Fade to Black

by Nyx Smith

  Claude felt the tap against his chest and saw the string whip back into the woman's mouth, vanishing before he could really grasp what was happening.

  Cybersnake. Narcoject delivery system. The burning spike of pain that suddenly pierced his chest suggested hypercyanide, but then he felt his heart hammering like it would burst and realized his eyes had gone out of focus.

  What was it? Atropine? Working this quickly? He felt his legs give way and suddenly found himself lying on the floor on his back, staring blindly at the ceiling.

  How had that happened? What was going on? Why was he so hot, burning up? He couldn't breathe. It felt like he had a metal strap ringing his neck and another around his chest, crushing him. He tried to force air into his lungs, but the pain was overwhelming.

  Angels. He heard angels singing ...

  * * *

  Surikov was wide-eyed and looking around as the towers swung by, but then the winch above their heads pulled them up beside the door in the helo's flank. Dok reached out, and in another moment Rico, Shank, and Surikov were all inside.

  Dok hooked a safety line onto Surikov. Rico popped the line off his own harness and moved forward to the copilot's seat. The helo banked and picked up speed, vectoring down a long chasm of steel and crete towers.

  "Three birds!" Thorvin shouted. "Coming in on freaking intercept!"

  Rico shouted back. "Port Authority cops?"

  The Port Authority had jurisdiction over Manhattan air space and regularly put patrols in the air.

  Thorvin shook his head. "I don't think so!"

  Who the hell could it be? Rico wondered. Piper'd had the Crystal Blossom tower locked down solid.

  They'd been in and out in just minutes. Who could even know they'd been there, much less have helos in the air and coming down on them this fast? "Can ya lose 'em?"

  "Do I HAVE A FREAKING CHOICE!"

  * * *

  "Master," the voice whispered.

  Bandit closed his eyes to the tilting, vibrating world of the helicopter's interior and looked to the astral plane. The raccoon-like form of the watcher crouched before him.

  "You must come," it said.

  Bandit considered that.

  Very risky.

  * * *

  Claude Jaeger dead? Killed by a woman? There was no doubting the witness of his astral senses, yet Maurice struggled with the concept, astounded. The physical adept had often seemed sufficiently formidable to be virtually indestructible. He should have known, Maurice thought Time disproved all such lies.

  Now he would have to finish the job himself.

  Disgruntled, he left his biffs in the Mercedes and crossed the street to the narrow front of the warehouse. The smaller of the two doors clicked and opened at a word. He stepped into the long, narrow, rectangular space of a loading area, then mounted the loading dock at the rear and continued on through another door, down the hall and into what looked like a lounge. The woman was there, huddled on a cushioned bench and quietly sobbing, her face and head completely hidden under a disheveled mass of shiny whitish-blonde hair. Jaeger lay dead on the floor, on his back, a look of inexpressible bliss monopolizing his features.

  "Master," said Vera Causa, his ally, murmuring into his ear. "Beware ..."

  Maurice shifted to his astral perceptions in time to see the radiant figure emerging from the wall at the back of the lounge.

  The shaman ...

  * * *

  The slags in the pursuing helos were pros. Thorvin's evasive maneuvers didn't throw them. Neither did the halfer's E.C.W. They came in high and low, and Rico had no choice but to point Thorvin toward the Hudson River. They'd have to sprint for the Jersey Side, hoping Thorvin could find the speed to get them dear of their pursuit.

  As they passed out over the dark expanse of water, the first slugs clattered against the helo's hull. One penetrated the airframe to gouge Shank in the upper right thigh, another fractured the window at Rico's side, spitting a jagged sliver of transparex across his cheek. The wound wasn't deep and the blood loss was minimal, but it didn't improve his mood any.

  He looked to the rear and saw Bandit sitting cross-legged, unmoving, eyes closed, flute lying across his lap.

  No help coming from that quarter.

  They're GAINING!" Thorvin shouted.

  "Push it!"

  "I'm freaking pushing, ALL RIGHT?"

  * * *

  Bandit paused at the rear of the lounge. He had seen the corpse in the stairwell and now he saw the body on the floor here in this room. Things were happening. It seemed that Rico's concern for Farrah Moffit's safety had been more than justified. Bandit only wondered how two men had come to be dead, while Moffit still lived.

  A tall, thin man stood at the head of the lounge, just in front of the door to the hallway. His aura now grew radiant, revealing truths. The man was a magician, and he was using his astral senses. That meant he was probably looking at Bandit, seeing him. That didn't bother Bandit much. What bothered him was what he saw standing beside the man.

  The spirit had a female form. It looked from Bandit to the other magician and back again several times. Was this a conjured spirit or an ally? Either way, it boded no good.

  Two against one.

  Bad odds.

  Bandit felt inclined toward just leaving. The equivalent of one step back and he would be on the other side of a physical wall and all but immune to spellcasting. There was a problem with that, though. Farrah Moffit was important. Rico had made a point of impressing that on everyone. If Bandit simply stepped out, she would be at the mercy of this magician.

  "I regret this," the magician said. "Have you any last words?"

  Bandit nodded. "Goodfellow."

  The spirit so named emerged from the wall at the rear of the lounge and paused at Bandit's left. It took the form of a human, but slim, short, and bearded, and wearing peculiar clothing with ruffles and lacy trim. It looked at Bandit for a moment, then across the astral terrain to the other magician, then, with a flourish, bowed, extending one arm with the hand palm up.

  The floor rumbled and quaked and split open. The magician opposite shouted and fell through the hole, down and out of sight.

  Goodfellow bowed again and vanished.

  The other magician's spirit leaned over to gaze into the hole, then looked at Bandit and smiled. "You should go away," it said, "before my master wakes up."

  Bandit could see the wisdom in that.

  Manifesting on the physical plane, he moved over to face Farrah Moffit. She sat on a cushioned bench with her back pressed to the wall and her legs drawn up before her body. Her eyes were wide and round and she held one hand thrust back against her mouth. She looked terrified. She went on staring at the hole in the floor till Bandit moved directly into her line of sight, then her eyes widened further as her gaze met his.

  "Come with me if you want to live."

  Moffit gasped, then slowly nodded her head.

  * * *

  The LZ became a killing zone.

  They had no choice but to put down. It was that or wait to get shot out of the air. The pursuing helos didn't hesitate to fire even as they passed over heavily populated sections of the Newark metroplex.

  Populated, sure, but by who? Nobody that mattered.

  Thorvin's hideaway for the helo was in the ruins of Sector 13, an old abandoned airport near the wastes of some long-forgotten cemetery. Chain-link fencing topped by coils of razor-wire surrounded one of the smaller hangars. Thorvin put the helo down inside the fencing, and the other helos closed in.

  Bullets hammered against the airframe. Thorvin turned the helo parallel to the front of the hangar to provide cover. One of the hangar doors slid open and Thorvin's van came rolling out, guided by remote. The weapons pod on top opened up and began blazing. By then, Rico could see that the other helos were dropping uniformed troops to the ground.

  Bandit was still in a trance. Shank grabbed him up and Rico grabbed Surikov and they broke for the van.

  I
t was a straight run-from the side of the helo to the side of the van-no more than about five meters.

  The troops moving in cut loose with a storm of autofire.

  Abruptly, Dok veered left and out beyond the front end of the helo, shouting and blazing away with his Ingram. It was a suicide move. The instant he saw it happening, Rico thrust Surikov toward the van and lunged across the ferrocrete. But not even his enhanced reaction time and speed could get him going fast enough. His ears were full of the stammering of autofire weapons and Dok's shouts of vengeance and wrath, and none of it mattered. None of it made any difference.

  Dok rammed a fresh clip from his belt into the Ingram, then his head snapped back and he plunged to the ground. Rico didn't hesitate.

  As he moved beyond the front of the helo, slugs pounded into his chest. The impacts stole his breath.

  He staggered and fell to one knee. It didn't feel like the bullets had penetrated his armored jacket, but it hurt. Mother of God, how it hurt. He forced himself forward, grabbed Dok beneath the shoulders and started dragging him back toward-the van. More slugs slammed into his chest and shoulders, Another moment and he'd probably be dead, laid out as limp as Dok, but then Shank was there, grabbing Dok around the chest, lifting him off the ground and shoving Rico toward the van.

  They had only one chance left. They had to dive like devil rats into the transitways before armor-piercing slugs or a wire-guided missile took them out They had to go where the helos couldn't reach them. It was up to Thorvin now.

  And it didn't get any closer than this.

  * * *

  Farrah Moffit huddled in the corner formed by the rear of the dumpster and the wall of the alley.

  Bandit hovered, sitting cross-legged, just far enough above the ground to see over the dumpster to the street. Hours had passed and that was bad. If he didn't get back to his body soon ...

  Moffit broke down again. She had a strange way of crying, like a series of violent coughs, one rolling swiftly into the next. The upset seemed genuine. Her first episode had started when he asked her what had happened to the slag called Cannibal and to the other man, the one lying dead in the lounge with Moffit. She seemed deeply disturbed. Perhaps she had led a sheltered life in her corporate towers, insulated from the realities of the plex. At least she didn't make too much noise.

  Some more time passed, then a rumbling arose, then Thorvin's van pulled into the end of the alley.

  Rico got out and looked around.

  "They're here," Bandit said.

  Farrah Moffit rose and went to the van and all but fell sobbing into Surikov's arms.

  Bandit rejoined his waiting body.

  Dok looked dead.

  38

  It didn't end till they did the final check on Surikov.

  The slag had a snitch, a microtransmitter implanted at the back of his neck, just like the other Surikov, Michael Travis, who they'd busted outta Maas Intertech. Farrah Moffit had told them to expect that. All the senior research staff at Fuchi had them, she said. She herself didn't rate high enough for that.

  Getting the snitch out took some work. Rico had some experience with emergency med, but Shank had more so he did the job. Dok's equipment did most of the actual cutting. By the time Shank was finished, Surikov was pale and faint, but Dok's gear indicated that he'd get over it.

  They lost their pursuers. They picked up Farrah Moffit, and Bandit too. A second Bandit. A Bandit that looked like a ghost. A Bandit that hovered, floated over the ground, and finally disappeared into the body of the Bandit that had been with them from the beginning. It was eerie and would have been freaky only Rico had seen things like this before.

  Astral projection, it was called.

  They headed for the bolthole in Rahway, Sector 13. It seemed called for. They were shot to piss, the rain had come and gone, and they all needed some sleep.

  One last piece of work: they called Osborne to set up the exchange of Surikov and Moffit for nuyen.

  The meet was set for that night.

  * * *

  When Rico finally lay down, it was almost noon. He seemed to fall asleep in just moments. Piper shed her clothes in the dark, then carefully lay down beside him, shifting in against his side, lowering her head lightly to his shoulder. She lay there with him throughout the afternoon, moving little, resolved to let him sleep.

  She could not, would not allow herself to sleep. These final few hours before their meet with Maas Intertech might be their last time together, intimately, as man and woman. She tried to savor every moment, tie feel of his body, his musky aroma, his warmth, the soft sound of his breath. She called to mind everything she had ever admired about him. She struggled against the tears that welled time and again into her eyes. She prayed silently to the kami for deliverance, but had no real doubt about how the night would end.

  Life provided few pleasures, and scant love. Too soon it was all over. She struggled against regret and bitter sorrow.

  She had known all along how it would end, this run, everything. Fate would not be denied. The corps had all the power. Maas Intertech, through its parent organization Kuze Nihon, had virtually unlimited resources. The complete operational forces of Daisaka Security might be waiting for them tonight when they arrived at the meet. What chance did they have against such an army? They would be crushed like worms beneath the feet of giants. She only wished she'd met Rico sooner, that she'd spent more time at his side. He was the only man she had ever really loved. There would be no life without him.

  One thought brought a fleeting token of contentment If she died tonight, she would die not for Ansell Surikov or Farrah Moffit She would die not to further the battle against the oppressive megacorps, and not to save the planet Rattier, she would die for jefe , for her lover. She would die defending all that he believed in and all he considered good. She would die for him, and for him alone.

  Nothing else seemed to have any meaning now.

  The argument started as dusk descended into darkness. Shank looked at Thorvin, and Thorvin shrugged.

  "I don't believe it either," Thorvin said.

  It began with Piper declaring, loudly, somewhere down the hall from the main room, that she would accompany the rest of the team to the meet with Maas Intertech. She could do nothing in the matrix. At the meet, she could at least carry a gun. Rico told he, curtly she wasn't going. She protested. He cursed. They both started to shout. It was the first time Shank had ever heard Piper yell.

  By nine p.m., they were standing in a room with plastic flowers, perfumed air, and quiet music at the Chapel of the Eternal Light in Sector 7. For five hundred nuyen, they got the same deal for Dok that they had gotten for Filly. Only this time, when the pre-recorded trideo service ended, nobody had anything to say. Dok had said it all himself when he ran like a wild man out onto the tarmac, shooting his SMG. It was about Filly and revenge and doing what you had to do, damn the consequences. Damn even death.

  After the service, a slag in a neat black suit came with an urn full of ashes. Rico thrust a fistful of the ashes into Surikov's pants pockets.

  "Don't ever forget," he said. "What you're getting didn't come free."

  Surikov paled, and said, "No. No, indeed."

  The meet came down in Sector 9 amid the gang-ravaged projects of Owens Park. The street was just one block long. Piles of building debris, the empty shells of gutted autos, and every kind of junk and garbage lined the street. Plastic sheeting and thin macroplast panels covered the windows of the buildings, all abandoned but for squatters and derelicts.

  Heavy clouds lingered overhead, backlit by the moon and reflecting a strange, almost unearthly light.

  Nobody seemed to be around.

  At just past midnight, a pair of white, short-frame Toyota limos turned the corner and came slowly up the block. They stopped across from the van, near the opposite curb. Rico waited and watched. Thorvin had a drone in the air, keeping everything under surveillance. Bandit was in a trance, watching astrally. No warnings from eith
er of them. Maybe Osborne was straight.

  Maybe things would work out.

  The rear door of the lead limo swung open. The slag who stepped out was nothing like the punk-like clown Osborne had brought to the first meet. This one was a real cutter, cool and corporate, easy in his movements, watchful and wary without showing more than he had to.

  Shank stepped out of the van, showing his iron. Rico followed, then moved out as far as the middle of the street. Osborne met him there. Thunder rumbled in the distance, and the air felt unusually warm and humid. "Sticks?" Rico said.

  Osborne handed him a synthleather wallet containing seven certified credsticks, which checked out on the reader on Rico's belt Rico handed the wallet back, then keyed his headset.

  The side door on the van slid open, giving Osborne a plain view of Surikov and Moffit. Piper was in the van with them. Rico hoped she had the sense to stay clear, stay under cover. She knew how meets like this worked, but he feared she wouldn't do what she should. "My tech's in the other car," Osborne said.

  Rico nodded.

  Osborne waved, and a slag in a dark blue suit came forward. After Dok's diagnostic analyzer declared the tech's DNA and retina scanner safe, Rico nodded toward the van. The tech went over to scan Surikov.

  Rico kept his eyes on Osborne and the cutter, but neither looked suspicious or like they had anything more on their minds than the careful biz of "buying product," or "recruitment."

  The clouds overhead seemed to be coming lower. A few curling tendrils of fog drifted along the street.

  No warnings from Thorvin or Bandit, though.

  The tech returned from the van. Nodded.

  Osborne motioned him back to the second limo, then looked at Rico and said, "Anytime you're ready."

  "You're satisfied the product's real."

  "As real as it gets."

  Rico keyed his headset. As Surikov and Moffit came walking out to the middle of the street, Osborne handed over the credsticks. "Thank you," Moffit said, looking at Rico.