by Mel Odom
A fourth micro-fissure blasted open, spraying into Hawke’s face and ripping at his cheek. His chem suite worked to sweep away the pain as he jerked his head back, getting out of the jet’s path. A pool of salt water was collecting in the bottom of the ATV.
Not understanding why she wasn’t responding, Hawke turned to face her. Just as he started to speak, he noticed the outline of the big submersible ahead of them. He guessed the underwater craft was close to a hundred meters long and at least twenty meters wide and fifteen meters deep according to the signature ping.
Hawke also knew Flicker had to see the thing, but she was headed straight for it anyway. With no way to stop it, he braced himself for the collision, knowing the micro-fissures were about to get a lot bigger.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The luxury of being a rigger was that when jacked into a vehicle, Flicker could see everything. Well, nearly everything. And what she couldn’t see with her cams and drones, she could “sense” with her detection software suites.
But she could see Hawke’s look of disbelief easily inside the ATV. He was drenched by the incoming seawater, one cheek bleeding from a pressure cut.
“Chill, omae,” Flicker told him over their private commlink. “We’ll be safe here.”
“If we don’t get fragged when we hit it.”
“We’re not going to hit it.” Flicker feathered the controls, cutting the propellers for a moment and swinging them around to blast forward and slow them. The seat restraints cut into their bodies. Then she switched to the encrypted frequency used by the big submersible.
“Attention, Scorpionfish, this is Mantis. Do you copy?” She spoke in Spanish more as a courtesy. Every crewman aboard Scorpionfish could speak English like a native.
“Hola, Mantis.”
Flicker smiled at the cheerful camaraderie in Joaquin’s voice. They’d shared some good times over the years. Splitting profits on lucrative runs and dodging heat waves together when Lone Star got serious about enforcing the laws made for deep friendships. Working with him was a nice change of pace every now and again, but they were too much the same to be together long. Too much overlap of skill sets, too much in the way of strong personalities, and Joaquin was too enmeshed in the Ghost Cartel drug biz. To Flicker’s way of looking at it, her friend had developed a wageslave mentality to the Camargo Cartel.
“Ah, Flicker, you didn’t mention you might be bringing Azzie helos when you visited.” His tone was mocking, totally self-confident, another trait that kept a working relationship from any kind of permanence.
She liked meeting with him occasionally, for biz or personal entertainment, just to see what toys he was playing with. The submersible was his pride and joy, though, and he’d developed tunnel vision regarding any other vehicle. Flicker appreciated a broader spectrum.
The exfil through Scorpionfish had been set up only as a fallback option. Flicker hadn’t mentioned the submersible to Hawke because she knew he didn’t like working in deep water.
“I’d planned to be rid of them by now,” Flicker replied, “but you know how these things go.”
“Of course, but this will go beyond the bounds of friendship. Staying in the shadows is our way. This, little one, will put our operation on the map for a time. The Azzies will seek retaliation.”
“You have my apologies.”
“I’ll have your cred to pocket as well. And you’ll owe me a favor in the future.”
That was the part Flicker dreaded. Cred was cred. That could always be found lying around in one corp’s coffers or another. But doing a favor for someone like Joaquin, who was quite capable as a runner—and very well equipped—could get someone slotted up bad.
“We hadn’t talked about a favor.”
“We’re talking about it now.”
A trio of depth charges exploded and buffeted the ATV into the submersible.
“And I don’t think you have any other offers open, hmmm?” Joaquin did enjoy having the upper hand during a negotiation.
“Agreed. A favor to be named later.” Flicker knew she’d probably regret the bargain, but hoped she’d at least live through it.
“Thank you.”
Flicker tracked Scorpionfish’s subtle movements as the big boat decloaked and shifted to go into combat mode. Shields pulled back on her bow and topside to flood the firing tubes. For the moment, the Azzie troops didn’t know what lurked in the ocean beneath them because the spoofing software rewrote her signature.
“Are you coming aboard?” Joaquin asked. He sounded distracted now and she knew he was running the boat, controlling her every move.
“If you can receive us. I have some repairs I need to make.”
“Of course. You know the way.”
As Flicker descended into the ocean and maneuvered under the bigger vessel, she tracked the salvo of underwater missiles as they jetted through the ocean for fifty meters, then turned toward the surface.
In the final seconds of their lives, the Azzie helo pilots knew they’d been fired upon. They jettisoned chaff to draw off heatseekers and tried to cut away, but too late. Locked on, Joaquin’s missiles caught the Azzies and exploded, reducing the helos to flaming debris that plummeted into the Pacific.
Hawke stared at the image relayed by one of the drones, gazing at the destruction in wonder.
“Believe it or not, Hawke,” Flicker said, “you’re not the only friend I have.” She said that partly out of anger at herself for being forced into the deal with Joaquin. When the drek hit the fan, she knew Hawke would stand with her no matter how deep a problem got. That was something she didn’t think Joaquin would do when push came to shove.
She deftly piloted the ATV through the open hatch at the bottom of the submersible and into Scorpionfish’s flooded cargo section amidships. Bright lights marked the boundaries of the hatch. The ATV squeezed through with millimeters to spare.
The hatch slid closed beneath them, and pumps cycled the water out of the cargo compartment in seconds, leaving them high and dry.
Soaked through, amazed to be alive, and not liking the fact that the larger submersible felt like a giant trap, Hawke undogged the ATV’s hatch and pushed himself out of the vehicle. His wired reflexes came online as he peered around, wondering what Flicker had piloted them into.
Bright lights filled the compartment. Other than the twenty heavily armed guards ringing the ATV on catwalks, nothing much was in the cargo area. Hawke resisted the impulse to lift his hands in surrender.
“Hoi,” he called out.
None of the sailors responded, and they seemed like an efficient lot.
Flicker started up after him. He reached down and took her hand, easily pulling her up through the hatch.
“You sure you have friends here?” Hawke whispered in her ear.
“Of course.” She stepped past him and looked around.
“Flicker, hola!” The greeting came from a man on the catwalk who looked to be in his early thirties. Like Flicker, he was heavily cybered for rigging. Implanted tech covered one side of his face. He was handsome and swarthy, wearing a neatly trimmed mustache with fierce sideburns and long hair. A gunmetal gray uniform sheathed his lean body, and a flechette pistol nestled in a shoulder holster. He held out a bottle of wine. “Welcome again to my boat. Rest assured that aboard Scorpionfish, you are among friends.”
Hawke suspected that last bit was directed at him.
“Hola, Joaquin!” Flicker beamed at the man. “Thank you for the assist.”
“But of course.” Joaquin waved her up with the wine bottle. “Come. Come, and bring your friends, yes? Cook has laid out a light repast from the galley. I thought you might be hungry after your ordeal. And I happen to be in possession of some very fine wine.”
“What do you know about our ordeal?” Flicker asked as she stepped down. Hawke got Rachel and the professor from the ATV and herded them after Flicker.
The young woman still managed to glare her displeasure at Hawke, but he noticed she
looked worn out, too. “Is this who you were hired by?” A trace of worry gleamed in her eyes. “The person that wanted us kidnapped?”
“No,” he said. “Keep moving.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Every shadowrunner had a history. At least, every shadowrunner still alive had a history. The dead ones got forgotten pretty quickly—unless they’d died spectacular deaths, or were made an example of by the corps. The past events of living shadowrunners didn’t often get shared with anyone else. Not even partners.
As a result, Hawke felt uncomfortable meeting Joaquin, because Flicker had never mentioned the man. He felt even more uncomfortable meeting Joaquin over a meal at the captain’s table, like they were on a vacation cruise. Especially right after a run that had gone so ragged, and had so many questionable areas and missing information.
Hawke glanced at Rachel Gordon seated to his right, knowing she was one of the biggest questions he had at the moment. That artifact she carried remained in the canvas bag slung over one shoulder, and even out of sight it was still on his mind. He hadn’t run across many powerful magical items in his career. In fact, he made it a point to steer clear of such things. To him, magic was an unknowable thing, and people that played with it were pressing their luck. He had friends who swore by it, but he never dealt with it if he didn’t have to.
The captain’s table occupied a room off Joaquin’s personal quarters, and was comfortable without being lavish. The table was real wood, some hardwood from the rainforest, and was bolted to the floor. Vases held cut flowers—the real things, not holos—which indicated the submersible might have a hydroponics lab. If that was so, the flowers—big and bold and filled with bright color—were a showy extravagance.
Around them, trideos broadcast images of ocean bottoms and marine creatures. Many of the images were beautiful seascapes that looked alien compared to the surface world. Other images detailed ancient shipwrecks scattered across the sea floor, and primitive monsters that Hawke wasn’t sure truly existed. Soft calypso music underscored it all.
Hawke suspected the meal wasn’t so much a dinner as a seduction. The food consisted of Caribbean dishes; fish with coconut-shallot sauce, broiled ginger-lime chicken, rice and beans flavored with chilis, garlic, and cinnamon. Dessert was Bananas Foster.
Their destination was somewhere in Amazonia. Captain Joaquin was being cagey about that. Hawke would have to figure out how they were getting back to the Pueblo Corporate Council. The contract called for the delivery of Rachel Gordon to Mr. Johnson in Santa Fe within a few days.
All during the meal, Flicker talked with Joaquin. They laughed and joked easily, like old friends, but after finishing their excellent meal, the submersible captain asked the steward for a bottle of brandy. Drinks were poured, and they settled down to business.
“It is my understanding that Aztechnology is searching for you with extreme dedication.” Joaquin swirled the amber liquid around in his glass.
“They don’t know who to search for,” Hawke countered before Flicker could reply. He was tired of playing the fly on the wall while the captain trotted out his dog and pony show.
“They do not know to search for you, my new friend.” Joaquin nodded. “Nor do they know of my good friend Flicker.” He gestured with his glass to Rachel and the professor. “But I fear Aztechnology knows very much about these two people. In fact, in the screamsheets they are now outlaws, guilty of absconding with national Aztlan treasures, if one were to believe the tales they tell. Theft of important properties, I fear, is frowned upon greatly in these southern lands. Our history is precious to us, and we have grown tired of people from your country and Europe coming down and taking whatever they want. Such thievery has been practiced for hundreds of years. We are, these days, intolerant of such things.”
“We’re not thieves,” Rachel objected, showing life for the first time since coming aboard. “We were there on a dig sponsored by NeoNET. Whatever we discovered was going to be turned over to the Guatemalan National Archives. We have contracts to that effect.”
“Perhaps this is so, and perhaps if things had gone differently, it would have been.” Joaquin pointed away from the table. “Or it may be that, according to someone else’s plans, you would be dead now. But at the moment, you are certainly being presented as thieves.”
The room trideos cleared, pulsed, then returned with images from one of the top newsfeeds owned by Aztechnology. Professor Madison Fredericks and Rachel Gordon were on prominent display. The professor stood speaking in front of a class, and in another video loop, the young woman walked beside her mentor across the college grounds.
Hawke suspected the vids had been tweaked from the originals because both the professor and Rachel looked somewhat nefarious. A pro could have changed body posture and the lighting easily in time to make the media deadlines.
“—learned today of the thefts of Guatemalan artifacts by two foreign thieves,” a beautiful reporter announced as she walked among the craters at the dig site. Bloody sheets lay over some of the dead workers strewn over the broken terrain. “Three of Professor Fredericks’ students were taken into custody at the scene, but the search continues for fugitive Professor Madison Fredericks and another student, Rachel Gordon.”
Hawke couldn’t tell if the woman was actually on location, or if computer imaging was being used to put her there. News hadn’t been exactly true for a long time.
“As we’ve discovered,” the reporter continued, walking through the narrow valley between a dead man’s two halves, “Professor Fredericks has been suspected of other thievery on digs around the world.”
“Lies!” The professor looked apoplectic, his face a deep shade of crimson. He trembled in his seat as he pointed a finger at the reporter. “This story is not true! Why would anyone do this?”
No one voiced an answer for that. The accusations could be true, or they were trumped up charges. Either way, it didn’t matter. Whoever was behind the smear campaign was using everything they had to paint the professor as a criminal.
“Most residents in Santa Fe don’t know Professor Fredericks very well,” the reporter said. “All they know is that he teaches in the archeology department at the University of Santa Fe, part of the Pueblo Corporate Council, where he had a fairly unremarkable career until the thefts in Guatemala earlier today.”
“‘An unremarkable career?’ I am considered among the top in my field!” Fredericks looked more pained by that accusation than he did of the one naming him a thief. “They simply haven’t talked to the right people!”
On the trideo, the reporter stepped down into a crater. The cam followed her so easily that Hawke knew it was a drone, not carried by an operator.
“At this dig site,” she said as she squatted by the large cover Hawke had seen near the hole Rachel and her mentor had gone into, “Professor Fredericks raised an army to kill the laborers working for him, then turned their sights on the Aztechnology protective service units above them. Although we don’t know the names of everyone who died, we know that several Aztechnology security guards were killed today.”
The camera swept over the bodies that covered the ground.
“Why is this being said?” The professor quivered in barely-suppressed rage. “I’ve never stolen anything. There have been objects of questionable provenance that I have taken on occasion, but never stolen. I merely held them until the proper owners could be located.”
Hawke couldn’t help wondering about how “proper” the owners the professor had found had been. Provenance could be changed readily enough. Hawke had been involved in some of that himself over the years.
“Professor Fredericks is a local resident. He grew up in Santa Fe, but he’s traveled the world, no doubt in search of more relics to plunder.” The camera zoomed in on the reporter, and an image of Rachel appeared beside her face. “Not so much is known about Rachel Gordon, a master’s candidate assigned to Professor Fredericks. According to public records, Ms. Gordon is a student at
the University of Santa Fe, studying under the professor. Before that, she was a ward of the state, an orphan, until she aged out of the system. Prior to her academic career, Ms. Gordon was arrested twice. Once for receivership and trafficking in stolen goods, and once for burglary.”
If Professor Fredericks had appeared discomfited by the charges against him, Rachel Gordon looked absolutely mortified. For a moment, Hawke felt sorry for the young woman. Then he closed that feeling down and put it away. Emotions like that clouded his mind, and didn’t belong in the biz at hand.
Who Rachel Gordon was, what she had been, was nothing to him. She was just a contract he planned to cash in. Nothing more. But he also recognized a shower of drek when he saw one.
Evidently Joaquin could, too. The submersible captain waved a hand, and the trideos shut down. “Well,” he said with forced congeniality, “that is enough of that.”
“I didn’t know that deck was stolen,” Rachel said in a small voice. “That’s what she was talking about. It was a used deck I bought from a friend of a friend. I needed one for school. I thought I was just getting a good price for it. And the burglary charge was bogus. I was just attempting to get some of my things back from a guy I’d been . . . involved with.”
“Dear girl,” Joaquin said soothingly, “you don’t have to explain yourself to anyone at this table. I run contraband into the California Free State, the Salish-Shidhe, and Seattle. Flicker and Hawke stole you away from that dig to ransom you to a contact they know solely as Mr. Johnson. No matter if you did do those things, you’re a better person than everyone seated here.”
For a moment, Professor Fredericks looked like he was going to object, then decided against it, and slumped in his chair with his arms folded over his chest. He didn’t look defeated, but instead had decided not to buy into the fight.
Although he also didn’t care for the way Joaquin put it, Hawke knew the captain’s words were true. Rachel Gordon was very probably the only innocent one at the table.
