Shadows Down Under: Shadowrun, #8

by Jean Rabe

  “Fire!” the intruder hollered. “Pigs, we got a fire!”

  His real quarry? Was that his real quarry come to this basement lair?

  More feet tromping. More people. Maybe all the singing women were coming down the stairs.

  Too many.

  The elf spun toward the stairs, and the Cross Slayer retreated into the shadows, tipping over a rack of dresses to buy him some space, then slipping behind the crates and lumbering into his secret tunnel. Knocking out a support, and then another, he collapsed the entrance.

  He hated fire. And he hurt.

  There were other tunnels and other caves.

  He had a target tonight, business, one more name to cross off his list. That name could not wait until tomorrow. He would have to circle back after he healed. It would not take long to heal. He would come back through another tunnel.

  Always the target came first.

  He hurt badly. If the elf was still at the tawdry house when he returned, he would kill her too. Kill her slowly, he thought. Slow and agonizing would be a good way. A very good way. It gave him something to look forward to.

  Wala-lang.

  Twelve

  A Dream in Flames

  In his mind’s eye, Barega saw the galah. His totem was trying to tell him something, but at the moment it only tantalized him, all gray and rosy pink, the color of the great, angry cloud. The spectral bird was sometimes like a trickster holding a sugary piece of candy just beyond the fingers of a begging child.

  Barega was used to waiting; he knew the treat would eventually come closer. The bird had led him here, after all, to the Cross, hinting at justice for his brother and that he should nurture another of his kind before his years were done. Two missions, one totem, everything tied together by a dark soul slaying people in this neighborhood. Barega had patience; he would wait on the galah.

  Sitting on the crate behind Cadigal’s Corner, he’d been listening to the sounds of the city when he had caught the galah’s oh-so-faint call. Every noise was muted here, even the parrot’s; the world kept at bay by the garishly painted walls over which the growing darkness looked like layers of ashen-hued shadows stretching to heaven. There were tiny spirits in the bricks, and he considered summoning one to speak with. That conversation would pass the time while Nininiru Tossinn searched for clues in the tawdry house.

  But the tiny spirits could be distracting and sometimes overly playful, and he needed to be alert in this alley.

  Dreary, but he could get through this. He could find peace in tedium.

  There’d been a man searching through the garbage behind the Chinese restaurant, retrieving discarded food, stuffing his hooded face with it, looking in Barega’s direction, then retreating to the other end of the alley following a stray cat. It was too murky here to make out the details, other than that the man was very large and clearly hungry. Barega had no food to offer him. There’d been an argument from an apartment above that restaurant, the deepening night doing nothing to diminish the hate-filled ranting. An irate man and woman volleyed unkind words back and forth, neither winning, the volume rising; they stopped when a baby started wailing.

  The air was foul here, tinged with pollution the often-rains couldn’t obliterate. The alley was worse than the streets, as it smelled of trash and urine and shattered hopes, everything close like a damp, clinging garment. He would rather be elsewhere, but more pleasant surroundings would not bring justice for his brother, and so would not mollify Barega’s soul and satisfy the galah. The killings happened in alleys, and so Barega would help Nininiru by keeping watch.

  The gun in his lap did not feel as heavy as he’d expected—no doubt because of the materials and craftsmanship. Barega knew little about weapons, but he guessed it was quite valuable, and that Nininiru Tossinn had honored him by entrusting it into his care.

  His fingers played across its smooth surface. The gun somehow felt as if it was more than just the sum its parts, beyond the metal and plastic and whatever circuits some keen-minded weaponsmith had added to it. The gun felt like it had a presence.

  Barega pushed a small button and a bright flashlight beam shone forth, stretching to the back door of Cadigal’s Corner. He marveled at that and experimented gripping the stock and sweeping the barrel from left to right, illuminating the rear entrances to the buildings. There was a streetlight at the opposite end of the alley, but its light didn’t reach far enough to be of any use, and the light that spilled from the hate-filled apartment above was diffused through a set of limp curtains. The gun’s beam was therefore helpful to his old eyes. What else could this weapon do?

  He let the light play across the graffiti, strange and colorful, some of the images beautiful, and others hurtful. Barega noted several ЯɌs, and knew from the news and his previous forays into the city that the symbol served as the signature of prejudiced, ill-thinking folks. There were more of the symbols now than in the previous years he had visited Sydney. Those prejudiced fools would not have tolerated his brother, perhaps were indeed responsible for Adoni’s death.

  Barega had come into the Cross nine summers ago, searching for Adoni, an effort to renew brotherly ties and deliver the news that their sister had died. That year, the galah had led him to another tawdry house, the Forum, where Adoni had performed a song composed by Harriet Abrams a hundred years before the Commonwealth of Australia was founded:

  “The frozen streets in moonshine glitter,

  The midnight hour has long been past,

  Ah me, the wind blows keen and bitter,

  I sink beneath the piercing blast

  In every vein seems life to languish,

  Their weight my limbs no more can bear,

  But no one soothes the orphan’s anguish,

  And no one heeds the orphan’s prayer.”

  Barega had sat in the back row, watching with wide eyes, hardly recognizing the beauty Adoni had become, drinking in her mournful song that filled the auditorium.

  The young woman who should be an aging man.

  Adoni had gone by Gin-Anne Tonic then.

  Barega knew there were many things in this world that altered the human condition—bioware, cyberware, drugs, magic. And though he was curious what Adoni had done to himself to reverse the years, Barega did not speak of it when they met, instead relaying the sad news of their sister. Adoni said he would not return to the Outback for the funeral ceremony, that his life was here now.

  “Do you still swim through the Great Ghost Dance?” Adoni had asked. “Do you dance with our ancestors? Have you danced with our dead sister?” He laughed lightly, but it lacked humor. “Dancing has added wrinkles to your skin, Barega. It looks like bark. Dancing has smoothed mine. It seems, you and I, we live in reverse.”

  They were in a large dressing room full of lights, mirrors, padded stools, and racks of gaudy clothes. Feather boas hung from hooks, every color in the world’s paint box on display. Sequins and rhinestones glittered like false stars, the air was thick with sickly sweet perfume, and Barega had trouble absorbing it all. Adoni sat on a stool and rubbed at his makeup.

  “I should get something permanent,” he had said. “Makeup tattoos. They’re not expensive. But then I’d be stuck with my face, wouldn’t I? It would be easier, though.” He’d looked at Barega and displayed a wistful, crooked smile. “Easier isn’t always the best, isn’t that what you’d told me after one of your many walkabouts? The more difficult the climb, the more beautiful the view, isn’t that what you’d said? I think I rather like putting all this old fashioned goop on and off. I am my own beautiful view.” Adoni plucked off his wig and put it on a stand on the counter, ran his fingers through his short, curly dark hair. He took off his shiny dress and wiggled into pants and a T-shirt, still looking impossibly young, his face free of blemishes, all smooth and even-toned like his voice.

  Barega had wanted to ask Adoni about it—why he’d done things to his body, maybe why he’d done things to his soul. The galah had circled higher in his mind, sugges
ting he leave that conversation for another time. They went out to dinner at an all-night spring rolls restaurant and just enjoyed each other’s company for a time.

  “Do you still go walkabout, brother?” Adoni had asked.

  Barega nodded. “And I still dream. I still feel the Rainbow Serpent’s anger manifested in the clouds. I still run with the rain.”

  “There is a lot of rain in Sydney,” Adoni had replied. “Give my best to whatever remains of our family, brother.” Adoni had finished his meal, grabbed his satchel, and headed out the door, looking back over his shoulder and waving. “And thank you for bringing me the sad news. I would like you to come visit me again someday.”

  They’d never spoken again.

  Barega blinked the past away. Looking at the graffiti, made more interesting in the flashlight beam shining through the soft rain, Barega wished he would have talked longer with his brother. The tears he shed now for Adoni and that missed opportunity were lost in the summer shower, the memory bitter and thick on his tongue.

  He continued panning the light around as the rain started coming down harder, clicking like the taps on a dancer’s shoes. He wondered what Nininiru Tossinn was discovering inside Cadigal’s Corner. Perhaps he should have gone with her and looked inside the place where his brother apparently thrived, not been so resolute that splitting their forces would be the better course. It would have been a drier plan. Fortunately, this was a warm summer.

  He’d seen the placard on the side of the building, a framed one showing Miss Ella Gance in a beaded gown that was all the shades of an Outback sunset. His brother looked happy in the image, yet haunted; looked the same—as perfect—as when Barega had come into the city nine summers ago. Perhaps appeared even younger. Yes, younger.

  The galah cried louder in Barega’s mystic mind, rousing him. He pushed aside the muted sounds of the city and the steady rain and listened to the ephemeral bird. The shrill cry sounded again, and he felt the bird flying above the alley, circling, dropping lower and holding out that treat-of-a-message. Still beyond Barega’s reach, but seductively closer. The bird banked, the rain passing right through it as it flew out of the alley and around the corner of Cadigal’s building.

  Follow me, its wings whispered.

  Barega eased himself off the crate, gave a last look at the back doors in the alley, and then thumbed off the gun’s flashlight. He stuffed the valuable weapon into a deep pocket in his pants and sloshed through the puddles. Nininiru Tossinn was a detective, and so should be able to find him.

  Follow me, came the bird’s whisper. Follow—

  Then the galah’s song was lost in the cacophony of sirens, and Barega’s vision was filled with neon patterns reflected in the puddles on the sidewalk, electric rainbow snakes writhing in the storm.

  Thirteen

  Wala-lang with a Side of Ekkert

  Ninn’s arms throbbed where the Cross Killer had stabbed her. Might need a doc, she thought. Might not be able to shake this off.

  She started recording with her thermographic eye, cursing herself for not doing it right away. But she’d been caught way the hell off guard, and for want of a slip hadn’t been wholly thinking straight.

  Charging after the hulking figure, her feet got tangled in the dresses on a rack the Slayer tipped over. She saw him lunge behind a stack of crates, and just as she freed herself, she heard something rumbling. Should get out of here, she thought, the place is on fire.

  “I fraggin’ hate fire,” she said. “Go. Go. Go. I fraggin’ hate—oh, hell.” Her left arm stopped hurting and went numb. And useless. She couldn’t move it, couldn’t make a fist; it was a dead thing hanging from her shoulder.

  Smoke billowed from burning cardboard boxes, forcing her to hold her breath. She couldn’t see a fragging thing beyond the edge of the crates, her one real eye watering like a faucet, and her bioware and cyberware not helping much; she lacked the correct compensators—something else to put on her shopping list. She stumbled forward anyway, stretching her working arm out, feeling beyond the crates and finding a mound of dirt and rocks where a hole in the wall must have been. She hurled a string of curses that was drowned out by Hurdy Gertie yelling “Fire! Fire!”

  “No drek there’s a fire.” Ninn hated fire, hated hated hated it. But this was a small fire, right? All smoke and no substance, and the sprinklers should kick on anytime now and douse it. Her prize was too near to quit. Couldn’t use her thermographic for sure, even with the flare compensator it would mess her up.

  Forget the fire, she told herself. Focus! Ninn furiously dug at the rocks with one hand. It was the Cross Slayer she’d fought, had to be, heater, slashing, trying to kill her right here in the basement of Cadi’s tawdry house. He’d caught her off guard and so got the upper hand, was abnormally strong, even given his size, and he could have geeked her if he hadn’t tried toying with her first. Clearly, he’d been playing with her. Had he played with all his victims?

  Forget the fire. But she could tell it was getting bigger, threatening to swallow the contents of the basement—and her for good measure. It had saved Ninn from the Slayer, had forced him to retreat, but if the sprinklers didn’t kick on soon, she’d have to retreat, too.

  Where’s the fraggin’ sprinklers? She should get the hell out of here, before the smoke could take her down. Fire. Dear God, she hated fire. Still she dug at the rocks, gaining only inches and realizing that bravery and foolishness were first cousins. Finally taking in a much-needed breath, Ninn instead sucked in a lungful of hot smoke that only made things worse. She didn’t have the tools for digging, nor any such useful cybernetic attachments in her fingers to help, and her right arm still burned from where he’d cut her. What the hell had that knife done to her left arm?

  She held her breath again and somehow managed to work faster. But for every handful of dirt and gravel she pulled out, more replaced it, filtering down to take its place. Milton wrote: “Death is the golden key that opens the palace of eternity.” She’d be waltzing into that palace in the next few minutes if she kept this up.

  Dizzy. From the smoke, dust, the throbbing pain in her one good arm and shoulder. Light-headed, despite her adrenal booster. C’mon, dig faster, you drekking dandelion eater! Go after the sonofabitch!

  “We’re on the move, Keebs!” This came from inside her head, Mordred talking to her. “The geezer is leaving his post and going somewhere. On the Road, 2012, Viggo Mortensen as Old Bull Lee. Can’t tell where we’re going. I’m riding in his pocket. In My Pocket, 2011, David Lisle Johnson director, drug addiction spiral. I don’t think you’d like that particular movie. Too close to home.”

  “No!” She couldn’t lose her gun! One of a kind, valuable, her companion! Irreplaceable! Idiot to have left it with the Aborigine. A stranger! What the hell had she been thinking? That was the problem, she hadn’t been thinking at all. And if Barega moved too far away, the smartlink would cut out. The Cross Slayer or Mordred! The Cross Slayer or—

  So dizzy!

  Fiery hot!

  “Moses on a pogo stick!” Her longcoat had caught fire, and she shrugged out of it. That’d been rather costly and had great pockets for concealing her weapons.

  More rumbling, farther away but significant enough to send a tremor through the floor of Cadi’s basement. Whatever route the Slayer had used to get here, he was probably collapsing all of it, and that made the decision for her. Ninn turned, woozy, tried to retrace her steps, bumping into another rack of clothes and knocking it over, the smoke everywhere, fire crackling. Tripping and struggling back on her feet.

  Where were the fraggin’ sprinklers?

  There was a WHOOSH! WHOOSH! And some of the smoke dissipated. WHOOSH!

  Hurdy Gertie manned a honking big fire extinguisher that whooshed white powder in an arc and cut the flames. Behind her were two performers Ninn had not seen before, their tall, wide hats taking up the stairwell, one manning a fire extinguisher too, the other simply panicking. Within a few heartbeats, they’d knock
ed the fire down to small, manageable hotspots.

  “Did you do this?” Gertie glared at Ninn as she whooshed with the extinguisher. “Did you set this fire?”

  Ninn coughed and shook her head, bent, and felt like she was hacking up a lung.

  “She’s hurtin’, mate!” This came from one of the hat girls. “All cut up, she is. Look at her.”

  “You’re gettin’ it, Gert,” said the one with the other extinguisher. “Fire’s almost out. Over there. Get that little bit over there, and I’ll get this. Ain’t big enough to call a truck over. It was mostly smoke, all noise and no worries. I think we’re gettin’ it all. Fire department would probably let a place like ours burn anyway.”

  Gertie continued to whoosh with the extinguisher to make sure, whooshed until it was empty. “Let’s get some water on this, just to be sure,” she told the tallest girl behind her. There’s a hose under the sink in the dressing room. Long enough to reach. Water ain’t going to ruin what’s already ruined. Pigs, what a mess you caused.”

  “I didn’t start it,” Ninn gasped, finally getting some air into her lungs. “The fire. I would never start a fire, you drekhead. The Cross Slayer started it. A heater. He sparked it with his knife, and—”

  “Pigs!” Gertie dropped the spent extinguisher, the fire out but the thinning smoke still filling the empty spaces. “Pigs, he did! Pigs, the Cross Slayer was—”

  “Pigs yourself. He was here. Maybe he was looking to geek you this time.” Ninn brushed past her and squeezed by the other two. “I gotta talk to Cadi. Keep blathering, Mordred. I’ll find you.” Then: “Cadi! Cad—”