Runner's Companion.pdf - Free

Simon Wentworth (order #1132857) 9life on the run . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .174of the criminals in here would only be here for thirty-six hoursor less. The high ceiling was studded with cameras, gun-turrets,and chemical sprayers. Drones stood on a catwalk, watching themetahuman scum below. No doubt other sensors watched themas well, gauging body-temperatures, listening to conversations,scanning for any sign of violence or disobedience. If things hadgone as planned, Raimee was in the system by now, hidden fromthe spiders by her particular technomancer abilities, watching himthrough the myriad cameras. If she wasn’t… Well, he was in now.Only choice was to go ahead with the plan and trust the rest of histeam to do their job.Horse began circulating through the room, talking to theother criminals, subtly manipulating the other men. Most of thetime, his talents were directed to leading his team, negotiating withfixers to get a better cut, digging up intel, or doing the occasionalmisdirection or con at a social gathering. This was difficult work,the kind of work that challenged every bit of Talent in him.Just casual comments. Cops suck. Bastard PD screwed me over.Ten drones with tazers keeping three hundred men down? Bullshit,man. Fucking cops are too pansy-assed to even come in here. Bet wecould show them.And to a few, a few men he judged were either stupidly viciousor already strung out with fear-tinged withdrawal, he bumped itup. Heard the cops been selling the SINless brothers off to the ghouls.Heard the corp-boys need some bitches for their labs and the copsagreed to supply them. Heard Tamanous’ goons be comin’ in to picksome choice bastards for their body shops. Heard the cops be gettingsome good nuyen today.After a few hours, the room was a riot of whispers. Horsecould practically smell the fear, anger, and violence building. Itwould take only a slight nudge to get the crowd to erupt in flames.He looked up at the catwalk, at the thick steel doors at each corner.If he’d judged the time right, the tour would be coming out in thenext few minutes. The impassive drones continued to watch andwait, not clueing into the key words they’d been programmed torecognize. He prayed to Coyote that meant Raimee was up there,watching him, ready to do her part. If the chemical sprayers hadn’tbeen disabled, the riot wouldn’t last more than a few seconds. Ifthey had…The steel door swung open on the catwalk. A group of suitedmen and women came out, escorted by heavily armed Lone Starofficers.It was show time.STICKS (BOUNTY HUNTER)Sticks leaned up against the grimy downtown building, tryingto squeeze into the small overhang and avoid the stinging acidrain. Water dripped off the brim of his ball cap and seeped througha tear in his supposedly water-proofed London Fog knock-off.Pedestrians were hurrying along the sidewalks with heads downand shoulders hunched against the rain. A few struggled withumbrellas, obvious out-of-towners—no true Seattleite would becaught dead with an umbrella, acid rain be damned.He’d been out here for over an hour. A bit desperate for rentmoney, he’d pulled up Lone Star’s list of outstandings this morning,and recognized one name of the bunch. Kettlemyer. Rat-bastard ofa dealer and tempo junky. Sticks had hauled him in twice before,and knew that eventually, Kettlemyer would show up for the shopperscrowded on the Renraku Plaza outside the ACHE malls. Hedid too good a business with the bored housespouses and overweightcorporate wageslaves to skip a day—which was probablywhy he hadn’t shown up for his court time and was now FTA (orFailure to Appear, in cop-speak). The 1k bounty would go a longway towards placating Stick’s landlord.While Sticks waited, he had his facial-recognition softwarescanning the visuals from the sensor feeds of his AR glasses. Inanother screen, he had a real-time job search agent running onJackpoint. And on a third screen, the agent he’d picked up fromBandit was scanning the police frequencies. Things were hoppingin Seattle. The police squawker put out a code red, broadcasting:Riot at Downtown detention center. All available units respond. Hesaw the few uniforms in the Renraku plaza clear out suddenly,motorcycles lit up with AR sirens. Well, this was perfect. Everydealer in downtown would be out on the streets now. Kettlemyerwas sure to show up.After another thirty minutes, he was as wet as humanly possibleand had a fairly urgent need to pee. He was debating thelikelihood that Kettlemyer would appear if he took a ten-minutebreak when someone settled against the wall beside him.“Sticks, how surprising,” the cop said, laughing at him. Lt.Laine James was a perennially cheerful woman with a liberalamount of freckles and unruly red hair. In her snappy blue uniform,Runner’s Companion