The Lucifer Deck

by Lisa Smedman

  Carla climbed hurriedly into the car, thumbing the volume key beside the tiny trideo screen. Pita’s voice crackled from the speaker and her image wavered. At first Carla thought it was just the trideo unit acting up, but then she saw the channel display. The broadcast was coming in on Channel 115—a channel that should have been carrying nothing but a blank blue field. This was clearly a pirate broadcast, fed illegally through a cable booster into a "dead" channel. The pirates were probably transmitting via remote feed to avoid getting caught, should their input be traced. The resulting distortion had caused the color to shift; Pita’s face was distinctly green. But her voice was coming through, loud and clear, despite the occasional pop of static.

  "This is where it happened." she said in a quavering voice. "This is where my friends were killed."

  The camera pulled back from Pita, revealing the wall behind her. The words that had been painted in the orks’ blood were faint but still legible, thanks to an overhang that protected them from the rain that had been falling steadily throughout the day: "Human Power!", "Goblin Scum Must Die!" and "Keep Our Human Family Pure!"

  Carla jabbed a finger at the screen. "That’s Rainier Avenue South, the spot where those three orks were killed by Humanis Policlub. I shot trid there a couple of days ago. If this is a live broadcast, that’s where Pita is right now."

  "It’s live all right." Masaki said, wheezing with excitement. "But the pirate would be a fool to broadcast from an identifiable location. Lone Star would be all over him before he’d even finished his intro.

  "See this faint blue line?" He traced Pita’s outline with a finger. "The kid’s image has been inserted over a shot of the corner where the kids were killed. The pirate is shooting with two portacams, one slaved to the other. He’s using a mixer to paste the two images together."

  "So how do we find him?" Carla asked.

  "The portacams can’t be more than a few hundred meters apart." he said. "He’s got to be within a block or two of that corner or else the signal would suffer too much distortion and the images wouldn’t match up. And he must be shooting outside to capture traffic noise. We’ll find him." Masaki put the car into gear and punched the accelerator. "Now what was that name you wanted to call me? A timid what?"

  "Shh!" Carla hissed. "I’m trying to listen to this. Has the kid said anything about the dead mage?"

  "Not yet." Masaki rounded a corner, tires squealing. "It’s been nothing but intro so far. After introducing Pita, the reporter went into this rambling spiel about the coming revolution and injustice against the metaraces. Usual bulldrek. About what you’d expect from amateur propagandists like Orks First! They’re eating up the kid’s story with a fork and—"

  "Quiet!" Carla leaned closer to the tiny screen. The camera was back on the ork girl, locked in a closeup that showed the tears at the corners of her eyes. Carla made sure the machine was set on record, for review later in case she missed anything.

  "We were stopped outside an apartment a few blocks from here," Pita began, gesturing up the street, "by two Lone Star cops. There were four of us. Me, Chen Wah . . ." She paused, blinking furiously. "And two younger orks, Shaz and Mohan Gill. The cops took our simsense headset and . . ."

  Carla glanced up as the car came to a halt. They were stopping for a yellow light. Cross traffic was light. "Let’s move, Masaki!" she said impatiently. "The pirate is going to wrap this story and disappear."

  "This intersection is monitored!" Masaki protested. "I don’t want to risk getting a tick—"

  Carla grabbed the wheel, slid across the seat, and punched her foot down on top of Masaki’s, depressing the accelerator. Masaki gasped in fear as the car leaped across the intersection, narrowly missing the oncoming traffic. Horns blared, but then they were through and racing along Rainier. Masaki glared at Carla as she released the wheel, then drove on, grinding his teeth. Carla was pleased to see that they were at last making some decent speed.

  She returned her attention to the trideo screen. The pirate reporter was standing beside Pita, one arm draped protectively over her shoulders. He was talking earnestly into the camera, his eyes glittering with intensity.

  "Most of us have gone through what Pita has just described." he was saying. "Lone Star seizes our property without warrant, stops and questions us without due cause, and talks to us in the most derogatory way they can think of. We live our lives in the Underground, afraid to venture onto the streets of our own city, shut out from the homes we once owned. Governor Schultz and Lone Star Chief Loudon have promised to ‘clean up’ Seattle. They pretend they’re talking about street crime. But anyone who remembers the events of 2039 will read between the lines and realize that the ‘housecleaning’ these humans are talking about is far more serious than the round-up that triggered the Night of Rage. We at Orks First! are about to bring you the true story of the links between our city’s ‘security’ force and the policlub that was notorious for—"

  "We’re close now!" Masaki called out. "They’ve got to be around here somewhere." He weaved around another vehicle, cut off a truck, and pulled back into the curb lane.

  The pirate’s voice was lost in a roar of static. The trideo screen had gone blue.

  "Damn!" Carla thumped the dash above the trideo set. "We’ve lost the transmission."

  "Doesn’t matter." Masaki wheezed, slowing the car. "There they are!"

  Carla looked up. The ork girl was perhaps a block away, standing near the curb. Her body posture was hunched, frozen. She looked like a frightened animal, caught in the glare of headlights and uncertain which way to run. The pirate reporter lay at her feet, tangled in his tripod as if he had tripped over it. He was struggling to raise himself to a sitting position, to point something black he held in his hand. At first, Carla thought it was a portacam. But then she recognized the streamlined shape of a pistol. She was just powering down her window when shots coughed out from across the street. The ork reporter sagged to the ground, then went still.

  "That’s gunfire!" Masaki said, slamming on the brakes. Around them, other drivers were also reacting, some accelerating away as quickly as possible, others spinning in tight fishtail turns. Two cars slammed together with a dull crunch and the scraping squeal of torn metal in the intersection ahead.

  As their car skidded to a stop, Carla peered around Masaki. On the opposite side of the street, a man was tucking a pistol into a holster under his arm. A smaller man sprinted out into traffic, heading for the ork girl.

  Cursing the power window for its slowness, Carla stuck her head out the opening. "Pita!" she cried. "This way!"

  The girl hesitated no more than a millisecond, then sprinted for the car. The man chasing her changed direction, angling across the street to intercept her. A car narrowly missed him, honking furiously. But he was gaining on the girl.

  Masaki had thrown their car into reverse. It jerked backward, wheels spinning.

  "What are you doing?" Carla screamed. "Wait for the girl!"

  Masaki was wheezing heavily, obviously scared. His pudgy hands were white on the steering wheel. He shook his head, eyes wide. "That guy’s got a gun! Close the window before he shoots!"

  Instead, Carla cracked the car door. The force of the backward acceleration made it slam open. She leaned out, reaching for Pita, who by now was running alongside the vehicle. One hand on the door, the other on the wrist of the ork girl, Carla yanked. At the same time, Pita jumped, knocking Carla back into the car.

  The man chasing Pita, a willowy Asian fellow, was barely a few steps behind her. His face was set in a determined grimace. Something snaked out from the gun he held in his hand, licking against Carla’s wrist with a hot electric snap. A wave of pain coursed through her as her body convulsed. For a moment or two, the world spun. Or perhaps it was the car. They were whipping around in a tight backward turn, leaving the man with the taser behind. The corner of the open car door caught his shirt, tearing it open and spinning him around. Then the car was rocketing forward, away from the spot wher
e the pirate reporter had been gunned down. Something heavy was in Carla’s lap—the ork girl, she remembered fuzzily. The car door thudded shut. Then the kid clambered into the back seat.

  Carla shook her head to clear it. Her right wrist was on fire; looking down she saw a bright white circle on the back of it. She blinked, testing the focus on her cybereye. The response time of the miniature camera inside it was a fraction of a second too slow, but the unit appeared to be undamaged. She hoped it had caught a good, clean shot of her assailant. If this story panned out, she could probably use it.

  Beside her, Masaki was cursing steadily, sweat rolling down his temples. His moustache and goatee framed white lips. He was at last ignoring the speeding limit, running lights and driving with terrified determination.

  The ork girl sat in the back seat, pounding a fist against the upholstery. "Fragging cops!" Her voice held an edge of hysteria. "Fragging, fragging bastards!"

  "Did you see that guy’s shoulders?" Masaki asked in a low voice, his eyes darting to the rear-view mirror. "They were covered with tattoos. Those weren’t cops. They were yakuza. I hope to drek they didn’t get my license bar code, or we’re all dead."

  "Yakuza? But what would they want with me?" The girl twisted around to glance fearfully out the rear window. "They killed Yao, didn’t they? They must have been aiming at me."

  Carla turned her anger on Masaki. "You’re not helping!" she told him. "And slow down. There’s no one following us."

  She turned to the girl, who now sat with her arms wrapped around her chest, hunched into herself. Carla took a moment to compose herself, then spoke in a soothing voice. "Everything’s all right now, Pita. We’ll take you back to the station. The building has a tight security system; you’ll be safe there."

  Carla took a breath, brushing her hair back into place with one hand. Her heart was still beating rapidly, but whether it was from fear or excitement, she couldn’t tell.

  Things were falling into place now. Somehow, Mitsuhama must have found out that the ork girl had acquired the datachip containing the specs of the research project and had sent its goons out after her—apparently the rumors that someone at MCT Seattle had connections with the local yakuza were accurate. The yaks had panicked when they saw her being interviewed by a reporter, and had geeked the guy—while he was on-air, yet. It was stupid and brutal, just the sort of thing you’d expect from gangsters. But it meant that the datachip was a top-priority item. Something worth killing for.

  Wetting her lips, Carla did her best not to seem too anxious. "Those men were chasing you because of something you found, Pita. Something you picked up in an alley from a man who had burned to death. An optical memory chip like those used in cyberdecks. Do you still have it?"

  Carla scarcely dared the breathe. If the kid had tossed the memory chip away . . .

  "What if I did?" Pita asked defensively. "The guy was already dead. It’s not like I stole it or anything."

  "That doesn’t matter to those men back there." Carla said soothingly. "They want the chip back, and they won’t stop chasing you until they get it."

  "Then I’ll give it back to them." The kid reached for the window button. "Right now."

  "No!" Carla fought to control her voice. So the kid did have the chip, after all. Now she’d just have to talk her into handing it over.

  "Even if they get the chip back, they’ll want to make sure the information it contains doesn’t get out." Carla told the girl. "You’ve had the chip for twenty-four hours. Even if the information on the chip is encoded, that’s plenty of time for an experienced decker to decrypt it. You’re just a kid, without any connections, but those goons don’t know that. They’ve got to assume you’ve read the data it contains. And that means—"

  Masaki cut her off. "Stop it, Carla!" he said. "You’re scaring her. You’re scaring me, too."

  "I was going to say," Carla said, an icy tone in her voice, "that it means we’ve got to air our story on Mitsuhama as soon as possible. Once the technical data on the chip is public knowledge, there’ll be no need for the corporation to try to keep us quiet."

  "Oh." Masaki was still driving quickly, but not recklessly. They were only a few blocks from the KKRU building. It was late, but Carla was keyed up with the excitement of the chase. This story was going to be a big one; she could feel it in her bones. After all, Mitsuhama had killed the mage to make sure word of their top-secret project didn’t get out, and had burned the hard copy printout he’d been about to give Masaki. Funny, though, them overlooking the chip.

  She reached out a hand. "Give me the chip, and I’ll make sure the story airs. Then you’ll be off the hook with the yakuza."

  The kid rummaged in the pocket of her jacket. She pulled out a tiny bronze disk. But when Carla reached for it, the kid yanked her hand back. "I want you to promise me something, first." she said.

  "What?"

  "That you’ll do the story on my friends." the girl continued. "About how the cops killed them."

  "Sure, kid." Carla promised smoothly. "Just as soon as the Mitsuhama story airs. That’s the important thing right now. Getting those goons off your back."

  The kid studied Carla for a long moment, then grudgingly agreed. "O.K.." she said, dropping the data-chip into Carla’s hand.

  "Now," Carla said, "tell us everything that happened the night you found the dead man."

  7

  When they reached the station, Carla immediately popped the datachip into a deck. Masaki fretted about encryption devices and self-wipe programs, but as it turned out, the chip wasn’t even encoded with a password.

  As the two reporters hunched over the display, Pita could tell from their perplexed expressions that they didn’t understand what they were seeing. The screen was filled with a series of weird diagrams and symbols and long blocks of text. Whatever was on the chip apparently had something to do with magic because she heard Carla and Masaki muttering stuff about "hermetic circles." "astral space." and "multi-something conjuring." They at last concluded that it must be a spell formula of some sort.

  By the time they gave up on trying to figure it out themselves, it was morning. Rather than going home to sleep, the two decided to visit a mage friend of Carla’s. Pita, despite the fact that exhaustion threatened to overwhelm her at any moment, decided to tag along. She was already coming to realize that the reporters were more interested in the datachip than in her. But they’d saved her ass once, and she felt safer with them than in an office full of strangers. Besides, she was curious about the chip.

  Their destination was an odd little shop on Denny Way, tucked into the middle of a block of buildings that looked as if they’d been built in the previous century. There was no sign out front, no indication of what type of store it might be. The large window in the front was entirely covered with intricate designs, done in gold leaf. Pita wondered if they were magical wards of some sort.

  As Carla knocked, Pita peered in through the glass. The interior of the shop was dark, but she could see that it was filled with untidy stacks of hardcopy texts bound in boxy coverings. These were books—the old-fashioned, difficult-to-use data storage units that had been so popular in the last century. Pita couldn’t see the attraction of them, and wondered how a place like this could make any money. She’d take a Pocketpad graphic novel over one of these dusty antiques any day.

  The door opened suddenly, and the brass bell above it tinkled. Carla stepped inside, then motioned Masaki and Pita to follow. As Pita closed the door behind them, a small white cat leaped down from one of the stacks of books and wove itself, purring, around her ankles. She reached down to scratch its head, looking around the shop. There was no sign of the proprietor.

  "Hello. Welcome to Inner Secrets Thaumaturgical Textbooks. Aziz Fader at your service."

  The voice came from somewhere just ahead. Pita jerked back as a human shape suddenly appeared a step or two in front of her. One minute there had been nothing but empty air in front of her; the next, some guy was stan
ding there. It gave her the weirds to think he’d been there all along, watching her invisibly. Masaki was equally startled, but Carla just smiled. "Hello, Aziz. Long time no scan."

  The shopkeeper was a tall man with jet-black hair combed straight back from his high forehead. He was human, but thin enough to be an elf. His nose had a slight hook to it, and his eyes were so dark it was hard to tell where the iris ended and the pupil began. He wore a flowing, one-piece garment with an ankle-length hem and wide sleeves, and held his hands in front of him, fingers laced together.

  His eyes were locked on Carla. They took in every centimeter of the reporter, from her neatly braided hair and high cheekbones, to her tailored suit, to her stylish, expensive leather pumps. "I like the new face." he commented, one eyebrow arched. He barely glanced at Masaki, with his rumpled shirt and uncombed graying hair, or at Pita, who still wore her torn jeans and cheap synthleather jacket.

  Masaki cleared his throat. "We’ve come to—"

  "I know why you’re here, Carla." Aziz said, still addressing the female reporter. "I did a minor mind probe before I let you in. A little protective measure. I hope you don’t mind."

  "Not at all." Carla said smoothly. "Let’s get right to it then, shall we?"

  Carla handed him the chip.

  The shopkeeper waved them to a large wooden desk in the back of the store. A telecom unit sat on one corner. The rest of its surface was covered with a jumble of books, loose papers, and datachips. Aziz pushed these aside, revealing an ancient data display with a fold-up screen and a battered-looking keyboard. It didn’t even have a pickup for voice recognition, let alone a jack for a datacord. The shopkeeper must have a jones for old-fashioned stuff.

  Aziz seated himself at the desk and powered up the datadeck. Carla and Masaki pulled up chairs on either side of him, and Pita, left without a seat, perched on a stack of books.

  "Get down from there!" Aziz barked. "Those are valuable!"

  Pita leaped to her feet, but the mage had already turned his attention to the flickering screen in front of him. He scrolled through the text, muttering to himself. Pita flipped him the finger behind his back.