Shadowrun 46 - A Fistful of Data

by Stephen Dedman (v1. 0) (epub)

  “Have you ever worked for a corp, Mr. Foote?” “Olympic Security. Two years, before I decided to go into business for myself.”

  Boanerges nodded, wondering what you had to be caught doing to get yourself fired from Olympic Security without going directly to jail. “How much do you think this Mr. Johnson knows about the job?”

  “I think he knew a lot more than he was telling me, but I’m not sure. He had one hell of a poker face. I don’t know where the money was coming from, and maybe he didn’t either, but I can tell you one thing—he wasn’t somebody you try to frag around with. If I was you, I’d get your butts out of here. It’s not like it’s prime real estate or nothing.” Boanerges shook his head slightly. “I’m afraid you’re wrong about that. Have you ever heard of the Crypt?” Foote’s eyes widened slightly. “I’ve heard a little. This is the Crypt?”

  “Yes.”

  “How many people you got living here?”

  Boanerges smiled. “I haven’t done a head count recently, but several dozen. Some of them can’t be exposed to sunlight without intense pain. But this place isn’t just a squat, or a sanctuary. It’s a school for street kids. It’s also my medicine lodge, and a clinic.” He waved at the painted snake that coiled, caduceus style, around the concrete pillar beside the entrance. “We offer both magical and medical healing, and we have patients who cannot be moved. More important, though, if we were to move, how would people who need us, find us?

  “So I’m afraid that we can’t move, and we won’t, and any attempt to move us will cost your employer far more than this land could possibly be worth. Please relay this message to him—or better still, let me speak to him.” Foote hesitated. “I don’t have any way of reaching him. I’ll have to wait for him to contact me with the rest of my payment. Look, I’m just a messenger. I don’t want any trouble . . .” He jumped slightly as Pinhead growled. “I mean, I don’t want anybody to lose their home or anything, but maybe you could make some sort of deal with this guy. Is there some way he can contact you?”

  Boanerges peered over the top of his shades to look him up and down, then turned to Pierce. “Do you have a booking agent?”

  The drummer blinked, then recited one of his e-mail addresses. Foote tapped it into his wristphone, then nodded and walked backwards up the ramp—still unaware of the city spirit that hovered above the ruins, or the watcher that Boanerges conjured up and sent after him.

  “He wasn’t lying,” said Sumatra once Foote was out of earshot. “He may’ve been lied to, but he believed what he was saying.”

  Boanerges nodded.

  “Do you think he’ll be back?” asked Pierce.

  “Him? No. I think they’ll send someone a little more persuasive.” There was the faintest hint of a hiss in Boan-erge’s voice, and Sumatra took a half step back. “I can’t imagine what it is they want here, but this is our home, and it’s worth defending.”

  Foote walked into his cubicle-sized one-room office to find the Hatter already waiting for him, sitting on the shabby sofa and reading the latest stock market report on his pocket secretary. “How did you get in?” the investigator blustered.

  “You need a better lock,” said the company man, not looking up. “And what’s that poison in your desk drawer for? Cleaning your guns?”

  “It’s bourbon.”

  “You drink that? Voluntarily?”

  “Only when I’ve had a bad day,” grunted Foote, sitting down heavily in his old synthleather chair and plugging himself into the tabletop computer to download images from his opticam. “Your vacant lot isn’t vacant. There’s at least three people living there, and they’re probably telling the truth about there being dozens. They’ve even got a small farm—well, a vegetable garden—growing in the ruins. You ever heard of the Crypt?”

  “Of course. Shadowrunners and other crooks go there to lick their wounds when they’ve nothing better. It’s in that building?”

  “Under it, more like.” He copied the images to a chip, which he threw to the Hatter. “The skinny human with the dreads is the boss. A magician of some sort, probably a shaman. The big pale ork with all the drek in his face is Pinhead Pierce, plays drums in a couple of clubs when they’re desperate and busks outside shops until somebody pays him to leave. The other ork I don’t know. They gave me a contact number, if you want to negotiate with them.”

  The Hatter smiled and reached inside his coat. “I don’t think that will be necessary,” he began, then blinked as a watcher spirit, shaped like a snake with a huge mouth, appeared on Foote’s shoulder.

  “Now hear this!” the watcher blared. “Any attempt to relocate us from our home will cost you more than the land could possibly be worth!” It looked at the Hatter expectantly.

  The company man hesitated, his hand still on the butt of his slivergun. “Tell your master,” he said smoothly, “that we own that land now, and he has until noon tomorrow to move. If he does not, it will cost him much more dearly than he imagines. Can you remember that, or do I need to repeat it?”

  The watcher faded away, leaving the Hatter fuming. He considered shooting Foote as he’d planned, but he hadn’t counted on the possibility of a magical witness. He’d already disabled all the security devices he’d found in the investigator’s office, but he had no way of being sure that the watcher had really gone, or that he wasn’t being observed magically or astrally. “I was never here,” he told Foote, “and you’ve never heard of the Crypt. You are likely to live much longer if you erase all records of the address, as well as these photos, and any photos you may have been foolish enough to take of me. Can you remember thatl”

  “Sure,” said the investigator, trying to sound braver than he felt.

  The Hatter nodded and tossed him a certified credstick. “Buying yourself a better grade of liquor would probably increase your life expectancy, too,” he added. “This should be more than enough. And you’d better replace that lock, too.”

  The last remaining bookstore in Pike Place Market was scarcely larger than Mute’s bathroom, but it was packed with antique comics, books and magazines, as well as a small collection of fiction chips and disks. Mute was examining a signed first edition of The Chrysalids while stroking the shop’s cat, but she looked up as soon as she heard the door open, then looked down again as a bald, ebon-skinned dwarf approached her. The dwarf looked around at the store—empty apart from the cat and the manager—and murmured, “Good book?”

  “Yes.” She nodded at the manager, who disappeared behind a curtain. There was a click as the door locked. “What’s the job?”

  The dwarf, 8-ball, stared at the cat. “You remember that squat we hid in after that Brackhaven run went sour?” “That hole down in Puyallup?”

  8-ball nodded. “Doc Czarnecki called me. Some fragger’s bought the land and wants to kick everyone out. No more clinic, no more illegal data tap, no more sanctuary for runners who’ve been ratted out to security . .

  “Did you ever find out who was behind that?” asked Mute softly. It had been more than a year since she, 8-ball and Sumatra had smuggled a decker inside Brackhaven Investments’ offices, then escaped to find their rigger and getaway car gone and their escape route cut off by armed guards. The decker, Mandy Mandelbrot, had been mowed down while they were diving for cover. Sumatra had been wounded, and had fought to remain conscious long enough to summon a hearth spirit to provide concealment while they ran. Mute and 8-ball had all but dragged him back to the lift, then blasted their way through a third-floor window and rappelled to the ground. The rigger, Mercedes Benzene, had never been seen again.

  8-ball shook his head. “I still can’t believe that Mercy would have done that to us—especially not to Mandy. I thought it might be their fixer, but that doesn’t make sense either. Maybe someone in the building got lucky, realized the car didn’t belong there . .He didn’t sound convinced. “I guess we’ll never know. Anyway, Czarnecki said they needed help, so I said I’d be there. They can’t afford to pay us, but I’ve stayed th
ere when I couldn’t afford to pay them, either. It should only be a day or two, and I don’t have anything better to do right now. How about you?” Mute nodded. “Count me in.”

  Hare studied the pictures Foote had taken and shook his head. “I don’t recognize any of them, but I’m not an expert on magicians. How about you?”

  “No,” said the Hatter, sprawling in one of Hare’s armchairs. “There’s an ork named Pinhead Pierce on our resources database; if it’s the same one, and he certainly matches the description, he works as a bouncer at the Big O sometimes, and plays the drums when they let him or need to clear the place. There used to be an illegal jack-point at the club, so he probably knows some shadowrun-ners, and may even have worked as muscle on a few runs, but I don’t think we need to worry about him. We don’t have a name for the other ork; I’ve run the picture through the facial recognition software, but it’s not clear enough to come up with any positive matches, just a list of possibles. The magician who lives there is supposed to be strictly a healer, but a good one, so Lord alone knows why he lives in that dump ... He may have set up some magical defenses, so we may need a magician as well as some muscle.”

  “Who were you going to use? Genocide George and his team?”

  “No. If it’s a shadowrunner hangout, they might have friends down there, and even George charges extra for shooting his friends.” “Genocide George” Sequoia was a Makah warrior who’d been discharged from his tribe’s military and become one of Seattle’s most trigger-happy mercenaries: he’d once blown a hole in a teammate’s abdomen with an assault cannon so he could get a better shot at one of his enemies. “And word is he’s just pulled off a big job against Mitsuhama and is resting up. I did think of hiring a gang, but the place is in neutral territory between the Forever Tacoma, Black Rain and Reality Hacker zones: I assume nobody wants it very badly. I’ve had some contact with the Reality Hackers, but I don’t think they’ll risk going in armed, and gangers are terrible at keeping secrets. No, there’s a squad of meres I’ve hired before. They’re strictly cash up front and expenses, no percentage, and they don’t ask any embarrassing questions. And they’re from way out of town, so they won’t have any sentimental attachment to this place. There wasn’t a magician on their team last time, but I’m sure we can find one they’ll work with if they can’t.”

  “What about the one you’ve been dating? The blonde with the legs and the pheromone glands?”

  “I don’t mix business with pleasure, and Elena’s strictly for pleasure. Have you managed to find plans for the building?”

  “Lost in the crash,” said the elf apologetically. “Do you want to send a drone over? Infrared and ground-penetrating radar should give us a pretty good map. I can make one disappear from stores for a while without anybody noticing. Do your meres have someone who can fly it?”

  “Their rigger, Griffin, is pretty good.” He looked around the tiny sitting room. “If this works, you can get out of this closet. Move upstairs a few floors. Maybe even get a window.”

  Hare snorted, and picked up his deck. “This is all the view I need,” he said. “Though some more scenery in the bedroom occasionally wouldn’t go amiss. How soon do you want the drone?”

  “The meres will start arriving at midnight. Wallace, the commander, and Griffin will be on the first flight; I’ll speak to them then.” He glanced at the chessboard on the table between them. “Fancy a quick game?”

  It was an hour after sunset when 8-ball drove his heavily accessorized Land Rover over the litter and rubble outside the Crypt and parked it between the remnants of two inner walls, glancing frequently at the satellite navigation receiver and radar readouts on his dashboard as he positioned it. “Worried about the feng shui?” asked Mute, yawning.

  The dwarf grinned, and flicked a switch. A heads-up display appeared on the windshield, and he checked the rangefinder before moving the vehicle forward another half a meter. “Grenade launcher,” he explained. “Minimum range. You want to get your stuff?”

  Mute grabbed her small backpack. Unlike the weapons specialist, she preferred to travel light, the better to move quickly and quietly. With her free hand, she picked up one of 8-ball’s cases, and barely managed not to grunt from the effort. “What have you got in here?”

  8-ball glanced at the case, looking at the notches on its rim. “Assault cannon.”

  “Is that all?”

  “And the ammo, of course. I may have put a few grenades in there as well.” He picked up another two cases, and hauled them out of the back of the Land Rover. “This one’s a little lighter . .

  Mute wrinkled her nose at this sexist remark, considered that he might also have been taking a shot at the fact that she was human, and followed him toward the entrance. A concrete ramp was set against the sublevel’s east wall, and Pinhead Pierce and a purple-haired dwarf girl who looked barely old enough to shave were leaning up against the painted pillar near its foot. The ork greeted the shadowrun-ners with an extravagant salute. 8-ball looked at the dented baseball bat in Pierce’s right hand and the big revolver tucked into the waistband of his ancient cargo pants. “Is that thing loaded?” he asked.

  Pierce looked down at the Warhawk as though he’d never seen it before, tucked the bat under his left elbow, drew the revolver with his right hand, broke it and looked into the cylinder. “Nah,” he said finally. “Didn’t think so.”

  “You ever fired it?”

  “Yeah, but never at anyone. But I’m pretty sure I didn’t reload.”

  “Where did you get it?”

  “Took it off some fragger at the O a week ago. Figured he couldn’t use it anymore anyway, not with two broken arms. Been meaning to pawn it, but haven’t gotten around to it yet.”

  8-ball shook his head. “I have some ammo for that in one of these cases; I’ll give it to you later. When I do, you keep the gun in your right hand, okay? Not in your pants.”

  “Okay.”

  The weapons specialist sighed and turned to the dwarf girl, who was gripping a Remington Roomsweeper and looking nervous. 8-ball hoped that it was loaded with gel.

  not shot; knowing Boanerges’ distaste for lethal weapons, that seemed likely. “Is yours loaded?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Safety on?”

  “Yes,” she said, then looked. “Yes,” she repeated. “What’s your name?”

  “Didge.”

  “Short for Dr. Digitalis,” Pierce explained, chuckling. He glanced at 8-ball’s face and decided that making short jokes in front of the weapons specialist was probably a bad idea.

  I le coughed softly and stared up the ramp at the cloudy sky. 8-ball ignored him. “Do you know who I am, Didge?” “No,” she said quietly. “But he did, and you know who she is, so I thought you had to be friends. And we’re not expecting any trouble tonight. No outsiders ever come here at night.”

  That, 8-ball reflected, was mostly true. “Okay. Where’s Boanerges?”

  “There’s a meeting in his lodge,” said Pierce. “You’re to go straight in.”

  8-ball nodded. “Where should I put these? I wouldn’t want the kids to start playing with them.”

  “Leave them with me.”

  The dwarf put his cases down behind the pillar. Mute did the same, then shrugged her pack onto her back. 8-ball led the way into the underground shantytown, a multicolored labyrinth of cubical dividers, cartons and crates and other scavenged or stolen building materials, decorated with posters and printouts and painted in a variety of styles. It was dark in the maze except for the illumination leaking out around the curtains that gave a vestige of privacy to the residents’ quarters. Both shadowrunners could see in infrared, and there were faint heat traces of other people on either side of the serpentine corridors. “You been here recently?” asked Mute.

  “I grew up here, and spare me the height jokes. I’ve heard them all before.” He turned left at a crooked T-j unction and kept walking until they heard raised voices. The dwarf paused. “Lankin,” he m
uttered sourly.

  “Long Lankin?”

  “Yeah. You know him?”

  She shook her head. “Is there anyone in this biz you haven’t worked with?”

  Instead of answering, 8-ball drew back the threadbare smoke-colored curtain and they walked into a crowded, candle-lit medicine lodge. Long Lankin, the tallest and blackest elf Mute had ever seen, was standing as he addressed the gathering, making a case for negotiating with the intruders. His head was slightly bowed, not in respect, but to avoid bumping it on the ceiling. “If they’l! give us more time, you can find another place.”

  “Snake wants me to stay here,” said Boanerges softly. “The rest of you can move, if you feel you must. I’m staying until she tells me to go.”

  There was a moment’s silence before a short ugly ork in a once-white lab coat, who Mute recognized as “Cutter” Czarnecki, the street doc, asked, “What about transport? The hospital’s not going to be easy to move, not to mention our patients.”

  “We get them to pay for transport,” said Lankin. “A bus and a truck should be enough, and cost much less to hire than they must have spent buying this land—”

  “That’s assuming they have bought it,” interrupted a redheaded elf in faded jeans and a “Cthulhu for President” T-shirt. “This guy Foote didn’t show us any proof of that.” “You want us to call Lone Star and check, Ratty?”

  The redhead unzipped his cyberdeck case, giving Lankin a nasty grin. “Do you know what they call you in England, Lank?”

  “Ratatosk, you make a good point,” said Boanerges patiently. “Can you hack into the council’s database and find out?”

  “No problem,” said the decker, and Mute stared at him in amazement. Ratatosk was a legendary figure: Mercurio Switch’s most promising student and protege, and one of the best freelance deckers on the West Coast. Mute looked around the room at the others gathered there: an androgynous blond troll in studded leather, Sumatra the street shaman, two middle-aged human males (one Anglo, one Native American), a neatly groomed dwarf with bandaged lingers, and a black-clad Japanese elf woman of almost breathtaking beauty.