Preying for Keeps

by Mel Odom

  PLAYED FOR A SUCKER

  When ace shadowrunner Jack Skater leads his team of commandos in a raid on an elven ocean freighter, things get a little sticky. Yakuza hitmen crash the party, and a Japanese shaman whips up a titanic sea creature just to make sure nobody gets out alive. Now, having escaped with his troops by the skin of their teeth, Skater wants to find out who set him up.

  But it isn’t going to be easy. Because the runners are stuck up to their pointy ears in a sinister super-scheme that involves Skater’s ex-wife, two elven gene corporations, a ruthless mafioso named McKenzie, and stolen data disks containing secrets worth killing for. It’s a high-tech mega-mess with no way out. And as a ghastly virus hits Seattle, unleashing hordes of homicidal cannibals onto the streets, Skater and company have to bring in some heavy artillery just to stay alive....

  PREYING FOR KEEPS

  SOMETHING TOLD SKATER THIS WAS MAGIC,

  but before he could fire his gun, a whirling mass of shimmering hot air came at him from one corner of the room.

  The flaming creature knocked his arm aside, making the bullet go wide of its intended target. More than two meters high and the color and consistency of orange clay, the body was roughly humanoid but definitely lizard-like. Fire clung to it like gossamer webs. Its eyes looked like they’d been poked into its head with a dull stick, and it had a crooked slash for a mouth. The thing had to be a fire elemental.

  Skater yanked a pole from the second-floor hallway railing and swung it at the elemental. He’d been told that madmen had the best chance against elementals on the physical plane because they became obsessed.

  The pole collided with the elemental’s face hard enough to jar the thing’s head. Flaming yellow blood trickled down its snout.

  With a ragged howl of rage, the elemental filled one hand with a spinning ball of flaming plasma and threw it at Skater. The ball grew as it passed through the air....

  SHADOWRUN : 21

  PREYING FOR KEEPS

  Mel Odom

  Dedication

  This book is for Darrel Madden.

  For years you’ve been my friend, stood by me when the times were bad, sheared my ego down to size when things were going too well. You’ve been there to help me build dreams, and offered a hand to pull me out of the rubble of the ones that fell.

  You’ve changed diapers on my kids, put up with inane jokes that only second-graders know how to tell terribly, and given doorknob wedgies to the children who really deserved it. Plus you play killer Super-Mario Kart.

  Since I’ve known you, I’ve never had to wonder if I was ever without a friend, never had to question if my back was covered when we were in situations that looked tense. I knew you were there.

  Sometimes family doesn’t just come from flesh and blood, and I’m glad you and I are family.

  Acknowledgments

  My thanks to agent Ethan Ellenberg, who steered me in this direction.

  Thanks to Donna Ippolito and Jodie at FASA Corporation, who gave me permission to play in their world, then a map to go with it. I couldn’t have done it without you keeping me on track. Your energy and enthusiasm and patience are deeply appreciated. See you next year at GenCon!

  To the folks at DarkCon here in Oklahoma who talked with me about the game.

  And to my wife, Sherry, who put up with trolls and orks and magical nasties during the writing of this book, as well as our four children. Matthew Lane, Matthew Dain, Montana, and Shiloh, my kids. (They like to see their names in books, and it gives them something for show-n-tell day.) Also, they kept me inspired by looking through the sourcebooks I had scattered everywhere, going, “Cool! Hey, Dad, did you see this really neat monster? You should put it in your book!”

  And to you readers: Run the shadows with skill and luck and nerve, chummers. Enjoy!

  1

  Buckled into the open cargo bay of the Fiat-Fokker Cloud Nine, Jack Skater felt the cool night air whip around him, carrying the wet taste of the approaching storm front. He trained his low-light binoculars on their prey. “How’s it look, Wheeler? You got a positive lock?”

  “Ninety-two percent probability of a hit.” the dwarf rigger called from the cockpit where he was jacked into the controls of the amphibian plane. “Targeting computer says that’s the best you’re gonna get.”

  Peering through the binoculars, Skater saw the name Sapphire Seahawk emblazoned on the freighter’s stem in English and Sperethiel and that she flew the flag of the elven nation of Tir Taimgire. Both would have been nearly invisible in the crawling dark of the storm, but the ship was running some lights, however minimal.

  Pocketing the binox, Skater grabbed the lip of the cargo bay and hoisted himself back inside the plane. He unbuckled the safety harness and let it drop. At twenty-five, he was dark and slim, something under two meters, with high cheekbones, dusky skin, and thick, close-cropped black hair that showed the influence of Salish blood. He lived in Seattle now, and had since 2049, but he’d grown up in the Salish-Shidhe Council lands surrounding that outpost of the United Canadian and American States that was the Seattle sprawl.

  Dressed in black and wearing combat gear that supported a shoulder-holstered Ares Predator II, a monofilament sword sheathed down his back, and a variety of other weapons, Skater looked more like he should be running the streets than riding the night skies over the Pacific.

  “How far?” he asked.

  “About a minute and we’ll be within range.”

  Skater looked up at Elvis. “You done?”

  The troll samurai had been connecting the Conner grapple gun to the firmpoint under the belly of the amphibian through the access port. Also wearing black, he was nearly two and a half meters of hard muscle and broad mien. The flat features showed a cruel history, reflected in a silver-crowned tusk and a twisted left horn. “You betcha.” he rumbled in deep bass.

  Sliding his hands over his gear in one final inventory. Skater glanced over at Wheeler. “Ten seconds, then fire at will.”

  “You got it.”

  Skater turned next to Quint Duran. “Keep bloodshed to a minimum.” he said, not softening his tone though the ork had a good ten years on him. “Those fragging elves hold a grudge as long as god.”

  Duran scowled, his face a map of past violence. Silver tainted his bushy dark hair, and gold hoop earrings dangled from his elongated ears. His synthleathered armor was as scarred and war-worn as his face, and he held a pump-action Franchi SPAS-22 combat shotgun in one gnarled fist. “I read you.”

  Skater nodded and walked back to the cargo bay to check on Wheeler. His brain cybernetically linked to the controls, the rigger had heeled the amphib over and was gliding down for the kill like a swooping hawk. Squat and broad, with an immense nose and slightly pointed ears, Wheeler Iron-Nerve worn his hair braided into a single length, its dirty chestnut color only slightly lighter than his full, bushy beard.

  The uneven planes of the ocean rushed up at the Fiat-Fokker, which was now just meters above the water, racing along in the same northeasterly direction the Sapphire Seahawk was taking to Seattle. They’d planned the operation well, choosing to attack where the freighter was most vulnerable—here at this point about equidistant from both Seattle and its home in the Tir. Certain aspects of the run were tricky, but once aboard the freighter, all they really had to do was lift some files from its computer system. And they had the magic, the muscle, and the decker to do it.

  “How you holding up, Trey?” Skater asked.

  The mage stood against the bulkhead on the other side of the cargo bay. All in black like the rest, he wore form-fitting body armor and a heavy Kevlar cape with high collar that was almost roguish on his slender, intense build. Thin beads of gleaming perspiration, ignited by stray strands of moonlight s
pilling through the amphibian’s windows, dotted Cullen Trey’s handsome face. “Making this bird invisible to either organic or technological detection isn’t my idea of a slotting good time, chummer.”

  Skater unclipped the D-ring from his combat rigging while leaving the other end secured, and leaned out the cargo bay. Lowering himself outside the door, fighting the wind, he clung to the plane, tripped the light-enhancement circuitry in his eyes and watched as the grapple gun spun on its turret, locking on target. The charge of compressed air fired the grappling hook toward the Sapphire Seahawk, the wire spilling out behind it, whirring in a high-pitched scream.

  Skater watched the line go taut, managed by a computer-assisted tension governor built into the gun.

  “Locked on.” Wheeler crowed triumphantly.

  Reaching out, Skater attached the D-ring and let go of the amphibian. The governor allowed just enough slack to send him sliding toward the Sapphire Seahawk three hundred meters away. Even with the Cloud Nine throttled down, it was rapidly overtaking the ship. Accessing his Commlink IV, Skater tripped the Crypto Circuit HD to scramble all transmissions along the two radio and two telephone channels provided. The rest of the team carried the matching circuits on their headware. All except Trey, who used an external setup. Cybertech was commonplace in the Awakened world of 2057, but new rules existed ever since the return of magic. One of the firmest was that a mage and cyberware didn’t mix.

  “Count off.” Skater called out. He shot across the open expanse of water, shedding altitude as he dropped toward the freighter. The line could hold only three people per hundred meters without snapping, so the five members of the team had staggered their approach accordingly. By the time Skater reached the Sapphire Seahawk, the D-ring was smoking and glowing cherry-red from the friction.

  “You’re made, kid.” came Duran’s gruff warning.

  Scarcely forty meters out from the freighter’s starboard side, Skater saw the shadows pull free of the deck and advance toward him. If there’d been any way to return to the amphibian, he’d have done it.

  The sailors were dressed in the ship’s yellow and red, and these elves obviously had no compunction about shooting first and asking questions later. Bullets sliced through the air around him, some of them phosphorus tracers burning past in purple blurs.

  Two of the elves raced for the grappling hook buried in the wooden coaming of the upper deck while others prepared to meet Skater and friends.

  “Skater,” Wheeler called out, “you’re running out of wire.”

  Just as he reached the freighter’s side, Skater kicked in his boosted reflexes and unclipped the D-ring. His momentum carried him over the heads of the elves as he fell to the deck. “I’m on.”

  He pushed himself to his feet as hands reached for him. Computer-augmented reflexes honed by a lifetime of fighting for his own took over. He grabbed an outstretched hand and twisted it viciously, snapping the elbow behind it with an audible crack. An agonized moan followed immediately. No bloodshed didn’t mean no maiming.

  Slipping past two awkward blows aimed at his face as the press of elves swarmed around him, Skater kicked another sailor in the groin with enough force to double the man over. Bullets chopped into the wooden wall behind him with thunderous explosions.

  “I’m on.” Elvis roared.

  Skater saw some of the elves break from him, moving to take on the troll. Knowing others were closing on the grappling hook imbedded overhead, he took two quick steps and sprang off the elf he’d dropped, using the body as a footstool to leap up and grab the coaming above him. He arched his body and flipped, landing on his feet in a squatting position just as one of the sailors advanced on the grappling line with a sword.

  Pushing himself up and forward, Skater reached over his shoulder and ripped his monofilament sword free of its scabbard. The second elf shouted a warning in Sperethiel and then launched himself at Skater.

  There wasn’t much room to maneuver on the lip, but Skater managed to grab the leaping man’s hair in his free hand while bringing his knee up into the elf’s face. Bone crunched. He dropped his unconscious foe and lunged over him.

  The first elf lashed his sword toward the cable with enough force to sever it easily, but not before Skater’s sword sheared through the metal near the haft, leaving the elf with only a stub fronting the ornate basket hilt. The blade went spiraling loosely and clattered to the deck.

  “You scrod-scarfing brainwipe.” the elf snarled. He reached for the pistol at his hip.

  Skater flicked his blade once, then stepped forward and gave the elf a mouthful of the sword’s knuckle bow. Squalling in pain and anger, the elf went backward and over the lip of the deck, crashing down among the crowd attempting to stop Elvis. The troll was a rolling dreadnought of Amie-Awesome cyberware unleashed in full frenzy.

  “I’m on.” Quint Duran dropped into an easy standing position only a few steps from the sailors. Without hesitation, he waded into the thick of the battle, triggering the SPAS-22 in a wide circle. His years as a merc had made him one chill opponent in combat. Elves scattered in all directions.

  Trey was next to drop from the grappling line to the freighter’s deck, a shimmering wave spewing from his hands. Wherever it touched, elven sailors collapsed in crumpled heaps.

  Not all of them went down, however, but Duran and Elvis were making short work of the survivors.

  “I’m on.” Shiva, flame-haired and also dressed in skintight black, was just hitting the deck. More than two meters tall and possessing skillsofts and vat muscle, she immediately began to wreak havoc with a collapsible fighting staff. Once a bounty hunter, Shiva was as devastating as Duran when the drek hit the fan.

  Trey meanwhile had whipped out his polished wooden walking stick. Among other nasty little surprises, the cane also powered up as a stun baton. He parried a sword thrust, then brought the stick up into his opponent’s crotch and triggered the stun charge. Visible electric current sizzled blue-white veins through the air. The elf went down like he’d been poleaxed. Trey moved on, gripping his cape in one hand. He hadn’t been born to street-fighting, but he had a natural aptitude.

  “Drek, the line ran out.” Wheeler warned over the commlink.

  Skater heard the deep-throated sproing of the cable separating as it hummed past his ear.

  “Jack.”

  He turned, recognizing Archangel’s voice. The elven decker was still almost three meters out, and the grappling wire had snapped. Dropping his sword, taking the sweep and roll of the freighter into account, Skater grabbed the line, his hands partiaily protected by fingerless gloves. He gripped and yanked with everything he had. “Gotcha.”

  Archangel came over the side and joined him on the second deck, miraculously keeping her balance with his help. She was as tali as Skater, but slender and small-breasted, almost childlike. Her hair, platinum and normally worn long, was now tucked up under a tight black skull cap that showed the outline of her very pointed elven ears. Almond in shape, her bronze eyes held orbiting gold flecks that were strangely hypnotic. The gleam of the datajack on her right temple was masked by the same camou cosmetics that streaked her beautiful face. Her deck hung from a strap over her shoulder in a waterproof case, counter-balanced by an Ares Light Fire 70 in a crossdraw holster on her left hip.

  She pushed herself out of his arms. Nothing personal, Skater knew, but the decker liked her space, didn’t like being touched at all. Archangel wasn’t her real name, but he’d never been given anything else to call her.

  Skater took the lead. The storm was overtaking the freighter and rain was starting to fall, making the deck slippery. He raced to the stern. Archangel only steps behind him.

  A trio of elven sailors met them at the companion way leading down into the private quarters of the Sapphire Seahawk.

  Skater threw himself backward, flattening against the wall as bullets ripped long wooden splinters from the coaming. “Fraggit!” he swore. He sheathed the sword, drawing the Predator IT and palming a f
lash grenade instead.

  “Elvis.” Skater called out over the commlink. “Fall back astern.”

  “You got it, chummer.”

  Skater peeled the pin from the flash grenade. Counting it down, he tossed it toward the companionway, then closed his eyes and told Archangel to do the same.

  The instant the brunt of the explosion was over and the flare had died away, Skater ran toward the companionway. Looking over the side, he saw two elves beating embers from their clothing and coughing hard enough to hack up a lung. He leaped over the side and dropped on them. Swinging the Predator, he caught one man alongside the temple and put him down. Then he swung into a sleeper hold on the other elf, choking him into unconsciousness.

  “Elvis.” Skater cried out as he tried the door at the bottom of the companionway and found it locked. “The door.”

  “Step aside, stringbean.” The troll came down the stairs, fitting tight with the armor and weapons on him.

  Elvis drew back one enormous hobnailed boot, then drove it forward. The door was made of ceramic and steel and didn’t give, but it was mounted in wooden framing that did, with a squealing shriek.

  Skater dove through the door, the Predator gripped in his fist. The room was a private berth, filled with a bed, desk and chair, and a short sofa.

  One of the four elves inside came at him, firing point-blank. The bullets smashed against Skater’s armor like hammer blows, stealing his breath away. Skater grabbed one of the elves and drove him backward, firing as fast as he could over the man’s shoulder.

  He put three rounds into another guard’s knees and cut his legs out from under him, tried to home in on a second man, but then the sailor he was holding brought his pistol up. Headbutting him in the face and braking his nose, Skater stripped the Ceska vz/120 from the elf’s grip and threw it to the floor. He spun and caught the elf with a roundhouse kick that put him down.

  An elven female dressed in street synthleather, looking as slender and unthreatening as Archangel, suddenly bared two sets of forearm snap-blades. Coolly and dispassionately, she rushed Elvis.