Shadowboxer

by Nicholas Pollotta

  “Yes, it is true. But how do you know this, decker?” he demanded.

  “We found it out in the deeps,” said a troll, coming up to join her. The male was also armed, heavily chromed, and covered with gang tattoos, yet Emile sensed no immediate danger from him. “They probably thought it was the only way to keep the location of the supercomputer secret.”

  “What fools,” Emile said. “Three may keep a secret only if two are dead.”

  “They also did it to remove any mages from this place,” said a norm male, stepping from behind a crumbled section of sewer pipe. This male wore a badly rumpled suit and was also armed.

  “He’s alone,” the man said to his companions.

  Annoyed, Grand chittered in response, and Emile scratched him reassuringly under the chin. “Why would they want to do that?” he asked.

  “Mages carry power in their minds. They cannot be unarmed. Twelve mages . . . you did say twelve, correct? That’s a fragging army in a slave society.”

  “Slaves, yes, I have seen that, felt that,” Emile said slowly. “I must admit, I do not like this place, or those who hold it in their power.”

  “I’m with you, chummer,” said the troll. “If you don’t like these hoopheads, then you’re jake in my chip.”

  “How were they killed?” asked the fem. “Zapping a dozen mages is no easy task.”

  Emile shrugged. “I do not know. They seem to have suffocated in a white cloud of bitter cold, so cold they could not move or speak.”

  “Liquid nitrogen,” announced the norm in the suit. “We’ve seen it before. The city hit ’em with a stream of liquid nitrogen. Like the Snowballs used to stop inquisitive subs. Case-hardened steel becomes brittle as glass when the stuff hits. Flesh crystallizes in a nano.”

  Emile looked deep into the norm. Grand bared his teeth. “I see that what you speak is true. Mon dieu, what a terrible way to perish. They . . . yes, they were still alive afterward, trapped inside frozen bodies until touched and then they crumbled into dust.”

  “No death is good,” said the norm, holstering one of his weapons.

  “But how do you know all this?” asked the troll nervously.

  “How shall I say?” Emile paused, trying to think how to explain one of the mysteries of magic. “Under certain circumstances, places of violent death retain . .. vibrations, disturbances in the astral plane, residual emanations that can be detected by one with magical abilities.”

  Emile gave them the closest he could come to a smile under the circumstances. “Pray excuse my lack of manners. It has been a most trying day.” He gave a bow. “I am Emile de Coultier Ceccion.” There came a short hiss. “Ah, yes. And this, of course, is Grand.”

  “Grant?” asked the decker, smiling at the ferret. Grand purred in response. A good omen that.

  “Grand, with a ‘D’,” corrected Emile, enunciating carefully. “His full name is West One Hundred Fifty-seventh Street And Grand Ave. It’s where we found each other.” A wan smile. “Grand for short.”

  “Gotcha.”

  “Both of us were formerly employees of the Gunderson Corporation.”

  “But no more, eh?” asked the troll, relaxing his shoulders. Emile scowled. “Indeed, not. They must pay. The one who ordered the slaughter must suffer.”

  “We wish you much luck,” said the suit, “but we’re here on biz. Once we get what we came for, we’re gone.”

  “Escape may prove to be impossible. Given time, they will capture us all. It is a small city.”

  “We have the means at our disposal,” said the suit.

  “A means of departure?” Emile asked eagerly.

  “Yes.”

  “A reliable means?”

  “No,” said the suit stonily. “A means, yes, but it will not be easy or simple to leave.”

  “How honest. Excellent,” beamed Emile, watching the empty streets. “Perhaps we can come to some arrangement.

  Assist me in my task and I shall assist you.”

  “And what’re you going to do?” asked the decker. “Kill the entire City Guard who set the trap?”

  “Oh no,” he declaimed. “They were merely the weapon, not the one who pulled the trigger. I will seek out the norm who runs this city. The one who gave the orders. Barbara Harvin.”

  The troll gave a whistle. “A wetjob like that’s gonna be a tough one. She’s bound to have a lot of guards with a lot of guns. And a superslick coldframe to run her security systems.”

  “True,” said Emile, looking at the dome above them. “But I am her only mage, a critical lack in her defenses. Plus, I believe that I can promise a distraction that will keep the City Guards very busy for quite awhile.”

  “Then maybe we can cut a deal,” said the suit. “We’re here on a data steal and the info we want is inside the coldframe.”

  “But it’s too powerful for me,” said the decker. “We need to turn it off so I can download the files from the auxiliary buffer zone. The backup data storage, you know. And the cut-off controls have to be in her office.”

  “Where I can deal with her personally,” said Emile. “So, it appears we are fellow travelers. Both of our destinations end at the same terminus. Shall we work together?” He offered his hand and they each shook it in turn. Emile assensed that he could trust them for the moment, but decided not to let down his guard. They needed him now, but later would be another matter.

  “Done and done. I’m Thumbs,” said the troll, jerking one toward himself. “The decker is Silver, Captain QuickDraw over there is Delphia.”

  “Hello.”

  “Konichiwa.”

  “Holy drek, they found us again,” spat Silver. “Incoming!” Thumbs and Delphia spun about. Coming down the littered street running along the edge of the dome wall five motorcycles were speeding toward them, the riders hunched forward as they raced closer, silent as ghosts in a dream.

  “Spread out. Get some cover,” snapped Delphia. “Conserve ammo. Short burst, no hose jobs.”

  “Check.”

  “Natch.”

  “There is no need for such preparations,” said Emile, holding his staff tight in both hands. His head was cocked slightly to one side as though listening to something only he could hear.

  “What the frag are you talking about?” demanded Thumbs, slapping a fresh clip into the Mossberg. “Those are fully armed OffRoaders!”

  Emile shrugged with Gallic elegance. “Are they? Ça ne fait rien. The distraction is about to begin.”

  Delphia stopped in the act of crouching behind a cracked engine block red with rust. “Distraction?”

  “Have to be a fragging motherless big one to stop those gleebs,” snorted Thumbs grimly, kneeling and aiming carefully.

  “It is,” said Emile, as the ground underneath them rocked and bucked. A thundering concussion boomed over the ruins, slamming the motorcycles to the roadway, two of them skidding off and one hitting a brick wall to whoof into flames.

  “What the frag was that?” demanded Silver.

  Emile merely pointed a finger upward.

  As she looked, a star blossomed in the glassy sky, a rosy fireball that sent thin cracks radiating outward from the point of impact on the dome as the muffled blast slapped her in the face with a warm wind. As the blast was doused by the sea, the fissures swiftly closed. Then faint rods of light lanced out from the base of the bubblecity into the murky distance, the feeble beams steadily increasing in brilliance until shimmering with unleashed power like tortured rainbows. More explosions appeared in the sea, and sirens started a banshee shriek over the city.

  “Pirates,” whispered Thumbs.

  Darkness crashed down as the city turned off every light. Only the pearlescent sheen of the dome offered any illumination.

  “To make the place less of a target,” reasoned Delphia, smiling broadly. “And giving us a perfect window of opportunity!”

  “Almost perfect,” countered Silver. “What if it’s only a sortie, not a full attack?”

  �
�She is correct,” Emile said. “Time may be short.” Down the street, the City Guards were stumbling about, trying to remount their Hyundais. “May I suggest we steal those bikes,” said Emile, brandishing his wand. There was a click and blades snapped out of either end. “It will save us much time traveling to Old Dome.”

  “If it’s still there when we arrive,” said Thumbs sourly, shielding his face from the hot winds and billowing smoke of the burning motorcycle. Another explosion shook the sky, the wild cracks spreading outward, resembling white lightning against the black ocean beyond.

  “Oui, mon ami, ” agreed Emile solemnly. “If any of us are still alive by then.”

  32

  Alarms howling, every sonar screen in the Old Dome Defense Center was covered with moving blips. People were scurrying madly for their seats before the consoles, where they began to throw switches and tap commands with practiced speed.

  “More pirates in Sector Nine!” called out a gunnery from his console.

  “West range torps, ready!”

  “North range torps, ready!”

  “City subs on the alert and moving in from the south and north!”

  “Surface battleships not, repeat, not, in the umbrella position! We have no roof!”

  Stoic, Shawn Wilson stood amid the chaos, watching the sonar screen and the murky view screens, the density of the water distorting the visual pickup of the telephoto vidcams. Subs of different sizes were closing in on the bubblecity in a four-on-four scissor formation. Jym suits were raining out of the ocean above them, and HK torpedoes were spiraling in. The lasers had stopped the first wave, but had not put the fear of hell into the buccaneers, as they’d hoped.

  Removing the toothpick from his mouth, Wilson said, “All missiles and APTs, launch at will.” The words echoed throughout the bustling room. “Repeat, launch at will! Bring down the invaders!”

  * * *

  Thunder and lightning filled the domed sky with the fury of warring gods as the four shadowy riders on sleek motorcycles rode steadily up the darkened spiral of stairs encircling the exterior of the granite mesa. Many stories below was the stygian expanse of Low Dome, the cityscape horribly illuminated by the flashes from outside.

  Suddenly, there was a landing before them, and standing there was a lone City Guard with nightgoggles holding a massive Barret rifle. Bouncing up and onto the landing, Thumbs revved his engine to the max, hit the brakes, twisting sideways. The Guard swung the big barrel of the rifle about, trying to track him, but got slammed by the back fender of the rice-rocket. With a cry, he dropped the rifle and went tumbling over the chain railing and out of sight.

  Braking his bike, Delphia grabbed the dropped rifle and the Barrett and checked the cigarbox-sized magazine. “Ten in the clip, one up the pipe,” he said, working the lever-action bolt, ejecting a tremendously large brass cartridge. “Emile, know how to work this?”

  “Oui, point and pull the trigger,” answered Emile calmly.

  “Yar, but don’t forget to brace yourself,” added Thumbs. “That ain’t no caseless rapid-fire with gas vents to neutralize the recoil. This baby fires big, old fashioned bullets. It’s louder than a grenade, and kicks like a combat bike riding the wire.”

  “But it hits like an express train,” finished Delphia. “The Barrett has a live range of a klick.”

  “Most acceptable,” Emile replied, slinging the huge ungainly rifle over a shoulder, forming a cross with his wand. “This Colt revolver offers scant protection in any serious firefight.”

  “And I seriously question the accuracy of these fender-mounted weapons,” he added, patting the Hyundai. Grand purred agreement.

  Delphia handed him an extra round, and Emile tucked it into a breast pocket. “An emergency spare,” he said. “Besides, I dislike bouncing wildly with a live round under the hammer.”

  “Bouncing is done,” Silver called out softly from a pool of blackness. “The elevator is over here!” Something hit the dome and spread in a wash of underwater flame, casting the decker, her bike, and the elevator doors into harsh blue light for a single heart beat.

  “How long for you to subvert the locks?” asked Delphia, climbing off his Hyundai and pushing it forward.

  Silver chuckled. “The gleeb left the passcard in the slot. Probably to give himself a fast escape route should pirates arrive.”

  “Lucky us,” said Thumbs happily, leaning forward on the handlebars.

  “I distrust luck,” said Emile, kicking down the stand of his bike.

  With a musical ding, the double doors parted, emitting a blaze of light that bathed them in harsh visibility. The two City Guards inside cursed at the sight of them and clawed for the Mossberg SMGs over their shoulders.

  A deafening roar ripped apart the night. It was followed by a finger of flame reaching out from the landing, going past the team and into the cages as the chest of the first Guard violently exploded and the other behind him slammed into the wall with most of his face gone. As the bodies dropped, a hole as big as an orange appeared in the back of the elevator.

  “Yes, most satisfactory,” said Emile, working the bolt on the Barrett, ejecting the spent cartridge. “I may keep this for my personal collection.”

  “Arctic,” said Thumbs wheeling in his Hyundai, along with the others. He kicked down the stand on his bike, then appropriated the Mossbergs and ammo clips. “But from now on, warn me before you shoot that fragging bazooka, will ya?”

  “Is a change of undergarments needed?” asked Delphia politely, smashing the ceiling EverBright with the barrel of his Manhunter.

  “Damn near,” grumbled Thumbs, stuffing clips into his pockets as the double doors closed with a hiss.

  * * *

  Some minutes later, the elevator doors opened onto a reception area: potted ferns in the corners, plush carpeting underfoot, indirect lighting, synthwood paneling. There was an electronic board on the wall for showing who was where, but at the moment it was turned off.

  “Very nice,” said Thumbs, twitching a cheek muscle. “We are definitely not in Low Dome anymore.”

  “And the air smells infinitely superior,” stated Emile, breathing deeply. “Yes, much better.” Grand looked around curiously with his sharp, bright eyes.

  “Where next?” asked Delphia, checking down the side corridors, both his weapons out and ready.

  “How should I know?” retorted Silver, looping her shoulder bag across her throat to keep it from sliding down her arm when she moved. “I couldn’t get into the system to find a map.”

  “Emile?”

  “Sorry, but I never did show up for my official tour of the facilities.”

  Delphia eased open a door, which turned out to be a supply closet filled with cleaning supplies and mops. “Great. We don’t even know what building we’re in!”

  “Come on, I have an idea,” said Thumbs. He grabbed the Hyundai and began pushing the bike down the carpeted corridor and toward the carved wooden doors at the end.

  Going past a security checkpoint with a scanner but no Guards, the team came to a short flight of stairs and onto the sidewalk outside the building.

  The street was dark, the street lamps not working. The noise of the battle was louder here, the dome closer and smaller, with much less room for the sounds to be absorbed in the distance.

  “No sign of security cams or snipers,” said Delphia, slipping on his sunglasses and checking out the windows above them. The lintel on the building they had come out of was turned off and unreadable. “Where the hell is everybody?” Just then, several City Guard vehicles screeched around a corner and leveled out, racing for someplace else. A deafening boom sounded from above, and a concussion slammed hot air over the team.

  “Whatever we’re gonna do, do it fast,” Thumbs shouted over the noise. “I don’t know who’s winning out there, but those yahoos are fragging serious!”

  Silver gestured at the departing vehicles. “Follow them?”

  “No,” called out Emile. He took Grand off
his shoulder, then tucked the ferret inside his jumpsuit and velcro’d the front halfway shut. “Follow me,” he called out, revving the bike.

  Rolling over the curb, the Hyundai hit the street and hummed away, taking a corner so close and so low the elf nearly lost a knee. The others took off after him, and soon caught up a couple of blocks away.

  “Just like Miami, right?” asked Thumbs with a grin, riding dangerously close. However, the elf did not flinch or pull away. Delphia bracketed him on the other side.

  “Correct,” said Emile, giving a little nod. “The Harvins like to inhabit the tallest building in the city, smack dab in the middle, so they can look down on their little kingdom and gloat. Every hour on the hour.”

  Rolling down the streets, the team encountered other bikes, mostly with City Guards riding escort to semis and small limos. Sirens sounded from somewhere, a security vehicle streaked by, a car alarm wheeped constantly, and then an explosion sprayed glass from a building across the street. They wheeled the bikes onto the opposite sidewalk to avoid the shards on the ground.

  Humming down the main drag of the dome, passing crowds of frightened people and darting vehicles, the four bikers received many strange looks, but nobody stopped to question them or open fire. Indeed, one truck full of Guards gave them a game thumbs-up and moved out of their way, allowing them passage.

  “Did you do something?” asked Delphia suspiciously, one hand still holding his Manhunter.

  “Yes,” said Emile, long blonde hair whipping in the wind.

  “Download us,” shouted Thumbs.

  “We are City Guards, wounded and bleeding,” said Emile.

  “Arctic. That should get us into Harvin’s office.”

  “Oui.” Emile grinned.

  Watching the building come closer and closer, the team angled around a corner and came upon the monolith thrusting up into the darkness like the head of a spear. Frantically, they wheeled about into an alleyway, careening off a wall and racing right back onto the next street over.

  “Keep moving!” shouted Deiphia, tilting his sunglasses. “It looks clear, but they might come after us yet!”