A tremendous roar arose…all the fingers convulsively clutching at every weapon or semblance of a weapon that was thrown up from the depths below…who gave them out, whence they last came…no eye in the throng could have told…
…the living sea rose, wave on wave, depth on depth, and overflowed the city…yet…lovers, with such a world around them and before them, loved and hoped.
–A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
Susan had taught Sarah about the 48 Ki release points, and the troll girl had listened wide-eyed to stories of breaking Flamestrikes on a Mystic Shield. Wielding such power herself had been a thing undreamt, until the squishy wizard threw flame in Sarah's face. Her Ki shield held back enough; her big, ugly body was burnt, not fried. If she was a coward and a failure, at least she survived.
She lay half-unconscious, feigning death and wishing she was dead, as the DocWagon ambulance carted off the little human slot with a contract. Even if the Corper pigs had seen a profit in treating her, she'd have crushed them first. No one was for her now except Lord Shavarus, as the marines stepped over her comrades' bodies.
Sarah heard their boots and voices spreading over the harbour around her. An officer arranged with the paramedics that an interrogation team would head to the hospital, for the shadowrunner. Their idle talk, in the language their TriD shows and tanks had spread from Calfree to Manila, choked her with terror and shame at every touch.
One marine was squatting down, to check out the dead trog's body. Two more behind him. The smell of his sweat made her fight to not be sick. One of them joked about the size of her rear, one laughed. Then Sarah's horns loomed three feet above his head, before she slapped it almost off his neck.
She killed the other marines with two blows. A rifle spat lead over her shoulder, but she was untouched. It was a relief–killing her abusers simply felt like a glad, intense release, for a moment. Maybe it'd take a dozen or a hundred dead demons for the pain they'd put on her to go? Susan would've known, but she'd never said. It was strange that she longed for her friend, right now–but if she could even be worthy of kneeling at Lord Shavarus' feet again, she had to fight on for him. Give her life for his dream. She could not die here.
There were shouts behind her, gunfire. Then an explosion at the end of the pier; a chance. Sarah thundered towards the water and dived in. They would both show the little demons what a troll's strength meant.
-0-
"So, now that I've expended much of my rather strained goodwill with Renraku and Mitsuhama, to keep you from a blacksite prison or the bottom of the Bay…can you please tell me you've found my fragging paydata?"
"We know where it is." Ilsa retorted across Kali's desk. The music mogul's expression would have cut through a steel door.
Anya, of course, had contacted Kali even before the Runners had reached the Embarcadero. Kali had started making calls at once, but the Renraku harbour patrol had been shocked by a call from their regional director only moments before they would have machine-gunned the stolen speedboat. Ilsa was overwhelmed with thankfulness for the digital ork who had saved all their lives again. Rather more so than for their resourceful Ms Johnson and her corporate employers, whose best hope of recovering their precious paydata was to keep their pawns on the board, for now.
Although finally kicking out the Azzies was no longer the Japancorps most pressing concern. The checkpoint before the city had been manned by Mitsuhama security rather than marines, with orders from on high to wave the Runners' taxi through. They'd heard shouting, defiant singing and the wet noise of incessant blows from behind the security station; the drive back to Club Eclipse through an urban warzone had earned their driver several times his fee in danger money.
There had been screaming crowds on the streets, with far more guns than banners. Petrol bombs sailing from any window, ambushes on any corner, and precincts under siege. Voire, the Tir elves and Shavarus had stirred up the rising of their dreams. MPA fighters, Tir-armed militants, desperate metahuman civilians and even human San Franciscans sickened by the Marines' brutality. Saito's forces had been hunting terrorists and showing their strength through Oakland and the Mission District all night–but at first some had fought them and then the city itself seemed to have risen.
Of course the Marines had still fought back for peace and order–backed by security forces from Fuchi, Shiawase, Mitsuhama and Renraku. There had been more bodies on the streets than rioters since noon, beneath a pall of tear gas, though Ilsa still heard distant gunfire from Kali's office window. The tanks and artillery deployed in Oakland had thundered for almost an hour after the streets were clear, until Saito's fury had been sated at last, for a moment.
The sudden rising had lacked plans, objectives and anything but hope; its failure was no surprise. Certainly not to the agents who had whispered, fomented and armed, simply to weaken Colonel Saito's standing with his masters. Or to the toweringly mad troll who had contrived so much, to merely distract from his master plan that Ilsa was ready to fall at Susan's feet for uncovering.
Exhausted from over sixteen hours of Run, Ilsa had actually fallen asleep in the taxi. Even Susan and Harry had been too exhausted to plunge into the rising themselves, as well as too angry to say a word to each other. But now they had promises to be kept, and miles to go before they slept.
"Hailey. Is she safe?"
"Of course. I had her transferred to corporate custody with the pretext that Renraku happen to lease that part of the Embarcadero. She's not a meta, and she was peripheral to the Mission District ambush; they'll cut her loose. Especially as I mean to enlist her as my personal decker. When you've got a talent like that on the hook for her life–make the most of it, I say."
"That should protect her and keep her out of dangerous shadowruns. Maternal instinct?"
Kali scowled, defensively.
"The Marines do usually bow before the Corps that give them their transports, their guns and their orders. Their investigators at the DocWagon facility did mention that they would find, break, and execute on live TriD, every terrorist shadowrunner involved in the Mission ambush. Your corporate protection, which slaps a substantial penalty fee on your final payment, will disappear the instant this job is finally over. I expect you'll manage that little problem as efficiently as everything else you've failed to deal with so far."
"Your own future plans should account for this city's fate being sealed by tomorrow morning, unless we can thwart Shavarus and the Tir. If the San Francisco peninsula's supply of fresh water and hydroelectricity is cut off in this condition of chaos, we will see primal anarchy in the street. The Megacorps and the Marines will evacuate, but ordinary people will kill each other for food and potable water; the death toll will be incalculable."
"I assume you have proof of this…?"
Ilsa's green eyes showed a woman who had fought across the abyss, whose chummer had suffered through hell, and was not prepared to be doubted. Kali sighed and told her to go on.
-0-
The plain female Ghost, Sergeant Alys Morgan, quickly confirmed the plans of Hetch Hetchy on Shavarus' datastick. While the troll examined one of the Tir fetishes, running huge fingers over harpies' feathers and medallions carved from coral. Susan lay on the concrete of the Embarcadero, at Shavarus' feet, and waited to hear what she had endured so much for.
"Exquisitely refined." Even the troll's murmur was like thunder.
"Of course. Our R & D labs at Hayden Slough work with our finest minds."
he Ghosts' commander, Aeirion the Defender, had himself graduated from Tir's elite Celisté university. He seemed less inclined to question an uppity wineg than deliver a lecture.
"Our fetishes and foci could create a new site of power at the Hetch Hetchy lake, or even in the centre of San Francisco. A gate from which we might summon and bind to Earth dozens of havoc-wrecking spirits. Saito's troops would not be destroyed, however, and the astral signature would make Tir's hand in the matter plain. It would be the excuse to march against Tir which that odious madman craves. We could, of course, open a gate at some existing site of power such as the Mojave, summoning hundreds of potent spirits and masking any signature. But at such a distance from San Francisco or Hetch Hetchy, the Japanese could muster a formidable defence, before –"
"Mission Creek!" Shavarus finally growled, "Beneath the Armoury!"
"Ah." Desorm murmured. Aeirion turned to the 'Frisco-based agent, "Mission Creek is a culverted river, sir, largely buried under the city. It connects to the Hetch Hetchy system, and it runs through the San Francisco Armoury's sub-basements. An old fortress in the heart of the Mission district, with a uniquely chequered history of pain and passion. The background magic count would both mask the gate's signature and enhance it. Superb."
"Hundreds of mighty, untiring water spirits." Shavarus's voice was low and heavy with triumph, "Our plans of the waterway will guide them, their hatred of unnatural confinement will drive them. They will pour out from the creek and destroy all 167 miles of pipeline, four power stations and a major dam, within hours and completely."
"Ah. If the Marines and the Japancorps refuse to vacate San Francisco?"
"I am no terrorist. They will leave, or they will die. The humans who cannot leave –those who stood by, as our people were deported and abused –will die. As the Amindians escaped the VITAS plague in their internment camps, the metahumans exiled to Oakland will escape the scourge. And humanity will know true terror, that their day is done, and their fall is nigh! The troll is stronger, the elf is quicker, the ork and the dwarf are should fear us, and they will! We must destroy them, if we would ever be free from hate, and when the doom of San Francisco makes them cower like dogs in their drek, we will! It may take years, but we shall see it begin tomorrow–the end of man and the day of metahumanity!"
"And San Francisco will still be a desert." Desorn's face was still and unsmiling.
"No victory can be won without sacrifice. I had not imagined the Ghosts of Tir were unaware of this."
"Excuse us one moment, Shavarus?" Aeirion drew Desorm aside, "Lieutenant, ignorant humans believe that the elves are tree-hugging daisy eaters. Elves rule the happiest, most blessed nation on Earth, because we are its protectors! Imagine Tir's redwood forests, buried under a second Renraku arcology! The world's most powerful, elf-hating nation has one solid foothold on the west coast. Even a chance of destroying it would be worth more lives and land than this."
"Forgive me, sir. For Tir's sake, an acceptable sacrifice."
"There are still elves in San Francisco…" As Tarne spoke, he knew he was dead, "And Hetch Hetchy supplies most of Oakland's fresh water too."
"What is that Goronagit doing here?"
"Shavarus' contact, sir. Only he had actually met the troll of the hour, before now."
"Ah. An expendable asset."
The elves turned back to Shavarus, and both of them clasped his huge hands. Under cover of the uprising the Armoury would be taken. Hetch Hetchy and San Francisco, destroyed. If any other Ghosts had any misgivings, they gave no sign.
-0-
The security forces, apart from protecting corporate property from the uprising, had been almost entirely assigned to guard checkpoints and prisoners while the Marines suppressed the enemy. The guards at a certain checkpoint, in Shiawase blue, watched a huge figure trudging implacably along the roadside towards the city.
Clad in surviving scraps of armour and ripped clothes, the troll seemed covered in filthy water, burns and bullet-marks. Dead-eyed, aware of nothing but his path ahead, and not so much of that to acknowledge the rifle-scope framing his skull. He seemed not to hear the guards bawling at him to halt.
"Didn't look like he was going to." Muttered the guard behind the scope. His FN HAR rifle cracked; the shot flashed past the troll's head. He aimed again. Then the guard behind the shooter shot the squad's comms specialist, before shooting him.
The domination spell blazed in Shavarus' claw. As the guards wrestled down their brainwashed comrade, the troll Mage broke into a charge. A fireball roared before him, but he was too fixed on the killing to make another sound.
"Fragging trog!" The last man screamed, coughing blood over the road. Sharavus kicked him down.
"Is that all you can say, human? Well, then. This is all I can do."
His enemies were thick around him, but Shavarus took a moment to place his foot on the howling man's head, and let it fall with a crunch. Then he charged away into the scarred alleys and streets, towards the Armoury. With the future burning in his twisted heart, and a single Tir fetish on his person.
-0-
"Susan Lei AKA Fighter AKA SeerauberJenny. A former operative of Saeder Krupp's Agency. Ilsa Tresckow AKA Wizard. Graduate of Heidelberg University, likewise affiliated with the Agency. Harry Percy Fawkes AKA Warrior AKA Hotspur. An unaffiliated shadowrunner, active in Seattle and Hong Kong."
"Thank you, Rowan." Desorn murmured. The caretaker of the East Cut safehouse (Tir Ghost, formidable decker, and janitor at the Fuchi building, with several of their top programmers in his network) smiled charmingly. Holograms over his cyberdeck displayed the three faces.
With a refined mass invisibility spell that also slowed the release of body heat (ideal both for cold-weather survival and foiling thermal imaging) the Ghosts had casually evaded both the Renraku patrols and the Marines, detonating their boat from a safe distance. Aeirion had retained all the valuable magical items on his person, or intended to–they could guess where the missing one was. Now the Ghost's commander was paced a short track around safehouse where they had paused to assess.
"To our certain knowledge, the Agency was destroyed. However, these Runners may still be working with Lord Lofwyr. I perceived from her finger-movements that the young Mage had trained at Heidelberg…" None of the Ghosts were remotely naïve enough to protest that, with a seat on Tir Taingire's ruling council, the golden wyrm was necessarily on their side. "Rowan, Morgan? Put about some false reports to obscure our purpose. Monitor communications. Activate all our comrades, in the name of the Council of Princes. Find the troll, find those shadowrunners, and find out if the Armoury will be imminently occupied by a company of Marines."
Morgan silently Jacked in; Ghost doctrine mixed cybernetics and magic intelligently to create the Sixth World's most capable operatives. Over the next few hours, they reported back.
"Shavarus appears to have met with his surviving followers. A message left where he knew we'd find it…essentially states that he has the missing fetish and is heading to the Armoury. Naturally, Tir will be implicated if the wineg uses our weapon."
"Naturally. He must have lifted it with a telekinesis cantrip during that skirmish."
"Clever monkey!" Lowri Greenwood quipped, her guns stripped down on the floor. Aeirion pursed his lips censoriously.
"If we had not understood the troll was skilled, unyielding and resourceful, we would never have proceeded this far. The winegs are not without intellect; they're simply not like us. As the Ghosts of Tir we choose our missions with care, but we finish what we begin. For our unit's honour, for our homeland and people, for our lost comrade–we shall see this mission through. The die is cast."
"Death to our foes."
Greenwood smiled like a fox. She had seemed less grieved by Lankin's fate than eager to describe exactly how she'd avenge it, although they had been casual lovers. Anyone good enough for the Ghosts, and Greenwood was a deadly Gun-Adept, was permitted mild eccentricities. And it had kept Lankin from fondling Morgan, Aeirion's quiet and plain XO. If you couldn't bear a little thing like sexual harassment, you certainly weren't good enough for the Ghosts.
Desorn was rather better than good enough. In Calfree, UCAS and Aztlan he had worn a dozen faces, and had brought about, as far as he could calculate, the deaths of thousands. And that was very little compared to Aeirion the Defender's storied career. A trip to a hellish metaplane, where his old comrade had remained, had allegedly turned his hair white on the wrong side of thirty. It probably wasn't even the first time a city's fate had been in his hands.
One had simply not to feel so much about things like being tortured or betrayed; the death of a lover or the death of a city. Perhaps one day, he would even cease to feel for his forests and his music. Only his bond with his comrades, and his love for his country, could never die while he lived. That would be enough to close this mission, whatever the cost.
Morgan presently reported contacts between Club Eclipse and the Japancorps that referred to the coming operation. Overstretched, aware of multiple false reports and looking to each other to respond first, however...neither the Megacorps or the Marines were moving any notable forces to the Armoury.
The Runners had been located by a Tir agent, at Club Eclipse. Aeirion heard the outcome of that encounter with a sour expression.
"Have our comrades meet us at the Armoury. Tir agents only. Reports and rumours can be dismissed, but no evidence of Tir Taingire's involvement in this matter must ever emerge. The shadowrunners, their associates, the troll. All of them will need to be killed."
Desorm had already snapped Tarne's neck as they left the Embarcadero. The would-be Ghost had never woken from Hotspur's blow. He hadn't strictly been a comrade, just an asset, so Desorm was only a little surprised at how little he felt.
-0-
Ilsa told Kali everything Susan had heard of Shavarus' plans. She was only speechless for a moment.
"I hope you weren't about to charge off and save the city on your own?"
"Not even if our condition had permitted it. I'm fairly certain, from Susan's account, that our enemies will require hours of ritual to open their gate and bind so many spirits, even if they head for the Armoury straight away. This is a rather greater matter than a shadowrun; we need any allies that might exist. Whatever goodwill you have left with the Megacorps, I advise you to spend all of it."
"Alright. I'll call people. I'll get all my people calling people. You can take any transport you need." Ilsa raised an eyebrow, "What? I love this city. Music and businesses, restaurants and nightclubs; everything dreamt up and built up by millions of people. I mean to be big in this city, and I believe that means stopping some madmen from blowing it to drek right now. There should be merchants and Runners left downstairs–or else take Goro with you." She nodded at one of the cybered bodyguards behind her.
"Danke. I will first check if any Runners are willing to assail the jaws of death, for whatever nyuyen we have left."
"Ganbatte kudasai. And give my regards to Hotspur and Susan when they wake up."
"Indeed, I showed them to a room," Ilsa muttered, before heading down, "But I rather doubt those fools are getting any sleep."
-0-
Indeed, since Ilsa had eventually frogmarched Susan into the Harry saferoom at Eclipse, ordered them to straighten themselves out, whatever that took, and left with the key…
…they had been having what felt like the first blazing row of their lives, shouting at opposite bare walls of the tiny bedroom.
"…you could've been killed! Or, or…I can't even…!"
"Harry, listen to me! That troll beat me up, I killed for him, that's all. That's all our fragging job is! But I'd never have let him rape me. I'd have fought him, killed or died, and the elves would've wrecked the city tomorrow. I faced that, all of it I could! I was on my own, it was a fragging nightmare, but I had to do it–"
"NO! He could've really brainwashed you or killed you! Or beaten you down, like that night…frag, frag, SUSAN! Two years running from it, both of us–then you charge into that drek without me! Throw your life away like nothing! Don't tell me you had to it!"
"I had to save the city! Like we dreamt we'd do, when we were shadowrunners! I've killed and bled…but was I supposed to stay in Redmond, and have your babies? I had to be strong, and I had to do this without you, because YOU LEFT, Harry! I did this stupid thing, what about you?"
"I know, I'm an idiot! I fragged up, I wasn't there, and I don't care about this frag-up city! Some crazy chance to save it–I'd only ever want to save you! You're worth more than the world. You made everything make sense, you could take anything with a smile– but not this! I can't bear even thinking what you went through. I can't…I'm so fragging weak."
Susan turned her head. Harry was fighting tears back. So close to his dream girl after so long, he couldn't even look her in the eye.
"…I lost two teams. The Triads chased me over half the world. When I think of losing you…I couldn't even save you. You don't even know–"
Susan's arms fell over him like an adamant ring on a finger. Their wounds ached as they came together; she buried her tears in Harry's neck.
"Then tell me, you idiot. All the frag-ups, all the fear, I'll take them! I could take what that troll did, because of you. Just don't leave, don't go away…just fight with me. I'll frag up, you'll frag up, we could die tonight, but if you're with me that's all I'll ever need! You stupid, selfish, perfect–!"
The kiss was like punch meeting counterpunch. Everything raw and bitter, everything desperate and longing, all threw their lips together. Nothing in them could even try to part; no more fear, no more waiting.
Susan drummed fists on Harry's back, as he sunk his grip in her bum to roll their bodies over. He bore down through her lips. Legs knitted together like grapping, and their tongues were wet flames.
Harry struggled for some room to pull off their chafing armour, but Susan's arms were clinging around him. He realised she was shaking.
"Frag…I'm sorry."
"It's okay. Just hold me. I guess angry sex is too much, now…I was so scared, so long. I just need you to hold me. Please."
Her arms that had killed and saved kept trembling. He kissed the scars across her shoulders. Felt her deep-measured breaths and coursing heart as she clung to him.
"I was so fragging scared, Harry. I was stupid and reckless. I'm sorry."
"You were a hero, Susan. I'm sorry I was stupid and selfish."
"No, Harry. You're my hero. You're the only one who can hold me like this. I know you'll always come to save me."
"I always loved you, babe. I'm sorry I wasn't there."
"I love you too, silly. Don't ever leave."
Harry stroked her hair. Watched Susan's wide, pure smile spread from her tearful eyes. Sparring and fantasies in Redmond. Longings and their stolen night in Hong Kong. After so long dreaming, her hand safe in his…felt like coming home. To a peace like nothing his own life had held. A world of shadows dissolved in her eyes like sunrise.
Harry felt as if his life's experience had all been for this moment. He had to be her perfect hero, her perfect lover…but for his wounded, perfect love, only one thing was enough.
"Susan, please… tell me what you want."
"Well. I can tell what you want, stud…"
She couldn't resist grinding–he had to kiss her. Again. She tasted like heat, felt like strength, as his mouth caught, rolled and stroked her pressing lips. Her breasts pushed heartbeats into his chest, shaking her with joy. He was finally with her. Desire too huge to be even felt simply moved them.
She still felt the weeks of terror under Shavarus. The clawing Halloweeners in Redmond, pulling her back. She had to gaze into Harry's tender eyes, and almost wept. He loved her, whatever she wanted, and she wanted to make love to the man she loved…
"We'll need to take it slow, Harry. Like it's the first time for us both."
-0-
The lights stayed on; they knelt on the bed. Harry watched Susan remove her own armour, gradually. Then her breasts fell from her top, her legs shone bare. Facing his battered, fighting angel on her knees, Harry didn't dare to touch her. Naked, she finally met his gaze.
"Oh, Harry…it's okay. I want you to love me. Thank you …"
They fumbled and sweated off his clothes like teenagers. Gently tasted lips as they reached out. Or gasped against strong shoulders–since Redmond, they had both been strong. Or simply gazed into beloved eyes, with desire for very much more than the half-hour they had left to look.
Susan laughed at the drunken tattoo on Harry's washboard stomach. And at the warmth of the silly, straining thing in her hand, that seemed to move men so much like a rudder. She stroked him, and his little tongue thrilled all her body, playing at the centre of her breast. Her skin felt taunt and fierce, pouring bliss through the channels of their flesh–not the strength to kill, but their power of flowing pleasure that joined their selves. Finally, Susan guided her love's breath-stealing fingers down from their gentle circles on her belly.
"Is this…?"
"Oh…yes. Yes. Right there. Right there, too! Don't you dare stop."
"You can go a bit faster with me, babe. Not that hard…yes. Down the front, just under…oh. Frag, I love you!"
"Just for this? You're such a boy. Ah, yes, yes, oh…feel me! You're messing me up! Also…ah! I love you too."
Then outside, they heard the blast of a Flamestrike. Susan barely shoved Harry behind the bed, and rolled away, as the saferoom door disappeared. An elf stood there, firing a silenced gun.
The bullet cracked the wall above Harry's tousled head. Snatching his handgun, always within reach of his pillow, he fired back. The elf ducked away. Summoning a Mystic Shield as Ilsa, in the corridor outside, threw more firebolts.
Then over sixty kilo of very angry, naked, weeping female Adept rolled from the room and shoulder-charged the elf into the wall. Susan had to be pulled off the Tir agent, or she would've thoroughly killed him.
-0-
"Word of advice, Hotspur? Never switch your comm off while dangerous parties are trying to kill you."
Harry's bad-puppy expression did look cute on him. Susan laced her fingers between his, and patted her boyfriend supportively. Ilsa suspected they would be a very annoying couple.
"Someone always wants to geek us. How did that fragger find us?"
"The Runners left in the bar are talking of hardly anything but our eventful Run. That Mystic Adept assassin was a shadowrunner and Tir agent, disguised as a human–or I would have identified him as soon as he asked about our connection to Saeder Krupp. It was Anya's A.I.-speed search of records and security footage which told us you needed saving. The assassin set up an illusion of your room door, by the way, so he could open the real door without you noticing a thing. As expected of the Tir Ghosts."
"What? Oh, magic stuff. That elf was just lucky my man's got magic fingers–" Susan snuggled and smiled; Ilsa facepalmed, "–or I really would have been angry. Oh, and thanks, Anya!"
"Don't mention it. What else have I got to do here but help you? I'm really glad you're safe, I'm sure you'll be very happy, but I'm just going off to watch old footage of me and Kenji now, and cry a bit with a digital chocolate cake…"
Kenji was Anya's pre-A.I. dead boyfriend, though her thoughts had been much more with her MIA father that day. Orion was out of comms range, presumably still protecting the Colma refugees. Bummer and Lazarus had vanished. Susan had been glad to hear they were safe, though very worried for Hailey, still in a corporate prison.
It was an hour before nightfall. The club floor where they'd assembled was empty and silent. Kali had shut Eclipse down for the duration of the emergency and set up a first-aid station in the foyer. Her Megacorp contacts, however, had yet to commit any response to the reported terrorist occupation of San Francisco's historic Armoury. Those local Runners who might've faced the Ghosts had all been quite canny enough to skip town already.
"So, it's just the three of us?" Harry's eyes were bright and hungry, "Three shadowrunners to save this city. Against a mad troll wizard, the Ghosts of Tir, and probably the fragging Marines. But after all we've faced, the paths we've fought down to reach this–"
"Please, spare us this once." Ilsa raised a hand, "We need to retrieve the paydata from Shavarus that will keep Kali and the Japancorps from having us killed, as well as conceivably inducing them to protect us from the Marines. Otherwise, I would be on the next flight out of San Francisco."
"Also, that's four Runners. Meatboy."
"Alright, alright... actually, you can save me a seat on that plane if you haven't cooked up some counter to that mass-ghostform spell. We can't kill those fraggers if they're invulnerable."
"You expected me to develop a counter for ancient, unbelievably overpowered Tir magic, in a few hours?"
"You didn't try?"
"You would definitely try. Wiz."
Susan grinned at Ilsa. The Heidelberg wizard smiled back at her chummers wearily.
"I have some ideas. In any case, I estimate that we have a couple of hours or less until our opponents finish the ritual. I suggest we leave in ten minutes, after I've called Henry one more time, had Kali deal with that assassin, and made sure her proffered bodyguard isn't another Tir spy. Alles gut?"
"Yeah. All good, Ilsa." Susan stood up, strong and confident as she'd ever been, "Let's finish this run together."
As Ilsa marched away, Harry whispered to Susan that ten minutes was enough time for–
"Harry! Did you notice, we're in the middle of a shadowrun? The biggest Run of our lives! I want you too, but we can have all the sex you want, after this." Susan must've seen in Harry's face just how much that was, since she smacked him. "Easy, tiger! Us, together, does not mean I turn into your mooning Asian babymama!"
"Yeah, I really was worried about that…" Susan smacked Harry's chest again, "…for under a minute. I'm fine with just loving the strongest girl in the world. Shavarus and that dance-fighting elf don't stand a chance."
Susan glanced away, burning. In one leap of decision she reached out and hooked her thumb in Harry's belt. He held her cheek, kissed her, and about a minute was well spent before she could speak. She could feel that a little gunfire hadn't cooled his ardor in the least.
"I suppose I can be your girlfriend for a bit, before we face it all. What should I do with this silly great thing, when we find a bathroom?"
-0-
Even if the Embarcadero hadn't quickly become alive with uniforms, a certain smuggler of 'California hot' BTL chips would still have ducked out of his current assignment as soon he'd seen the shadowrunners. He hid under a boat's tarpaulin, as the headbanded Warrior cut a path through armed orks before his eyes. Then slipped away once the Marines had thinned out, to call his boss in Chinatown.
"…Warrior? Here? Out of all the places in North America, he strolls into the city we've owned for over two hundred years?"
The smuggler sent a video. The moustache of the San Francisco Triad boss bristled like a dragon, and he started making calls. Club Eclipse was presently the hottest safe-hostel for Runners passing through San Francisco, and it was quickly confirmed that Warrior had entered with two women. With Kali's smuggling and Megacorp connections, a direct attack on Eclipse was swiftly vetoed.
"Get the best men we have. Shamans, Mages, snipers. Fill that shitbird with lead, the instant he steps out the door. Our descendants will speak of tonight after another two hundred years. How we avenged so many of our Yellow Lotus allies, and sent Warrior to hell."
-0-
"Why do they hate us this much, Takahashi?"
The Mission district had seen some of the fiercest fighting; tough as Lieutenant Arai was, he was exhausted. After a quick sideways glance, his comrade and lover rested against his shoulderpad.
"You know why they hate us, anata. But I still love this city."
Arai still loved it as well. Imperial Japan had nothing against homosexuality, but he had never seen it celebrated before he'd come to 'Frisco. After years of hard deployment in a barbaric, monster-haunted land–hated, bewildered, wrestling with a forbidden desire for his Warrant Officer–he had drunkenly poured out his troubles to a persuasive rainbow-haired nightclub operator.
Then soft music had come on just as Takahashi had sat next to him. Words had spilt out. The next week, they had gone together to another nightclub Kali had recommended, in the Castro District, and he had learnt that a true warrior must love.
The bodies on the streets of the Mission couldn't obliterate those nights in the Castro. The madness had to end; the Marines would end it. Then keep peace and order as they had come to do, which would be easier with the last of the metas shipped off to Oakland, or the makeshift holding centres outside the city.
As they rested in the battle-scarred Mission District substation, Arai's comlink rang.
"Kali-san? Oihayo goizaimasu. Yes, he is well. What…?"
Kali told him about the plot to cut the city's carotid artery, and let San Francisco bleed out in anarchy and starvation. Metahuman terrorists. No official response. He knew she was reliable.
Less than an hour later, Arai had assembled his unit. Twenty-five battered and battle-tested men and women, who had been fighting all day. But Marines fought day and night, until the job was done.
"Gentlemen. We are going to occupy the San Francisco Armoury, and eliminate any metahuman terrorists that we encounter. I must inform you that we will not be acting on orders from above, but on sudden intelligence of a plot to devastate this city with vile magic. And on our own convictions, that we must slay evil immediately, and protect the innocent people of this city! As at the Ikaeda Inn, where a handful of Shinsengumi saved Kyoto from destruction by fire–we are going to save this city, for the honour of the Imperial Marines!"
Uncertainly or fervently, the marines obeyed their orders. Takahashi joked that the enemy was in Honno-Ji, a reference from a completely different period to the Shinsengumi–he preferred anime to samurai dramas.
"What about the shadowrunners, sir? The team that Kali said were heading for the Armoury?"
"From her description–the Runners from the Mission ambush. We will eliminate them as well, at the first opportunity."