Saturday, March 29, 2097
Saturday – Partying with Serj
Serj’s place in Ironview is something else. He’s got this massive pad perched on top of an old apartment building. The whole place is a testament to how far a troll can get when they break out of the usual molds. You walk in, and it’s a blend of rough, raw steel and polished chrome—like someone threw a high-tech lab into an old warehouse and decided to make it luxurious. Exposed pipes snake along the ceilings, and the walls are bare concrete, but that’s where the industrial vibe ends.
He’s got the latest tech—massive AR screens, custom drones serving drinks, and a sound system that shakes the walls. Then there’s the luxury—custom furniture that’s troll-sized but wrapped in the softest leather money can buy, high-end art pieces scattered around, and a minibar stocked with rare, imported liquors that’d make any high-end corporate lounge jealous. The centerpiece, though, is the view. Serj’s place overlooks the Puget Sound, the water stretching out like a sheet of black glass under the night sky.
That view is his pride and joy, but it won’t last. Aztechnology’s about to start developing the waterfront. Soon enough, Serj’s going to have a great view of corporate megastructures instead of the sea. He’s not too happy about it, but for now, he’s enjoying it while it lasts. My new place, on the other hand, might just keep its "glimpse-the-sea" view.
The party was wild—models, locals, and a few low-level corp execs all mingling under Serj’s industrial-meets-high-tech haven. Evie and I stuck together most of the night. She liked the scene, and I could tell she was letting loose a bit. Not many nights where work doesn’t hang over your head. It was a good break from reality.
Sunday, March 30, 2097
Sunday Morning – Provolution and Family Time
Woke up in Evie’s arms. We didn’t move much for the better part of the morning. Sundays are supposed to be for relaxing, but I couldn’t get my mind off Provolution. It’s become a sort of twisted hobby for me—unraveling their cells, their VR networks, and how they’re managing to spread their terrorist ideas. I’ve found some useful threads, but nothing definitive yet. Collected some dirt on a few of them and helped myself to a bit of their cash—they really shouldn't spend their money on VR skins. The feds are on to them as well, with multiple arrests and searches ongoing. They really stirred the hornet's nest with that Edmonton massacre. I don't really care that much about these people, but it's good practice for when one day I'll have a look at what the Brotherhood is up to.
After some time in the Matrix, I decided to give it a rest. Evie had plans for us—meeting her parents. So, after brunch, we made the drive up to Bellevue.
Sunday Afternoon – Meeting the Gardners
Evie’s parents live near Lake Sammamish. Their house is something else—old money, inherited. Not the kind of place you can just buy into anymore unless you’ve got several million nuyen to burn. The house itself feels like it’s from a different era, spacious, with polished wood floors and more windows than necessary.
William “John” Gardner, Evie’s father, is the strong, silent type. Stoic but not unfriendly. He’s a coroner for Lone Star, so we had some common ground. For a moment, I almost slipped into “shop talk,” but I figured the last thing the guy wanted was to talk about bodies while eating lunch with his family. Still, we had a good chat. I get the feeling he likes me, which is better than most of Evie’s exes probably fared.
Maria Gardner, Evie’s mom, was more on the quiet side. She hasn’t worked since Evie’s brother was a kid. She’s nice enough, but I could see where Evie gets her reserve from.
Christopher, Evie’s younger brother, was something else. Recent UCLA grad with a degree in metahuman biochemistry, but no job yet. He spends most of his time in VR, the 2097 version of a keyboard warrior. Chris latched onto me pretty quickly. It reminded me of something Evie had mentioned before—her ex had the same effect on him. Not sure if that’s a good thing or not, but Chris was eager to bond. Honestly, it felt more like babysitting than conversation.
Sunday Evening – Back to Ironview
By the time we got back to Ironview, the family thing had taken its toll on Evie. I could tell she was wiped out, so we didn’t do much but make love, and she fell asleep pretty early. I stayed up, though. Family visits are always a mixed bag, and I had a couple of missed calls nagging at me. One from Blink, one from Mr. Black.
Late Sunday Night – Calls and New Jobs
I hit Blink up first. She’s making moves, trying to set herself up as a fixer. Not a bad play. She offers me a job—a heist down at the Tacoma waterfront. Time-sensitive, high-stakes. Something about a prototype sitting in an Aztechnology warehouse. I’ve worked with Blink before, in Bangkok. She’s smart, quick, and always seems to know more than she lets on.
Next, I call Mr. Black. He’s offering the same job. Typical Black. Always working the angles, seeing what he can get out of the situation.
To avoid a conflict, I set up a meet between them. Blink leads the job, but Black gets to look at the goods once the heist’s over. We work out the details, and Blink puts together the team—Slag’s back in, along with Eclipse, Tag, Vanya, and Wizkid. Same crew as Bangkok, more or less.
We’re hitting it just before dawn. No time to waste.
Early Monday Morning: The Run
After setting up the job with Blink and Mr. Black, we didn’t waste any time. We hit the road just after midnight, driving down to Tacoma in Tag’s “new” van. It’s a beast of an old thing, barely looks like it should be running, but it’s got one essential feature—Tag rigged it with a black box that lets us flip its grid ID on the fly. Basically, it’s got a fake SIN for a vehicle. Perfect for shadowrunners like us. Tag had a smirk on her face as we rolled out, knowing we could disappear from any eyes watching us.
We parked a few blocks from the warehouse, an Aztechnology joint down at the waterfront. The area’s rough—industrial zones always are—but this one felt tense. Even at night, there was a strange calm in the air, like the city was holding its breath. It didn’t help that the run was time-sensitive. We had a few hours, tops, to grab the prototype before it got moved to a secure facility.
While Tag worked her drones, I sent Wizkid, my Matrix persona, to stake out the place. Eclipse and I went in together—she’s the better decker by far, but I’ve got that technomancer edge. The Matrix was thick with automated security—patrolling drones, camera feeds, and remote Matrix surveillance. Nothing we couldn’t handle, though. Eclipse blocked any attempt by Matrix security to ping our location. We were practically invisible.
That’s when I noticed something odd: a door leading to the waterfront had been unlocked. No alerts, no signs of a break-in, but there it was—just hanging open. I didn’t like it. I locked it again, quietly, and had Wizkid start running deeper surveillance. Meanwhile, Tag sent her big drone around to scout the waterfront, and sure enough, we found a fast, sleek stealth boat moored at the quay. It was empty, but it screamed professional. Whoever was already inside wasn’t playing games.
We entered through the personnel side—silent, careful. Vanya went astral to get a better feel for what was happening and quickly reported back that a trio of Barghests, Aztech’s guard beasts, were roaming the storage area. The moment we cracked the door to the storage, we heard gunfire and screaming. Sounded like whoever was already inside had run into some serious trouble. We had to move fast.
As we slipped into the shadows of the warehouse, we found the other team—or what was left of them. Two bodies sprawled across the floor, torn apart by the Barghests. It was brutal. Blood everywhere. They’d never stood a chance. But there was one survivor—Ratchet, the rigger from Bangkok. He was backed into a corner, trying to keep one of the Barghests from taking his head clean off.
That’s when I stepped in. I managed to pull Ratchet clear just before the thing got its jaws around him. The rest of our team took care of the remaining two Barghests—Eclipse fried their collars, and Slag took one down with his katana. The whole thing was over in minutes, but it felt like a lifetime. I checked the other bodies. One of them was Hardwire, the decker from the Bangkok job. The other two were unknowns, probably hired muscle. All of them dead.
Ratchet was a mess but grateful. He explained that they’d gone in early on their own initiative. No orders from Mr. Black. He was pretty clear on that, which made things easier. If he hadn’t been there, I might’ve thought Black had double-crossed us, but Ratchet’s presence confirmed that the other team had jumped the gun.
We let him go, made sure the external cameras caught him leaving with his boat. It’d make for a good cover story. As far as Aztech’s concerned, Ratchet and his team were the ones who came in, and we were never there. Blink was impressed with how we handled it, especially with how cleanly we made the other team’s intrusion look like the real heist.
When we cracked open the crate back in a back alley in Redmond, we found stone artifacts—ancient, weathered, and likely dredged up from some deep part of the Pacific. Fiji, maybe. They were valuable, no doubt, but not the kind of thing Mr. Black wanted to claim for himself. Blink’s client would take them, but they were probably worth more to the right people in the shadows. Still, a job’s a job, and we got out clean.
No comments:
Post a Comment