1
The first thing I did when I got up this evening was to look out the window. Rain again. I hate the rain. I guess, being Seattle, it's inevitable. But that doesn't make me like it any more. I just live in the wrong city. Stretching, I hopped in the shower. Ok, yeah, it's the same thing, water coming down on you from above. But, the funny thing is I kind of like my water to be hot when it does so. Not to mention that I can't stand being dirty. It comes from walking with Cat.
Ordinarily, I would have stayed in the shower for about twenty minutes or so, luxuriating in the warmth. However, not tonight. Tonight was biz. I had a meet scheduled with 'Mr. Johnson' at ten o'clock. (Geez, when are the corporate types going to come up with something more original?) So, soap and shampoo, five minutes in and out, run a brush through my damp hair... As I dried off, I turned on the trideo to the weather report. Good. PH levels in tonight's rain were decent enough that I wouldn't have to take extra precautions. I'd be fine with an umbrella and a raincoat. Quickly, I slipped on my clothes, real silk stockings and underwear (I paid a fortune for those, of course.,) the white blouse, synthleather miniskirt, ankle boots, then my raincoat. Oh, and my Ares Predator. Every kitty needs her claws now and then, and, magic or not, I never went on biz without packing. Cast a quick Makeover spell for makeup, and a look in the mirror to make sure everything was in place. Curly, neatly groomed black hair, down to my mid back, and loosely french braided into a ponytail. Green eyes, with just a hint of matching eyeliner to set them off. A narrow, fae looking face with just a dusting of rouge to highlight my cheekbones. I certainly looked ready to go out. I turned, then, just before walking out, I leaned down to kiss Sakura good-night, idly shooing a fluffy orange and white cat out of her face, and I was ready to go.
Actually, I guess I'd best introduce myself. My name's Carolyn O'Brian, but everyone calls me Sheba. I was born and raised here in the Seattle Sprawl. Not the best part, either. Not the barrens, mind you, but still pretty bad. The man whose genetic materials gave me life ( I refuse to call the fucking monster 'father,') was a sporadically employed factory worker. He was also a drunkard, an ignorant, racist fuck, and a wife and child beater. Mom and I did our best to stay out of his way. It wasn't easy, though. I lost track of the number of times I went to bed, sobbing in pain, after a thrashing, or the bruises on Mom's face and arms, or, even worse, where other people couldn't see.
Of course, Karma eventually comes back to get everyone. In Gerald O'Brian's case, it was a stormy night (much like this one.) The trouble was, it didn't happen soon enough to save my Mom's life, and I'll always feel guilty for that. It was not long after my twelfth birthday. The bastard had been fired from his latest job for drinking on the clock. Mom and I had already eaten, and saved some for him. But, as often happened in our neighborhood, the power had gone out again. When he came home, his food was cold. Stressed out, drunk, and mean, he snapped, and decided that tonight was going to be the night that Maeve O'Brian, as well as little Carolyn, were going to pay for everything bad that ever happened to him. I...I don't remember what happened clearly. The headshrinkers say that I repressed the memories. I think that I jumped between him and Mom, but I'm not sure. All I can remember was pain, as I felt the fists hitting me, and the screams from my Mom. Screams which, suddenly, stopped. I opened my eyes, and, no matter how I tried, I have never been able to forget what happened next.
I wasn't in our apartment, anymore. Instead, I was on a bare, featureless plain. The only other living thing there was my little black and white cat, Jillian. It still hurt, the bruises starting to show up on my skin, and she came up to me, nuzzling one of my arms. Then, she spoke...
"Carolyn, can you hear me," she asked. "I can no longer protect you, but I can give you the power to protect yourself, if you but follow my path. Come with me, and I will guide you through life."
I nodded, desperately, wanting nothing more than for the pain to end, even as I faded out once more. But there was no oblivion. Once again, I could hear the sobs of agony from my Mom, the sickening sounds of flesh smashing into blood soaked flesh, of bones breaking. I opened my eyes.
He stood over her, beating her with his bare fists. She was limp, the sobs and gasps for breath fading. Even as I watched, I knew that she was dying, that he had killed her. I watched as the last breath left her shattered body, as she went completely limp in death. Then I struggled to my feet, gritting my teeth to drive away the pain...
I don't know how I did what I did that night. As near as I can figure it today, I somehow managed to cast a stunbolt, even though I had never even learned the spell. The last thing I remember was a flash of light, the bastard collapsing, and my hitting the apartment's panic button, before everything went dark once more, as the spell drained the last reserves of energy in my injured body.
It was two days later when I woke up. Somehow, someone in the Lone Star command structure had done something right. When I found myself in the hospital, I was greeted by the social worker that had been assigned my case. Shannon Burke was an elf woman, originally from the Tir. She was also a Shaman, like me. It was Shannon who was there to comfort me when she told me that my Mom was dead. It was also Shannon who took personal charge of helping me to learn my magic, and to help me cope with the trial. It wasn't a long one. With a history of alcoholism and domestic abuse, the forensic evidence, and what little testimony I could give, the Prosecution had an open and shut case. The jury came back with a conviction in less than ten minutes. And there. It was done. With my mother dead, the bastard serving a life sentence, and no living relatives, I was left alone but for a social worker and a cat. Over the next six years, while I was shuffled from one foster home to another, Shannon was the only friend I had other than Jillian. And, on the day I graduated High School, she was there.
Starting at University of Washington was a completely different world for me. Shannon had arranged for Lone Star to supplement the little bit of money that Mom had managed to set aside for me before she died. I knew I'd end up working for them after graduation. Of course, at the time, I hadn't seen the truth about the megacorporations yet. I majored in Shamanic Traditions, with a minor in Criminology. And for three years, I was happy. I was an adult, and living on my own without being in the system. Unfortunately, it didn't last.
It was late on a Tuesday night in October. I was heading back to my apartment from a late class. However, I'd taken my magical abilities for granted, assumed that no one would want to mess with me because I could potentially fry them in their shoes. What I didn't consider was what would happen if they took me by surprise. I don't remember much. Someone sneaking up behind me, and putting a rag soaked with chloroform over my mouth and nose. When I woke up, I found myself in a small cell, dressed in nothing but a skimpy, and none too clean nightgown, my brain fogged with a drug induced euphoria.
The year I spent in the bunraku is still little more than a drug fogged nightmare for me. Most of the slaves there were kept under the wire, controlled by BTL chips with persona-fixes. They couldn't do that with me, though. Like most criminals, they found it cheaper to just addict me, in this case to heroin, than to implant a datajack. At first, after they hooked me, I refused to sell myself. But if I did, all they did was take the drugs away from me. Low tech, but still effective. I don't know how it was that I finally mustered the strength to break out. But one day, I refused to do what they wanted. Then, when I hadn't had the drugs for three days, three days of shakes, of vomiting, of agonizing pain, I struggled through the withdrawal. They didn't know I was Awakened. That day, they learned. They learned, and they died.
I didn't stay to watch the place burn. I got the other victims (for that's what all of us were,) out. The scum who ran the place, though? I left them to die. I don't like to kill, but even now, I would do the same. Then I disappeared, hiding in the barrens. I suffered for weeks more, squatting in one of the worst parts of Redmond, hiding from the local gangers, stealing to eat. It's not something I'm proud of. No one should be. But I survived. And, no matter how tempted, I refused to turn back to the drugs, to track down a fix.
Eventually, when I managed to track down friends from school, I found out that every effort I had made to claw my way out from the poverty I grew up in had been lost. I'd been declared dead, my SIN locked. I had nothing. The investigation had ended, the case filed as cold. The only person in Lone Star that gave a fuck about a dirt poor college student was Shannon Burke. She didn't give up. For a solid year, she kept searching, trying to find the little girl who's life she had touched, and who had touched hers. Naturally, when I finally got away, it was her I went to. She helped me to get back on my feet, and covered up the murders I had committed out of desperation. She understood why I did it. But she also knew that I had crossed a line, that I could never go back. So, she told me what I could do. I had nothing that would let me be legitimate. No money, no SIN, no home. All I had was my skill as a Shaman. But that was enough. Like many people who were as down and out as me, I turned to a life of crime for hire. I became a Shadowrunner...
Which brings us to now, and tonight's meeting. I had to be at Matchsticks for the meet. Hailing a cab, I quickly ducked into the back, getting out of the rain, and slotted my credstick, telling the cabbie my destination. I was lucky to find one, of course. Sakura and I live on the northern edge of Renton, literally a stone's throw away from the Redmond Barrens. The cab took about an hour to get me to Downtown, as there was a backup on the 90, thanks to the fact that the 405 Hellhounds decided to do all of us a favor, and rumble the local band of the Night Hunters (good riddance to bad rubbish, if you ask me.) Still, I had left in plenty of time for the meet, and when the cab dropped me off at the base of the Space Needle, it was still only about 8:45.
Popping open my umbrella, (I did mention that I hated rain, didn't I,) I walked the short distance from the base of the Needle to Matchsticks. I've always preferred the quiet ambiance of the jazz club to the more popular meeting places like Club Penumbra or Dante's Inferno, and I was a regular, often coming in even when not doing biz. The trio on the stage was jamming a pretty decent version of 'Straight, No Chaser,' and Carl, the manager was behind the bar at the moment. When he saw me, he waved, motioning me over.
"Hoi, Sheeba. What brings you here tonight? Coming in for the grooves?" Carl's lopsided grin never failed to make me respond in kind. The tall, dark haired man was definitely a charmer, even though he was a bit on the chubby side, and, had he not been engaged to a dear friend, I'd have given some thought to taking him as one of my rare male lovers.
I shook my head. "Sorry, Carl. Tonight's all business. Is the back room available for ten?"
He tapped a few keys on his terminal, and nodded. "Sure thing. Need me to send anyone back?"
I nodded, handing over my credstick to pay for the room. "Yeah. I'm expecting a Johnson in about an hour. I told him to ask you for me. When he gets here, have Lotus pop astral and let me know. And if she'd be willing to run overwatch for he meet, I'd make it worth her while.
"You'd better ask her yourself," Carl said, as he motioned a petite, beautiful Asian woman wearing an immaculate suit over. Lotus wasn't a Shaman, but rather a Hermetic mage. Nonetheless, the two of us got along well, and I considered her to be a good friend. Her silky black hair was cut to just below her jaw, framing a pair of dark brown eyes in a round, yet somehow delicate looking face.
"Evening, Pussycat," she grinned as she saw me. "What's the word?" I reached out, and took her in my arms, hugging her warmly.
"The word is biz, tonight, Fireball. I'm meeting someone, and need you to pop astral to let me know he's here, then keep an eye on the meet.
"Null persp, honey. And just because I love you, I'll only charge you three hundred new ones." Her grin turned a little more wolf-like, as she sensed the opportunity for profit. Still, the price was a good one, especially for having an Initiate running astral cover, so I didn't even try to dicker her down. Instead, I retrieved my credstick from Carl, and slotted it to hers.
"Always a pleasure doing business with you, sweetie," I said, a smile on my face, then I winked. "So, when is it going to be a pleasure doing pleasure?" I couldn't resist flirting, and she took it as the good-natured teasing that it was intended as.
"Honey, you know I don't walk that side of the street. Not that you don't make it tempting." She winked back, saucily, then flashed the diamond ring on her left hand. "Besides, Carl and I are perfectly happy together, and you know it." However, she did give me a chaste peck on the cheek, not even having to get on her tiptoes, since I wasn't much taller than her. "Now, you'd better get into the back. Time's a wasting, and I know you'll want to scout out before your meet. I'll let you know when Johnson's here."
Grinning, I made my way through the crowd to the back room, looking down at the chip in my hand with the dossier on the Johnson that Chaz, my Fixer, had gotten for me. Yeah, I know. Strictly speaking, it's bad form. But I'm paranoid. Among shadowrunners, there are three rules: Shoot straight, conserve ammo, and never, EVER deal with a Dragon. However, if you want to survive in the shadows, there are a couple more. First, trust NO ONE. Second, trust your Johnson even less. So, as usual, I'd gotten Chaz to give me the lowdown. I closed the door, settled down in an easy chair, and slotted the chip into my perscomp, scrolling through the pages.
First of all, my contact's name wasn't Mr. Johnson. Yeah, big surprise there. Rather, he was Evan Wainwright, a mid level manager with Megamedia, the simsense studio. I glanced at the picture that was included with the dossier. He was human, and handsome, in a generic, entertainment industry sort of way. Blonde hair, blue eyes. Chiseled features. The sort of person that someone higher up would have picked to appeal to a female runner. Hell, it might even work with me, if he's got a good personality, but I wouldn't make book on it if I were you.
I scrolled down, through the information that Chaz had gotten. Wainwright had started at Megamedia in 2042, as a production assistant. In 2048, he was assigned as Honey Brighton's Personal Assistant, until her defection to Brilliant Genesis in 2050. Since then, he had become an associate producer for a number of their B-unit productions. There wasn't much more info, which didn't surprise me. It looked to me like this guy had been chosen by someone higher up, and was likely about as much of a puppet as the other boys and girls in the bunraku parlor had been, albeit in a different way. The big question was who was pulling the strings. I clicked off the perscomp, and set it aside, glancing at the time. 9:35. Ok, time to go astral, see what I can see. Maybe, there might be more to Mister Evan Wainwright than meets the unAwakened eye.
I reclined the easy chair, and closed my eyes, letting my spirit leave my body. The first time a spellcaster, be they Mage or Shaman, enters the astral, it's hard for them to adjust to the flow of information. You can see everything visible to mundanes, of course, but there's more. Auras are visible, telling you things about people that most of them would rather you not know. Not specific information, mind you, but more impressions, indications of things that might not be quite right. For example, my aura, while quite bright, as normal for anyone who's magically active, is shot through with black tendrils, the lasting spiritual scars of my childhood and my heroin addiction, as are the phantom track marks which appear on my arms astrally. Likewise, if someone has cyberware, it's visible to astral senses as black circuitry, or even limbs.
It was these auras I saw as my astral self slipped through the wall of the room and out into the main club. Most of the patrons were mundanes, usually with at least a little cyberware. Here and there were the brighter auras of spellcasters. One in particular waved and winked as I flew by, and I returned Lotus's greeting on my way outside.
One advantage of being Astral is that you can't get wet. You're not part of the mundane world after all. While you can sense it, in some ways, you can't interact with it. I floated around Matchsticks, taking a perverse, and only slightly guilty pleasure in watching those outside who were getting wet from the rain. Every now and then, I would see another spellcaster flitting by, or spirits, mostly messengers or watchers. In Seattle, biz is biz, and the shadows always have action. But it wasn't my biz, so I generally ignored them, concentrating on the people wandering by the club. By my best estimate, it was 9:50 when a Ford Americar pulled up, and a tall man with Evan Wainwright's face stepped out. When I saw his aura, I was completely taken aback.
Evan Wainwright was Awakened.