Nestled among the heavy plastic packing crates in the back of the truck was a thin figure wearing a long, dark coat. Her hair was long and braided, and it looked like she had at least some Native blood. She turned as Kellan landed and raised one hand, a faint shimmer forming around it. Kellan squeezed the trigger twice, snapping off a couple shots. The first one went wide, blowing a hole in a crate with a scattering of packing material. The second hit the shaman in her shoulder, spinning her to the side into one of the crates and breaking her concentration. The spell, whatever it had been, didn't go off.
Kellan moved closer, gun held extended in both hands, leveled at the shaman as she struggled to her feet. It looked like her coat was lined with enough armor that it stopped the bullet, although Kellan knew from experience that it still felt like being hit with a baseball bat wielded by a troll. The shaman had suffered some blunt trauma to be sure, maybe worse. She was clutching at her shoulder as she regained her feet.
"Try that again," Kellan said flatly, "and the next one goes between your eyes."
The shaman glared at her, but didn't say anything, slowly lowering her hands to her sides, but keeping them where Kellan could see them.
"You're controlling the spirit out there." Kellan said, and the shaman nodded.
"Get rid of it." Kellan told her, raising her gun slightly for emphasis. "And don't try pulling anything, understand?"
The shaman paused for a moment, eyes locked on Kellan's, and Kellan wondered if she was using magic to try to figure out if she was bluffing. She didn't feel anything, but it was hard to tell. Then the shaman slowly raised her hands and began to chant like she had before. Kellan could feel the magic in the air, could almost see it coalescing around the other woman.
The spell lashed out at Kellan, hitting her like a physical blow. She reflexively pushed against it, gritting her teeth and holding her ground. It felt like icy claws were tearing at her very soul, but she thought about the crystalline egg Lothan had taught her to visualize, and the claws seemed to scrape against it without really hurting her. At the same time, her finger squeezed the trigger.
The shaman just looked at Kellan, shocked that her spell had failed, then she doubled over when the shot hit her in the gut and crumpled to the deck of the truck. The effects of the spell faded with her, and
Kellan gasped as time seemed to snap back to normal. She felt a bit drained, but her adrenaline was pumping and her heart was pounding. Kellan stared at the fallen shaman for a moment, but she didn't move. Kellan keyed her commlink.
"This is K." she said. "I'm in the back of the truck. Their shaman is down."
"Good work." Lothan replied. "That's definitely taken the fight out of the storm spirit as well as their magical defenses. Let's wrap this up, shall we?" the troll mage said to no one in particular.
Kellan felt another surge of magic, like a rippling in the air, and the gunfire ahead of the truck suddenly fell silent. She heard a clang of metal and a cry of pain from the right side of the truck cab, then suddenly Liada and Orion swung into the back of the truck from opposite sides. The Street Deacon and Lothan followed close behind.
The other shadowrunners quickly searched the back of the truck for any other Ares personnel, then Lothan spoke into his commlink.
"Max, we're clear." he said.
"Roger." the dwarf rigger replied. "I'm on my way."
"Jackie, status." the troll said.
"We've got a window." the decker said in a businesslike tone, her previous playfulness absent. "A call went out to Lone Star when things started going down, but I'm scrambling some messages from the dispatch that should keep them busy for a little while. You've got five, maybe ten minutes at the outside."
"All right, let's go." Lothan told the rest of the team.
Liada hunkered down beside the fallen shaman, looking her over. There was blood on the flatbed.
"Is she . . . ?" Kellan asked and Liada shook her head.
"Not yet." she said.
"Dump her." Lothan told the Street Deacon. The street samurai holstered his weapon to scoop up the unconscious shaman. He tossed her off the end of the truck onto the street. Kellan started to say something, but a glance from Liada made her reconsider it. The elf mage shook her head slightly.
Orion hopped down from the back of the truck, sheathing his sword. He disappeared around the corner as Silver Max and G-Dogg climbed into the cab of the cargo hauler. The engine roared to life again and Lothan grabbed hold of one of the straps holding the crates in place.
"Let's ride!" G-Dogg called from the cab. Silver Max threw the truck into gear and it lurched forward, forcing the shadowrunners in back to grab for handholds. Max plowed past the escort truck and the electric three-wheeler, and Kellan could see security guards lying scattered across the road. Some lay in dark puddles of blood, while others appeared completely unmarked. There was no one to watch as the truck, its cargo and the shadowrunners rumbled away down the highway and into the night.
Chapter 10
With Jackie Ozone running interference in the Matrix, the shadowrunners were gone long before Lone Star responded to the scene of the hijacking. The decker fed the team a running update of the response to their activity, but it was clear they'd made a clean getaway. Lone Star had started a search, but the team planned on concluding their business long before the authorities had any chance of finding them.
Silver Max took the first exit off the highway and headed into Redmond. The rigger expertly guided the big truck through the dark maze of streets, lined with the burned-out shells of cars and other refuse— living and nonliving. If anyone noticed an Ares cargo hauler trucking through the streets so late at night, they didn't bother doing anything about it. People in the Barrens generally knew to mind their own business. It wasn't healthy to do otherwise.
Lothan talked in low tones over the commlink, presumably with Jackie, although Kellan couldn't be sure. The troll mage used a private channel. The number of turns and back roads Silver Max took them on convinced Kellan the dwarf must have an implanted global positioning system. He navigated the streets of the Barrens like they were tattooed on the back of his hand. Or maybe the inside of his skull is more like it, Kellan thought.
In fairly short order, the truck pulled up outside of what used to be part of an old strip mall, built around a central anchor store with a sizable loading dock, which was ideal for their purposes. G-Dogg hopped down from the cab to haul open the rusty garage door, which protested this movement, and allow the truck to pull inside. Orion roared up on the back of his Yamaha Rapier right behind them, pulling the bike inside as G-Dogg pulled the door closed. The Street Deacon jumped down from the back of the truck to help, and the two of them wrestled the corrugated metal door closed as Silver Max killed the truck's engine and switched off the headlights.
The abandoned loading area was plunged into darkness, the only illumination the dim light coming through the heavy sheets of plastic covering the few windows. Kellan waited for her eyes to adjust to the gloom. Everyone else on the team was either a metahuman or—in the Street Deacon's case—had cybernetic eyes and could see in near-total darkness. Kellan couldn't even think about replacing her eyes without feeling nauseous. She blinked a few times, and was able to make out the shadowy shapes of the other runners around her.
"Looks like we're in the clear." Jackie reported over the commlink. "I'll continue to keep watch and let you know if there's any trouble."
"Understood. Good work, Jackie." Lothan replied. "Well, then." he said, turning to the rest of the team. "Now we await Mr. Johnson and our payment. G-Dogg, why don't you, Deacon and Orion keep a lookout for the arrival of our employer." Although phrased politely, it wasn't a request, and G-Dogg nodded, moving off to get the other two men and comply.
"Good job with that shaman." Liada said to Kellan as she tucked her gear into her ever-present shoulder bag.
"But not exactly according to plan." Lothan interjected, giving Kellan a disapproving glance. "You were suppos
ed to stay with the decoy vehicle."
"And what, get shot?" Kellan said.
"Not if you stayed under cover."
"Lay off her, Lothan." Liada challenged the big troll. "She did a good job taking out that shaman. Saved us a lot of trouble."
Lothan bristled. "I would have dealt with her and her spirit soon enough."
"Of course." Liada sneered. "But not as fast as Kellan did. We could have overcome that shaman's defenses together, but thanks to her we didn't have to bother. One stun blast took the rest of those guards down like that"—she snapped her fingers—"and we were on our way."
"Success doesn't excuse excess." the troll shot back. He took a step toward Kellan. "In the future, if you can't stick to the plan, you will at least inform everyone else of your movements. Don't go off on your own, or you're liable to end up in the line of fire." Then he turned on his heel and stalked to the end of the truck, clambering down with the aid of his heavy, gnarled staff.
"Makkanagee." Liada muttered under her breath, watching him go. Then she turned toward Kellan. "Don't listen to him." she said. "You did good. Lothan just hates it when somebody comes up with a good idea that he can't take the credit for." Liada flashed Kellan a smile and touched her arm. "Hey, you okay?" she asked, realizing that Kellan's face had gone white as she holstered her pistol. Kellan's hands were starting to shake and she folded her arms across her chest, hugging them close to get them to stop.
"Yeah, yeah." she said. "Fine."
"It's just post-run shakes." Liada said sympathetically. "Coming down from the rush. You'll be okay."
"It's just, I never . . ." Kellan began, glancing up at Liada and then looking down again, embarrassed to say more to the more experienced shadowrunner.
"What? Shot anyone?"
"Not like that." Kellan replied quietly. "I mean, I shot at people when I was running in KC. Probably even hit some." she snorted mirthlessly. "But I never shot somebody that close before, right in front of me. It wasn't like this in Kansas City."
"Get used to it." Liada said, and a note in her voice made Kellan look up at her. The elf woman's face was sympathetic, but also cold. "She was working for a corp. She knew the risks. She won't be the last one, Kellan, not in this biz. If you're lucky, you'll at least get to be face-to-face with everyone you have to shoot. It's when you start shooting them in the back that you need to worry."
Liada laid a hand on her shoulder, and then left Kellan alone with her thoughts. The run kept playing in her head like a simsense loop; the moment when the shaman tried to cast that spell on her, the feel of the gun in her hand, the look on the shaman's face when the spell didn't work and Kellan's bullet caught her in the gut. Kellan wondered if she'd survived, or if she had died on the highway before help arrived. She wondered if that was how she was going to go one day.
She knew the risks. Liada's words came back to her. She knew that's the way it was in the shadows: kill or be killed, survival of the fittest. When you didn't have the advantages of wealth and privilege, or even the legal existence granted by a SIN, the other option was to be like those lost souls they passed in the Barrens on the way here: squatting in abandoned ruins, living like rats, victims of the corporate machine. Kellan knew she could never live like that.
Looking at the crate she was leaning against, she wondered what it was that they had gone to all this trouble to acquire. Crouching down, she read the shipping label. Most of the information consisted of barcodes for electronic readers to scan, but the words made Kellan frown. She checked the labels on some of the other crates and they were basically the same. Then she went to the front of the cargo area and found a pry bar she used to open one of the crates, popping the lid to look inside. It confirmed what the label on the outside said, meaning that the contents of the other crates were probably the same, not some sort of blind for contraband or hidden cargo. But then why would anyone—?
"What the frag do you think you're doing?"
Kellan jumped and turned to see Orion gracefully pulling himself up onto the back of the truck, glaring at her.
"I'm just checking. . . ." she began, but the elf strode forward, grabbing the pry bar from her hand.
"Nobody told you to check anything." he said in a low, harsh tone.
"Yeah, well, somebody should." Kellan shot back. "Why the frag is our Johnson paying for a shipment of electronic drek that he could buy at any mall in the plex?"
"What?" Orion said.
"See for yourself." Kellan replied, gesturing toward the open crate. "Simdecks, players, interface cables, blank chips—it's all Hong Kong-grade electronics, not even top-of-the-line Novatech or Mitsuhama stuff."
Orion gripped the edge of the open crate, peering inside with a look of disbelief visible even in the dim light. He cursed under his breath, then stalked off with deliberate purpose in his stride, jumping down from the back of the truck. Kellan quickly followed, in case he was going to Lothan to complain about her.
She saw G-Dogg escort "Mr. Johnson" inside. Their employer was alone, and dressed much the same as the first time Kellan saw him, in dark, nondescript clothing that shouted class and influence. He approached Lothan and the two of them began talking in low tones. Orion pulled up short when he saw the troll mage speaking with Mr. Johnson. There was a dark scowl on the elf's face. He folded his arms and waited as Lothan and the other man concluded their business.
Kellan went to stand with Liada and G-Dogg. Silver Max still sat in the cab of the truck. Kellan couldn't make out what Lothan and Mr. Johnson were saying to each other, but it seemed clear that the other man was happy with what he was hearing. Lothan gestured somewhat grandly toward the truck, but the Johnson waved a dismissal, making it clear that he felt no need to inspect their prize.
"Lothan's probably telling him how he pulled it off all by himself." Liada whispered.
"As long as the cred's good." G-Dogg replied.
Kellan looked away from Lothan when she saw movement in her peripheral vision. The Street Deacon entered the garage, walking toward the truck. The street samurai reached the cab and stopped dead in his tracks, staring at Lothan and their Mr. Johnson. Kellan swore that the man's face blanched as pale as the white skull tattoo he wore. His hands flexed as if grasping for something unseen.
"What's with the Deacon?" she asked quietly, and G-Dogg glanced in that direction. The Street Deacon quickly regained his composure and made his way slowly toward the back of the truck, his eyes on Mr. Johnson the whole time.
"Beats the frag out of me." the ork shrugged. "Who knows what's ever up with him?" He turned his attention back to Lothan and Mr. Johnson. Mr. Johnson took out a handful of credsticks and handed them to the troll, who inspected them and seemed satisfied. They shook hands, and Mr. Johnson walked away as Lothan came over to Kellan, G-Dogg and Liada.
"So?" the ork asked. Kellan noticed that Lothan seemed particularly pleased with himself.
"Payment, as agreed." he pronounced, flourishing the credsticks. "Plus a bonus. Mr. Johnson has said that he has no further need of the cargo, so long as Ares is deprived of it, so we are free to dispose of it as we see fit. That should net us a tidy little sum."
"What is it?" Liada asked.
"Electronics, entertainment centers, stuff like that." Kellan said before Lothan could reply, earning her a withering glare from the troll that asked how she knew this information. Kellan did her best to not quail in front of it.
"Not bad." G-Dogg said, ignoring the exchange of looks. "I know some people who'd be interested and would give us a decent price."
The mention of further profit distracted Lothan from glaring at Kellan. "Arrange it." he said to the ork. "We should be all right keeping the swag here for a while, but I want to make sure that we haven't scored a lure that will bring Ares security down on us." Then he headed over toward the cab of the truck to fill in the others.
"Well." G-Dogg said to Kellan and Liada. "I've got to make some calls, then I think a little celebration is in order. The night isn't
over yet, we're still alive and, for the moment, we're flush with nuyen. What do you say to hitting Dante's Inferno or Penumbra?"
"Sounds good to me." Liada replied, glancing at Kellan.
"Wizard." she agreed, though she wasn't feeling as good as G-Dogg obviously was about the whole thing.
"Let's invite Max." G-Dogg said, and he and Liada followed Lothan toward the truck. Kellan looked around for Orion and saw that he had stopped Mr. Johnson by the side door of the garage. She wanted to catch the elf before he buzzed, so she decided to interrupt.
". . . promised us those weapons, Brickman." Orion was saying as Kellan approached. At a glance from Mr. Johnson, Orion broke off as Kellan got closer.
"Um . . . hey." she said, glancing from one man to the other. "We were going to go out, have a few." she said to Orion. "Just wanted to tell you that you're welcome to come with."
"My business here isn't finished." the elf said coldly, glaring at the other man.
"Oh, okay." Kellan backed away, then turned and walked toward the truck as quickly as possible without running. G-Dogg, Max and Liada were waiting for her next to the cab.
"What's with that?" G-Dogg asked her, nodding in the direction of Orion and the man he called Brickman. The two men continued to talk, then Brickman gestured politely toward the door and Orion walked out ahead of him, his back stiff with anger.
"Dunno." Kellan said slowly, watching them go.
"Well, the Deacon is going to take first shift watching our haul," Liada said, "and Lothan already took off. It's late for a guy his age." she continued with a vicious little smirk. "But he handed over our cut of the cred. Here's yours." and she handed Kellan a credstick.
Kellan took the nuyen with a surge of pride. It felt good to get a cut of the take in addition to the lessons from Lothan. She felt like she really had contributed to the success of the run, and getting paid made it official: she was a shadowrunner in the big time!
“Thanks." Kellan said.
Born to Run Page 10
