Find Your Own Truth

by Robert N. Charrette

  The tale was told soon enough. Respecting Cat’s professional privacy, Dodger forbore to ask after the method by which the meeting was witnessed. Of real data there was little. But Cat’s mention of Renraku in connection with the AI gave his story a veracity that would be difficult for a runner, especially a non-decker like Cat, to fake. Dodger wanted to believe. The mention of the disappearing files buzzed his head. It fit with his own experiences, especially with his encounter in the the druids’ system.

  “So you see." Cat concluded, “I think this Sato suit has got it all wrong. I think the renegade nicked the AI and is using it against them. That’s what you wanted, isn’t it? You wanted to know who had the AI.”

  Dodger rubbed at the triple row of jacks on his left temple. “And who is this renegade?”

  Cat hesitated.

  “Come now, Sir Feline. You need not fish for more reward.”

  Frowning, Cat quietly said, “I don’t remember.”

  “Ah, you speak an unpleasant truth. Perhaps you are trustworthy after all.” Relief, and gnawing terror, flooded Dodger. Cat’s response put the runner’s tale beyond the bounds of artful contrivance. Cat had told the truth as he knew it. Only he knew so very little. And so very much. “Your price is paid. Have you sold this tale to another?”

  Cat looked as though the idea had never occurred to him, and shook his head. Young in the shadow games, Dodger thought.

  “If no further word of your tale is whispered in the shadows, I will see that your account grows fatter.” Cat’s expression changed to disgust. “I have made my sale. What do you take me for?”

  A youngster. “An honest thief?”

  Cat grinned.

  “Very well, then. Say rather that I shall reward further enlightenment. Is that acceptable to an honest thief, Sir Feline?”

  “I think we can do business, elf.” Cat winked at him and popped out of virtual existence.

  Dodger remained, contemplating what he had learned. Then he left, too, slipping unnoticed out of the virtual reality of the Magick Matrix. He was in no mood to chat with the doorman.

  8

  This place was desolate, almost completely devoid of life. Sam’s astral senses could perceive the pale glow from the lichens and mosses that carpeted the cold ground, but he caught only fleeting glimpses of more complicated life forms. There was no sign of man or his works. It was still cold this far north, but even in the brief summer this near-arctic region would remain mostly uninhabited, for it offered no water.

  He hovered at the edge of a zone that seemed more barren yet. Distantly he perceived a faint spark. A familiar spark. He flew toward it.

  No time seemed to pass before he stood next to the mound of white fur that was the source of the lifeglow he had seen from afar. He did not need to see the broad, dark-skinned face surrounded by its mane of fur, the taloned hands, the fanged mouth, or the deep-set red eyes to know this being as a wendigo. He had learned to recognize the tints of aura that proclaimed the wendigo for what it was. The aura was fainter than when he had last seen it, weaker. By the aural shadings that were individual to this wendigo, he knew it was the one he sought, “Janice.”

  The huddled form made no move, gave no sign of recognition. For a moment, he was puzzled. Her aura was not so weak that she would be unable to respond. He had feared arriving too late. One way or the other. But her aura allayed those fears. She was still alive, and she showed only a hint of the moldy grayness he had seen in other wendigo auras. So why did she not respond? The silent treatment was not her style. Finally, he remembered. He was astrally projecting. His words and image were unknowable on the mundane plane. He twisted his perception as Hart had taught him and manifested an image that, though ghostly and faint, could be seen by ordinary eyes.

  “Janice." he called again, confident that his voice could now be heard.

  The furred mound shifted, enlarging as massive muscles bunched to arch her back. A dark paw whose toes ended in glossy talons appeared briefly before the motion settled once more into stillness.

  “Janice.”

  The mound shifted again and a dark patch appeared, her face. An eye opened, a sullen ember in a deep pit. “I heard you the first time.”

  The deep pitch of the words startled him. Subconsciously, he had been expecting the voice of the sister he remembered, not the cavernous tones of her changed voice. While the tonality was different, the intonation and grouchy irritability were familiar from long-ago school mornings. Janice had never liked waking up.

  Her next words were a growl. “Who's the fool who disturbs me?”

  “It’s me, Janice. Sam. Your brother.”

  The ember winked out and the dark face disappeared back under a furred arm. “Go away. I have no brother.”

  “I won’t go away. We’re family, Janice. Don’t shut me out.”

  The face reappeared, both red eyes visible now. “I have no family. You saw to that. Remember?”

  At first he thought she was blaming him for their being orphans. They had been just kids at the time. His own recollections were vague and blurred by halfremembered pain and anguish. She, being younger, could hardly have clearer memories. The accusation didn’t make sense. She couldn’t really believe that he had anything to do with the riots. Did she blame him, and herself as well, for surviving when their parents and older siblings had died? Her Renraku psych profile hadn’t indicated that kind of grief displacement. What did she mean? “I’m your family, Janice.”

  “There’s no more Janice. She’s kawaruhito, a changeling no more a part of anybody’s family than of polite society. What’s left found someone to care about her. Someone who didn’t run away and hide when he knew what she had become. But that someone is dead now. Remember?”

  “Whatever face Hyde-White showed ...”

  “Dan Shiroi!” she shouted, erupting explosively from her huddle to tower over him.

  Sam looked up into the dark face that twisted with emotion. She still clung to her vision of that wendigo as a protector. As long as she did, his influence over her remained. “Whatever face he showed you, he was evil. He was a killer who sought to enlist others in his villainy. However kindly he seemed to you, he was consumed by his wendigo nature. He was a liar and a deceiver. You know that what I say is true.”

  “You killed him." she said flatly “I swore once that I would never take an innocent life. And I don't think that I’ve broken that oath. He was no innocent; he was a murderer, and he would have made you over in his own image. Killing him was the only way to end the threat he posed to you and many true innocents. It was the only way to free you from his influence.”

  “I didn’t want to be free. Dan ioved rne.”

  Sam remembered the scene in Hyde-White’s retreat where the wendigo that Janice knew as Dan Shiroi had come back from the brink of death, or perhaps from beyond, to keep her from attacking Sam and Hart as they lay wounded and helpless. “That may be so, but only at the end was he worthy of your love. As a wendigo, he understood the danger to your soul. But it wasn’t a wendigo that saved you. It was too late for him, but he knew that you should not be like him. He gave you a chance to change things.

  “You say he loved you. I love you, too I want to see you saved from this wendigo curse, and I’ve come to tell you there’s hope. 1 think we’ve found a way to change you back. We’ve built a ritual to save you, but you must come to Mount Rainier.”

  “Save me?” Her lip lifted to reveal yellowed tusks, but Sam couldn’t tell if it was a sneer or a snarl. “It’s too late. Where were you when they sent me to Yomi?”

  “I didn’t find out you were going through kawaru until it was too late. Then they wouldn’t let me see you. I tried everything to find you.”

  “But you didn’t succeed, did you? Not until you could take away everything that meant anything to me.

  “I did what had to be done.”

  She turned her face away. For minutes she was quiet. Then, she said, “I’m staying here.”

&n
bsp; Sam was appalled. “Staying here? What have you got here? I’m offering you a way to get your life back.” He reached out to take her by the shoulders and shake some sense into her, but his hands couldn’t grip her. She turned at his ethereal touch and glared at him.

  “You can’t be serious. Nothing could ever be the same. Your precious little sister Janice Verner is dead. She died before you left your cozy corporate cocoon at Raku. She was replaced by ASN1778, who went to Yomi and got a new life, but even that non-person is dead. Abandoned, like the one who had gone before. Why would I want either of those lives back? I had happiness and you took it away.”

  “You weren’t happy. You were enthralled by the wendigo’s false promises.”

  “How could you begin to know what I had?”

  “I know the sister I grew up with. I know the parents who raised her. I know what they taught us, and what they would think of anyone who succumbed to the wendigo nature. And because I know all that, I know what you must think of what has happened to you. You can’t give in, Janice. Don’t let despair win. There’s hope.”

  “I don’t want hope. All I want now is peace.”

  “You can’t have it as a wendigo.”

  She took a deep breath and let it out slowly with a rumble that was half growl and half moan. Her eyes left his face and traveled along the distant horizon. “There is peace here.”

  Sam looked around. Astrally, he could feel the emotions of the place. The air was filled with despair, hopelessness, sorrow, spite, and hate. There was not a trace that he could identify as peaceful.

  “You’re wrong, Janice. There’s nothing for you here.”

  “No, you’re wrong There is safety here. This was Dan’s place, his refuge in the lean days when the magic wasn’t strong enough to let him walk among you norms. The hunger is weak here. In the quiet its absence creates, I can sleep the dreamless sleep. As I was doing until you disturbed me. You should be happy that I’m here. As long as I stay in this place, you and all your kind are safe from me.”

  Sam suddenly understood why she refused to leave. “You’re afraid.”

  She growled, but there was no spirit in the sound. He saw his opening, a way to persuade her to do what must be done.

  “What is your totem, Janice? Mouse?”

  “I have no totem.”

  “That’s a lie. Your change into a wendigo has awakened power in you. I can see it I’ve learned enough about wendigos to know that their power molds most easily to the shamanic mode. For all his warped vision, your Shiroi was a shaman I know he taught you because I’ve seen your magic. You can’t do that magic without a totem.”

  She growled again, a warning sound. “Leave Dan out of it.”

  “What’s your totem?” Sam insisted At last she said, “Wolf."

  “Wolf?” He hoped his voice did not sound falsely incredulous. “Wolf isn’t a coward’s totem. Are you sure you don’t focus through Ostrich? That would be more suitable for someone who ignores what’s going on around her. You’re a disgrace to the Wolf nature.”

  “Wolf understands." she said sulkily.

  “Wolf must be appalled at your lack of strength.”

  The growling returned, stronger than before. “If you don’t want to feel my strength, leave.”

  “Not without you.”

  She glared at him, still growling. Her eyes radiated heat but Sam felt chilled, like a mouse under a hawk’s stare. Had she gone so far? Had he pushed her too far? Was he no more than meat to her now?

  She shifted suddenly and he took a defensive step backward, having forgotten that his astral body was impervious to physical harm.

  The growling stopped and she laughed, the sound brittle and without humor. “Are you going to take responsibility for me?”

  He sensed that this was the turning point. His answer would decide her. Could he take responsibility for what she might do? Hadn’t he already? There was only one answer he could give.

  “I will.”

  “That’s the fool I once had as a brother. Haven’t you learned yet that everyone is responsible for themselves?”

  “Families are responsible for each other.”

  “Very Japanese. I would have thought you’d given up your fascination with their culture when you ran away from their corporation.”

  “I haven’t given up on my sister. Are you going to come or not?”

  Janice shrugged. “What have I got to lose? You’ve roused me now. I doubt I could rest here peacefully.”

  “I’m telling you there is no peace here.”

  “How little you know." she said softly.

  “You’ll have peace when the ritual restores you.”

  “I certainly won’t get it until you dance your dance.”

  Tinged with something undefinable, her words echoed strangely in him. He forced the uncomfortable feeling away, concentrating on the matter at hand. Janice had agreed, and it would be to no one’s benefit to delay. “Hart has arranged a plane. The course will be laid into the autopilot and the computer will do the flying All you have to do is board, sit back, and enjoy the ride.”

  She bared her teeth in a grin that made him uncomfortable. “No pilot? What’s the matter? Afraid 1 might eat him?”

  Sam tried to tell himself she was just joking, just needling him, but he could see those teeth. “The fewer people who know about your entry into Salish-Shidhe Council, the better. They have a bounty on wendigos ”

  “And on those who aid and abet wendigos." she said.

  Sam nodded, already well enough aware of that.

  9

  Though Ghost Who Walks Inside was tall for an Indian, his broad shoulders, massive chest, and wellmuscled arms made him seem more squat than he was. He was a street samurai, but unlike many others who claimed that title, Ghost showed few obvious signs of cyber-enhancement. Dressed in his tattered jungle fatigue trousers and boots, armored vest, beaded wristlets, and feather-adorned headhand, Ghost revealed only the palm-mounted induction pads of his smartgun link. Which was not to say they were his only chrome. He just didn’t believe in displaying his advantages, preferring to let others underestimate his abilities. Just one more edge.

  From his vantage point in the shade of a kiosk selling Seattle metroplex memorabilia, Sam spotted Ghost’s wild black frizz on the far side of the court.

  As the Indian moved through the Sunday tourist crowds thronging Aurora Village, his swagger and rugged appearance opened a path for him, making his progress swift. With nonchalant ease he sidestepped those too self-absorbed or oblivious to notice him, never breaking his rhythm. Only once was he interrupted, when a fat German suit bumped into him. There was a slight jostling and for the next few steps, a smiling Ghost let deutschmarks, corporate scrip, coins, and credsticks dribble from his fingers. The turmoil in the crowd behind him made his forward progress even easier. The Indian seemed in no hurry. An observer might have thought that he turned in Sam’s direction purely by chance. Sam stepped out from behind the kiosk to greet him, but Ghost beat him to it.

  “Hoi, paleface. Whazappenning?”

  “Hoi, Ghost. Biz as usual. ’Zappening with you?”

  “Running hard to stay in place Wakarimasu-ka? Biz as usual." Ghost said with a laugh.

  “Not too busy for a little extra, I hope.”

  “Man’s too busy for friends, he’s too busy to live." Ghost said, grinning.

  Sam grinned back. Ghost’s thaw toward him had coincided with the onset of Sally’s glacial chill. Sam wished Sally would stop avoiding him so they might have a chance to talk it out, but as long as he was seeing Hart, Sally would never let him get her alone. Ghost, however, seemed to find the situation exactly to his taste, and that was good. Sam much preferred a friendly Ghost to a hostile one.

  Sam checked around for eavesdroppers, then got down to business. “I need your help to find a safe place for my sister to hide. Someplace outside the Seattle metroplex.”

  “Why me? Thought you’d have enough grease with Hart.
Hear tell, she’s got connections in Council lands. I’m just a city boy.”

  Sam had never spoken of Hart’s connections, and Ghost rarely worried about people and places outside the plex. If he knew about Hart’s connections, somebody was looking into Hart’s affairs. Most likely Sally. Sam hoped it didn’t bode trouble. If it did, he’d deal with it later. “Got a good net going, Ghost. But not good enough. Hart’s connections aren’t suitable to the current situation.”

  “So ka. Sister got a feud?”

  “She’s ...” Suddenly Sam wasn’t sure he should explain. Telling anyone was a danger, and Ghost was a mercenary, always on the lookout for ways to improve his tribe’s financial position. Would he be tempted by the bounty? If he turned Sam in as well, might not Ghost also improve his standing with Sally? Or would he even consider such a course of action? Sam wasn’t sure. For all the easy camaraderie, Ghost was still a bundle of unknown quantities. But trust was needed. Before Sam had attracted Sally’s attention Ghost had treated him well, almost as a younger brother. Aside from the Indian’s interest in Sally, Sam could find no reason to distrust Ghost. The other man lived by a code of honor, one that Sam did not always understand, but he was confident that Ghost wouldn’t abandon his honor for a few credits. There was, of course, only one way to find out.

  “My sister has goblinized. Hart’s contacts won’t take her in.”

  “So ka.” Ghost nodded sagely. “How illegal is her breed?”

  “How did you figure that?”

  “Null perspiration, paleface. If her breed wasn’t illegal, you would have made arrangements with Cog or Castillano. Fixers are real good at moving merchandise, even live merchandise. But you’re asking me, and that means you don’t want anybody to know so bad that you’re asking a city Indian to find you a place outside the wall. So what is she?”

  “Wendigo.” Without waiting for a reaction, he added, “But she’s never killed.”

  Ghost looked at him strangely. “What’s that got to do with it?”