spec, but ya taught me shadowrunning too good. I want an ace in da hole, a magical ace.'
'I understand the lay of the land, Kham.' She gazed off across the bar. 'But I'm afraid I can't help. I've got something cooking myself.' 'Ya didn't call me.'-'
'Nothing personal, Kham.' She still didn't look at him. 'It's just not your sort of biz.' 'What about my run?'
'Null perspiration, chummer. There's lots of magic children on the streets these days. You can take your pick.' Sure there were magicians out there, but she was the only mage he would trust. Without magical aid, he was left to rely on his orks and their mundane fire-power. Magic might not be common everywhere in the world, but shadowrunners had a tendency to run into it, and that was the possibility that worried him. 'Maybe I only want da best.'
She faced him, a wide, warm smile on her face. 'Ooh, flattery. You tempt me, chummer, but a girl has to honor her commitments and I've already got one. Tell you what, though. Just for old times' sake, I'll run cover for you at the meet.'
'No cost?'
Her smile was sweet. 'I could ask for a percentage, but you're a chummer. Besides, I have to be here anyway.'
Kham's guys arrived in a bunch only half an hour after the time he had told them. Not bad for them: they were only ten minutes behind the time he wanted them there. Punctuality before a run was always a problem with them. Fortunately, that problem disappeared when things got warmer.
They joined him and started drinking. Just beer, nothing to queer the meet. With each round, Kham watched the tab go up, but the job would pay for it, he hoped.
Sally was hanging out at her usual table in the back, screened from most of the noise of the dance floor. It was still early and the crowd was light. Big Tom the sasquatch was doing the warm-up show, all instrumental pieces that he could imitate with amazing facility. The club's real action wouldn't start until later.
A pair of rough boys walked in. They were real hard cases, razorguys with lots of obvious cyberware. Both wore patches from a half-dozen mercenary units, implying that they'd seen action in some of the corporate fracas of the last ten years. One was a blond and the other a brunet, but otherwise they were identical. Cosmetic surgery probably. Something in their body language also made Kham wonder if they were lovers. The razorguys looked around, scanning the place. The blond said something to Jim at the bar and Jim nodded toward the back room. Kham was sure these two weren't the employers, so they had to be other applicants. Was there to be a bidding war for a place on the run?
A dwarf was the next runner Jim sent to the back room. Kham recognized him at once. The dwarf was Greerson, a West Coast heavy-hitter who spent most of his time down in California Free State. His presence definitely meant that others had been contacted about this run, and raised the odds of a bidding war. But any Mr. Johnson who wanted it discreet would be making a mistake to start taking competitive bids. The losers would have word of his run on the streets in nanoseconds.
Kham nodded to Rabo. Time for the guys to go in and show the flag. He hoped Sheila wouldn't let Greerson goad her into causing trouble before Kham was in there to keep her temper cool. There had been trouble between the two of them before.
Kham waited a while longer. He was almost ready to go in himself when another stranger approached Jim. This one was a small Asian, Japanese maybe, who was no taller than the dwarf but slighter by a wide margin. Young, too, for a norm shadowrunner. The Asian had a whispered conversation with Jim, who then sent him on back. Another runner, definitely, but what sort of specialty? Maybe a decker? He sure wasn't big enough for a frontline fighter and he didn't have the look of a magicboy.
'Your Mr. Johnson's an elf,' Sally's voice whispered in Kham's ear a few minutes later as a tall man in a long trench coat approached the bar.
Confident that she would hear, Kham whispered his thanks and rose from his seat. He caught up with the elf before he reached the door to the back room. He didn't surprise him, though, because the elf turned as Kham approached. With a wide, toothy grin Kham said, 'Evening, Mr. Johnson.'
'You're Kham.'
'Right.'
The elf looked over Kham's shoulder. 'You are alone?'
'My guys are waiting inside. Along wit a few other people. I wasn't told dis was a joint venture.'
'You cannot expect to know all the details. I was informed that you were a professional. Professionals understand that secrecy is a necessity of business.'
Kham leaned toward him. 'Professionals expect fair deals, too.'
The elf turned his head to the side as if offended by Kham's smell, but he didn't retreat. 'I am prepared to offer a fair deal. To all. However, I am not prepared to cut separate deals with overly pushy persons of inflated ego. You will hear the deal along with the others, or you will not hear it at all.'
Pulling back and allowing the elf his personal space, Kham said, 'Yer gonna be late fer yer own meet, Mr. J.'
'Perhaps you would care to precede me,' the elf suggested.
Kham shrugged. 'Ain't worried about having you behind my back, Mr. J.' Yet.
Kham opened the door and entered the room. The elven Mr. Johnson followed.
The runners gathered for the meet were a mixed lot, but that was no surprise to Neko. Mr. Enterich had said that this was to be an ad hoc team. He surveyed each runner carefully, trying to assess his or her role and potential value to the team. Many showed obvious cybernetic enhancements and all carried weapons. All the orks, save for one, seemed to be muscle types, too. The odd ork, Rabo, had datajacks in his head and a variety of logo patches on his jacket, most advertising manufacturers of automotive or aeronautic equipment. There seemed little doubt that the ork was a rigger, a vehicular technomancer.
Neko found the preponderance of orks curious, even a trifle unsettling. Until now his contact with runners of that metatype in Hong Kong had been only the most cursory; the less beautiful metahumans were not much welcome in the island's corporate enclaves. It was not that Neko himself felt any distaste; he had dealt with far less savory metatypes in his shadowy business. He watched the orks curiously. Their easy familiarity with one another led him to conclude that they had run together in the past.
The orks named the dwarf for Neko: Greerson. Though they obviously didn't like him, Neko could see that they knew him, possibly had even worked with him in the past. Greerson's name was not unknown to Neko, and he knew that a runner with the dwarf's reputation within the international shadowrunning community would not come cheap. Mentally, Neko raised his own price for any upcoming bargaining; one could not afford to be seen as of less value than one's fellows.
The other two runners were a matched pair of heavily modified norms, 'razorguys,' in common street parlance. One was a blond and the other dark-haired, but the faces beneath their thatches of hair were identical. That need not be natural; Neko thought it more likely that they had chosen to have their features altered to match. Such artificiality would seem to be to their taste. Neko found their reliance on machinery more distasteful than the brutish forms of the orks, and so, like the others, he mostly ignored the razorguys. Such division would not serve on the run, but neither should he be forced to accept unpalatable companions in circumstances unrelated to the biz.
The door opened and admitted a blast of noise from the band starting to warm up in the main room. The sound was muffled briefly as a burly ork squeezed through the doorway. Dressed in leathers and fatigues, the metahuman entered and looked around with an air of casual caution that marked a man who was no stranger to dangerous places. Following hard on the ork's heels was the elven Mr. Johnson who Neko had met briefly upon his arrival in Seattle. The elf's clothes were different now, as were his hair and the fashionable face paint. Despite the superficial differences, the frown that darkened the slimmer metahuman's features when the ork put an arm around his shoulders told Neko that this was the same elf. It was not a lover's embrace, more a possessive statement of control. The elf was clearly discomfited by the contact, but the ork was only amused, to judge by his half-concealed grin.
''Bout time,' Greerson grumbled.
The elf ignored him and shrugged away from contact with the ork. Unfazed by his rejection, the big ork joined the others of his kind, with shoulder-slapping and arm-punching all around. The others addressed him as Kham,
