by Kai O'Connal
Now that the moment had passed, Mr. Johnson eased back and picked up his own glass, once again resuming the aloof air feeding his sense of superiority. It was his turn to savor the alcohol while buying time and forcing Keandra to wait for his response. This was the game they played, and one Keandra enjoyed. She looked up to match his gaze and refused to speak before him.
The silence stretched on long enough that the waiter came out carrying a couple of plates of steaming food. They had come here often enough that the waitstaff no longer bothered to take their orders. Mr. Johnson never touched the dish, but he appeared to relish the aroma of the spices. Keandra refused to let the food go to waste, so she’d gotten used to her fish growing cold. She wouldn’t eat in front of her employer if he refused to partake. It was still good, even if it had to sit for several minutes.
Mr. Johnson waited until the waiter departed before he spoke again. “I do believe my instructions specified no one was to know of your presence. It seems as if you have done quite the opposite.”
He tilted his head to the side. Again, it was almost imperceptible and most people would never notice. Most people did not have Keandra’s levels of scrutiny.
“Sometimes such encounters are inevitable. Even the best of plans can run into unexpected obstacles.”
“Were any of your resources damaged?”
His words cut her off before she had a chance to justify the encounter with security, and caught her off balance. Did he know about E-jekt? Or at the least, did he know that one of them had been injured? Keandra took precautions to make sure most of her team remained hidden and never known about. Being too well—known could be a hazard. The only faces and false identities they ever shared publicly were hers and Lance’s.
Too late, Keandra realized she gave him information. This time the smile crept around his face and reached up to his eyes with a brief sparkle letting her know he was only plying her for information. Even if he did know about her team, he clearly didn’t have the facts relating to E-jekt’s injury. But now he knew someone was hurt. She cursed herself for slipping up with so easy a trap.
“Nothing you need to worry about. After all, the resources at our disposal are not what you’re really interested in, are they? You are more interested in our results.”
Lance stepped forward as if summoned, pulling the BTL chip out of his pocket and resting it on the table before resuming his sentry position. With two fingers, Keandra slid it across the tablecloth, leaving it halfway between the two of them. He reached out and picked up the chip, handing it over his shoulder without glancing back. The bodyguard removed it from its case and plugged it into a scanner on his watch. Both negotiators waited until the bodyguard performed his analysis.
“It checks out. The chip is valid and undamaged.”
The bodyguard placed the chip back on the table in front of his employer. Mr. Johnson drummed his fingers on the table next to the chip. The motion was light, and the impact with the hard surface made little sound.
“Your team performed adequately, and I am glad to see you have in fact recovered your objective. However, I still maintain issue with your methods.”
“Clearly you don’t have that much of a problem with our methods, or you wouldn’t keep us in your employ. This is the tenth time we’ve been of service to you in the last six months, I believe. If you had a problem with our methods, surely there would be others who would take your money.”
“True enough, which is why it is such a disappointment that you did not rise to the usual level of excellence I have come to expect. Perhaps your reputation is catching up with you and you have hit the limits of what you can accomplish. All things start to fade with time.”
“Even corporations?”
Mr. Johnson chuckled, something Keandra had never seen before.
“Especially corporations.”
Mr. Johnson pushed his chair back and stood up from the table, scooping up the BTL chip and dropping it into his jacket pocket. He extended a hand palm-up to Keandra. She placed her hand on top of his and he nodded.
“You will find your usual fee deposited into your accounts. I’m sorry to say that your performance means there will be no additional bonus. However, I do hope this is not the last time I will be able to count on your services.”
Keandra smiled and returned the nod. “Of course. I understand completely, Mr. Johnson. Have a wonderful evening. I look forward to our next endeavor.”
“I’ll be in touch.”
With those words, he took his leave, the bodyguard close on his heels as he left the patio. Keandra waited until she received the notification that his vehicle had left the parking lot before picking up her fork and digging in to her food. She was glad to have the opportunity, since her mouth wouldn’t stop watering at the scent of poached sturgeon with lemon. Lance took that as his cue and sat down in Mr. Johnson’s chair, helping himself to the food left behind.
“That seemed to go smoothly, all things considered,” he said between bites.
“Something he said has me uneasy. Did you see how he reacted when I made that crack about corporations? Something big is going on.” Keandra shrugged and devoured another bite of fish. “At least we’ll have more work ahead of us. I suppose that’s the most we can hope for. That and not catching any bullets on our next run. Speaking of, let’s finish up and get back to the primary. I want to check on E-jekt.”
“Paz will be less than pleased if we come back empty-handed.”
“Then take the bottle. We’ve already paid for the whole thing.”
3
Their primary safehouse was a secured apartment on the twelfth floor in downtown Seattle. Keandra owned the place, purchasing it using certified credsticks years ago when they started to hit their successful stride as shadowrunners. It wasn’t perfect, but it had everything they needed to plan their excursions. Keandra was proud of it, and thankful to have it considering how many times they’d needed to lie low over the years. The building owner made a point not to determine his tenant’s identities, and even removed all cameras in the building. Plus, the location was convenient right in the middle of downtown with restaurants, clubs, and corporate sectors all within easy walking distance. Keandra wondered if they were an anomaly, or if the location was popular with other shadowrunners. She’d seen several members of high society in the hallways, so it was clear the apartments catered to the wealthy with a desire for anonymity.
By the time she and Lance arrived at the apartment, E-jekt and Paz were already there. The older ork rested on the couch, splayed out with his head propped up on the arm. He had the distant stare of someone fully in the Matrix. Paz sat on the floor, cleaning a small collection of her armaments she kept at the safe house. She must have stopped when the door opened as Keandra stared at the barrel of an Uzi. Paz put it back down and clicked the safety on when she recognized the new arrivals.
“You better have brought me back some of that good stuff.”
Lance hurled the bottle at her as soon as Keandra was out of the way, and Paz snapped her arm up to catch it before it smashed against her shoulder. She grinned, pulling out the cork and taking a long swig before putting it down next to her, now smudged with black grease. Keandra went to the kitchen and turned on the air filters. Hopefully they’d help clear out the gun-oil smell pervading the air. When she returned, she dropped on the couch next to E-jekt and looked him over. His body was limp as she lifted his arm and examined the wounds on his side. The hospital did a good job patching him up, and only a little bit of redness had bled through the bandage, so he looked like he’d be fine. Probably hurt like hell, though.
She let his arm go and sent him a quick message.
E-jekt blinked a few times as he came back to reality and shifted on the couch, wincing in response to the motion. Keandra patted his leg before standing up so he could have the entire space to himself. She moved to the center of the room where everyone could see her. The
rest of the team gave her their undivided attention, Paz even putting down the gun she worked on.
“I met with Mr. Johnson and he transferred our fee into our team account. On the way back from the restaurant I verified it’s all there. There was no bonus, so after taking out expenses and overhead, we’ll each get about five thousand nuyen. Nothing weird there, and the scrubbers are already siphoning the money through to our accounts. It should all be there in about two days.”
“What did the suit have to say? Was he pissed things got loud and messy?” Paz asked.
“He was less than pleased. That’s why there was no bonus. But at least he didn’t try to cut our fee. He also said he’d be willing to work with us again, so we didn’t burn that bridge.”
“That’s a good thing, right? I mean, of all the suits we’ve worked for over the years, this one pays the best. Usually gives us a bonus too, when things don’t get all messed up. Still wish you’d let me go try the fancy food for once.”
E-jekt pushed himself to a sitting position, swinging his legs around. He put his hand on his side and pulled it away, checking the palm.
“So I guess it’s on to the next job, right, boss?”
“How do you feel?”
“Dead tired and like my skin’s hanging loose around me. I might need to be out for a bit and running remote support. I don’t think I’m up for pushing that limit.”
Keandra began to pace, a nervous habit she made sure not to demonstrate when meeting clients. It was one of the reasons she preferred a sit-down meeting when engaging in business. However, in front of her team, she didn’t bother to hide her habits. She paused, an idea coming to mind. It was crazy, but it could work.
“She’s getting that look again. I don’t like when she gets that look. At least let me stock up on ammo first.” To accentuate her point, Paz picked up one of her handguns and slammed a magazine into place.
Keandra snapped her attention back to her team.
“I’ve got an idea. Look, we have a reputation, right? We always get the job done, no matter the risks. We’ve earned that reputation, and more than one Johnson out there knows we can handle ourselves. Hell, we get more offers for work than we could take on even if we cloned ourselves. I only tell you about the best offers we get. I literally turn down at least ten every week. But you know who doesn’t know us? Or at least doesn’t know our faces?”
“Knight Errant?”
“Anyone, hopefully.”
“Corporate security?”
“UCAS?”
Keandra shook her head and waved a hand to stop the stream of guesses.
“Other runners. Hell, we don’t even know the faces of most other runners. All we know are their aliases and their reputations. Granted, there’s a few who like to showboat, but most runners know getting too popular paints a big target on your back.”
Keandra paused, waiting to see if anyone else would jump to the same conclusion she had. She glanced from one team member to the next, but they were all silent and waiting for her to finish. Just before she gave up and continued, she saw the light of an idea on E-jekt’s face as his eyes went wide and he shook his head.
“You can’t be serious.”
“Yes I am! Think about it. It could totally work!”
Paz frowned. “Someone mind filling in the rest of us who aren’t as quick? Your nice loveable enforcers are kinda in the dark here. No offense, skinny.”
Lance just waved a hand, brushing aside Paz’s comment.
E-jekt spoke up. “Well, our illustrious leader wants us to hire other runners to do the work while we get paid.”
The room became so quiet Keandra heard faint snatches of music from the club across the street through their soundproofed windows. Paz stared at E-jekt and turned slowly toward Keandra, her eyebrows raised all the way up. Lance tilted his head and scrunched his face.
“It isn’t as crazy as it sounds,” Keandra said. “If other runners don’t know who we are, we claim to be a Johnson. I’ll handle the negotiations. It won’t be anything different than what I’m currently doing, I’ll just be sitting on the other side of the table.”
“But you don’t work for a corp!” Paz slammed her gun down on the floor.
“But they don’t know that, do they? We take a job and then farm it out to a team we know can get the job done, at a reduced rate. We take the payscale that our reputation earns, and subcontract the work to someone else, letting us collect a small portion of it. Think of it like a finder’s fee. The job still gets done, the Johnson still gets what he wants, the runners still get paid, and so do we. Everyone wins. The best part is, no risk for us. We don’t go into the hot zones.”
“This is absolutely fucking insane—” Paz began
Lucas’s eyebrows lifted. “In a rare show of solidarity, I find I have to agree with our mechanized infantry.”
“—and I love it!” the dwarf finished.
Lucas rolled his head back until he struck the wall and spoke to the ceiling. “So much for harmonious unification.”
Keandra turned to face E-jekt directly. His opinion would be more than enough to sway Lance to her way of thinking. “What do you think, E-jekt? We’re all getting a little long in the tooth. Maybe it would be best to leave the grunt work to someone else and ride on the reputation we’ve earned. We’ll start small, something easy, and see how it goes.”
All eyes in the room turned to the ork as he deliberated. He took a deep breath and winced, bringing his hand once again to his side. After a few more gentle breaths, he opened his eyes and looked at Keandra.
“You do have a point.”
Keandra turned to Lance, but she already knew the battle was won. He appeared to know it too, as he held up both hands in supplication. “If everyone wants to go down this crazy road, I am more than willing to participate and learn what trouble I need to save you from.”
She nodded. “All right, it’s decided, then. The first thing we need to do is find a good job, and then start looking for runners who could take it on. E-jekt, I want you to start compiling a list of runner teams in the area looking for work. Try to find someone who has a decent track record, but is either new to the scene or at least hasn’t taken on any big jobs. I’ll start filtering through our backlog and see what we can try that wouldn’t be too large of a task: probably something normally beneath our paygrade. I’ll come up with an excuse for why we’re taking the job. Lance, you’ll need to take on the most dangerous part of this.”
“What would that be?”
“You need to help Paz look presentable as a bodyguard for a Johnson.”
For what may have been the first time Keandra had ever seen, Lance was speechless. No pithy comeback rolled of his tongue. All he managed to do was stare at Paz. She offered him a toothy smile promising a future filled with difficulty.
“But that’s tomorrow. For tonight, let’s get some rest. We’ve certainly earned it.”
With those words, the meeting ended. Lance and Paz gathered their belongings and prepared to leave. When E-jekt stood up from the couch, Keandra put a hand on his shoulder. “Crash here. I’ll get you a blanket and a pillow.”
“I can make it back to my place just fine.”
Keandra didn’t bother responding. She knew the more she argued, the more he would dig in his heels. Instead, she went to the linen closet and pulled out some extra bedding. By the time she came back into the living room, the other two had left. Keandra tossed the bedding on the couch next to E-jekt. She turned around and walked down the hall to her bedroom. Behind her, she heard him grumbling, but also making himself comfortable. Yes, he could handle the trip back, but she felt better this way.
As she crawled into her own bed and arranged the pillows around her to form a nest, her mind wandered over the proposed plan. Doubts crept in past the false confidence she’d displayed to her team. She mentally worked through the potential problems multiple times, convincing herself as much as she had the others. It took over an hour, but she ev
entually managed to fall into a restless sleep.
She woke at five in the morning, sweat covering her body, and jerked to a sitting position. Keandra rubbed her face, shaking off any last vestiges of sleep. Out of habit, she checked the proximity sensors, but none had been tripped. As she started her morning routine, she called up a list of the possible jobs archived on her commlink.
By the time the sun rose and she didn’t feel quite so guilty about disturbing her guest, she’d identified the job they’d use for their trial run. She’d even sent a message to the Johnson, requesting more details and negotiating the fee. The initial communication with his secretary had gone well, and everything appeared to be going according to plan. He was grateful they found time to take on his task. It was a straightforward wetwork gig for a target with a very predictable schedule. Discretion was not required, which made Keandra more comfortable handing it off to runners who might possess less finesse. It wasn’t her favorite type of job, but they had taken a few over the years and this was the best option to use as a trial.
When Keandra entered the living room, E-jekt was awake and already plugged into the Matrix, given the distant look in his eyes. She sent him a message.
Keandra closed the display and went back to her room to pick out an outfit. She probably wouldn’t need to meet with Mr. Johnson to finalize the arrangements. They had worked together before, and this job was simple enough that they already had enough details to go on. So she needed to make sure she looked the part of a corporate employer. Something strong and commanding, intimidating without being over the top or trying too hard.
She was perusing her options when her commlink pinged with a message from E-jekt.