The Lowdown in High Town: An R.R. Johnson Novel

by DK Williamson

  “Bob?”

  “Bob?”

  “I think we got a problem,” said the boss. “Everyone, back to sixty, now. High Town team, where are you, you in range yet?”

  “We are just coming up on Green Plaza.”

  “Shit,” said the boss, his transmission sounding of static. “Get back to High Town, Remy. That son of a bitch slipped us.”

  “This is High Town team. Roger.”

  As I expected, they had a team waiting in High Town. My trip to Old Houston fixed that, but since I didn’t shake Team BluCorp it just added one more carload of guys on my ass. They were all behind me though, that was a small advantage.

  As I got further away from the building the worse the transmissions from the BluCorp crews became until I couldn’t pick up anything. I knew they would be coming, but if I got to High Town I’d be on my turf. I’d have the home field advantage, outnumbered who knows how many to one.

  My plan wasn’t working as well as I would have liked, but that was to be expected. The best laid plans of mice and PIs... I’d just have to improvise.

  A smart guy would find somewhere to lay low and let things play out. I wasn’t going to lay low. I had a stake in the game and I was determined to play my hand. Besides, it was like Gene said, some of these people got me good and mad.

  I fished my mobile phone out of my pocket and coded in Hap’s number.

  “RR? That you?” he said when he answered.

  “That’s right.”

  “We’re on our way to High Town. That BluCorp badge that chased us got a couple of buddies to join in on the fun so it took us awhile to get rid of them. Lolly says thanks for the blade, it came in handy.”

  “Did you have to kill anyone?”

  “No, but a couple of’em ain’t walking very well.”

  “I’m glad it worked out. I’m still being chased. I’m headed to the Red Light from Old Houston, so when you get there find somewhere and lay low till the shooting stops or I call you.”

  “You’re expecting gunplay?”

  “The way things are going right now, it wouldn’t surprise me if it didn’t come to that. Stay clear until this plays out. If they nail me take what you have and follow the plan, got it?”

  “Yeah. Good luck, RR,” he said as he disconnected.

  I turned and looked out the back window. I wondered if the closest BluCorp team was near enough to keep tabs on me. I decided it didn’t matter. I was in it as deep as I could get and I’d be shocked to come out of the situation not dead or in prison.

  I keyed in Lieutenant Weaver’s number. It appeared to me that I had drawn an awful lot of BluCorp’s security personnel away from the computer center and it might be a good time for Weaver to use a tac team to effect a rescue of the Savans.

  “Hello?” he answered.

  “This is Johnson.”

  “Johnson? Why are you calling this time of night?” He didn’t sound happy.

  “Sorry about the time, but I thought you’d be mad if I waited until a decent hour to tell you where you could find Charles and Beverly Savan.”

  “What? Are you serious? How—”

  “Don’t ask how. They are at BluCorp’s Central Computer Processing Center. Building six, room two. Check it out and you’ll see that I am straight on this.”

  “BluCorp Computer Center? How the.... Ah, damn it, Johnson. You had better be straight. Would you happen to know how many kidnappers are with them?”

  “Two.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yeah. A pair of BluCorp’s Arc Tau rent-a-mercs last time I heard. Time’s a wasting. You can thank me later. Good luck and tell Beverly she owes me,” I said as I hung up.

  The cab was nearing the Sky Riser. I leaned forward and looked at the meter, tabulating how much scrip I needed to pay the driver.

  “You might want to make yourself scarce as soon as I get out,” I said.

  “Why’s that?” the guy asked.

  “One, you’ll be in Squatsville. Two, there are four skycars following us, each one full of guys that want me dead. Reason enough?”

  “Fuck me!” he said.

  “Don’t worry. I’ll tip you.”

  “Fuck me.”

  The hack brought us down like a troop ship in a hot landing zone. I tossed the scrip into the front of the cab as we set down. The hack had the cab pulling away before I was completely out. Smart man.

  I wanted to shake any pursuers that might be dogging me before I got to Pete’s. I thought they had to know we were friends and had to consider that I might go there, but I doubted they possessed the manpower to be able to sit on the place and hunt for me at the same time. I hoped I could lose them in Squatsville or the nearby areas and then get to Pete’s unscathed and unseen.

  I ran to the north past The Cog and through one of the housing units. I went half a block west and ducked into an alley leading north into a warehouse and storage area. I stopped under a covered loading bay to catch my breath and drink the last of the water from my canteen. I leaned against the wall several steps from the door.

  It was as dark and quiet as having your head in a vat of used engine oil. I know, because it happened to me once. You see nothing. You hear nothing. The guy they did before me apparently tried to yell his head off in there. Bad idea, real bad. In oil, nobody can hear you scream. I figured it must be the calm before the shitstorm.

  The headset buzzed. “—and I’m sure he was headed for the West Bridge. The cab’s vector indicated that,” an insistent voice said.

  “He tricked us once. You think that’s the last time he’ll pull a stunt?” said the boss voice I heard at Green Plaza.

  “I didn’t say that, but I am positive he was going to the West Bridge.”

  “Fine, Remy. If you’re so sure you go there. Skycar two, set down at his office and cover the area around there. Three, drop two of your guys on Houston Street near the pink zone, then orbit with the heavy blaster. If we find him you get him from the air.”

  “This is three, roger.”

  “Where are you going, boss?” Remy asked.

  “I’m dropping two guys north of you, then I’m going farther north. We’ll do check-ins every five minutes. Find this son of a bitch.”

  I heard a skycar not far away as I exited the loading bay. I guessed it was the boss dropping off his two guys. I wished I had gone straight to Pete’s.

  I moved slowly northward between rows of large industrial strength metal storage boxes. Scratches and dings scarred them from countless attempts by locals to gain access with hand tools. Ahead, down an alley that ran between two warehouses, I saw a flashlight beam coming from the right. I crouched behind the storage box and waited. A minute or two later the beam was pointed down the alley and coming my way.

  I peered at the BluCorp thug through the narrow space underneath the storage box. He was by himself. To the east, I heard a skycar pass by at a distance. The man with the flashlight turned to his left and followed the row of storage boxes. As soon as he disappeared from sight I closed with him, moving as fast and as quietly as I could over the plascrete surface, keeping the storage box between him and me.

  The headset buzzed. “Units, check in,” the boss man said.

  “Skycar one-two, with you, boss.”

  I peeked around the corner of the storage box and the guy was standing three meters away with his back to me awaiting his turn.

  “Skycar one-three.”

  “Skycar one-four,” said the man in front of me. I closed on him and struck him in the back of the head with the buttstock of my shotgun. I had five minutes before they figured out he was down.

  The guy was carrying a chattergun, a small automatic weapon that sprayed lightweight polymer slugs. They were popular in urban areas because they were short-ranged and didn’t punch holes through walls. They could chew flesh very well, but were not a very good choice if your target was behind cover. I tossed the sling over my shoulder and slid the chattergun to my back as the last of the
BluCorp thugs checked in.

  I moved down the alley between the warehouses to the street. A quick look left and right showed me the street was clear so I moved for the alley directly across from me. I had just entered the dark passage when a man rounded the corner at the opposite end less than fifty meters away.

  I could see by his silhouette that he carried the same kind of chattergun I took from Skycar one-four.

  “Marcus, that you?” he asked.

  I brought my shotgun to my shoulder and fired. The man screamed with his microphone activated so I heard it through the headset as well as live and in person. It meant all of the BluCorp thugs heard it too.

  The guy went down but struggled to get up again. I closed on him and fired once more. He fell back to the plascrete and his struggles ended.

  “Last calling unit!” the boss man said over the headset. His voice was tight and higher pitched than before because of the tension.

  “Last calling unit.”

  I was tempted to answer, but if I did it would give away the fact that I had a headset of my own. It was an advantage I intended to keep so I stayed mum.

  “All units, check in.”

  “Skycar one-two,” said the guy with the boss.

  After several seconds, the boss came on again.

  “One-three and one-four, check in.”

  “One-three and one-four, check in.”

  “Warehouse area!” the boss ordered, his voice loud enough to cause distortion on the headset. “All units close on the warehouses.”

  I knew the closest units would be coming from the southeast and northeast so I went back to the street and headed west.

  A heavy blaster bolt slammed into the wall high and in front of me, dropping a shower of particles onto the street and me. The bolt came from behind me and to the left. It was the damned skycar with a heavy blaster.

  I turned and ran toward the skycar as another bolt flew overhead. The driver started to slow and turn to bring the blaster man in the open rear door to bear on me from a hundred meters away.

  I stopped and fired, buckshot pellets striking across the front of the skycar, one of them scoring a hit on the windshield. I could see the small white starfish where it struck.

  The skycar driver threw the car over to his right and went full thrust over the nearest warehouse. I fired again and heard a couple of pellets hit the vehicle as it arced over the building and out of sight. One of the men in the skycar was yelling almost incoherently over the radio.

  I ran west once again, shoving the four remaining slugs I carried into the tube magazine of my shotgun. Once they were loaded, I hit the release on the slide and kicked the buckshot round out of the chamber and into my hand. When I slammed the action forward once again I had four slugs ready for the next round with the skycar.

  I had gone half a block when the skycar returned. This time the driver was not going to allow me any shots at a slow-moving vehicle.

  The skycar passed by 150 meters behind me coming from the direction it had fled a short time before. The gunner got off a shot, but he was far off the mark. The skycar was out of sight before I had chance to fire.

  I ran into a recessed entry to my left and waited for the next pass.

  The skycar came from my right. I fired twice, but missed. The heavy blaster answered with another wild shot. As soon as the skycar vanished from sight I ran to another entry twenty meters to the east. I didn’t want to be in the same spot when they came by for another pass.

  “Get closer to him this time. He can’t hit us at this speed. I’ll get him on this run,” came over the headset. I was sure it was the gunner.

  I heard the skycar closing and when it appeared, it was to my left. They must have assumed I went west because the gunner was facing that way.

  My first shot went in the open door and punched through the top of the skycar. I reduced my lead and fired my last slug. It hit halfway between the passenger compartment and the trailing edge of the skycar.

  Black smoke belched out of the air vents on the rear deck. The car emitted a screeching sound as its lev and propulsion systems ground and shorted their way to junk. The skycar passed over the building and out of sight quickly running out of power and lift.

  “We’re fucked! We’re going down,” came over the headset just before the vehicle went silent and plummeted downward. I heard no impact, so I surmised it went over the edge of the Sky Riser. The headset went crazy with too many voices to count yelling over one another.

  I ran westward up the street shoving shotgun shells into the magazine of my weapon. After a block, I went north. The headset told me the guys who were placed near my office by the boss man were moving on foot to where I was last seen while the others were coming from the other direction.

  I hoped I would be able slip between the two groups undetected if I kept going north and west toward the center of the Red Light.

  Somebody new came on the headset. He said he was in a ground sedan on Dierker. A replacement player from off the bench for the visiting team.

  Once I was felt confident I had slipped by the guys coming from the west I went toward Houston street. If the coast was clear I intended to head straight north to Pete’s. I hit Houston just south of my office and crossed the street, then I went north up the sidewalk. The new addition to the group hunting me came on the headset saying he was going on foot, but he didn’t say where he was. A few seconds later, I found out.

  A man stepped from a car parked at the curb just ahead and glanced at me in passing, then his eyes came back and locked onto me. He was surprised, and that quickly turned to anger. He had recognized me. “He’s here! By his office,” the guy said on the headset. I closed with him, reluctant to shoot with the amount of people on the street and sidewalks nearby.

  I recognized the man as well. A detective out of one of the Midtown districts. He used to work High Town as a uniform. He went for his weapon on his right hip, but his arm hit the doorframe near the roof of the car. He should have stepped clear before he tried to clear leather. It cost him. I drove the buttstock of my shotgun into his face and slammed the door onto his body when I crashed into it. He was out cold, his nose was a bent and crimson mess.

  I opened the door and he fell onto the street, his head and loose blaster bouncing off the pavement. I dug into his right front pants pocket for the keys to the sedan while the voices on the headset told the crooked cop “to hold on because help was coming.”

  It dawned on me I inadvertently made a classic mistake. I wasn’t trying to go to my office, but I was going right past it, which amounted to the same thing. Fugitives love to go somewhere familiar.

  The dirty cop’s addition to Team BluCorp made me wonder what other wild cards were going to come into play that night.

  I kicked the crooked detective’s blaster away and climbed in the driver’s seat of the car. I started the sedan and whipped it around 180 degrees and went north. As I came to the central intersection of the Red Light at Houston and Dierker a car approaching from the opposite way slewed across the street as shots rang out from the right.

  I threw the car left and went west on Dierker. In the rear view I could see the night crowd around the nearest clubs scattering and the sedan that tried to block the street coming after me in pursuit. Voices on the radio were talking over one another again, but I could hear someone say they couldn’t get through the crowd and they were trying to go around in a vehicle.

  I drove to the end of the street and slid the car to a halt in front of a parking lot on the edge of the Sky Riser that provides a nice view of Old Houston. The view was the least of my concerns just then. I ran up the left side of the street toward the oncoming car and took cover at the corner of a building. As the car passed I fired at the rear tire, flattening it and sending the car sliding toward the railing at the end of the street.

  The driver fought for control, but lost. The tail end of the car slewed one way then the other as the driver overcompensated. The car hit the curb out of
control, careening off a building and came to rest against the railing very much the worse for wear. I topped of my shotgun as I ran back to the commandeered sedan and a quick look told me the two guys in the other car were out of the game.

  I spun the car around and raced east.

  The voice of the boss man came over the radio and said Lawton Muckle was en route to High Town in a skytruck with more men. Reinforcements coming and I was getting low on ammo.

  A car coming at me from the opposite way sprouted a man from the passenger window. He had a pistol in his mitt. I drew my .45 and shifted it to my left hand as the passenger in the other car started throwing lead my way, one of the bullets punching through the passenger side of the windshield and hitting the headrest of the seat beside me.

  I stuck my pistol out the window but held my fire until we were close, the driver of the other car doing the same. We were closing on each other as if we were competing in some sort of strange jousting tourney. I suppose we were, only this wasn’t for sport.

  I could see people on the sidewalks on both sides of the street, oblivious to the crashing cars and bullets flying, oblivious to the spectacle and danger right next to them. The stoned, drunk, chipped in, brain damaged, or stupid going about their way without a clue.

  Some of those that were aware of the situation made things worse for themselves thinking it might be safer on the other side of the street—irrespective of what side of the street they were on—so they ran in front of two speeding cars with lead sailing by. Madness.

  The driver and passenger in the other car fired as we got close to one another, but they missed.

  As we passed one another, with less than two meters of space between us, the other driver and I both fired. I triggered two rounds in rapid succession. I heard a hit on my car somewhere behind me. In the instance we passed one another I recognized the driver of the other car. He had brown hair, brown eyes, and was very average looking. It was Arthur Teasdale’s lackey, Tom Rooney.

  At first I thought the other car was turning to give chase, but I could see in the rearview mirror that I was wrong as it spun out of control and hit a parked car. Maybe I hit something when we shot at one another, or maybe Mr. Average had less-than-average driving skills.