. At ninety-eight stories high, the air over Seattle is cool, with a stiff breeze blowing in from the Sound. Nadia Mirin leaned her slim form casually against the rail and breathed in. Strands of midnight black hair floated into her eyes, only to be brushed gently away by Raphael.

  She laughed and turned slightly. "You never give up, do you?"

  "No, I do not," he said, smiling. "Why should I?"

  "Maybe my boyfriend is bigger than you are."

  "Maybe, but that still would not stop me. I’m stupid that way.

  Laughing again, she held up her hands in front of her. "Enough, enough. We came here to talk business, not flirt like twelve-year olds."

  He sighed. "If you insist."

  "I do," she said. Then, after a moment, "I’m sorry."

  "Your boyfriend had better be a lot bigger than I am."

  "He is."

  Raphael smiled and looked away. When he turned back, his face was serious. "All right, but you aren’t going to like this."

  She nodded and leaned back against the rail. "I never expected to. "

  He moved alongside her and looked out over the city as he spoke. "Cortez is running something, but we haven’t been able to determine what."

  "No clues at all?" she asked.

  "I did not say that. There are a great number of clues, but that’s all they are."

  "Line them up for me, Raphe, in order of importance." He nodded. "First, we found a stash of weapons, high-power shadow-grade, in his apartment. Gear you or I might keep around, but not something the assistant director of a food-processing firm would.,"

  "I don’t keep that kind of stuff around any more," Nadia said, smiling lightly.

  "So you say."

  She laughed. "Touché. Go on."

  "We also found a pin. Small and silver with a single blue sapphire at the edge. It took us a few days to trace it, but FastJack finally tagged it in the Tokyo Metropol data banks."

  "Tokyo?" she asked.

  "It is a Yakuza pin," he said and her eyes closed. "One of the Sendosha subclans, the Mizu-Kagayaite. First surfaced in Tokyo about twenty-eight years ago as one of the New Century Yakuza clans. Allegedly, the Sendosha have a lot of pull over the local Dungeness Crab Chapter."

  "You think Cortez is Yak."

  Raphael laughed. "No, he’s not slick enough."

  "Then who?"

  "I’m not sure. There is a second possibility."

  "Yes?"

  "Cortez is seeing a woman, a Latino-Japanese, who has a false-front apartment in the Redmond Barrens. She is listed under the name Wakako Sandoval, but that’s not who she is. We were only able to follow her once, this morning, and we got lucky. We did run some cell samples, presumably hers, that we found in Cortez’s apartment, but we found nothing.

  "We’ve also connected Cortez with George Van Housen, a desk sergeant for Lone Star, and spotted Cortez passing information to him at least once. They've met a lot in the past few days."

  "What do you think this all means, Raphe?"

  He pushed back from the rail slightly and turned to face her. "I really do not know, Nadia. I don’t know enough about what’s happening inside Aztechnology and Natural Vat to make any guesses. Besides, you won’t tell me the source of your information that Cortez is involved with something, nor what that information is." Raphael smiled. "Plus. I’ve been a little busy with another run."

  Now she smiled. "Of course. I understand. When is that going down, by the way?"

  "Tomorrow night."

  "Any fireworks planned?"

  He nodded. "Probably."

  "Well, keep safe and if you stay in town, give me a call after? "

  "I will."

  "Thank you again. Raphe, and if I can help you, let me know." She turned and began to walk away.

  "Actually, I was wondering if I might borrow a Dragon." Nadia stopped and spun around to face him, surprise and confusion showing on her face. "Excuse me?"

  "Well, not a real one, of course ..."

  * * *

  Lipton stared as the current balance of his account appeared on the small screen. "Well, Jack, where the hell are you?" he said under his breath, looking up at the monitoring camera. In response to his questions, the vidscreens fuzzed and Jack’s face appeared on them.

  "Sorry I took so long, Witt, but First Tribal’s got a pair of deckers sniffing their grid these days," said Jack. "Had to give them a chance to miss me completely."

  Lipton leaned against the teller for support. "Jack, I have something to tell you."

  "Oh? And what might that be?"

  "I’m not the only one leaving Brilliant Genesis."

  Jack made his eyes widen slightly. "You mean Honey's decided to come with you?"

  Witt blinked. "How did you know ..."

  "Oh come on. Witt. It’s obvious." Jack smiled. "Well, to me anyway."

  "She wants to go with me to Brilliant Genesis and—"

  "—take your current project with you? And finish it the way you both really want? Witt, that’s brilliant!"

  "Well, yeah. I guess it is."

  "Of course, MegaMedia might just decide to sue the skin off Genesis, but what the hell, business is business."

  "Will they agree to taking Honey on as . . ."

  "Witt, you should have seen them when I told them Honey wanted to jump ship with you," Jack said. "Actually, I can show you!"

  Jack's image disappeared, to be replaced by one of a boardroom of men congratulating themselves and cheering wildly. Jack reappeared. "You and Honey can code your own tick.. . "

  "Fantastic!"

  "Yup. but now comes the hard part. Getting you and Miss Brighton out. Listen up. Witt, "cause if you mess this up, we’re all going to be meal-cakes. Comprende?"

  * * *

  The moment Raphe told her, Janey hugged him. God know, how he did it, and someday I will find out, but he got Janey in as a clown selling cotton candy, complete with cart. Apparently. the theme of the MegaMedia wrap was "Festival," and the costume she had to wear was truly a sight. Naturally she loved it. Me. I was a waiter. And once I saw the male-clown costume. I was damn glad.

  "Babykins." said the vapor-head model to his girlfriend, "have you seen Mr. Escarte? I have got to talk to him about my contract." She began to shoot the Gin Pearl I’d just given her and shook her head

  "Darn," he said.

  Wilt was true to his word. The party was truly ripping. The only time I have ever seen more excess jammed into a single room was when the Tacoma Timberwolves combat bike Scam decided life was too dull and paid a surprise visit to Miss Silk’s. A fifteen-year-old learns a lot from sights like that.

  I flicked the time onto my retinal display and saw that only fifteen minutes remained before the one o’clock go-cue. Janey was easily visible, and unfortunately, a center of attraction. Witt and Honey Brighton, in the flesh, I had seen earlier lounging by the inner reflecting pool. I'd given Witt the signal, and he'd returned it, indicating that everything was fine.

  I had not seen Raphe, but wasn’t supposed to. If everything was on schedule, he and Jack were down in the main Post Studio snatching the masters of Rock Solid.

  The plan was simple. At one o’clock, Witt would finish flirting with the gorgeous clown selling cotton candy and vanish with her into the warrens of the building. Five minutes later, I was to go over to Honey and tell her there was a telecom call for her. I would then lead her out of the room and down the employee stairs to the production level. We would all meet in Studio 3b. where Witt would input his release codes for the master-sense program. Then Jack would download it to lord-knows-where and crash the data stores. From there, it was up to the roof and away. Simple and straightforward. At least, that’s how we planned it.

  Witt had just vanished with Janey when the trouble began. I was taking drink orders when I felt a familiar warmth in the back of my head. My retinal display indicated a coded transmission incoming on Channel 2: Vocal. I keyed it, and Jack’s voice filled my head. "L
iam, old buddy. I think we’re made. Over."

  I handed my tray to one of the guests, stuck my order-pad in his pocket, and walked away. "Problem? Over," I subvocalized.

  "Six deckers just entered the system. Three through the access nodes, and three at the security sub-processor," he said. "They’re burning hard through the system at full-tilt. They know somebody’s here and want his brain bad. I’m damn sure I didn’t blow it. Over."

  "Roger, stand by. Over." I moved into a calm section of the room and keyed Channel I: Vocal to Raphe. He responded immediately and I explained the problem.

  "Tell Jack to stealth it until further notice," he said. "Meanwhile, get Honey and meet us. Over."

  "Roger." I said and caught a weird look from a dark-skinned woman with live reptiles in her hair. "On my way. Over," I said and shifted to Jack’s channel while I hurried to where Honey was. I reached her just as he responded.

  "Got ya, Liam, except I’m running out of room to sneak in. These boys don’t care what they roast to find me. I think I recognize one of them as The Waco Kid, a decker for Lone Star. Over," he said and it all fell into place. Standing next to Honey was the guy who had met George Van Housen outside Cortez’s apartment. His name tag read "J. Redstone." Next to him were two other uniformed Lone Star guards. He smiled.

  "Well, if it ain’t Mr. Businessman. I thought I recognized you, chummer." He put his hand on Honey’s shoulder. "Looking for someone?" he asked pleasantly. Staying remarkably calm, she eyed me expectantly.

  I keyed Channel 6 and transmitted to Honey’s subdermal simsense recording interface. "Drop your left earring," I subvocalized.

  "What was that?" Redstone said, alarm showing on his face. He figured I'd just tipped off some fellow runner in another part of the building, and was very surprised when Honey reached up, yanked off her left earring, and dropped it. The three small balls in the dangling earring that Janey had slipped to her earlier shattered on impact. One was pure shock-noise, while the other two exploded with smoke.

  Redstone stepped back, and I closed the last few meters. I didn’t have all of Janey’s chipped flexes, but I wasn’t exactly slow. I pressure-pointed him near the solar plexus, watched him fall, and then wheel-kicked the nearest other guard, flattening him. The third guard closed on me, his Cheap Charlie Muscles bulging through his uniform shirt.