The Shadow Fixer

by Matthew S. Cox

  She jumped in, yanked the door down, and accelerated so hard the enormous hovercar squeaked the tires. The emergency lights and audible warning signal activated seemingly on their own as Dorian appeared in the passenger seat.

  “Caught me napping. What’s going on this time?”

  “Our guy sent a ghost to shoot up a Div 1 substation.” Kirsten pulled a hard turn, leaning against the door, and lined the car up with the exit ramp.

  Dorian looked over at her. “If this is our guy, I hope you reconsider your opinion of summaries.”

  She’d gotten the patrol craft up past eighty miles an hour already in the garage. When she hit the ramp up to street level, the car caught serious air. She switched to hover mode, the ion thrusters coming online with seconds to spare before the car nosed into the ground. The drivers of several land cars and a pedestrian or twelve probably cursed her out for being thrown by the ionic downblast. She narrowly avoided plowing into the wall of the high-rise across the street from the open courtyard behind the PAC, levelled off, and accelerated through a storm of advert bots and flashing holograms.

  Due to the relatively short distance, it worked out being faster to drive at 300 MPH or so between high rises than waste time climbing high enough to do 600 in a straight line over them. She held altitude at forty feet, flying over the centerline of the street.

  Nausea swirled around in her stomach. She couldn’t tell if he said it in jest or seriously wanted her to execute someone. True, almost every other cop would gleefully put a bullet into the face of a cop killer, but she still had a problem with taking a life when not in immediate danger. If she had a half-second to react and not killing someone would mean she—or an innocent—died, she could do it. But pointing a gun at a pacified suspect and killing him like an executioner? The mere thought of it made her ill.

  Would it be the same if I astrally bound the sword and let Dorian do it? She swallowed bile. Yeah… and I don’t want him to darken any more. The Harbingers finally seem okay with him.

  Rather than slalom city blocks, she flew straight east to Sector 2150, then pulled a ninety-degree left turn and headed north. Comm chatter on the local Div 1 channel contained lots of screaming and cursing. She couldn’t follow the chaos too well but heard enough to know someone still shot up the station. Sounded as though the officers managed to establish a defensive position, but most yelled about their weapons being dead.

  “Familiar trick,” said Dorian. “What do you think we’re walking into?”

  “Dispatch said it’s an aug. Probably possessed. It takes a lot of concentration to possess someone. There has to be another spirit helping out by draining power.”

  “Agreed.”

  The speed, and low altitude, of Kirsten’s patrol craft sucked small ground vehicles into its wake, knocked pedestrians over, and sent advert bots spiraling into windows behind her. In any other situation, she’d feel awful for banging people around, but cops had been shot, possibly killed, and more could die for each second longer it took her to get there.

  When the precinct building came into view, the lowest eighteen floors of a high-rise otherwise containing residential apartments, she extended the ground wheels and decelerated hard. The harness restraint punched her in the sternum, catching her as she rocked forward. Growling, she fought the control sticks, diving the patrol craft once her speed dropped below 150. Rubber screamed on the traction-coated plastisteel road surface. The patrol craft skidded to a halt halfway up on the sidewalk near the shot-to-pieces main entrance.

  The rapid chattering of automatic fire thundered inside, azure muzzle flare flickering in the windows.

  “Any closer and you’d have landed in the lobby!” yelled Dorian. “Gonna shut down his gun.”

  Kirsten drew her E-90 while jumping out of the patrol craft. She sprinted up to the precinct entrance, taking cover at the door and aiming into a standing wall of smoke. In between pulses of gunfire, two male voices muttered, “Kill all cops,” simultaneously. The louder voice, gruff, overly deep and tinged in electronic crackling, sounded mortal. The other voice sounded more ordinary, but trancelike.

  Dorian ran past her, unconcerned about being shot.

  Seconds later, the machine-gunning ceased. Kirsten dashed forward into the smoke, heading across a waiting area of empty benches toward confused grunting and the repetitive slapping of a metal hand against a metal firearm. The smoke thinned at the far end, allowing her to see an interior security entrance beside a bulletproof glass window. The armored door lay on the floor, twisted up into an unrecognizable scroll of plastisteel.

  Kirsten took cover behind the wall by the front desk, aiming through the breached door into the office beyond.

  A large, mostly open room of green-and-white checkered tile contained more smoke, a handful of bodies in Division 1 armor or blue uniforms. Four confused ghosts—all in cloth Division 1 uniforms, bloody and riddled with bullet holes—stood over their remains, gawking in astonishment. Various holo-panels on the walls flickered as static, displayed errors, or kept turning off and on. Cleaning bots zipped back and forth in crazy, unpredictable ways.

  The slapping drew her attention to a dark mass in the haze, the indistinct outline of a wide-shouldered human figure easily two feet taller than Dorian. Gaps and struts in his enormous arms revealed them to be entirely robotic.

  Dorian, and another ghost—who appeared to be a gang punk—wrestled nearby.

  Thirty or so cops tried to shoot at the aug over multiple portable barricades—collapsible plastisteel walls—at the opposite side of the room, but their weapons only emitted the faint clicking of electronic triggers connected to dead batteries.

  Kirsten drew a bead on the aug’s head just in case, then reached out psionically. She sensed both surface thoughts and a paranormal presence, confirming her suspicion the aug had been possessed.

  “Console, interface, PA system.”

  Her armband beeped.

  “Division 0 coming in the front door,” said Kirsten, her voice booming from overhead speakers. “Don’t light me up.”

  The aug, predictably, spun around to face her. He stepped closer, revealing a body covered in grafted plates of shiny dark grey plastisteel armor. The crude, older cyberarms with their exposed actuators and struts looked as though he’d stolen robotic limbs from a hovercar assembly plant. A bundle of steel-encased hoses dangled from the center of his back, connected to various points on his arms and legs. Baggy grey pants concealed his legs, though she suspected they had to be metal as well to hold up the weight of his inhumanly large, augmented torso and arms.

  Red lens-eyes surrounded by black star tattoos brightened. Smoke peeled up from his lime green spiked hair. When a vibro-blade the size of a medieval broadsword sprang out of his left hand, it occurred to her all four armored Division 1 officers on the ground had vicious stab or slash wounds. His machinegun could penetrate patrol officer armor given a good enough angle, but not reliably.

  “Stop.” Kirsten’s eyes glowed white. “Do not move.”

  “The fuck’s a Zero doing here?” yelled someone behind the barrier.

  “Who gives a shit why she’s here?” shouted a woman. “She stopped the son of a bitch.”

  Dorian threw the ganger ghost to the floor and went to pounce on him, but the other spirit manifested a knife and stabbed him in the side. Groaning in annoyance, Dorian rammed his forearm into the ghost’s face, knocking him flat on his back.

  Another spirit exuded from the aug, his body stretching like molten cheese stuck to the immobile cyborg. He grunted, straining to move, but unable to.

  Kirsten concentrated on the lash, extending the long, shimmering energy cord out from her hand. She rushed closer, swiping the glowing whip at the gang spirit, missing Dorian by less than a foot.

  He flinched.

  The ghostly punk howled in pain when the lash smacked him in the chest. He forgot all about Dorian and grabbed the ‘wound’. Kirsten swung her arm up and around, the shimmering blue-white
ribbon trailing gracefully after her hand. Flicking her arm, she sliced the energy strand at the towering augmented cyberganger. A faint whud accompanied a blast of pale glowing light radiating outward from the point the whip made contact.

  Another ganger flew out of the aug, spun over twice, and landed flat on his chest by the portable barriers thirty feet away. None of the cops noticed him, primarily due to his being a ghost, but also because they mostly stared at Kirsten and the painfully bright energy ribbon coming from her hand.

  “This is Lieutenant Wren from Division 0,” said Kirsten in as commanding a tone as she could muster. “Everyone stand down. The aug is neutralized. Medics, now!”

  “You call that neutralized?” Dorian gestured at the large vibro-blade.

  “He won’t be able to move for at least another three minutes. I have time to figure out if those ghosts were compelled or malevolent,” said Kirsten, forgetting she’d routed herself to the PA. “Console, PA off.”

  Most of the officers stood cautiously out from behind the barrier, still aiming handguns or rifles at the giant cyberganger.

  “You…” Kirsten approached the ghost who stabbed Dorian, since he appeared less disoriented, and raised the lash. “I hope you have a good explanation for why you and your friend over there attacked a police station.”

  The gang ghost raised his hands. “No idea! This pendejo just kinda gave me the evil eye. Mean, ain’t losin’ too much sleep over some dead pigs, but I’m a little past this bullshit, now, ay?”

  “I’m supposed to believe someone made you do this?” asked Kirsten, hoping the guy would give more information.

  “Yeah, chica, ’cause it’s true.” He rolled back to his feet, glaring down at her.

  A group of medtechs appeared clustered in a doorway behind the barriers.

  Kirsten waved at them. “Get over here before there are more damn ghosts. I think everyone in armor is still alive. The aug is paralyzed.”

  The medics ran into the fray.

  “The guy who you claim made you do this, what’d he look like?” asked Kirsten.

  “Why’m I gonna tell you, bitch?”

  She whacked the lash across the ghost’s chest, slicing him momentarily in half before his essence reintegrated.

  He shrieked, collapsed to the floor, and let out a wail loud enough for all the normals to hear.

  Everyone—except the medtechs—froze, staring around while making ‘WTF’ faces. The medics disregarded a random disembodied scream, too focused on their work attending to the wounded officers.

  “Because, I get the feeling you’re the kind of spirit Harbingers would really be interested in. Another hit or two from this, and they’ll drag you off where you don’t want to be. The only reason I’m not already hammering you into the Abyss is because I already know about the guy who mind-controlled you. If you don’t want me to arrange a date for you with tall, dark, and vaporous, tell me what this guy looked like.”

  Dorian raised both eyebrows.

  “Uhh, little younger than him.” The ghost pointed a middle finger at Dorian. “Black dude wit blond hair. Purple eyes.”

  “He should be easy enough to spot in a crowd,” whispered Kirsten. “Big guy?”

  “Nah. Average. Found me in my alley. No idea where he came from.”

  The spirit who’d been inside the aug grumbled a whole bunch of curse words and walked toward the wall.

  Dorian started after him.

  “No point. Both of these spirits were compelled.” She looked at the ganger. “Where were you when you ran into this guy? Do you have any idea where he could be?”

  “Probably under the city. He had the charge to him.”

  Kirsten narrowed her eyes. Thousands of spirits dwelled in The Beneath. The forgotten old city held darkness, sorrow, and pain as thick as a physical fog. Spiritual energy soaked into a living person who spent a significant amount of time down there as sure as bad smells saturated the clothes of people who worked at chemical plants. Spirits could feel it on a person. They referred to it as ‘the charge.’ Granted, someone who lived near a breach would also get it, but few normal people could tolerate the negative energy. Humans weren’t wired for it. Even the least psionic person in the world would feel uneasy near a breach and come up with some excuse to go elsewhere.

  “Did he get into a car or anything?” asked Kirsten.

  The gang spirit offered a disinterested shrug. “Nah, walked.”

  “Where do you haunt?”

  “The Sixty-Sevens.” He puffed out his chest.

  Kirsten tilted her head. “I’m not in a gang task force. Your crew or…?”

  “Yeah. We’re in Sector 4067. We call ourselves The Sixty Sevens. Mi casa is the alley behind The Penis Merchant.”

  Dorian blinked. “Well, there’s a Navcon search that’ll get you a meeting with HR.”

  The ganger laughed. “Nah, it ain’t a brothel. Cyberware shop specializing in… augmentation.”

  “And they say there’s no truth in advertising anymore.” Dorian snickered.

  Warmth spread over Kirsten’s cheeks. “Alley near a cyberware store in Sector 4067.”

  “Yeah. You’ll know you got the right place if you see a bunch of people hanging out with the number sixty-seven on them somewhere.”

  “Thanks. Worth checking out. Go on back home… and you might want to try rearranging your priorities. The Harbingers will eventually catch up to you.”

  He laughed. “You’re a funny one. Talkin’ shit about cops ain’t gonna get them vaporous shitheads mad.” After mockingly saluting her, he walked out through the wall.

  Sighing, Kirsten approached the aug. “Drop the gun.”

  Metal fingers snapped open with a click. The squad machine gun clattered to the floor.

  “Blade away.”

  He retracted the vibro-blade.

  “You’re… controlling me?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why? You could ask.”

  Kirsten bit her lip.

  “Honestly, I have no idea why I’m here.” The huge man sighed. “I don’t expect you will believe me, but I think someone hacked my NIU and took my systems over. Spent the past hour wandering around like a damn remote-control android. You’re psionic. Go ahead and read my mind.”

  Kirsten shrugged, and dove in with Telepathy.

  He thought back to a few hours ago when he’d been wandering a black zone in search of anyone needing food or medical help, machine gun in one hand, backpack of supplies over the other shoulder. Despite the terrifying appearance of the being in front of her, the brain inside the nearly eight-foot-tall killing machine belonged to Dr. Hasan Kouri, a former cyber-surgeon specializing in neural implants. He’d been the victim of an attempted assassination for warning the authorities about some unethical practices his former employer—White Orchid Corporation—had been engaged in. Though he’d survived, his biological matter consisted of a brain, heart, one kidney, stomach, and a scrap of intestines stuffed into the only cyborg frame he could find on short notice.

  In his memory, cold washed over him, his body disobeying his brain, walking off by itself from the Sector 18 black zone due south from here, heading to the nearest police station—or the first one he saw, which turned out to be here. His effort fighting the spirit for control of the body likely prevented several deaths by throwing off his aim ever so slightly.

  “Oh…” Kirsten covered her mouth. “I’m sorry.”

  A dozen or so armored Division 1—and three Division 5 cyborg interdiction squad members—approached. The Div 5 officers pointed their ABR20 rifles, enormous shotgun-style weapons chambered in 20mm armor-piercing explosive rounds, at Dr. Kouri’s head.

  “Considering my appearance and augmentations, plus what happened here, I don’t blame you.” The doctor tried to look at the cops approaching behind him, but still couldn’t move.

  The medtechs rushed several wounded out of the room on hover gurneys.

  Kirsten raised a hand at the Divisi
on 1 officers. “This man was… mind-controlled. Believe me, I’m every bit as furious as you are, but he’s not the one responsible for this attack.”

  “Bullshit,” said a muscular Division 1 cop. “I watched him do it.”

  “Officer Gonzalez,” said Kirsten. “Did you not hear me say he was mind-controlled?”

  The lone female Division 5 officer snapped her ABR20 up into firing position.

  “Don’t shoot.” Kirsten glared at the woman, the momentary glow in her eyes sapping some of the animosity radiating from the cops.

  The Division 5 woman shuddered, trying to fight the command, and failing. “Bitch mind-controlled me.”

  “That ‘bitch’ is a lieutenant, Squad Officer Parson,” said Dorian, his voice taking on a weird echoing quality. “You’re an E4. Be glad she’s not one of those officers who adores outranking people. Even second lieutenants are smart enough to fill out insubordination report forms.”

  “Uhh, who the hell said that?” asked the woman.

  “I said, stand down.” Kirsten tried her best impression of Captain Eze’s body language when he tried to be forceful. “This man was mind-controlled.”

  “What in the nine towers of Fuckstantinople is going on out here?” shouted a gravelly voiced man, stomping over to them.

  Kirsten opened her mouth to tell him to calm down but noticed captain’s rank insignia on his nameplate and collar. She saluted him. “Captain Serrano, I’m trying to deescalate an extremely tense situation. The augmented man behind me was the victim of paranormal mind-control. Someone else had control of his body, using him like a puppet.”

  Squad Officer Parson grunted, again trying to fire, but couldn’t overcome the suggestion not to shoot. Scowling, she lowered the giant rifle.

  Captain Serrano set his fists on his hips and looked around at the carnage. “Some talking trash can kicks in my door, goes apeshit shooting up my people, and you’re going to try and make excuses for him?”

  “It’s not an excuse, sir. A spirit possessed him, took over his body, and made him—”

  “Spirits now?” Captain Serrano bellowed a manic laugh, more angry than amused. “Look, hon, I have no idea what the hell they’re doing to you kids over at the PAC, but this is the real world. Someone shoots up my fucking precinct house, they’re going out of here in a damn plastic baggie.”