Nyx Smith - Fade to Black

"You're not arresting me!"

The slag went for his gun.

Filly lunged forward, seized the guard's gun arm, and pounded a shock glove-covered fist into his face. That quickly, she had a full-scale brawl on her hands. The shock-glove treatment didn't seem to affect the fragger. She twisted his arm and slammed him back against the lobby's rear wall. The slag managed to tug his gun free of its holster. Rico stepped up on her left and rammed a fist into the guard's mid-section just as the gun detonated.

All this just to keep up appearances, the likeness of a legitimate arrest by police, to keep that special detail up on thirty-eight unawares.

The roar of the gun affected Filly like the peel of a siren. She felt the adrenaline surge even as Rico staggered back, turning half a circle. She went animal. She pummeled the guard. She slammed his elbow back against the lobby wall to maybe numb the gun arm, and then tugged the pistol out of his hand. She rode him down to the floor on his chest, dragged his arms behind his back, and applied a pair of cuffs.

Panting for breath.

Looking for Rico.

The bossman stood leaning against the rear of the security counter. He shook his head as if to clear it. A dark spot was forming around the tear in the thigh of his right pants leg.

Fragging great.

When the elevator doors slid open, Bandit had the spell waiting, held in the palm of his hand. He saw the lengthy corridor stretched out ahead of him and the two men in dark suits standing near a door on the right. Bandit opened his hand. A noise like an alley cat shrieking arose quick and raw from the distant end of the corridor. The suits looked, and a pair of thumps sounded from Bandit's left and right. The thumps were from Shank and Dok's automatics. The bullets they fired were not lethal, but the pair of suits up the corridor slumped to the floor anyway.

Not dead. Just unconscious.

Shank and Dok hustled up the corridor. Bandit followed along at his own cautious pace. He saw nothing of any interest in the corridor. Shank motioned for him to hurry.

The door marked 35-8 slid open. Shank and Dok hustled inside, automatics thumping again. Bandit followed. A small, richly decorated foyer led into a luxurious living room. Another suit lay sprawled on the floor of the foyer. Bandit followed Shank and Dok into the living room, running his eyes around, taking in the wealthy furnishings: paintings, drapes, vases, bonsai, crystal goblets, deluxe trideo with simsense. All very deceptive. A mundane could probably live here for years and never realize that he or she was actually living in a crete and plastic coffin, all but cut off from the essential energies of the universe. A quiet exclamation came from another room. Nothing to worry about.

Bandit considered the situation, then took a small, velvety pouch from his duster pocket and laid it on an end table. The pouch contained the extracted essence of a number of herbs and roots used in ritual magic by mages. Bandit had once thought that the combined essences might prove valuable for him, but the expectation had turned out to be false. Useful perhaps for a mage, not for a shaman.

It would make for a fair exchange.

Steinberg was staring at some bowl game on the trid. Tsugaru looked sound asleep, sprawled on the sofa. Steva Karris glanced at her wrist chrono for the fifth time this hour and mentally began ticking off the seconds.

There was nothing more boring than sitting watch on some corporate property, especially one that never went out, never left her assigned corporate quarters, for chrissakes. Steva didn't know the woman's name, didn't even know if she had a name. It was like playing nightwatch for some out-of-the-way corporate facility of dubious interest to anyone. A big yawn. That wasn't to say that she wouldn't do her damnedest to protect Fuchi corporate property. She'd just be a little more excited about it if she had some idea that she'd been posted to a job that made a difference.

Her wrist chrono dinged. She looked up as Devoe came up the hall from the bathroom. "You're on."

"So soon?"

Steva nodded toward the foyer. Devoe knew better than to argue. He straightened his suit and headed out.

Abruptly, he was back, whispering urgently, "Alert! Alert! Status five! Code Red!" -

Karris grabbed her Ingram SMG and lunged for the foyer, the others close behind.

Dok had met some wildly sculptured biffs in his time, but this one was the most outrageous he'd seen outside a Tomikon bordello. She was built for sex. Every curve shouted it.

Her name was Marena Farris. She was Ansell Surikov's wife. When the lights came on, she was lying there on her back on the broad black expanse of the bed. She wore some kind of sheer, silky nightgown that covered her to the ankles, but didn't hide a thing, not the rounded prominences of her breasts or even the broad, dark patches surrounding her nipples. Not even the part lower down, beneath her waist. Discreetly veiled in hair as fine as the whitish-blonde masses surrounding her face.

She lifted her head. A soft exclamation slipped from her lips. She sat up, one hand rising as if to defend her eyes from the lights.

"We're busting you out," Shank announced.

Farris gasped and blurted, "What?"

The woman was obviously overawed. Who wouldn't be? Dok thought Awakened from a sound sleep by the sudden glare of the bedroom lights? met by a pair of slags in full battle gear? Dok smiled and said, "We're taking you to your husband. He's safe, okay? Don't wor-"

It was too much.

Abruptly, Farris' eyes rolled upward and she fell back on the bed, limp. Dok hurried over and broke out his medikit. Farris' vitals were running strong, remarkably strong for someone in a dead faint, but not so strong that any kind of incident seemed imminent.

Shank grunted. "You carry her."

"Someone'll bust my skull," Dok said, grinning.

"Do it anyway."

"Hai, commander."

"Eff you. Hurry up."

Dok put one knee on the bed and gathered the woman into his arms. She was no lightweight, but then the best-looking ones never were. No doubt his chummer Shank would agree. He only wished that he'd gone for the stage two muscle replacement at mat clinic in Johannesburg, the one with the specialist direct from Chiba City.

Then again. …

Maybe not.

As Shank led back through the condo toward the corridor, Piper's voice came to him over his headset. "Time is oh-two-twenty-four," she said. "Condition Two."

That wasn't good.

Condition Two: Somebody injured. It had to be Rico or Filly, or Piper woulda called Condition Three, and that woulda been panic time because it woulda meant that Thorvin and their ride outta here wouldn't be on schedule-or might not be coming at all. Shank stole a glance back over his shoulder. Dok had caught Piper's warning, judging by the look on his face. Shank gave the old mercenary signal for double-time, pumping his fist. Almost in sync, the two of them leaned forward into a quick jog.

In the living room, Shank stopped, incredulous. Bandit was standing there looking around like a reviewer from Modern Condo. Shank cursed. "You're supposed to be watching the corridor!"

The shaman just looked at him, his face as blank as a wall. They'd gone over this part of the plan a dozen times, and Bandit still didn't get it. Shank felt a sudden surge of anger. Slotting sonovabitch. Frag it anyway. No time for jacking around. Someone was blooded-they had to move!

He hustled through the foyer to the corridor door, then immediately jerked himself back into the foyer and clear of the doorway. A female voice carried in clear and loud from outside. "Fuchi security! Throw your weapons into the corridor! Come out with your hands up!"

Shank glanced at Dok, standing right there beside him, and said, "We could be in trouble."