Flakes of dried skin caught under his fingernails. He rubbed his thumb across his finger tips to brush the detritus to the floor.
He stared at the stone, ensnared by its beauty. It was more beautiful now that he owned it. What might not be his once he learned how to make best use of it?
Crawling higher on his arm, the itch became intolerable. Without thinking, he rolled back his sleeve to get at the irritation. When he finally tore his eyes from the stone to examine the source of the prickling sensation, he stared with horror.
The hard, lumpy thing that had been his arm was black and glistening with oozing liquid where it had emerged from the brittle flakes of epidermis. The streaks exposed by his scratching were already hardening to a dull, waxy shine. Two long, hook-taloned appendages replaced his fingers, and a smaller version lay slightly offset in a parody of a thumb.
His stomach churned and he retched. But he didn't scream at the horror that was emerging from his own body. At this new manifestation of the taint. No, he didn't scream. He reached for the telecom with his human arm and opened a circuit to his administrative assistant.
'Get me Soriyama,' he ordered. 'And send in Masamba and Akabo.'
Dodger had never moved so swiftly through the Matrix, nor so easily. The pulse of datalines was brighter, the clarity of icons sharper, and the blackness between all the places and passages of man's creation was darker. The electron skies spread over a horizon as limitless as his imagination. No meat experience could match this transcendental adventure.
Distant messages, falsely urgent, impinged on his joy, but he banished them by turning his eyes to the wonders of cyberspace. This was the freedom and power he had sought for years, the oneness with the Matrix.
And she was with him.
Hart looked into the fixer's face and searched for any clue to deception. She was disappointed. Everything he had said was true, or so he believed. They had worked uncounted shadowruns over the years, and she trusted him as much as she could anyone in her business. She knew of no reason he would deceive her. Worse, she didn't know of any reason that he might be deluded.
'You're sure there are three devices?'
'Three. Four. Five. What does it matter? But, yes, a minimum of three. All multiple-warhead. All conveniently forgotten by a well-paid weapons officer when the Americans left German soil for good.' For a moment the tiny old man seemed wistful, remembering old causes. 'They were the terrorist's El Dorado for decades following reunification. A Barbarossa sleeping beneath the earth until the final reckoning. They were to be the great liberators, destroyers of the bonds that tied the Fatherland's spirit.'
'You claim they're real, then you call them a pipe dream. Make up your mind, Caliban.'
'Oh, they're real enough.'
'But you can't tell me where they are.' He shrugged. 'Deeper pockets than yours have asked, but I'd give it to you, my dear. I'm an old man now. I don't have the strength for it. But I can't sell or give away what I don't have.' He chuckled dryly. 'At least not to you, my brilliant student. Barbarossa will not awaken in my lifetime. Cosimo took the secret of the lost weapons to his grave when Mossad cornered his Fenris faction in Casablanca. His papers were all destroyed in the firestorm. There have been plenty of fakes over the years, but IVe. seen through them all. None ever had the marks.' Hart leaned forward. 'What marks? The wolf?' 'Of course, the wolf. But there were others.' As he described them to her, she remembered what she had seen. Each detail fit. Her doubts had fled well before he finished.
So it was true. All of Caliban's old hints had been true, except for the one that he knew the secret hiding 'place of the weapons. Like most runners in the Eu-jiopean shadow world, she had grown up believing that if Caliban didn't know, no one did. But somewhere, somehow, someone had found Cosimo's legacy. The data Dodger's contact had retrieved from Grandmother's operation had included a map, but the accompanying text hadn't specified the map's purpose. Hart had almost missed the small symbol near Deggendorf. Dodger hadn't recognized the stylized wolf head, but she had. She hadn't wanted to believe the map could be real, but the details Caliban gave her left no room for doubt. Her worst fears were confirmed. Sam had to be told, of course. But beyond him, who?
Sam awoke with a shock. The old Hummer was jolting him as it bumped its way down an embankment. Ahead and to the left were distant mountains, screened occasionally by the buttes of a badlands. The landscape was all dusty greens, multi-toned grays, and dusky purples that were deepening in tone as the sun sank lower in the sky. He wasn't in Denver anymore. The ache in his head and the stiffness in his body told him that he hadn't dreamed his travails in the Ute zone. In flashes, he remembered parts of his escape from the battle. The alley and the ever-louder sirens. The fugitive glimpses of a hunched figure in a scrape. The muck and filth of a trash heap. Strong hands dragging him. An old surplus Hummer stacked with boxes and cans. Shadows, darkness, and light shot through with voices, gunshots, and chanting. Wind and cold, then wind and warmth.
Someone had rescued him and driven him away from danger.
Apparently that same someone had covered him with a cloth that had once been bright with color, but was now stained and filthy. Even though the wind of the Hummer's passage drew most of the scent away, enough remained to tell Sam who had rescued him.
He turned his head to look at the driver. Sure enough, it was the old Indian. The driver's reservation hat was tilted to shade his eyes from the setting sun, casting most of his face in shadow, but there was no mistaking him. Sam squirmed to get a look behind him. The rear of the vehicle was full of supplies. They were alone. ffi amp; mWtM amp;V 3553SS8 amp; ti amp; IbmpanWs notice. 'Hey hey, back in this world for a while?' Sam's attempt to reply in the affirmative came out as a croak.
'Canteen on the floor by your feet.' On the third attempt, Sam convinced his body that it could bend forward and retrieve the canteen. The water was tepid and tasted of minerals, but his parched throat didn't care. He splashed some into one hand and rubbed it on his face, wincing when he touched his scrapes. Nevertheless, he felt better than he expected, or deserved. Well enough to realize that last night's it was just one night, wasn't it? thoughts about the old man had been unduly unkind.
'I guess I owe you some thanks for pulling me out of that mess last night.' 'Yup.'
'Well, thanks.' That seemed the end of the conversation for a time. As the Hummer nearcd a broad river, Sam decided to try again. 'Where are we?' 'Under the sky.'
'Oh.' He had been hoping for something a little more specific. Maybe the old man didn't trust him. Introductions might break the ice. 'I'm not from around here. Mostly, I live in Seattle. Out there, they call me Twist.' 'Yup.'
That was it? Maybe the old man thought Sam already knew who he was. 'You haven't even told me your name.' 'That's right.'
The hummer hit the edge of the river. Muddy drops churned up by the tires splashed against the windscreen. Sam was getting annoyed. 'Well, what should I call you? 'Old man' doesn't seem very polite.' The old man shrugged. 'Description's always po 176
Robert N. Charrette lite, Anglo. If you gotta problem with it, call me Dan-cey.'
'Dancey? As in Dizzy Dancey?' 'That's me.' The Indian threw both hands into the air and bounced in his seat, chanting a few nonsense syllables. His motion sent the Hummer out of control. It swerved under the pressure of the water, then dipped as it struck a pothole. Water splashed up over the sill, wetting Sam's leg with its cold mountain freshness. As Sam recoiled, Dancey returned his hands to the wheel and took control of the Hummer.
In the shadows of Denver Sam had heard about Dizzy Dancey, and none of it had been comforting. The old man had once been a hot shadowrunner who had hosed up badly and been caught by the Navajo Tribal Police. Whatever they were supposed to have done to him had left him slightly out of his head ever since.
The Hummer jounced out of the river and began to crawl up the long sloping embankment. It topped the rise, scattering a pair of small horned animals that ran like jackrabbits. The Hummer then bounced a dozen meters across the grassy prairie and onto me remnants of a road. Dancey started to hum and seemed happier, as though the river had been a boundary beyond which he need not worry. The Hummer picked up speed.
'How'd we get here?' Sam asked. 'And where's 'here' anyway?'
