Anthology - From the Street

Then the sky started to howl, and I knew we were hosed.

Wasn't really the sky, of course. It was the building's own alarm. Howling like a herd of banshees, loud enough to bring the Star down on us right quick even if nobody inside had managed to push a PANICBUTTON. Every fraggin' po-leece patrol within a klick of the place was gonna come a-runnin'-we needed to bug out right fraggin' now. So I fired up Demon's engine, just as three little red blobs came tearing outta the building. That's right, three-one of 'em big and shapeless, which meant somebody'd got hurt and somebody else was haulin' 'em along. Followed by four more blobs, a little ways behind as yet but catching up waaay too fast for comfort. I switched from thermo to visual sensors and saw Punch pounding toward me, with Zipdrive slung over his shoulder. Rocker and Catseye were close behind, stopping every so often to shoot or sling a spell at the sec-squad following. And I saw two sec-drones, the vidcam kind with a homing beacon that'll film your sorry hoop in the criminal act and follow you all the way home. The corps love those; they can track you to your safehouse and send the footage straight to the ten-o'clock news. A one-two punch.

I popped the doors open as Punch came up. Without missin' a step, Punch slid Zippy off his shoulder and into the back seat, then threw himself in beside him. Rocker and Cat jumped in the middle. I slammed the doors and took off. The sec-boys behind let loose a hail of gunfire, none of which hit. I could hear Punch's FN-HAR talkin' back, but didn't dare look behind Demon to see if he'd got anybody. Then I heard some more shots that didn't come from Punch, and somethin' smacked me hard on the back of the head.

I thought I was dead. Just for a second I really thought one of the sec-skags'd plugged a bullet right through my meat skull. Then my brain caught up with me, and I realized I was still runnin' Demon down the road. Which meant I was still alive. With a killer headache and a weird, itchy feeling across the back of my scalp that told me the fraggin' bastard had punched a hole through Demon's rear windshield. I didn't have to see it to know that the whole thing was crazed with fracture lines. Have to replace it, I thought, while the rest of me concentrated on the road ahead. And also on the sirens that were startin' to wail all around as the neighborhood Star patrols twigged that somethin' was up. I shunted a smidgen more mental energy toward the audio sensors to sharpen the pickup; I needed to know what direction the sirens were comin' from.

The sensors gave me bad news. The Star was headin' toward us from the north and east. The place we'd hit, with its sec squad on full alert, was behind us to the south. That left just one direction for a getaway-west, toward Puget Sound. Which meant Demon and me'd have to head west far enough to slip past the Star and hope to highway hell that we didn't hit water first. Then we'd have to make a sharp turn southwards, then pedal-medal it back crosstown to the safehouse. All the while keepin' the Star off our trail, or else losin' 'em somewheres in the maze of city streets.

I always did love a challenge.

First thing, though, I hadda take care of the drones. They were clingin' close, buzzin' 'round Demon like gnats. I opened the roof and raised the Vindicator from its inside mount, braced my hands on the wheel so they'd stay steady when the ASIST recoil hit me, and fired at the nearest drone. Blew the fragger to dust, and didn't hardly swerve atall. The FN-HAR barked again as Punch sent the second drone spinnin' into the side of a building. A little puffy fireball told me the second drone wasn't a problem anymore. Which just left the Star-and they were gettin' closer.

Demon and I whipped around the corner hard enough to make me dizzy for a second. The street ahead was clear, the sirens all behind us or a ways off to the side. As I gunned Demon's engines, I snuck a peek at the gridmap. Seattle's traffic grid, superimposed in bright yellow lines over a detailed map of the city, flickered to ghostly life across the top of Demon's windshield. The bright orange dot that was Demon showed up just four city blocks shy of a main drag. If I could get to it, I could take it to the I-5 and on home.

I wasn't counting on the three patrol cars that suddenly shot into the intersection half a block ahead. They'd been runnin' silent, caught me off guard. Smart bastards, the Star. Don't underestimate 'em if you want to live long. So now I had a choice to make-fast. Stop and surrender, whip around or run backwards straight into the patrol I could hear closin' in behind us, floor it and hope Demon could crash through the blockade without takin' too much damage to keep goin' or find me an alley to fly down in the next couple seconds.

Luck was with me. A patch of empty dark appeared in the solid wall of plascrete to my right. I aimed Demon's nose toward it and floored the gas. I was gonna pay for this later on-I could feel the burn in my calves from too much redlinin', like a distance runner who starts out too fast and burns up his reserves-but so long as I got us out of immediate trouble, I'd deal with the consequences.

The dark hole was an alleyway, dirty and stinkin' and narrow. We took the turn a hair too sharply; my right arm caught fire as poor Demon scraped a fender against the side of a crumblin' factory. Now she'd need a new paint job along with everything else. Rubber screeched on pavement as the patrol cars caught on to the change of plan; I knew we didn't have much time to get ahead of 'em. So I poured on more power and ignored the charley horses that were formin' in both legs. The only thing that mattered was getting to the end of the alley before the Star did and then findin' us a fast route outta there.

We'da made it clean if the fraggin' hole in the road hadn't slowed us down. A real axle-breaker-big as an oil drum and so deep I swear it went halfway to China. Hurt like hell when we hit it. Think of the worst sprained ankle you ever had, then multiply that by ten, and you've got some idea. Luck was still with us, though; the internal sensors told me Demon's axles were still intact. So I floored it and we shot toward the alley's far end.

And fraggin' near collided with a patrol car. Just one-lucky again!-and a glancing blow at that; otherwise I wouldn't be tellin' this story. Demon's right front fender got up close and personal with the front left fender of the Starmobile. Spun the cop car all the way around; when a Leyland-Rover argues with an Americar, even the razzed-up kind the Star drives around in, the Rover almost always wins. Hell of an impact, though. Felt like I'd smacked my head into a brick wall. What with all the other hell I'd been through on this joyride, the crash nearly blacked me out. But I hung on to consciousness by my fingernails, stopped Demon's fishtailin' on the slick pavement and managed to turn us in the right direction. Then I burned rubber and sent us flyin' down the road.

The Star followed, of course. For awhile. Demon and I dodged and wove and bumped across sidewalks, even crashed through a coupla flimsy fences, before we finally lost the last cop car. My head felt like a thousand little guys were beatin' on it with hammers, my feet were freezin' from the icy asphalt under Demon's baldin' tires, and every wild turn made me want to throw up-but I gritted my teeth and kept goin'. That's how you survive in this biz. Me and Demon didn't stop until I pulled her up in front of a clinic near the safehouse, where we knew a street doc who'd patch Zipdrive up quick. And me, too. Wild rides take their toll on a rigger's meat even if lead and fireballs don't. I had a lump on my head the size of an egg from where I'd hit Demon's roof bouncin' outta the pothole, and I was so fraggin' tired that my hands were shakin' on the steering wheel. I popped the doors so Punch could take Zipdrive out, then jacked out and just sat for a moment. Just sat and breathed, and thought about how nice it was to be able to do that.