2xs

by Nigel Findley

  They were just passing floor twenty when something materialized in the elevator car. The two reports varied drastically-predictably-but some features corresponded. First, the thing was a bipedal creature, definitely not human or metahuman, and second, it was terrifying. It paid no attention to either of the witnesses, but lashed out with an arm and quite literally tore Naomi's head off. Then it vanished. End of show. Nobody knew what the frag it was or where it came from, or- more important for Lone Star-how it made it through the arcane defenses of the headquarters building. The official conclusion was that some terrorist group had decided to slot up the Star by sending in some magical nasty-a city spirit, the report surmised-to cause terror. Naomi Takahashi died simply because she was unlucky enough to be near at hand.

  Like fragging drek. If you're a terrorist with a city spirit and you want to kill somebody, just anybody, why go to the bother of sending the monster into a fragging elevator on the fragging twentieth floor? Much better to send the nasty into the lobby or the word-processor pool or maybe the executive suite. And if you are drek-headed enough to pick an elevator, why not maximize the effect by geeking everyone there, hmm? No. Naomi's death was an execution. A particularly unusual and messy one, but an execution nonetheless. She'd queried the wrong data- base or accessed the wrong file, and some hit mage at Yamatetsu had sent forth his pet to silence her.

  Take it a step further. This putative "hit mage" was probably X himself. I already knew X was magically active, my face on the security camera in Lolly's building had proved that. Why hypothesize more than one murderous mage? Occam's razor (with which I would gleefully and with relish slit X's throat).

  Yamatetsu. That had to be the key. I had to find out more about the company. The whys and the hows as well as the whats. There was something there, something important enough to kill-and keep killing-to protect. I had to find out what it was. And then I had to find a way to bring X down-and the whole-of Yamatetsu, if that's what it took.

  And I had to do it myself. No more sending friends to do the dirty work, risking their necks for me.

  But how? I wrestled with that question the rest of that evening and late into the night, but didn't come up with a totally satisfactory answer. I woke the next morning feeling like drek-too little sleep, too much stress-but forced myself out of bed and back to the telecom.

  First things first. I knew next to nothing about Yamatetsu Corporation, other than the quick thumbnail sketch Buddy had given me. Time to remedy that. Starting point, the public datanets.

  Most of the datanet entries talked about Yamatetsu's international operations. God, it was a monster.

  From its headquarters in Kyoto, its influence spread virtually everywhere in the world: Atzlan, Europe, the Soviet (dis)Union, even, reputedly, Tir Tairngire. It owned or controlled several hundred smaller corps in virtually every industry-automotive, food processing, electronics, hospitality, armaments, travel, and so on and so forth-and had at least some financial participation in a thousand more. Its revenue figures were unavailable (no fragging surprise), but judging by what information I could lay my hands on, I figured its annual profit figures exceeded the GNP of quite a few small countries. (I'll admit it, that doesn't mean much to me, financial matters not being my strong suit. A more meaningful comparison was that Yamatetsu appeared to be almost twice as large as Mitsuhama. And I'd never even heard of it before a couple of days ago. That was terrifying.)

  Yamatetsu had limited investments in Seattle, relatively speaking. It owned the City Center Building at Pike and Fifth, and that's where it had its local headquarters. From there, its management team, led by Senior Veep Jacques Barnard, controlled the destinies of only a dozen or so local companies and some three thousand employees. Small potatoes, petty cash, a mere bagatelle.

  The corp also had a secondary facility in Fort Lewis. In fact, from the datanet description it sounded like Yamatetsu had its own little industrial park hidden away in the trees. Predictably, none of the public databases offered any indication of what kind of work was done at this outlying facility, but I could make a good guess. In general, what are you going to find in the Fort Lewis District? The military, that's what, chummer. Fort Lewis is home to the Seattle Metroplex Guard, McChord Air-base, and training facilities and accommodation for almost twenty corporate security forces (read "private armies"). Add to this the fact that any corp loves to be as close to its potential market as possible. I figured I 'd found Yamatetsu's ISP division, developer and marketer of SPISES booster technology.

  I tried to do a little digging into the background of Senior Veep Jacques Barnard. Know your enemy and all that drek. But-no surprise-there was nothing on him in any of the databases to which I had access.

  No mailing address, no LTG number. Presumably, anybody who wanted to contact Barnard either already knew how to do it or did it care of Yamatetsu's Seattle HQ.

  Okay. So I'd exhausted that source of information. What was the next step?

  I sat back and thought it through once more. What exactly was I looking for?

  X, part of my mind yammered. X, so I can kill him.

  But how did I expect to track him down? the more logical portion of my brain demanded. Assuming X was a part of Yamatetsu-still an assumption, even though a very fragging good one-where was he or she in the hierarchy? Or, to ask the same question another way, where did the sweetheart deal with Sutcliffe originate? Veep level, meaning that the whole Seattle structure would be backing his actions? Or-at the other end of the scale- an ambitious product manager willing to do anything to advance his career? Maybe it was wishful thinking, but I tended to favor the lower end of the scale. If someone at veep level, or even Barnard himself, had ordered it, there wouldn't have been any frag-ups, and I wouldn't be around to worry about it.

  So the question remained, how to track X? I knew nothing about him or her ... But X knew all too much about me.

  I wanted to shy away from that line of thought, but if I really intended to track down X, was I willing to put my own neck on the line to do it? (Like I'd been so willing to do with Naomi's? a perverse voice within me mocked.) The truth of the matter was, I simply couldn't think of a better way of going about it.

  Okay, then, down to tactics. I fired up the telecom again, checked the status of Naomi Takahashi's apartment. According to the leasing records, on her death the lease devolved upon her parents. If they didn't do anything to renew it, the lease would expire on December 31. Whether they renewed it or not, the apartment would be empty for about a month. That would make a perfect killing ground. All I had to do was drop a few clues that I was crashing there, then take X when he came to kill me. Simple.

  Simple- maybe- if X was a mundane, just another street gun. The problem was I knew X was magically active. And you've got to fight fire with fire.

  Chapter 17.

  Like most denizens of the shadows, I've always considered fixers to be a necessary evil. I don't like dealing with middlemen, and I strongly resent paying a percentage to someone who plays people like me off against one another while staying out of the shadows himself. My especial disdain was generally reserved for weasels like Anwar, regardless of the fact that he'd brokered most of my best-paying jobs over the last year and a half. Now, however, I was glad for the fact of his existence.

  Except for Jocasta Yzerman, who I wasn't counting, I knew no magicians. But I needed one, and fast.

  If I was seriously considering luring X into a trap, I mustn't forget the decidedly unnatural way Naomi had died. If another monstrous horror like that should rear its ugly head again, I'd better be ready to meet such a threat. And that meant I needed a mage.

  Anwar must have been in a particularly benevolent mood: he only soaked me three hundred nuyen for the name and contact data, and an extra seventy-five for a preliminary phone call from him to establish my bona fides. What a deal.

  The name I got was one Rodney Greybriar, located at Suite 5,1766 Galer, in the Capitol Hill district.

  No LTG number
, apparently Greybriar preferred doing business in person. I wasn't too happy about that, but had to admit that Anwar would never have enjoyed such a long and profitable career if he'd been selling out his clients on a regular basis.

  Capitol Hill has an anachronistic, almost bohemian, feel to it, a total contrast with the rest of the sprawl. In fact, as I cruised Galer looking for a parking place, I might almost have believed I was somewhere very far from downtown Seattle. The buildings were a schizoid mix of 1980s-vintage structures and contemporary apartment complexes ranging from soulless lower-class housing to middle-class buildings with some semblance of security. Greybriar's building, 1766 Galer, was one of the former. Designated a heritage building, its lower floor boasted some lovingly restored neon-work that identified it as the Fitness Connection Aerobics Center. The signs were still in place, but the exercise gym had long ago been broken up into four economy-size apartments. Suite 5 was on the second-and top-floor, apparently taking up half the floor space. Pretty good, I thought. There must be nuyen in the magic biz.

  A car pulled out of a space across the road from me, so I darted over the center line and took it, earning a one-fingered salute from a middle-aged woman whose eye had been on the same spot. Then I walked the half-block back to Greybriar's building. Suite 5 had a private entrance, it seemed, a narrow staircase leading up from the street. As I climbed the steep stairway, I loosened my Manhunter in its holster. No sense taking any chances.

  The door to Suite 5 had no viewport or buzzer. I scanned the frame around the door, the ceiling above it, even the floor, but saw no sign of any kind of security gear. No cameras, no sensors, no nothing. Maybe mages don't need drek like that, I thought, suddenly feeling very cold. I reached out to knock on the door.

  And a voice in my ear froze me where I stood. "You must be Mr. Dirk," the voice said. A warm contralto, definitely feminine, the kind I'd normally love to have murmuring in my ear.

  But not right now. I spun, looking for the source, my hand reaching for my weapon. I spun so fast I almost catapulted myself back down those steep stairs. All to no avail. No one was there.

  Which made it even more unsettling when that same inviting voice chuckled beside me. Slot it all, now I knew why I didn't hang with magicians. "Enough of the games," I snapped.

  The voice answered at once, its tone contrite. "I'm sorry, Mr. Montgomery. I didn't mean to startle you. Please enter. Rodney is expecting you."

  The door swung open with no preliminary clicking of locks and latches being released. My heart still felt like it was lodged in my throat, so I forced it back where it belonged and stepped into the entryway. The door shut behind me as soon as I was through it. I spun again.

  This time someone was there. A striking, willowy blonde dressed in a floor-length gown-robe?-of jade green that perfectly set off the luster of her waist-length hair. She stood with her hands demurely behind her back, which only served to exaggerate her magnificent figure. She was tall, the top of her head level with my forehead, and she regarded me with large eyes, almost impossibly green. A trace of a smile played around her lips. "I really am sorry," she said, and it was the same luscious contralto from before. (Like hell you are, I wanted to say, but refrained.) Her eyes twinkled with amusement, for the first time I realized they matched her gown. "But you did jump nicely," she added quietly. "Please go on through." She gestured with a slender hand.

  The front door of Suite 5 opened into a small hallway, more like an antechamber. I strode forward, leaving the blonde to lock the door-if that was necessary-and entered the main area of the apartment.

  I suppose I'd expected the apartment to be something on a par with Buddy's, dark and claustrophobic, filled with disorder bordering on devastation, but with magical gizmos replacing the high-tech gizmos.

  Fetishes or amulets or such drek, I suppose. Jars containing eye of newt and toe of frog. And books, books, books everywhere: dusty grimoires showing cabalistic symbols on their covers and with ornate ritual daggers as bookmarks.

  Wrong. Suite 5 was light and airy, decorated in an open plan that maximized the sense of space.

  Furniture was sparse but attractive-and expensive-in a Scandinavian-retro kind of way. It was also positioned just so, making the place look like a plate out of an interior decorating rag. Several pieces of art hung on the walls, mostly geometric abstracts. The place was immaculate, nothing out of place and not a piece of newt or frog anatomy anywhere in sight.

  The room I was in was L-shaped, and I stood at the top of the long side. The rest of the room went around a corner to the right. And it was from around that corner that I heard a voice-male, this time-"Mr. Dirk, I assume. Please, join me."

  Walking toward the voice, I rounded the corner. Though no less artistically arranged than the rest, this "wing" was more like an office. Bookshelves lined two walls, though I saw nary a mildewed grimoire. A top-of-the-line telecom was against the third. In the center of the room was a desk, in the same clean-lined style as the rest of the furniture, atop which was another computer. From this angle I couldn't see exactly what appeared on the screen, but it looked something like my conception of a pentacle.

  Behind the desk sat an elf, and behind him stood the green-clad blonde. I looked around. There was no other door leading into the office area, and no physical way she could have beaten me here from the entry hall. I glared at the blonde, gritted my teeth, and vowed never to deal with mages again.

  The elf's polite smile faded as he saw the expression on my face. He glanced over his shoulder, seemingly unaware that the blonde was there. "Amanda," he scolded, "I'll ask you to stop tormenting our guest."

  Amanda hung her head, looking remorseful as a naughty child. Initially I'd judged her to be about my own age, but now had to admit I could easily be off by a dozen years. "I was only having fun, Rodney," she whispered.

  The elf softened. "I know that," he said. "But fun and business rarely mix well. Now run along. We'll talk later."

  Amanda nodded, flashed me a megawatt smile, then vanished into thin air. Now you see her, now you don't. Before I could comment, the elf smiled wryly. "I do apologize for Amanda," he said. "Her, um, high spirits sometimes interfere with her good manners." He stood and walked around the desk to join me, extending his hand. "My name is Rodney Greybriar, Mr. Montgomery."

  I shook his hand and looked the elf over. He was short and stocky for an elf, standing a couple of centimeters less than me, but with shoulders almost as broad. He had thick, chestnut-brown hair. Unlike most elves, his hair was curly and he wore it shoulder-length at the back and shorter at the sides, highlighting the points of his ears. His face was broader than the average elf's, too, with a strong jaw. He wore black trousers and boots, a white shirt buttoned to the neck, and a well-tailored black jacket. Silver flashed on both lapels, stickpins bearing unfamiliar-and probably arcane-symbols.

  "Our mutual friend Anwar says you're in need of my services," Greybriar went on. "And, I might add, he gives you a solid referral. Now, how may I be of assistance?"

  For the first time, I paid attention to the elf's voice. Slightly higher-pitched than I'd have expected from one of his build, with a distinct English accent. (Real or assumed? I wondered.) The overall effect was somewhat foppish, almost effeminate.

  I didn't speak for a moment, taking the time to phrase my requirement in the best way. Greybriar seemed to misunderstand my hesitation. "I do hope Amanda didn't, um, disturb you too deeply," he said with genuine concern.

  "She didn't disturb me." I corrected. "She scared the drek out of me. Who is she anyway?"

  The elf turned away, perhaps a little disturbed himself, or maybe embarrassed was a better word.

  "Amanda is, um, is a companion of mine." He glanced back at me from under his curly mop of hair, and his almond eyes twinkled with wry humor. "Not one always and entirely of my choice, I might add." I raised an eyebrow at that, but he shook his head. "Not because of sexual orientation on either of our parts," he hurriedly explained. "Things woul
d be very different if Amanda were a human or a metahuman."

  That was the last thing I'd expected him to say. "What is she, then?" I asked.

  Greybriar grinned, then chuckled dryly. Despite myself, I found myself liking the British-sounding elf.

  "A very good question, that," he admitted, "one that it took me some time to answer. Shall we?" He gestured to the living room section of the L-shaped room, waved me over toward the couch. "Please, have a seat." As I did, he settled himself in an armchair. "Some refreshment?" he offered.

  I couldn't resist. "Tea?" I asked innocently. The elf grinned again, and I found his grin infectious.

  "Actually, I prefer beer at this time of day."

  I shook my head. "Nothing for me," I said. "You were talking about Amanda."

  "Yes, yes I was, wasn't I?" He settled himself more comfortably in his chair. "Amanda is what is known in some circles as an anima, a free spirit," he said slowly. "I believe her to be a city spirit of some variety, although she never talks about such things."

  "So how," I began, then just kind of trailed off. "How ...?" I waved a hand vaguely.

  "Quite," Greybriar smiled. "I'm not exactly sure myself about the whys and wherefores of it. Again, Amanda is very .. . careful ... about what she will and what she won't talk about. She started, um, hanging about, you might say, just over a year ago. At first I suspected she might be a summoning gone wrong, but I found myself at first unable, and then unwilling, to banish her. She's a harmless sort, really, although her sense of humor leans somewhat toward the embarrassing on occasion. But she has never done anything that's brought me harm. I think of her somewhat like an undisciplined child ..."