Into the Shadows

by Jordan Weisman

  "Has anyone ever fallen?" Turtle asked me as we approached my space. I put down my gypsy bag among several other rags and tatters that resembled it.

  "Naah! If ya kin’t handle high places, ya shouldn't come up here. Ya kin sleep on the floor if ya want, but the rats give ya a lot more trouble down there."

  He went on to stake out his own space, a corner location where no one could come up behind him. Meantime, I had meandered over to speak with Shadaman, an Indian shaman from outside the city. His powers differed from mine in several ways, but I respected him greatly and tried to learn from him when I could.

  Finally, it was time for bed, but I didn’t feel like sleeping, still too filled with nervous energy from the violent afternoon. I grabbed a blanket from my nest and went over to see Turtle, who had nothing but his overcoat for a cover and his arm for a pillow.

  He opened his night-black eyes as I padded toward him. "Want some company?" I asked.

  "Maybe," he answered coolly. "You’ve done a lot for me, Flut. It’s not just because I tipped you for the reading. Why are you doing this?" His last question came out muffled because I had slipped out of my blouse and dropped it playfully on his head.

  "It was in the cards," I answered, bringing my lips to his. Then there was no more speaking until after I had my way with him.

  * * *

  "Wake up. Flut!" Turtle hissed the words quietly into my pointed ear, but at that range, it was like a shout. He also shook me. Reluctantly, I opened my eyes.

  "Is it morning already?" In the near darkness, Turtle was pulling on his clothing as rapidly as possible. Even as I asked, I heard the sound of gunfire coming from the front of the building, followed by a deep bellowing that could only be an outraged troll.

  "Get dressed! The warehouse is under attack. I’m going to see what's happening." With that, Turtle slipped off into the darkness in a crouching run.

  The building was dark, darker even than the night-shrouded streets. After 2000 hours, only a few lights in the area around Goob’s office or near the loading bay doors remained lit. I was disoriented and still half-asleep as I reached for clothes, but it came to me that the crisis revealed in the cards was suddenly upon me. That meant my only hope tor survival was to stay close to Turtle, and he had already run off into the heart of the action.

  * * *

  I made my way back to my own nest to salvage my stuff, including my tarot deck. After cramming everything I’d need into my green bag, I moved quietly and cautiously along the girder. I heard something and looked down. Ten meters below me was an aisle lined with big pallets loaded with boxes of Natural Vat foodstuffs. Three lithe men toting Uzis moved like shadows in the gloom, but my elven eyes could make them out in fair detail. They wore black camo suits, and besides the semiautomatic weapons in their hands, each one wore a short, slightly curved sword slung over his shoulder— wakizashis, unless I missed my guess. They looked something like the trid image of ninjas. I froze in place, hardly daring to breathe. If they looked up and cut loose with their guns. I wouldn’t have a chance. One attached something to a stack of containers below me, and then they quietly moved on.

  I resumed my course, heading cautiously toward the front of the warehouse and Goob’s office. Reaching an intersection of two girders, I met StrangeDos, the elven decker. He was carrying his deck and looked confused. "Did Turtle go through here?" I asked.

  "Yes, about two minutes ago. Flut, what's going on?"

  "An attack." I said, "I saw it in the cards yesterday, but I didn’t think it would happen so soon. There are men with guns and swords on the floor below, probably all through the 'house. Get as many of the others as you can. We’ve gotta get down off these walks and out of the building or we'll all be dead.

  "Gotcha!" Holding his precious Radio Shack deck close to his body, he scuttled off at right angles to gather recruits.

  I continued toward the landing.

  About sixteen meters from the upper deck, I decided there was too much light. From here on, I would move forward on hands and knees. As I did, I saw two men break onto the flooring of the landing from two different paths. First, I recognized a Street samurai named Lucky Larry, but apparently his luck had run out. A man in black popped out of the doorway to Goob's office with Uzi chattering and cut him down.

  The second man was Turtle, moving like a blur, his overcoat slapping around him like a pair of dark wings. But he had almost twenty meters of open space to cover. The killer spotted him and swung around to spray him with bullets, too.

  Turtle dived and rolled, but from the way his body jerked, at least two shots had hit him. A lump formed in my throat, but by then Turtle had came up from his roll onto one knee. He snapped off three quick shots that slammed the killer up against the door, and punched a neat little hole right between his eyes. I should have known that anyone called Turtle would be bulletproof.

  I crawled on toward the landing as fast as I could, but I thought frantically about the other men of the squad I had seen below. There had been three of them, but now I only saw one. Where were the other two, and did Turtle know about them?

  I’m no gunman or fighter of any sort, but as a mage. I’m not totally helpless. Fireball is my most effective combat spell, and I readied one now, just in case. Gun in hand and moving a bit stiffly, Turtle stood up and walked cautiously toward the door to Goob’s office. Bulletproof or not. getting hit by an Uzi round had to hurt. Suddenly all hell broke loose as killers in the darkness below cut loose randomly toward the ceiling. I heard yells of pain and fear, and wondered which of my friends had been hit. I flattened myself on the steel girder while slugs whined by on either side. Slithering on my belly like a sea slug, pushing my green leather bag ahead of me like a shield, I inched toward the landing.

  Turtle ran back to the edge of the landing, threw himself prone, and began to fire at the men below. With his laser-aimed smartgun, he didn’t miss, and exclamations of dismay and pain joined the crescendoing noise of the battle. I kept my eyes on Goob’s office door, and when it began to open, I summoned all my willpower to cast my spell.

  Two more men in black came through the door with guns ready to fire, but a ball of green flame shot from my hands, expanding as it went, and burst upon them with a sudden roar. They barely had time to scream before becoming human torches at the center of a raging bonfire.

  In a lull in the firing, I came to my feet and dashed toward the landing. I knew, at least I hoped, that Turtle would cover me. He did, and I reached the landing safely at about the same time that Troog and about a dozen others also emerged onto it from the darkness.

  "Was that your fireball?" asked Turtle as he pulled me off the beam and into his arms very briefly.

  I nodded, still a little giddy from the exertion of casting the spell. If was burning out now, leaving only two charred corpses and some melted equipment behind, along with scorch marks on door and floor.

  "Thanks! Now, let’s see who these guys are." Turtle released me and moved to the body of the first one. Pulling back the man’s face cowl, he revealed the face of an oriental. The dead man was dressed in black, like any other night-roaming assassin, except for a shortsword on his back that proclaimed him as either ninja or maybe Yakuza. "Probably Yakuza," said Troog eyeing the body. "There are too many of these goons downstairs for this to be a true ninja attack." Turtle took a moment to rip open the dead man’s clothing, exposing a vivid tattoo of a cobra and twining snakes. "Definitely Yakuza," said Turtle. "See the markings. They all have some tattoo. It’s a matter of pride with them.

  "And speaking of goons, Troog, why don't you and some of your boys cover the stairwell before we’re surprised by more of these creeps?"

  Troog looked dismayed. "Who put you in charge?" he snarled.

  "We could fight for it," said Turtle calmly, "but consider this. I’m older than you are, but I got here first from farther away, and I’ve already killed a man. Who do you think would win, and would you bet your life on it?"

  Troog
tried to stare Turtle down. With a muttered curse, he turned to do as he was told. Two of his Dirty Boys went with him. It’s hard to stare down someone who has only flat, black scanning caps where eyes should be.

  "You know that’s not over," I told Turtle.

  "I know," he said, "but I’ll finish taming him later. Right now, I’m going to appropriate some weapons, and figure out our next move. We can’t stay up here, even if we can defend it. We’re trapped."

  He took the sword, the Uzi, and all the ammo he could find. He also found a small transponder, which he handed to me. Setting it to receive, I tried to learn who was ordering this attack, but all the communications were in Japanese.

  "Let’s check on the troll," said Turtle. "Stay behind me." We moved over to the door, and Turtle kicked it open. As we stepped into the office, I saw pieces of Goob lying in a big puddle of troll blood. Other pieces of him were spattered all over the back wall. The poor monster—never had a chance! The vid-banks and all the automatic controls had been systematically trashed. Bob’s executives wouldn’t get any clues about tonight’s events by replaying the decks.

  As I stood in the blood-smeared office, a wave of nausea and weakness passed over me, and I swayed against the wall. Everything dimmed, and I seemed to pass into a dream. I almost always enter a trance state when reading the cards, but sometimes it comes on spontaneously in moments of stress. Goob’s blood on the floor glimmered like a deep red crystal with something hidden inside it—something that I had to find. Time slowed to a crawl as I struggled to understand this sending. I could still see and hear everything that was going on around me, but it all seemed infinitely far away.

  Renewed gunfire from outside called Turtle away from me. He sprinted to the stairway where Troog was engaged in a dodge-and-shoot firefight with a squad of Yaks at the bottom. One of our boys was already down with a shoulder wound, and Troog looked both grim and frightened. Turtle assessed the situation, including the fact that our fighters had pistols, at best. He took off his Uzi and gave it to Troog, along with the ammo belt. "‘Here, use this. I’m going to get something to slow those guys down." I watched it all from a vantage point somewhere above them. I could also see my own body, still in Goob’s office, moving like a zombie in slow-motion, but all I could do was watch things unfold. I had no control.

  Even as Turtle turned away from the stairs, the thunder of feet on wood came from below. Troog popped up and cut loose with the Uzi, spraying a hall of death into a charging throng. They were shooting back, and Troog’s other minion took a line of bullets right through the head.

  Among the survivors who had joined us was P’kenyo the dwarf, who sometimes worked late and then just slept in the rafters with the rest of us. Turtle tapped him on the shoulder. "You look strong. Help me with this."

  They re-entered the office, shunted the body to one side, grabbed a huge filing cabinet full of paperwork that must have weighted a good 200 kilos, and manhandled it back out the door, and over to the stairs. Staying out of the line of fire, they brought it to the doorway just as another group of Yaks decided to charge. Turtle and P’kenyo gave a mighty heave, and the cabinet bounced down the stairway and crushed the attackers.

  "How are we going to get out of here?" Turtle asked the group waiting on the landing. "We'll never get down these stairs alive."

  "I have a rope ladder at my nest," said StrangeDos. "If that part of the warehouse is empty, we can climb down that. "

  "Let’s go." Turtle said. StrangeDos gestured for people to follow him, and they began to disappear into the darkness in single file.

  "No one else is trying to come up," said Troog.

  "Then make a break for the elf’s ladder," commanded Turtle, "I’ll be the rearguard."

  Troog didn’t wait for a second invitation. Helping his wounded pal, he staggered off after the others.

  Turtle made one last check of the stairs, and started to follow. Then he stopped and retraced his steps to where P’kenyo was standing outside the office. "Where’s Flut?" asked Turtle.

  "She’s still inside," said the dwarf, "and she doesn’t look right."

  Turtle poked his head through the door and saw me rummaging through Goob’s desk with a glassy stare on my slack features. "This is no time for looting," he yelled, then ran in and threw me over one shoulder.

  Just before he grabbed me, my fingers found what they sought, and I palmed it.

  The dwarf picked up my leather bag and followed close behind Turtle and me. He also took the transponder from my hand and listened intently. "They’re ordering everybody out of the warehouse," he told Turtle. I heard the words as though from a great distance as I struggled to pull myself out of trance. I didn't know P'kenyo could speak Japanese.

  Suddenly there was an explosion, followed immediately by several more. The covering darkness dissolved as fires erupted in more than twenty places around the building. Turtle almost lost his footing, staggering to one knee as concussions shook the girder below his feet. P’kenyo reached out and helped steady him.

  With the thunder of the explosions, I suddenly snapped back into my body like a released rubber band. "Let me down!" I said. "I’m all right now."

  Turtle let go of me, reluctantly, it seemed.

  Plenty of light filled Bob’s warehouse now, flickering brightly enough to light up both floor area and catwalks as stored merchandise all over the huge building began to burn.

  I saw several Yak groups running for the nearest doors, and about ten of my friends down among the crates and barrels. The Yak rearguard turned and sprayed bullets at every house-person they could see, while we ducked for cover.

  By the time we dared poke up our heads and scramble down the ladder, we good guys had the 'house to ourselves. Small comfort, given that the temperature was rapidly rising and the air filling with smoke. Dodging flames and running crouched, people made for the exits. Turtle and I headed for the same back door by which we had entered.

  It isn't that easy to burn down a large warehouse. The walls are corrugated tin. the floor is concrete, and the goods are tightly packed and contained. The Yakuza had sent at least thirty men into Bob’s to plant incendiary devices in every corner of the offices and plant. If they knew about the street people living here, they didn’t care. In fact, from the violence of their attack, they seemed determined that none of us would survive to tell about it.

  We reached the door right behind a squatter named Bumbee. It hung half-open. He popped his head out, didn’t see anything, and scurried out into the night, but he hadn’t gone four paces before killers in the shadows opened up with automatic weapons and blew him into bloody frags. Seems the bad guys weren’t completely gone.

  "So much for that plan," groused Turtle. At several other exits, others were discovering the same bad news. Anyone who tried to go out got shot, but if we stayed inside much longer, we’d be barbecued just like the Vat products. I saw a blazing case of Kung Pao Pork not more than five meters from me, and began to wonder if I would soon be on my way to becoming Kung Pao Flutterbye.

  Troog, StrangeDos, P’kenyo the dwarf, and Shadaman the Shaman converged on us. "We’re trapped!" screamed Troog. "Anybody who leaves gets geeked! I don’t want to burn!" Turtle looked around desperately, as if by sheer will he could find a way out of this deathtrap. "If we only had some armor, we could bust out of here," he muttered, "but the only thing even close to a tank is that old truck, I wonder if we could get it started."

  There was something metallic in my hand that I had forgotten about. Unclenching my fingers, I said, "Look, Turtle. I have the keys!"

  The air began to burn in my throat, and StrangeDos began to cough. He was the tallest. P’kenyo rapped him on the knee and cried, "Get down, you fool! The air is better and cooler closer to the floor. Everyone down by the tires of the truck." He hopped off the dock to follow his own advice.

  Turtle grabbed the keys out of my hand. "Let’s hope these are the right ones. This truck is built like a tank. I could rip through that
light aluminum gateway like a paper curtain if I can get the motor started!"

  Turtle put his gun away and jumped up onto the running board to unlock the cab door. He found the right key on the fifth try. That one would also turn the ignition.

  "Shadaman, Troog, get as many survivors as you can, and get them into the trailer here. The air ought to be good in there for a few more minutes," said Turtle. He climbed in behind the wheel and inserted the key into the ignition. Luckily, the vehicle was old enough for a standard key instead of one of the newfangled maglocks.

  "I used io ride in trucks like this twenty years ago." muttered Turtle. "Now if I can just remember how they work." While he was talking, I climbed into the cab beside him, and P’kenyo also came up to stand on the running board. The vehicle still had a twentieth-century set-up, with steering wheel, clutch, gas pedal, and gearshift. Newer models all had control panels more like that on a jet plane, all buttons, switches, and digital readouts, with a joystick for steering. Turtle shoved in the clutch and wrestled the gearshift into low, then released the clutch and turned the key. A horrible grinding noise assaulted our ears as the motor burped and died. The truck lurched forward and then rolled back. Caught off-guard. Turtle and I both banged our heads against the back of the cab. and the dwarf almost fell off the side.

  "Damn fool!" howled P’kenyo. "Either start it in neutral, or hold the clutch in when you turn the key!"

  "Oops!" said Turtle very quietly.

  Meanwhile, Shadaman was gathering together the rest of the warehouse survivors who could hope to reach us, as only he could. After sitting down in a twisty-legged lotus position, he recited some secret mantra and went into trance. Leaving his corporeal body behind, his spirit self winged unharmed through the burning hell of the warehouse to wherever he sensed life, and planted a suggestion in the minds of those he found to walk, run, or crawl, out to the back dock where the truck was parked. By combining astral projection with detection and mind probe spells, he reached everyone who was still alive in the building, and set them on the safest path to join us. It ail took about three minutes.