[SHADOWRUN: BROCKTON BAY]
1.4 TOIL and TROUBLE
"Dip her again!"
Gurgling, I flailed as I tried to fight off Sophia's grip on my scalp and shoulder, but her leverage and strength were too much to overcome and she forced my head down into the toilet again. She pinned me there, and through the water I could hear Emma and Madison laughing at her antics.
I don't have to put up with this.
Suddenly, I was on fire, and Sophia screamed, reeling back as the flaming aura burned her skin. I rose to my feet, the flames evaporating the toilet water, and I turned about to face the three of them. In the mirror, beyond their terrified faces, I was a visage of power and fury, the flames licking at the air around me, some of the tongues forming wing-like shapes from my back, and a pair of spectral horns jutting from my forehead. They tried to flee, only to be plucked from the ground and held just a few inches above it by an unseen force, their feet flailing uselessly. A crown of fire manifested above my head, pitch blubbing from my eyes and mouth as I forced them to look upon me. I drew Emma closer, bring her face to face with me, my hand around her slender neck, wracking them all with pain and suffering for all they had done, and their flesh began to melt…
I stood over ash and bone, staring into what remained of Emma, Madison, and Sophia. I breathed in the scent, remembering their faces… and I shuddered.
The school had faded away, leaving me standing in an endless desert of barren land, the sky above overcast. I looked up, the flames fading with the remains of my tormentors, scattered to the wind, and beheld the Adversary. She still mimicked my form, looking at me with some bemusement.
"Don't mean to interrupt you, dear, but I wanted to talk," she said. I flushed.
I'm better than that. They're beneath me.
"I'm sure, Taylor, but we all need hobbies," she said good-naturedly. "You need to stop repressing, though, I mean
really. It's just not healthy." Her face turned serious. "And neither is picking fights with random thugs in Stuffer Shacks. Baiting pickpockets and muggers was one thing, but are you really looking to end up with a bullet in your face in some run down convenience store?"
"I had them handled!" I said indignantly.
The Adversary seemed unimpressed.
"Well, you and that Imp girl – you'll find out when you wake up, I'm sure, I
love the name though – managed to get lucky, yes," she retorted. "But playing vigilante isn't going to get you anywhere, Taylor."
"But…" I hesitated. "I couldn't just
stand there."
"Why not?" The Adversary seemed genuinely curious. "It didn't involve you. You could have just stayed out of the whole thing and gone about your business."
"Because…" I pursed my lips. "Nobody ever helped me. Nobody at Winslow. This world's so ass-backwards and fragged up because nobody does anything! They just expect things to get better… I expected things to get better. For someone to save me. And they never did. And I'm better than that."
"So… your pride, then? Pride's well and good, Taylor. It drives you to excel, fuels ambition, but it won't do any good if you're dead," she chided gently. "And you're right. Most mortals are complacent to duck and hide, and you're surely not like them. You know the world only makes sense when you force it to. But you should be more careful where you apply your strength. You have potential to make a real impact, but sticking your neck out on the chopping block won't accomplish anything. What nearly happened to Brandeen is distasteful, to be sure, but it's not something of real consequence or rarity. Countless people have starved and died during this very conversation, women and children raped, lands defiled, lives destroyed… and you nearly got your head blown off over two little lives."
I shuffled me feet, an uncomfortable feeling in my chest.
"…maybe I'm just being a worrywart. You did turn out mostly fine, even if you nearly gave yourself an aneurism with all that spell slinging. And you've uncovered an opportunity through your meddling."
"Huh?"
"Imp, dear, the comely ork. She's not ordinary street trash. And whatever Brandeen's involved in, it's enough for someone to hire those four to find her and kill her. This could be the just what you need." She clasped her hands together, a devious gleam in her eyes. "You're still injured, but you'll awaken soon. You can either go home with tonight's bounty and be done with it, or you can go deeper still and find a way to exploit the situation."
I nodded, thinking. The Adversary wasn't a fan of altruism, helping others for its own sake, something we'd discussed before, and it'd been a more enlightening discussion than I'd expected. Part of it was just self-interest… but also how so much of the world, and the way it worked, was just a zero sum game. People had to fight for what they could get, or settle for what they were given. Sacrifices had to be made to get anywhere. For every person who succeeds, another person is left behind. For every life, there must be…
"I killed those men," I whispered, the blood draining from my face. Distantly, I could hear the snapping of bone, and the stench of blood and guts invading my nose. I staggered, my breathing labored, and the Adversary steadied me. "I… I saved Brandeen and her baby… but I killed those men…"
"You did, after a fashion," the Adversary agreed. She held me, resting my head against her shoulder as she rubbed my back. "You may have not done it
directly, but their deaths are at your hands." She pulled away, taking hold of my chin and forcing me to look into her eyes. "But Taylor… they were going to kill her. There was going to be blood. Maybe just Brandeen and the infant, maybe everyone in that store to remove any witnesses. But you made a choice and took control. You changed the outcome… what other choice would you have made? As you said, you couldn't stand by and watch. Sometimes there's no other choice but to… remove the problem."
I swallowed.
"I only meant to stun them," I said. "Just knock them out so she could get away… but then the shaman summoned that boar, and I was already feeling the drain," I went on. "It… I knew what might happen… the boar could have just left, but…"
"You only have so much control," said the Adversary. "So much power, now. But Taylor, you will grow more powerful. You'll have more options, more control. I can guarantee that."
Taking a breath, I nodded and pulled away, wrapping my arms around myself. She was right – I was in a corner tonight, a clusterfrag beyond anything I'd expected. They were the ones who brought the guns, the ones who tried to savage me with a rabid boar spirit, and the ones who tried to kill an elf and her baby in a Stuffer Shack.
"How close was I to dying, tonight, really? Just from the drain," I asked. I faintly tasted the copper on my lips. The Adversary sighed.
"Closer than I'd like," she said, hands on her hips. "Your power is growing, Taylor, and in some ways it's growing faster than your ability to handle it. Learning to channel more and more mana is fairly simple at this stage, but learning how to do it without incurring as much drain is more of a challenge. You're not quite ready for the higher mysteries, and you've honed your mind to nearly its highest potential."
"So… what are my options?"
"In the long term, we can talk about initiation and metamagic. In the short term? Try to be more conservative with the force of your spells," advised the Adversary. She looked me up and down, a coy smile gracing her face. "Alternatively, we could come to an… arrangement."
"What kind of arrangement?" I asked, the hairs on my neck standing up.
"When it comes to drain, two in particular come to mind," said the Adversary, looking at me appraisingly. "One, you can agree to wear my mask when you cast your spells. As you channel mana and perform magic, certain features will manifest, showing you are one of mine. As you grow more skilled in sorcery, you'll have an easier time casting with subtlety, but stronger spells become more and more obvious in your visage. Obviously throwing around fireballs and putting up barriers isn't exactly subtle in the first place, but it can make things awkward if you were trying to influence a lesser mind or create an illusion. In exchange, the drain for the spells will be lessened, as the energy bleeds off into the mask."
"Okay, so I get a little flashier with my spells but dealing with the drain is a bit easier. What's the other option?" I asked.
"We share the load, essentially," she replied, sauntering toward me. "We will be joined, spiritually, and I will take some of the load of the drain for you. In exchange I will partake of, well…
you." She was standing a lot closer now, her voice becoming husky.
"What, um…" I babbled, feeling flush. "What exactly do you mean by that?"
"Taylor, something that makes you mortals so special is your capacity for growth and change. Spirits, even ones like me, are very set in their ways. Essentially, I would feed off of that capacity. As you struggle and triumph in life, you have a pool of energy within you. A spiritual energy." She caressed my face, her touch warm. "This energy solidifies itself as you grow as a person, growing in skill and power. By agreeing to this, I benefit from that energy. There are similar pacts to what I'm talking about, to our mutual benefit, but this particular one would be best for dealing with your drain problem."
"Are you talking about my soul?" I asked, incredulous, stepping back. "You can actually do that?"
"Well, not quite your
soul," she said. "You can always get more of it, too. It's just a simple exchange. What I'm talking about is of mutual benefit, not simple parasitism."
"Well, the way you described it, I'm not going to get any stronger if you're eating my ability to grow," I retorted. Chuckling, the Adversary put an arm over my shoulder as we walked across the landscape.
"That's true, Taylor, and fortunately for you this kind of pact is effective on a case by case basis. If you used it all the time, yes, you would remain rather stagnant, but you don't
have to use it all the time. It's just an option. And a good one, if you're in a tight spot."
"I'll… think about it. And the mask."
"That is wise. No need to jump into anything half-cocked," agree the Adversary. "Even if there are lovely elven maidens involved," she said pointedly. "I'm sure she's very grateful."
"It's not like that," I sputtered, flushing again. "I'm not even into girls!"
"And she's a woman, so it works out! You really need to indulge in life's little pleasures, Taylor. It'll be easier if you don't write off half the world's population. Anyway, time to go. Ta-ta!"
And then a storm of dust rolled over us, and everything faded away.
[SHADOWRUN: BROCKTON BAY]
I awoke with my head in pieces. Screwing my eyes shut, I groaned, trying to sit up. My body took exception to that, burning pain erupting in my torso. My chest and ribs felt like they'd gone ten rounds with Neil the Ork Barbarian. I fell back into the bed, and the lumpy mattress wasn't doing me any favors. It smelled musty, with a musk of cheap perfume and sweat. Somewhere, muffled, I could hear voices.
Lightning ran through me, and I bolted upright, eyes open, grimacing again from the pain. In the darkness, I could see a bit of light coming from under a door, just enough to see by. Looking around, I was in what could generously be called a bedroom – a tiny thing, with the bed taking up half the space, the other half being a few square feet of shag carpeting, and a sink, mirror, and toilet built into the wall. A bassinet was mounted there as well, empty. I found my glasses and other bits set on a little shelf above the bed (more of a cot, really), and slipped them on, also grabbing my cell phone. Its battery wasn't quite dead, and the time read just past 5 AM. I sighed in relief. My dad should have left for work already, and he hadn't taken to waking me up as he left. The absence of panicked text messages and missed calls put me at ease.
Or, it would have, if I had any idea where I was.
Looking down at myself, I realized someone had taken off my hoodie and armor vest, leaving just an undershirt. With a word, the lights flickered on and I winced as I peeled the shirt off.
My entire left side was a giant, angry bruise, crashing into another bruise on my chest where I'd been…
Where I'd been shot.
I'd been shot. With bullets.
My vision swam as I stumbled back from the mirror, landing back on the bed as I tried to keep my breathing under control.
"Oh… oh frag…."
If it'd been just a few inches
higher, I would've been in the god damned morgue.
My ribs felt like hot coals under my flesh, and I gingerly stood up again, fighting down a wave of nausea. I leaned against the sink and centered myself. Careful breaths. Slowly, my body came back under my control.
Now what?
I put my shirt back on, then the armor vest and hoodie. The respirator and the Ares Predator were among the pile – safety off, fully loaded. Ugh. Lacking a proper holster, I flicked the safety back on, I ejected the magazine, removed the round from the chamber, reinserted the round into the magazine, inserted
that back into the gun, and proceeded to ignore all those lessons on basic gun safety my parents had drilled into my head years ago and stuffed it down my waistband at the small of my back hoping I didn't shoot off what little ass I had. I definitely had to look into getting a proper holster and a jacket or something down the line.
I looked at the respirator in my hands, wondering if I should put it on, before deciding to just put it in the kangaroo pocket of my hoodie. Wherever I was, they'd obviously seen my face already. I turned my attention to the tiny bedroom's door and steeled myself.
It came open easily enough, revealing a small kitchen-slash-den area. As far as economy apartments went, it was all actually really nice, tastefully decorated. Sitting on the couch across from a retro, 2D style television screen were three sleeping figures. Imp was sprawled out gracelessly on one side, arms and legs hanging off the couch and feet resting on the coffee table, snoring without a care, her obnoxiously generous chest rising and falling gently. On the other side Brandeen was sitting with the baby in her arms, looking far less frazzled but still exhausted. And she was looking at me, brilliant blue eyes wide. Oh.
"Um. Hi. Thanks for letting me use your room?" I rubbed the back of my head. "Are you okay?"
She stared at me a moment longer, before snorting, then bursting into a fit of giggles.
"I… holy drek, yeah, I'm good, hon. I'm not the one who threw around street trash and tanked a ghost pig," she said as she caught her breath. "Glad you're awake, we were a little worried after that beating you took." The baby stirred as she stood up. "Have a seat, you hungry? I make a decent soy omelet."
"I really should be getting …" My stomach roared, interrupting. "…home. Actually, that sounds great."
Brandeen put the baby (Cody, as she introduced him with a sleepy wave of his hand) into his bassinet in the room before busying herself in the kitchen while I sank into the couch, letting my brain adjust to things as I faced my eyeballs in the general direction of the television without really watching it. It was on Brockton Bay's local news channel, and thankfully I didn't see my face plastered in the corner saying I was wanted by Lone Star. Instead it was a story about the recent surge in cults heralding Halley's Comet, which they'd been talking about for a few weeks already.
"Freakshow, do you like your eggs spicy or cheesy?" Brandeen asked. It took me a moment to realize she was talking to me – where the hell had
Freakshow even come from?
"Uh, both?"
"Wiz."
Beside me, Imp came awake at the smell of cooking soy eggs, and let out a mighty yawn as she stretched on the couch, joints and vertebrae popping.
"Mornin' Freakshow! I knew you'd be alright, you're way too much of a badass to let that shit put you down long. Just needed a nap," she said, grinning with a punch to my arm. It was a surprisingly light love-tap, but I flinched away on pure reflex. "Oh, drek, still tender?"
"I'll make it," I said. I looked at her appraisingly, brow furrowed. "I remember you carrying us out of there and things got… fuzzy. How'd we get away from the boar?"
"I'm a fast runner!" was Imp's reply. I stared at her. "Okay, I'm a fast runner with superpowers."
"Like an adept?" I asked, turning toward her. I hadn't met anyone else Awakened, and while physical adepts were totally different in application from magicians… well, it was still really cool!
"Nah, more like some weird ass ninja," she said. "Basically I can… well it's not invisibility, I still show up on cameras and drek. It's more like some smoke bomb or something on people's brains. When I let it go people just stop paying attention to me. Far away they just don't see me. If I do it right in someone's face though, it'll jack up their memory too, and they won't remember what was going on."
"That's… whoa."
Imp grinned.
"Whoa is right, chummer. I can just roll up wherever and clean places out, pick pockets. Sometimes I just like screwing with people, pop up outta nowhere and they go nuts. Funny ass drek. Hell, this one time I just walked past this stuck up dandelion eater –" In the kitchen, Brandeen looked over her shoulder with a moue on her face. Imp's smirk told me everything – "hostess at one of those fancy pants elf restaurants. Found a couple suits having lunch and talkin' biz. No idea what they ordered but it was pretty good. Funny as hell too when they started talking about how unfilling it was."
"You're kidding," I said, disbelieving. I mean, after what she'd said I could see it, but…
"Nope, honest truth. 'Course, then their security dudes saw what I was doing on camera and they came looking for me to chase me out. Passed by the table three times before they started talking to one of the guy's working the cameras and he just started swinging a shock baton at me, by then I made a run for it."
"Huh. You're awfully open about this," I said, skeptical. One thing parahumans and mages often had in common was how they were usually secretive about the specifics of their powers.
"Now where did… Freakshow, you like cheesy or spicy?" asked Brandeen from the kitchen.
"Uh, both, I guess," I answered. I leaned back into the couch, trying to figure out my next move. Hungry as I was, I wasn't going to turn down Brandeen's offer of food, and after all that insanity at the Stuffer Shack I wanted to know a bit more about what was going on… the Adversary had been right, whatever Brandeen was into, it had to be big.
And then there was an ork eating an omelet on the other side of the couch, and I sprung away on reflex, reaching for my pistol before I caught myself.
"Gah! You scared the drek out of me!" I hissed, mindful not to wake Cody. Imp, I remembered her name now, snorted as she downed half her omelet in one bite.
"I know, it was fun. The look on your face! Anyway, yeah, that's why I don't sweat it too much."
"Sweat what too much?" I must have been more tired than I'd thought. What was she talking about…?
"Nothin' big, Freakshow, it's all good. You handled yourself pretty good at the Shack, you been running long?"
"Ah… not really. This was my first night out," I admitted. "I wasn't really looking to do any shadowrunning. I was just trying to get some cash to fund my studies. I'd just gone to the Stuffer Shack to get something to eat before heading home, then drek hit the fan." She looked a little taken aback, before nodding with a smirk.
"Huh, wiz. So, you like a wizard or are you a shaman?" she asked. "Or something weirder like a psion or a Jedi? Can you read my mind?"
"Um. Hermetic's probably the best way to describe my tradition," I deflected. "And nope, no mind-reading spells."
"What, like a hermaphrodite?" she asked, tilting her head. She glanced briefly, leaning back.
"NO! Hermetic! It's like, magic based on formulas and knowledge, the name comes from…" I trailed off as she smirked at me. "Oh. Funny."
"You know it."
Brandeen came to the rescue with a plate of soy-based egg substitute stuffed with other goodies that managed to taste not quite like cardboard. I ate, ignoring Imp's attempts to keep messing with me. I may have been in a more humorous mood if I wasn't nursing a killer headache and a busted up ribcage.
Brandeen had already eaten, apparently, and was nursing a cup of soykaf as we ate. She looked at Imp and I shyly.
"I… really can't thank you both enough," she began. "I never expected him to go this far."
"Who?" I asked. A part of me really wanted to just drop this, go home and sleep, forget it had ever happened. I didn't listen to it.
Brandeen sighed, draining the last of her soykaf before gathering her thoughts.
"About a year ago I started seeing this guy, Mel. Corper, not a drek-hot exec or anything, but he was definitely big nuyen. I was a waitress at a casino and we hit it off, started an affair not long after. He's married, and he got his cushy job largely thanks to his wife and her family. I didn't know he was married until a ways into it, and then I got pregnant with Cody. I wasn't making enough money off my job to support the both of us." Imp and I listened, the ork having quit her attempts to needle me for now. "I knew he wasn't going to take it well. And I knew he wasn't going to make me his mistress or anything, so I couldn't count on him for real money even if I pawned the gifts he got me. So I threatened to tell his wife about everything – the affair, Cody, and his gambling habit, which he was supposed to have put behind him. I told him I'd keep it quiet so long as he paid me regularly. Just enough to keep me afloat and take care of Cody."
"So… instead he hires some thugs to kill you," I said. "Real keeper, that one." Brandeen snorted.
"Yeah. Not the best decision I ever made," she sighed. "I was stupid, I admit. Anyway, after our falling out I was smart enough to switch apartments, so I'm pretty sure this place is safe for now. Those guys found me while I was out looking for a new job. Last place I was working out fired me after I took too many days off due to the whole 'I'm pushing a small human out of my vagina' issue."
"Human?" I asked. "Not elf?"
"Oh. Well, yeah, Cody's an elf, but honestly I never bought into the whole Proud and Noble Race shtick." She gave a pointed look at Imp, "and I'll have you know I like a good cheeseburger more than a salad. Just not too much, these elf genes only do so much for my figure."
"Sure thing, keeb," she said.
"Trog."
"Squeaky."
"Tusker."
"Fairy."
I glanced at them, back and forth as they volleyed slurs at each other. Imp grinned at me.
"Sorry, norm, you it'd be racist if you said anything."
"Har har. We're getting off track," I commented.
"Right, right," Brandeen nodded, rubbing her face. "So yeah. I doubt the skinny guy from that team is going to be trying anything, not after you two geeked his entire crew."
"Us two?" I asked, confused.
"Oh, yeah, you were asleep when I was telling Brandeen about it. I let my power loose and screwed around while you were fraggin' drek up. Messed with their aim and stuff," came Imp. "I woulda tried taking them out proper, but if I actually start laying into someone they tend to notice and I wasn't lookin' to get my ass shot. Sorry about that one shot that did get you."
"It's cool…" I said. "What exactly is your power again?"
"Like a ninja smoke bomb for people's brains," she replied, and it sounded like she'd gotten used to saying it a lot.
"Huh. Wiz." I chewed on my omelet, and then looked back to Brandeen. "So… what are you going to do now?"
"That's a good question," she said, head in her hands. "I could try going to the cops, but they'll want a DNA test and he'll lawyer up, and if this goes to court he'll be out of a job and won't be able to pay me child support anyway. Assuming I don't have an 'accident' in the meantime. The smart thing would probably be trying to just skip town and hope Mel just lets bygones be bygones. But I'm at the end of my rope here, moving's expensive and I'll just be stuck trying to find a job again."
Imp snorted. "Pretty elf girl with a baby, yeah, that'll be tough. Who'd want to hire you?"
"Creeps and backroom pimps, mostly," she sneered. "I'm not quite that desperate yet, and I'm not looking to get turned into a prop at a bunraku parlor. And I don't want to leave anyway. Brockton Bay may be a drekhole, but it's the drekhole I grew up in and I'm not letting some sleazebag limp-dicked corper run me out of it."
We fell into a silence, then, as Brandeen brooded. Imp had gone silent as well.
"That casino…" I started. Imp and Brandeen looked at me. "Does he still go there?"
"Uh, yeah, last I heard. He was kind of attached to the place, they're discrete." The way she was looking at me… it was hope and disbelief. I felt a little queasy.
"I could talk to him. Let him know that even if he did try anything, I'd be there to spill everything to his wife."
"That… that could work. He's a coward, and you're a mage who took out the last team of thugs he hired, and he won't want to be on your bad side," she breathed. She stopped "But. Frag, Freakshow, you handled yourself well at the Shack but how old are you? You don't need to do this, not for me. You just met me. You're practically a
baby."
"I'm old enough!" I said, a little indignant. "Like you said, I handled the Shack pretty well with Imp. And if we this right, it shouldn't turn into another shootout."
"But… are you sure?"
"Yes."
She looked at me again, hard, searching my face for… something.
"What choice do you have?" I asked her. She looked away.
"Freakshow… if you do this, you can have a share of the take. I'll owe you, forever. You need anything, let me know and I'll do what I can."
"Taylor," I said. "My name is Taylor." Brandeen smiled, grasping my hand.
"Taylor," she said. "Thank you."
"You two gonna make out?" asked Imp. Neither Brandeen or I were amused, and we looked at her as such. "Okay, jeez, nevermind! Anyway, I'm in too. Fraggin' up this guy's day sounds like it'll be hilarious, and we can probably squeeze a little extra money out of him if there's more of us for him to worry about... and if this goes well, I may be able to introduce you to some people."
"What, are you some kind of big name?" I asked. She may have looked full grown, but I got the impression that Imp wasn't that much older than I was. "The great shadowrunner Imp?"
"Hey, you don't know! That's the great thing about my power!" she said, grinning. "Anyway, I know people and you got rare talent, Tay-Tay."
"Okay," I said. "Guess we'll see. Just uh… drek. Could you not spread around my real name?"
Imp rolled her eyes, pulling her fingers across her lips. "Lips are sealed, omae. Hell, I'll go ahead and tell you, my name's Aisha."
"Well, thanks." I turned back to Brandeen. "So. What's the name of this casino?" Brandeen took a breath.
"The
Ruby Dreams."
