Disclaim: I do not own any rights of Shadowrun, all rights are the property of FASA Corporation.

Chapter 1: Original sin

I looked around. I looked at my town, filled with unimaginable content, passion and pride. I have built this, from the pure ground, I have made it my capitol, I have filled it with magic, with wizards, I have built and upgraded places where I can hire my soldiers, my weapons and where I can hide my treasures, where I can be safe. I walked besides the walls and took a look on the nest of the dragons, my strongest and truest servants. I wanted to see them, see the birth of one of them, touch the scales protecting him, feel the heat of his flames.

Suddenly, some annoying voice, a siren interrupted me. Dammit. I closed the program in one moment, and I looked at the clock of my deck – of course, not physically. I had to realize that I had wasted all of my thirty minutes. I simply could not continue playing. I had to pull the cable out of my datajack and I had to go and shave my face, and then, I had to go to work today again, just like I did yesterday, the day before yesterday, last week, and in my whole life.

It was the time for me to turn from a mighty, powerful wizard to Arnis Azalinis, a simple, ordinary programmer of Trans-Latvia. It was a painful transformation.


I opened my eyes but I didn't see anything. I knew that I was lying in a bed that wasn't mine at home. Of course, I didn't see anything because I didn't put my glasses on. I tried to raise my hand but I couldn't. I simply couldn't! I didn't have any power, even to move my arm. What happened to me, I thought. A door was opened, I heard it creaking, and I guessed that someone moved towards me.

"Where..." I moaned. Naturally, I wanted to ask more but I couldn't even move my mouth, really. It was fixed in some bandage.

"Please, don't try to make any unnecessary moves, Monsieur Carré." answered a voice. A voice of a woman. I saw something, and I thought she was moving around me, and in a short time, I realized that she wasn't really listening to me, wasn't really looking at me. I tried to look around the room. But I didn't see anything without my glasses, except it was white.

"What... happened?" I asked slowly.

"You didn't remember. That's natural." she answered. Her voice sounded like he was spending her whole day with people who can't even move. This gave me an annoying idea. "You're a survivor of a tragic accident."

"Whaaaa..." I tried to say what but I weak to speak.

"I see you really want to know. You were traveling by train, crossing a bridge. The bridge collapsed and the train fell in the river."

As she said it, on her cold voice, memories came to my mind. I was going to the university, to Toulouse. I was not finished with my homework, although I should have been. And the train seat was also creaking during the whole journey. I even remembered the ugly orc lady's smile who was sitting opposite to me. And I remembered the moment of immense panic when I noticed that we were sinking somehow, unnaturally sinking.

"Thank you." I sighed. She didn't say a word. She just left, leaving me alone with my thoughts. So, I was at hospital. At least, I could miss education for a while. On the other hand, I'm probably chained to this bed for several months. Great! I have to call someone to communicate with me, to tell me what on earth is happening on the university.

"You don't have to call anyone." said someone. It was definitely not the nurse's voice. It was deeper, resembling more to a man's. I turned my head to the right. I was shocked. I couldn't make out anything from the white background. Anything, but a raccoon. How the hell did that get in there? And didn't the nurse notice it and throw it out of the window?

"He didn't notice me." What the...? Is this a hallucination? A talking raccoon? "In fact, no one can notice me, except you, Alain. You may have survived the accident, but do you want to know how did you do it? And "it added" I'm anything but a hallucination."


I woke up angrily. Just as angry as anyone can if he's waken up early – it was still morning, although I got into bed after five o'clock – and waken up with a gun in front of his face. I had to admire my foresight that I didn't turn off my wired reflexes. Just before the other could move, I jumped out of my bed, grabbed his hand – naturally, with the left one, made of chrome – and twisted the gun out.

I kicked him in the stomach and he collapsed. I pointed the gun directly to his back.

"You can pull the trigger." said a familiar voice. "There are no bullets inside."

"Double-D, you damned moron." I hissed. This human – with the ethical sense of a worm – had been one of my mediators, before I was caught. And I wasn't very happy that I have to see him again. He reminded me to my old life. The life I wanted to leave behind me. After I checked that he didn't lie and there were no bullets in the gun, I gave it back to him.

"I see you're in your old shape, Brick. I just wanted to see. I may need it."

"Forget it, Double-D." I spat back. "I'm out."

"You really think, Brick?" he asked. "You want to go back this night again? You want to butter those honorable people up. Come on, you can't be serious."

"I still prefer doing that to being sent back to jail again."

"Look at you, man. You're an orc. You've spent five years in jail and now you have a criminal SIN. What do you think, what do people on the bus think, what are you? They think you're a loser. I'm one of the few who know that you're not." Unfortunately, I didn't belong to these people.

"Yet I have a legal employer and the only illegal thing I will do is killing you and breaking your skull into pieces."

"Brick, don't talk to me like that." he squeaked. "What's the point? I need you, your power and you need my employer's money."

"Why do you think that?" I replied.

He stepped to my comm and turned it on. There was a page, formerly seen by me. A page of the London Central Hospital, showing the prices of growing and implanting organic limbs.

"A small present from one of my friends. Unfortunately, it can be used once, I guess. So, what do you think?"

"I'm not interested." I said angrily. "And don't come back. I might break your neck."

"Brick, Brick." he laughed as he opened my door, not even distracted from my alarm. "I don't have to come back." He pulled a card out of his jacket and dropped it. "Soon, you'll come to me. If you change your mind before Saturday, this is the meeting point." With these words, he left. I didn't know why but I picked up the card.


If you thought you hated your job, pal, I would generously offer you a swap for one, only one day. You would immediately start to think different about your job. Being a restaurant worker in the middle of Frankfurt, among offals of several different animals and disgustingly rich tourists and speculators is not really anyone's dream job. Add my Turkish ancestry, you'll immediately get catastrophic results. After you've seen this, you might understand why didn't I like to interact with any other people – except some Turks, of course.

This day wasn't really tough, although we got about a dozen of drunk tourists wanting Kebab in the middle of the night, just before we wanted to close the shop. So, after I got to my rent, I didn't fall asleep in the first minute – as I did usually – instead, I turned my comm on and looked at my mails. In fact, I waited for one message:I ordered a damned license for the new Busty Jessie movie – yeah, I thought about it, why the hell do these Americans need my nuyen, but that's nowadays. I didn't find a message from the shop, instead I saw that someone – an unknown RTG – tried to call me at least six times in the last 24 hours. After the last attempt, he left me a message, too.

"Ata Bin Eserler. If this is your phone, my prayers were heard and my enemies didn't destroy or steal my message and it found you. My name is Drachen." Strange name, I thought, especially in these days, when dragons were trying to establish their rule over the world. "And I'm your stepbrother. Your father, who always used to hear Rashar from his cybernetic memory and died several years ago, is mine father, too." What the...? I've been living here for twenty years, and no one mentioned me this? And, strangely, his statements were true."We must talk. Urgently. If I can trust my friends I'll know if you've found this message. After that day, I'll show up at your workplace. If I didn't, go in to the safe room of Zwiete Welle Gesellschaftsbank Frankfurt." Impressive, I thought. That bank was one of the main ones of the city. "You must ask for the key of safe 710. The key is you. Goodbye."


Have you ever traveled by a suborbital plane? To tell the truth, I didn't feel even the smallest bit of difference between it and a simple one. It was even annoyingly quiet for me. Maybe I got used to the noisy assaults supported by helicopters and rifles. And another reason for my ignorance, that I didn't listen to the plane or the view out of it. I have just noticed that the trip was shorter than usual and I could only read about fifty pages of my book. Yeah, it was an original book, printed on paper. You may call it a luxury but I liked to spend for money for these. For a few years, after I paid for the Cosa Nostra with my work, I wasn't out of money, so I could buy things like this. And, I was a maniac fan of some last-century adventure novel writers. I wasn't out of danger, either, and I knew, the famous Needle would be caught in minutes if he lived in these years, but in spite of this, these books became quite a passion for me.

An artificial voice stated that we'll arrive to Frankfurt Airport in a few minutes. My job was to capture a smuggler who stole a shipment of cocaine from my bosses. The German Alliance was a bit cold for me for the first time, but I had to acclimate quickly. My bosses didn't expect a journey description from me. They expected results from me, to capture that bastard. The wizards told me that he was here, and I had to find him and bring him back. That was my job, and I had no alibi because of the circumstances or anything else.


"So what's the deal?" asked I after a sip of my beer. The company weasel sighed heavily. Luckily, I ordered a big jug of it. I didn't really want to listen to some bullshit about his personal problems. Or I didn't want to hear all the rubbish poured on me, even if it was connected with my assignment. Despite this, I had to. About 80 percent of the information given by these company rats can be thrown directly in the dustbin. But there's another 20 percent, which might be useful.

With the credit card, he gave me an optical chip, too.

"Alberto Correia was killed three days ago. You'll find every data of him on the chip."

I puckered my brows.

"What's my job? According to my experiences, you don't like to bother yourself with corpses."

"He was my boss at Lusiada." he said coldly. I could hardly hide my smile.

"Lucky you. I wish my bosses would die." I made bold to say a statement like this but he didn't react.

"I want to know who killed him." whispered he.

"Why?"

It seemed so that I've insulted him. Just as I expected and intended.

"Listen here, bub. There are a lot more information about him than the data on this chip. He probably had enemies, conflicts. If I don't notice something important, thanks to you, I might let his killer get away. Starting with you. Isn't there a fight for his position? Of course, there is. Do you want to slip in his shoes?"

He looked angry. Very angry. And this made me happy. I simply liked to make these rats nervous.

"I have to get his position." he said. "And for that, I have to find his killer."

"You have to prove that it's not you..."

"Why would I hire you if I was it?"

Why should I know that, I thought. But I've already worked with company men and I've seen twisted things.

"Do you have a suspicion?" I asked.

"I have too many. That's why I pay you." he answered angrily.

"The usual fee?" I asked. It seemed that my plan backfired on me a bit. I looked in his eyes and I could see him thinking if he had made the right choice with me. But it's their disadvantage of falling in the shadows. You may find people who are not strongly depending from you and see you just like you are. And they even tell it, face to face, like me.

He nodded and stood up. Luckily, he didn't order anything. I didn't have too much money and I didn't want to pay his consumption, too.


I closed my books. It wasn't the time for them right now. This wasn't practice any more. All I've learned, all I ever dreamed of, becomes true this night. Now I'll show everybody. I'll show for every individual who had doubts about my power and my talent. They will regret that they have expelled me because they haven't recognized my abilities. I'll call help, conjure and bind a powerful spirit, then I'll return to Oxford. But they won't receive anything from it. Except Lucretia, maybe. But the others! I want to see them pay, want to see them do penance.

There was full moon, without any clouds and tide had almost reached its peak. I altered my senses so I could see the astral space. I walked into the sea, the great water, the mother of life. I could feel the energy vibrating around me. I grabbed my pendant, my focus of energy, as well as my silver knife and I put my cloak on. The latter was the most important of them all, because I painted the symbols of the rite on it, because I couldn't draw any symbols in the water. I saw the lines of mana getting brighter and brighter.

I cut my arm, I spilled my blood and the first drops fell into the sea.

"Spirits of nature, spirits of water, spirits of mother and father of all creatures on this world, I call you. Come to me, show me your power. Show me that you are the ruler of all. You play with air and light, you erode the silent rock and you can absorb the heat of arrogant and sparking fire, make it cold and slow and destroying it."

I could feel my pendant getting breezy and closer to my heart and the mana lines began to form something else, a ripple. They were obeying my will, and only mine. Slowly, the ripple grew and the middle of it turned black. An elemental appeared, in a form that I've never seen before. It looked like a serpent, a sea serpent, but it had waves covering it, instead of scales. I almost touched it, but it tried to bite me, or do something like that. It was pulsing, and it was very cold.

"Show me your might! Show me your power!" I shouted.

Suddenly, it disappeared, leaving me totally confused. Did I say or do something wrong? I broke the trance, because I wanted to find the creature. I looked around, naturally, I didn't see anything in the dark. Something hit me behind my back heavily. I began to collapse, but I couldn't keep my eyes open, even to the time when I reached the cold surface water.


I was in euphoria. I looked at the crowd, and I could feel their enthusiasm and this made happy. I was sweating, sweating heavily, but that didn't matter. I was here to serve my crowd, my fans who gave so much money as an entrance fee. Just to see me. To hear me. To feel me, feel my spirit trying to reach the sky, to give them best.

I looked around my band, my friends, my helpers, and asked for another cataclysmic applause. I held the microphone tight and began to sing our hit, "Adjusting". Of course, they knew the lyrics, they wanted me to feel their support, and they sang with me. Of course, with the microphone and the stuff in my throat, they couldn't sing louder than me, even if there were thousands in front of the podium. After about two minutes, I slowed down, drew myself back to give place for Kay-Tee, our guitarist for his solo.

And then, everything turned totally black.