Into the Shadows

by Jordan Weisman

  Tiger shoved his right hand against Charles' breastbone and pushed him back against his retainers. Claws thirty-five centimeters long shot from Charles’ hands as his arms convulsed, but the shotgun held him at bay. Like a cobra watching a mongoose, Charles stared at Tiger, then let a derisive smile crack his face. "Ha! I get it now! You two wanted to impress Raven and join his group, but he blew you off!" He turned to the others, then raised his voice as they moved off into the din of the crowd. "Hey, everyone, have you heard about the two Halloweeners who thought they were good enough to join Raven’s group? They got shot down!"

  "Ease off. Tiger. Just back off." Iron Mike’s urgent caution battered its way through the red rage exploding in Tiger’s brain. "Splash him here and now and we'll have more trouble than we want to handle. Let it lie. We don’t need them." Tiger closed his cat's-eyes and holstered the shotgun. He smoothed his close-cropped hair with deliberate care, then eased himself into the booth again. Forcing himself to breathe in and out slowly through flared nostrils, he got control of his anger. "Damn him!"

  "Who is it you’re cursing? Charles the Braindead or Wolf?"

  Tiger opened his eyes again and met Mike’s malachite stare. "Charles. I hate being humiliated, especially here in front of the others. And what I hate even more is when he’s right."

  Mike raised an eyebrow. "How do you figure Charles to be right?"

  "Face it, Mike, Wolf’s forgotten us. We were convenient back-up for one job. All his chatter about introducing us to Raven was just so much hype. He was just shining us on, and we should have known better." Tiger looked around the room. "We’re the same as everyone else in here. Ciphers in a world where having a System Identification Number is the key to wealth and happiness. Raven doesn’t need us anymore than the rest of the world does."

  "Don't be so quick to judge, my friend." Iron Mike leaned back and lazily crossed his arms over his chest. "It’s only been two weeks since we took that job and the rumor mill has it that Raven only got back into town a couple of days ago. He’s been down in the elven lands. And remember, Wolf said for us to give him a call if we didn't hear from him." Tiger snorted harshly. "He said it, but I wouldn’t bet he meant it. He won't remember who we are. He kept calling us Zig and Zag. Whaddya want me to do, call him and say, "Hello, do you remember me? This is Zig—"

  "Tiger, I was Zig."

  "Great! If I can’t remember what he called us, how the hell will he remember? No, Mike, that was just one bad call from beginning to end."

  Iron Mike shook his head. "You can be pessimistic if you want, but I'll still hope we can salvage something from it. Oh ho! Company."

  Pia was escorting a tall, slender man wearing dark glasses toward their table. "Mr. Morrissey, Mr. Jackson," she intoned respectfully, "Your eight-fifteen appointment is here."

  "You’re a love, Pia." Mike swept the tail of his coat off the bench and offered his hand to the corporate type. "Mike Morrissey, and this is Tiger Jackson. Have a seat."

  Clad in a black suit, white shirt, and black tie, Mr. Johnson lowered himself onto the bench with all the enthusiasm of someone entering an ice-cold bath of crude oil. "This is quite a place you have here."

  Mike smiled pleasantly while Tiger kept his face a stony mask. "We consider it a place of diversion. Can I get you something to drink?"

  "No," Mr. Johnson answered quickly. "I mean, I cannot stay long." The man rested a package about the size of a simsense cassette on the table, but it was in a blue bag that hid its title. The corporator carefully opened his jacket to show them he was not carrying a gun. then he pulled a slender envelope from an inside pocket and put it on the table. As though the envelope were something loathsome, he used his sensetape to push it toward Iron Mike.

  "In there you will find a picture and the address of a man who owes my, ah. me a great deal of money. Why this is so is unimportant, but if you mention ‘the Prudential Project.’ he will make the connection. I want you two to have a talk with him to persuade him that prompt attention to my account is conducive to assuring his continued health and well-being." Mike glanced over at Tiger. "He wants us to lean on a welsher."

  "Ugh." Tiger started his right hand inching across the table toward the simsense cassette, estimating how far he’d get before the corporator’s anxiety level rose to the point where he broke out in a sweat.

  "Let me ask, Mr. Johnson, how much this man owes you " Despite the man's dark glasses, Tiger could tell that he was blinking with shock at the question. "That is not your concern."

  Conciliatory, Mike held up both hands. "Don't get your heart all flipping and flopping here. That is a normal question in these cases. If the welsher owes you five thousand nuyen. then he has a problem. If he owes you five hundred thousand nuyen, then he can afford to be a problem. Also, our fees generally depend upon the amount of money we're sent to recover."

  "I don't want you to get any money. All you’ve got to do is talk to him and get him to send it to me." The corporator’s voice began to rise in pitch as Tiger’s hand closed to within fifteen centimeters of the blue package. As casually as possible. the executive placed his left hand on the sensetape and slowly started drawing it back to himself. "You will be well-compensated for your work. That envelope contains ten thousand in corporate scrip. You will receive an equal amount once you have convinced my debtor to settle his account." Iron Mike shot Tiger a covert glance, which Tiger acknowledged with the barest of nods. There has to he something buggy about all this because twenty-K is more than one of these jobs usually brings. This guy must want his money bad, or there’s something he’s not telling us.

  Tiger prodded the package with a finger. "Simsense tape?"

  "Y-y-yes. I just got it today, by special courier from Hokkaido." Obviously proud of himself, the corporator smiled confidently. "It's a copy of the latest Rambo episode: "Siberian Slay-ride." It's uncut, even has the scenes with Vita Revak, the Russian porn star. It won’t be available here for another five months."

  Tiger smiled cruelly. "We'll do the job for the money and Rambo Twenty."

  The corporator worked his mouth like a fish trying to breathe car exhaust. "W-w-what? That's outrageous! This is my tape. It has nothing to do with the deal."

  Mike drew in a hissed breath as Tiger scowled. "Let’s not be hasty, Mr. Johnson." Mike laid a hand on the man’s shoulder in a friendly manner, but the corporator still jumped half out of his skin. "If my friend wants the tape, there are only two possible outcomes here. The first, which is to be preferred by all, is that you open your heart and give it to him."

  "What is the second',’"

  Iron Mike shrugged. "Tiger will open your heart, and you'll give it to him."

  Tiger cracked his knuckles.

  Mr. Johnson went white. "First the ghoul, and now you two ..."

  "Hey, I just thought of something." Mike grabbed the back of the corporator’s neck, and despite the sweat, shook him in a friendly manner. "Now, lad. you're only doing this for someone who’ll cover your expenses, right? So all you have to do is bill him for your Rambo Twenty tape

  The corporator looked less than thrilled with that suggestion, but he slid the package over to Tiger. "Please, take it with my compliments " His cold tone belied his words, but Tiger accepted the tape and slipped it into a pocket in his longcoat

  The corporator slid from the booth. "Your target will be at home tomorrow evening. He's just returned from a trip to Los Angeles and will be heading out again the next morning. Do him then."

  Tiger looked up at their employee. "How messy do you want it to be?"

  The company man thought for a second, then shrugged "If he's hurt too badly, it will put his productivity into a negative curve, and that affects his ability to repay me. He should not present a threat to you two, so I think you need only, to use your colloquialism, ‘lean’ on him a bit. If necessary. break an arm or leg or whatever.

  Iron Mike threw him a nod. "You'll see a report in the news fax Net thirty, with six in ten."

>   The corporator’s head came up "Ten in five and two for cash

  "Major corporate scrip or elven, yes. Otherwise no deal.'" Mr. Johnson smiled in a politic manner. "It is good doing business with you. Until later."

  Tiger watched the man disappear toward the door, then turned back to his partner. "Why all the percentages? You know as well as I do, he’s hiding something from us."

  "Sure enough, boyo, sure enough." Mike sipped some of his beer, "His eagerness to bargain suggests that he’s just brokering this job. Someone dropped a bunch of nuyen on him and toid him to hire talent. What he saves, he keeps. Now I might just be asking myself who put the bug in his ear about us? We've not got the rep of the likes of Dancer or Ghost, or even Johnny-Come-Lately or Smilin’ Sam."

  "Don’t try to cheer me up, Mike. We know what they got." Tiger scowled. "Hell, a corpgeek like him probably called up Lone Star and asked who they’d lag for any unsolved beatings or shoot-outs."

  "You don’t think we've made the top of their list, do you?" iron Mike chuckled to himself. "Old George Van Housen can’t still be mad that we shot up his patrol vehicle. We did stop that chiphead Gaithers from escaping."

  "Yeah, but we also fireballed his Jackrabbit and that torched five keys of BTLs and a half a million nuyen. You know the stories about George. He’s dirty and he gets cranky when he’s deprived of the spoils of his anti-crime crusade."

  Iron Mike pursed his lips as he slit open the envelope with a finger. "A wise man you are. Tiger Jackson. This corper pays us a lot of money to do a simple job, then brackets us as to time. Our target lives at 10017 Alder, Apartment 602B. Not a bad part of town, but I’m thinking we best be very careful on this one."

  "He said it was corporate scrip." Tiger tapped the envelope. "What’s backing it?"

  Iron Mike slid the money out of the envelope. Neatly bound with a green band, the 100 century notes looked and smelled crisp and clean. "Looks like United Oil. Wanna bet the apple didn't drop far from the fruit stand?"

  "Good, then we know where to find him if things go bust," Tiger said. "Cut me my half, then let’s get out of here. I’ve got some things to take care of, then I’ll probably reconnoiter the place tonight."

  "Here you go." Mike split the packet of money in half and riffled it. "I make that 5,000 nuyen for you. I’ll do an early recon tomorrow morning, then give you a call and we can compare notes. Where will you be?"

  Tiger thought for a moment, then shrugged. "Try LaVonne’s place. If I don't hear from you by noon. I'll call you. No matter what, I think we should go in armed to the teeth. This doesn’t feel right to me."

  "Better safe than sorry." Mike pulled himself free of the booth and tucked his wad of nuyen into the pocket of his jeans. Tiger did likewise and both men headed for the door. As they reached it, a voice lashed them with ridicule.

  "Off to the Dr. Raven Fan Club meeting?"

  Mike turned easily. "And sure you’d be knowing what time it was held, wouldn’t you, Charles? It’s important to know when he’ll be busy, isn’t it? That, after all. is the only time you can walk the streets without fear of wetting yourself, eh. chummer?"

  Charles snarled in anger, but restrained himself from dignifying Mike’s charge with denial. "We've made a decision. You two are out of the Halloweeners. We don’t want your kind in here. Don’t come back."

  Tiger’s nostrils flared. "What'll you do about it if we do?

  Charles screwed his face into a look of contempt. "I’ll make your mama a very unhappy woman."

  Tiger shrugged Mike’s hand off his shoulder and skewered the Halloweener leader with a stare. "Whatever you do, Charles, you make sure to do it good, real good. No holding back because you’re not going to get a second chance. When you feel the muzzle of a gun pressed against your balls, you'll know it's me. and you’ll wish you’d done it right."

  Holding eye contact with Charles the Red until the smoke formed an impenetrable wall between them, Tiger backed out of the Jackal’s Lantern and let the night swallow his anger.

  * * *

  Tiger’s gentle knocking on the screen door pulverized a patch of its peeling green paint. Without waiting for an answer, he opened the door and stepped into the narrow kitchen, being careful not to kick fragments of linoleum tiling loose. Except where rust-colored water stains writhed down through the design, the flowery wallpaper did succeed in making the room seem slightly larger and somewhat less oppressive than its general condition should have allowed.

  His sister, her hands covered in a curry-hued batter, smiled at him from the stove. "I had a feeling you’d be showing up here tonight, Eugene. I was saying to myself, ‘Here I am fixing Natural Vat’s Yangtze chicken stir-fry. I just know Gene will be coming by,’ and here you are." She dropped several strips of batter-laced meat into the wok on the stove, then wiped her hands on her apron. "Are you clean?"

  Tiger gave her a peck on the cheek, then stepped to the sink. He turned on the hot water and let it run until it cleared, then washed paint dust from his hands. "I remember the house rules. LaVonne. No dirt on my hands, no shells in my guns. " He frowned while looking for a towel to dry his hands, then settled for a corner of her apron. "Isn't it a bit late for you to be making supper?"

  She shook her head as she chased the chicken around the wok with a wooden spoon. "They asked Frankie to put in some overtime tonight. After they lost that shipment in the warehouse fire, they needed to step up production. They’ve got a new product, Kung-Pao pork, and a bunch of it was destroyed when Bob's warehouse went up. But I expect Frankie home any time now."

  "Oh." Tiger pulled a chair around from the table and straddled it with its back against his chest. "How's he treating you? You don’t have to stay with him, you know." Tiger's voice dropped an octave. "I could have a talk with him." LaVonne, still pretty though she’d filled out after her pregnancies, whirled and pointed her spoon at Tiger. "No! I don’t want you having one of your ‘talks' with my Frankie. We've been over this before, Eugene. Frankie is a good man and he's been a good father to my children."

  "When he's not beating up on you."

  "Gene, you just don't understand!" She fished the chicken strips from the wok and put them on some paper towels to drain, then added more chicken to the wok. "Frankie doesn't hit me . . . that often . . ."

  Tiger’s cat s-eyes narrowed. "He shouldn't hit you at all."

  "That’s something I just have to live with, Gene." She turned from the stove and wiped her brow with the back of one hand. "You and I were born without System Identification Numbers. Mama did her best to take care of us, but without SINs, we didn't count in the system. We couldn’t go to school because teachers wouldn't get paid for teaching us. The social welfare people couldn’t slot us into their programs, and the corporations wouldn’t hire Mama for real jobs. Her jobs were all temporary and never at a real wage.

  "Because of Frankie and his job at Natural Vat, my children have SINs. They go to school, they get medicine, and they can get help when they need it. A Natural Vat VP, Nadia Mirin, started that ‘Computers for Kids’ program and we got Bobby into it because of Frankie. Frank Jr., they say, may have magical aptitude so they’re looking into that, too! With their SINs, my kids have a chance that you and I didn’t have. And Frankie even claimed Mama as a dependent so that Natural Vat would accept her into that home over in Renton." LaVonne swallowed hard. "If Frankie sometimes forgets he’s not simming and hits me, it’s a price I’m willing to pay." Tiger looked down at the cracked linoleum. "How is Mama?

  "Doing O.K. She has good days and bad. I think, though, she might let you come up and see her."

  The hopeful note in his sister's voice brought Tiger’s head up. "What?"

  LaVonne smiled proudly. "Well, when I went to see her two weeks ago. it was right after that elven woman got rescued by Dr. Raven’s friend. Wolfgang Kies. She started in with how nice she thought Dr. Raven was and what fine things he does. I could see she was angling in on how disappointed she was in the way you turned o
ut, and to get me to promise I won’t let Bobby or Frank Junior do what you do."

  "Same old tune, just different words."

  "Don’t give up hope. I told her that you’d been one of the guys to help Wolfgang rescue the girl—Mama said she was an elven princess or something—and she flat refused to believe me. But when I went back this week, all of her cronies were congratulating me on what you had done. Now Mama wouldn’t say a thing to me, but your picture reappeared on her dresser there. I think she’s really happy you’ve gotten in with Dr. Raven."

  Tiger’s claws flashed in and out in a split-second. He slumped forward on the chair and his sister came over to stroke his hair.

  "What happened. Gene? Didn’t things work out with Raven? I know you had your heart set on leaving the Halloweeners and hooking up with him."

  Tiger chewed a bit of excess skin from his lower iip, giving himself a chance to choke down the lump in his throat. "The Raven thing is a bust. It’s been two weeks and no word, I really thought Mike and I had an in there. We did everything Wolf asked us to do and got his people clear, but we’ve not heard anything."

  "I’m sorry."

  "Yeah? It gets worse." Tiger shook his head wearily as he remembered Charles the Red. "Raven doesn’t even know we exist, and Charles the Red punts both of us from the Halloweeners because we’re ‘Raven’s men.’ "

  LaVonne returned to her wok. "Well, you wanted to leave the Halloweeners anyway. You said you’d outgrown them."

  "True, but Mike and I wanted to have another affiliation before we jumped. Right now we’re buck naked in mosquito country." He drew in a deep breath and sighed heavily. "It’s like you were saying earlier ... I looked on Raven as a Frankie for Mike and me."

  LaVonne turned and watched her brother carefully. "What’s really wrong, Eugene? I’ve never seen you this low."