Poison Agendas Page 8

  I hope you make the score. I really liked you, Kellan, and I know you can make it. You’re a kick-ass shadowrunner.

  Squeak

  Kellan felt a chill as she read the message and glanced up at the window of the apartment where Squeak lay dead. The warez dood's feelings were right on the money. She looked back at the phone's display. What if this was more than just another random act of Barrens violence? What if someone else knew about Squeak's data and, unlike Jackie, believed it would lead to a big payoff? They might have killed Squeak in order to get his files—or to make sure he didn't give them to anyone else.

  Did they find the data? The place certainly was torn up, but a tech-head like Squeak wouldn't leave paydata just lying around. He would have stored it somewhere safe, in some online hidey-hole that no one else could find.

  She watched the icon flash on the phone's display screen for a moment before thumbing the read key to download the files. The phone buzzed to indicate they were stored in its removable memory. Then Kellan snapped the phone closed and put it back in her jacket pocket. She suddenly felt sure of it: somebody thought Squeak's data was valuable enough that they needed to kill him to keep it quiet.

  Squeak thought Kellan had what it took to follow the mystery through to the end. She thought, This isn't over. I am going to see it through. She kicked over the Rapier's engine. There was work to do.

  Chapter 8

  Kellan had never recruited shadowrunners entirely on her own. Back in Kansas City, the shadow community was small enough that you knew everyone worth knowing, and word of potential work spread quickly. Informal teams assembled as needed, and many of them became pretty tight-knit. When she was learning the ropes of the shadow biz, Kellan was never involved in putting teams together—she just wanted to make sure they included her. Since her arrival in Seattle, Kellan got her jobs from movers and shakers like G-Dogg and Lothan. The one time she'd put together a team, she'd gotten her contacts from G-Dogg, whose mind was an inexhaustible database of names and places. Kellan was counting on that knowledge now.

  G-Dogg answered his phone on the second ring. "Talk to me." he said.

  "Hey, G-Dogg."

  "Hey, Kellan, 'sup?"

  "I need a little help."

  "Sure thing. What do you need?" G-Dogg asked.

  "Some names." Kellan replied. There was a long pause on the other end of the line.

  "You're not still looking to put together that run you told us about, are you?" G-Dogg asked.

  Kellan had expected this reaction. "Look, G-Dogg, if you don't want to help—"

  "Hey, chill!" the ork protested. "I didn't say that. I just want to know if you're still set on doing this run, that's all."

  "I'm doing it," Kellan said firmly, "and I need some talent."

  G-Dogg sighed. "There's no way I can talk you out of this?"

  "No. Look, G-Dogg, I need to do this, okay? I'd like your help. I'm not asking you to buy into the run. I just need some names."

  The ork sighed again. "Most runners I'm willing to work with aren't going to be interested in a run like this." he began.

  "But I bet you know some that might be." Kellan concluded.

  "Yeah, a couple."

  "Put me in touch with them. After that, you're out of it, G-Dogg, I swear." When the ork hesitated, she went on. "If you can't help me, that's cool. I'll post the job on Shadowland, and ask around a few other places."

  "Okay, okay, I want to help." G-Dogg said. "I know a few runners who will take on high-risk jobs, especially if the run has the potential for a big payoff."

  "This run has got a lot of potential."

  "And a lot of risk. But hey, that's for them to decide. I'm sending you the contact info now." A moment later Kellan's phone beeped to indicate G-Dogg's incoming download. She stored the virtual business cards in the phone's memory.

  "Just remember, Kellan." the ork bouncer warned her. "These guys aren't like the runners you've worked with before. They're willing to take risks either because they're desperate or because they like it, for one reason or another. Runners worth working with don't take unnecessary risks." He left the remainder of the criticism unspoken, but the message was clear: which category did Kellan want to fit into?

  "Thanks." she said dryly. "I promise I'll be careful. I owe you one, G."

  "Yeah." he said. "Buy me a drink and tell me all about it when it's over, and we'll consider it even, okay?" He paused. "Good luck, kid." he said, then he hung up.

  Kellan looked at the information she'd downloaded to her phone. G-Dogg had given her a depressingly short list, but on the bright side, it wouldn't take her long to make the calls. Plus, she had a few resources of her own she could tap. She highlighted the first name on the list and hit call.

  It didn't take Kellan long to work her way through G-Dogg's list. Within ten minutes she'd set up a couple of meets, been turned down by a couple of potentials, and left messages for the rest.

  Still buzzing on the adrenaline from her adventure in the Barrens, Kellan knew she'd go stir-crazy if she just sat around and waited for the phone to ring, so she grabbed her jacket and headed out. Like most shadowrunners, she'd adopted a largely nocturnal lifestyle, sleeping late and staying up later. Business was best done in the dark, and nighttime was when Seattle's shadows really came to life.

  Business at Underworld 93 was starting to heat up when she arrived. The club was housed in a renovated industrial warehouse, a massive two-story block of ferrocrete with windows covered in heavy metal mesh. Neolux letters a meter high spelled out its name across the marquee, and as usual, a line of hopeful club-goers stretched out the door and around the block. Kellan pulled her bike into the alley, parking it alongside the others already there.

  The Underworld was the first nightspot Kellan had visited when she arrived in Seattle. She smiled to herself when she thought about how different things were then. Then she had been a complete newbie, taking a Grid-Cab to the club and bluffing her way past the bouncer looking for G-Dogg, whom she'd heard was a potential contact. Little had she known the bouncer at the door was G-Dogg, and that he didn't know her from a hole in the wall. If it hadn't been for an unwanted altercation with some troll gangers, the Spikes, Kellan might never have gotten G-Dogg's attention—or discovered her magical abilities, for that matter. She'd cast her first spell that night, turning one of the trolls into a metahuman torch. It earned her an introduction to Lothan and to the Seattle shadows.

  After that, Underworld 93 became a familiar haunt for Kellan, since it was fairly close to where she lived in Puyallup and one of the hottest nightspots in the metroplex. G-Dogg worked there on a regular basis, but Kellan knew tonight the ork bouncer was elsewhere, which suited her just fine. She really wasn't in the mood to face any of her current shadowrunning associates.

  With a smile and a subtle donation of nuyen to the bouncer working the door, Kellan slipped past the line to enter the Underworld. As always, the club had a live act on stage and people crowded on the dance floor. Kellan wended her way through the crush to reach the bar running along the back wall.

  "Hey, Leif." she greeted the elven bartender. He was tall and blond, and he flashed Kellan a smile as she approached.

  "Hey, Kellan, zappinin'?"

  "Same ol'." she replied and the elf nodded sagely.

  "Usual?" he asked, and Kellan nodded. The elf popped the top on a bottle of beer and slid it across the counter to her. Kellan slotted her credstick into the bar's payport and it automatically deducted the price of the drink. She added a tip before removing her credstick and pocketing it again. Then she rocked back on one of the barstools, sipped her drink, watched the crowd and listened to the band get ready for their show.

  They played a good set. Their style of Celtic fusion metal wasn't usually to Kellan's taste, but the lead singer boasted great vocals and the compelling stage presence typical of an elf. Their synth player was also excellent. He was plugged directly into the instrument, and played it using the neural interface. H
e achieved much finer control of the instrument than any player could achieve with his hands, and his skill boosted the band's performance way above the ordinary.

  The band was breaking down after their set, and Kellan was still at the bar nursing her second beer when a beautiful woman emerged from the crowd and leaned into the bar near her. She was an elf, with the striking features of her race: high cheekbones, almond-shaped eyes and delicately pointed ears. Her skin was fair, pale in contrast to her raven-black hair, which was pulled tightly into a ponytail at the nape of her neck, highlighting her ears and graceful, upswept brows. She wore black leather pants that fit her like a glove, a silvery button-down shirt under a short leather jacket, and slim black boots with pointed toes.

  She spoke briefly with Leif, who poured her a drink. After she paid for it, she turned to look at Kellan, then moved down the bar toward her.

  "Hello. . . . Kellan, isn't it?" she asked.

  Kellan was surprised the woman knew her name, but she saw no reason to deny it. She nodded.

  "I'm called Midnight." the elf said. "I've actually been hoping to meet you." she continued. "I've heard good things about you. And I heard through contacts earlier tonight that you're putting together a run." She paused, and looked at Kellan more closely, a curious expression on her face. "More importantly, though, I think I may have known your mother."

  "What?" Kellan asked, her cool, professional demeanor momentarily forgotten. "How? When?"

  "Let's talk, shall we?" Midnight invited. She gestured toward the tables off to the side of the dance floor, allowing Kellan to lead the way. She seemed completely unaware of the admiring looks her catlike grace drew on the way.

  As they slid into chairs on opposite sides of the table, Midnight studied Kellan closely, sitting back comfortably in her chair and crossing one shapely leg over the other.

  "So, you knew my mother?" Kellan asked, barely managing to control her curiosity.

  "Well, I'm not certain, of course." Midnight said. "It's just that I knew a woman who looked quite a bit like you, and you seem the right age to be her daughter, if she had one. She was my mentor when I first started working in the shadows, and she wore a necklace just like yours."

  Kellan's hand went to the amulet she wore on a chain around her neck. It was made of green jade, carved in a simple yet intricately detailed design of a dragon coiled into a circle. It had arrived at her aunt's house in Kansas City in a package along with a few other items and a note that said, This stuff belonged to your mother. Thought you might want it. The package had no return address, but it did have a Seattle postmark. She didn't remember her mother at all, and she had come to the metroplex hoping to track down the sender, and maybe find out what became of her mother.

  "You're sure?" she asked, and Midnight nodded.

  "Absolutely." she said. "That amulet is quite unique. The woman I knew had one just like it, and I doubt there are two of them."

  Kellan could hardly believe her luck. After months of searching and finding nothing, someone who knew her mother had turned up looking for work!

  "It was my mother's." she told Midnight. "I mean ... I was told it was my mother's. I never knew her."

  "Oh. Well, truthfully, I didn't know she had a kid, assuming it's the same woman."

  "Tell me about her." Kellan suddenly realized how intense she sounded. "Um, that is, if you wouldn't mind."

  "Of course not." Midnight gave her a dazzling smile. She took a sip of her drink, set it back down on the table, then folded her hands beside it.

  "It's been nearly twenty years since I came to Seattle from Tir Tairngire." She pronounced the name of the elven nation south of Seattle with an exotic lilt in her voice. "I think I was probably about your age. I wanted to work in the shadows, but I didn't know a thing about life in the metroplex or the shadows. I had the great good fortune of hooking up almost immediately with a woman called Mustang. She was a shadowrunner with a good reputation who was willing to work with a newbie and show her the ropes.

  "She taught me so much. We worked together for a couple of years, and I learned how to run the shadows like a pro. Then, one day, she disappeared."

  "So you don't know what happened to her?"

  Midnight shook her head. "I never found out. I actually was hoping you might know. I didn't even know Mustang had a daughter, though you must have been born after I met her."

  "How did you find out about me?" Kellan asked.

  Midnight smiled. "I still do a lot of work in the shadows." she said. "Particularly finding things people want to have, or want to know about. Simon Brickman wanted to know about you."

  "Brickman. . . Kellan recognized the name of the company man working for Knight Errant Security Services who had hired Lothan's team for Kellan's first shadowrun in Seattle. It turned out Brickman planned the run simply as cover for a scheme to funnel weapons made by Knight Errant's parent company, Ares Macrotechnology, to Seattle gangs. Kellan had put a kink in that plan. She gave Midnight a wary look.

  "Don't worry!" she told Kellan. "I told him there wasn't anything to find, really, that you were just a kid who got lucky. I recognized your amulet, you see, and I wanted to talk to you in person."

  "Why didn't you get in touch before this?"

  "Business." Midnight said simply. "Other work came along after I finished the job for Brickman, and I didn't have a chance to follow up. Also, I tried to find out more about what happened to Mustang before I got in touch with you, so that I'd have something more concrete to tell you, but I'm sorry to say I wasn't able to turn up anything else."

  Kellan opened her mouth to respond, then closed it again. She wasn't sure what she felt. She realized that it had been so many months since she'd followed any solid leads on her mother or the origin of the mysterious package she'd received that there was a part of her that had started to give up hope. Now when she finally met someone who actually might have known her mother, that hope had been instantly renewed—then crushed again when it became clear that Midnight didn't know anything more about her mother's fate than did Kellan.

  "How frustrating for you." Midnight said, echoing her thoughts. "I wish there was more I could tell you."

  "It's okay." Kellan replied, shaking her head. "I found out more tonight than I've managed to discover the whole time I've been in Seattle. . . . So, you say I look like her?"

  "Oh, there's a definite resemblance." Midnight replied with a smile. "You've got her hair, her eyes, her chin."

  "What was she like?"

  The elven woman thought for a moment, searching for the right words. "Forceful." she said. "Dynamic, smart, talented and savvy. She was good—one of the best."

  "Talented. . . Kellan repeated. "Was she a magician?"

  Midnight frowned slightly and shook her head. "Not that I know of, why?"

  "Oh." was all Kellan said. She had assumed that since her mother's amulet was magical, and Kellan had the Talent, her mother must have been a magician, too. Midnight's reaction to that suggestion meant her mother must have been mundane. Or maybe her mother's talent had been latent and had never awakened. Or maybe her Talent came from her father. . . .

  Kellan noticed that Midnight was looking at something behind her just as a looming shadow fell across the table.

  "Lothan." Kellan said, looking up at the troll mage. He stood within arm's reach of the table. Kellan kicked herself for sitting with her back to the crowd.

  Midnight had maneuvered to take the seat against the wall of the club without her noticing. Otherwise, she would have seen Lothan approach. Now she felt at a disadvantage.

  "Kellan. Interesting company you're keeping these days."

  "Lothan, always a pleasure to see you, too." Midnight said, though her smile said all of the pleasure came from the fact that her presence annoyed Lothan.

  Does Lothan know everyone? Kellan wondered, watching the exchange. Of course, the old troll had been in the shadow biz longer than anyone else Kellan knew—longer, in fact, than most of the other s
hadowrunners she knew had been alive. Still, it was an interesting coincidence, Lothan showing up here and now. If it was a coincidence.

  "I'd introduce you," Kellan said to Lothan, "but it seems like you already—"

  "Know each other?" Midnight interjected. "Oh, yes. Everyone knows Lothan, of course. His reputation precedes him."

  "The same might be said of you." Lothan told Midnight.

  "I prefer to keep a lower profile." the elf said. "Not that it's difficult, by comparison."

  "No doubt. Kellan, might I have a word with you?" Lothan asked.

  Just at that moment, Kellan felt the vibration of her phone ringing.

  "Hang on." she said, pulling it from the pocket of her jacket. "Hello?"

  "Kellan, what's this I hear about you following up on the run?" Jackie Ozone's voice sounded concerned. Frag, word gets around fast. Kellan wondered if G-Dogg had said something to Jackie. On the other hand, finding things out was what Jackie did best.

  "I can't really talk right now." Kellan said in a neutral tone, glancing at Midnight and Lothan. The elf got to her feet, slipping a slim hand over Lothan's massive arm and giving a winning smile.

  "Let's give Kellan some privacy, shall we? We can catch up on old times." she said, just loud enough for Kellan to hear, then guided Lothan away from the table.

  * * *

  "What kind of game do you think you're playing at, Midnight?" Lothan demanded as soon as they were a few steps away from the table and out of earshot.

  "I could ask you the same thing, Lothan." she replied, raising her dark eyebrows in a question. "Imagine my surprise, after making arrangements with you to buy information about certain trinkets that might cross your path, to stumble across the amulet hanging around that girl's neck."

  "What do you want with it?"

  "As I told you when we made our deal, that's my business."