"Don't wanna tango with no pirates," stated Thumbs flatly, crossing his herculean arms across his bare chest. "Those motherfraggers don't care what they do or who they scrag to get what they want. When they're done with you, the only person could love you is an organlegger. Atlantic Security, the local corps-there ain't nobody been able to get to them. You can stuff that into your stick."

"And the megacorps don't care," sneered Two Bears, " 'cause the pirates are too fragging smart to try looting those ships!"

"You got that right, omae. Some megacorp versus the pirates of the Caribbean." Thumbs exposed both tusks. "Now, there's a fight I would truly love to see."

"From a great distance. Like deep space."

"Def," said Thumbs with a slight laugh. "But I wouldn't know which side to root for."

"Okay, so it's something to do with pirates," said Two Bears. "Jesus, Buddah, and Zeus, what does that tell us? A pirate what, and where?" He turned to Silver. "A ship, chief buccaneer, their supply depot, main base, arch-enemy?"

"Sorry," she said. "Honestly, don't recall. But it's something to do with pirates."

"Can we ask this Louie guy?" inquired Thumbs. He smacked a huge fist into an equally huge palm. "Maybe we encourage his memory a bit?"

"Ichi, he's a chummer," said Two Bears angrily. Then relented, "Besides, he's so near the edge, he forgets where he lives sometimes. A simple kick in the hoop might scramble his internal software forever. And if they traced my call to Sister Wizard, they might know who I am and be watching my place."

"Telecom?" squeaked Silver, staring at them. "And all this happened this morning?"

"Yes," said Two Bears slowly. Thumbs just stared at her. "You did catch somebody's attention," she said. "I was in the matrix myself then and saw some deckers from someplace rush to a public telecom node."

"Frag!"

Two Bears rubbed a hand over his face and asked, "Who was it? Lone Star?"

"No, I never saw anything like them before," said Silver. "True. Anybody who could fry Sister like that had to be some corp bastards. Probably Atlantic Security-they write their own programs and their deckers are real burners. Top flash."

"Yeah," drawled Silver. "Nova hot and their codes even hotter."

"Atlantic also imports major bangbangs from the Confederated American States," added Thumbs, eyeing the pile of guns they'd just finished cleaning.

"So, what do you scan? Think it was AtSec, or even Gunderson itself that hit Sister?" asked Two Bears.

"Null program," said Silver. "Gunderson does own Atlantic Security, but I don't think the good Sister was enough of a zerobrain to try a Matrix run on the mainframes of TGC without major protection. That's not something you do off the fragging cuff or on a freaking whim. I'd want three, four deckers to back me up, and one drekload of whitehot programs to even try."

"Yeah, guess you're right about that." Thumbs opened a cold container of some takeout soykaf they'd brought with them and gulped it down. "Maybe it's one of the megacorps trying to put Gunderson in their place cause they're getting big ideas?"

"All multinationals wanna be megacorps. What's new about that?"

Thumbs crumpled the container and tossed it across the tent into a macroplas box serving as a dumpster. "So maybe Gunderson found a way to do it."

"Battle the big boys?" Two Bears snorted sardonically. "Earth to Thumbs, try again, please."

"If this IronHell thing does have to do with pirates," insisted Thumbs, rubbing his chin with the sound of sandpaper, "then who would know more than Atlantic Security? That's what they do, hunt pirates." Atlantic Security had contracts with many of Miami's private corps and local sectors, but their ships also patrolled the seas around the sprawl.

"Or is the big secret that they really are the pirates?" asked Silver quietly.

"And are working both sides of the fence?" finished Thumbs for her. "IronHell being their codename for the covert op? Slot me like a surfer, lady, but I do not like the way you think."

Two Bears sucked air in through his teeth. "God's blood, but if that's what's really going on. ..." His thoughts were interrupted by the elevator sounding a ding and the doors sliding open wide. Nobody was visible inside the cage.

"Get hard," snapped Two Bears, pulling the chattergun in front of him and working the selector from single to full auto.

Thumbs closed his ballistic vest, then lifted the Predator into view, snicking off the safety.

Colt in hand, Silver studied the elevator. Tilted off-angle, the corner security mirror showed only the tiled ceiling. Then a tall norm stepped into view from the area behind the door normally shown on the mirror. Dark hair, dark eyes, sideburns, and moustache. He was wearing a tropical synth-cotton suit, loose and easy-fitting. A large dull black gun was tucked into a crossdraw holster on his left hip. The metal was totally non-reflective, the window light seeming to fall into the ebony finish and vanish. Something ceramic hung around his neck on a thin woven band but was hidden under his soft linen shirt.

Slowly and steadily, the norm approached the tent as if he was dead sure that everybody knew who the frag he was and stayed awake at night worrying about it. Without so much as a pause, he entered the tent and stood unblinking in the strong light of the EverBrights. He ignored the collection of death-dealers lying openly on the table, but instead looked at each of the three people sitting there, moving his neck stiffly with a slight mechanical jerk like some robotic drone locating their positions to the exact millimeter.

"Good afternoon, I am looking for Adam Two Bears," he said. "Are either of you gentlemen he?"

Two Bears grunted yes.

"Fat Jake said you were looking for a professional mechanic," said the norm softly, his voice strangely accented and with the scholarly tones of some professor or high-level corporate suit.

"Depends," returned Two Bears gruffly, the deadly barrel of the Crusader pointing straight at the man's gut. "Morlocks."

"Kings."

Forcing himself to relax, Two Bears lowered his weapon, and the others did likewise in stages. "Okay, you're kosher," he acknowledged and kicked out a chair. "Take a load off. Let's talk."

"Call me Delphia," the norm said, taking the chair and turning it around to straddle the seat backward. "What's the scan?"

"Datasteal."

"The pay?"

Two Bears pulled out his credstick. "Forty thousand. If you're any good with a gat."

"I am," responded Delphia. "Very good."

"Oh, yeah?" said Thumbs, laying the Predator on the table.

Delphia shrugged.

"Captain Cool, eh? You that good?" asked Two Bears gruffly. "Or am I yakking with a used chip-dealer here?"

"Perhaps a small demonstration," said Delphia, sounding bored. Standing smoothly, he reached a hand toward Two Bears as if offering to shake. His arm was fully extended, the sleeve pulled back to show the bare skin of his wrist, when he bent a finger. Instantly, Two Bears saw nothing with his right eye as a click sounded. Shaking his vision clear, the dwarf pulled back, realizing he was looking down the ebony barrel of a Cold Manhunter and that the click had been the hammerless auto triggering an empty chamber.

"Holy drek," whispered Two Bears. "N-nobody's that fast! T'ain't possible even for chipped reflexes!"

"Bah, it's a trick," said Thumbs hotly. "A holograph, or something. Nice try, gleeb. But I got chummers who love yakking about iron more than bopping with the bettys. And if something like that was out there, they'd have been short-stroking themselves into a frenzy. A gat that draws itself? Bulldrek."

Removing an ammo clip from his pocket, Delphia loaded the Manhunter. "If you say so," he said, working the slide and putting the loaded pistol into the holster on his hip. As his hand came away, everybody saw that there was a slim ferruled cable of burnished metal connecting the butt of the black weapon to a powerpack on his right hip.

"This guy is for real, chummers," said Silver weakly. "I know, because I've seen one like that before."

"Have you?" asked Delphia turning about to look at her as if noticing Silver for the first time.

"Hai" she grunted.

There was a pause. "Indeed," he said softly.

"It's a VPR2, right? I've heard about it-all shadowtalk, so I thought it was only smoke for the gunbunnies and boom-freaks. Wet dreams for wannabes. Some story about banned research. Secret weapons for megacorp exec bodyguards and gov assassins."

"I am no assassin," Delphia replied in a low tone, his face a mask.

"And I believe you," Silver said. "But something like that doesn't just drop out of the sky or magically appear from the Land of Oz."

The dark-haired man's demeanor did not flinch or crack, but Silver saw his eyes react and knew she'd hit home with that shot. So the rumors on the grid had been correct, Oswaldo Fontecchio hadn't been executed for his failure to protect an Imperial Minister of Japan. And now he was a street samurai in Miami? Muscle for hire? Excellent.

"Ya mean that thing is for real?" asked Thumbs, pointing. Silver nodded emphatically. "Oh, yes."

"Where can I get one?" demanded Thumbs urgently. "How much and where? Name the price."

"They're only ten nuyen, eight if you buy them in a bunch. Got mine in a pawn shop on West Fourteenth," said Delphia woodenly. "But it burned down ten minutes ago. Sorry." Thumbs sat back in his chair with an annoyed expression, then he broke into a smile. "I asked for that, didn't I?"

"Yes, you did," said Delphia.

"Truce?"

"I am the essence of peace, sir."

"Truce?" pushed Thumbs.

A minute passed. "Truce," agreed Delphia.

"Two Bears, you wanted an edge on this run, and here he is," Silver said eagerly. "This guy's for real. Worth twenty streetcorner bangers."

"Well, real or not, I don't like show-offs," snapped Two Bears. "They got a nasty tendency to get fancy, and thus sloppy, in a brawl. And this hump is already tough enough."

"Then do not retain my services," said Delphia without emotion, removing some lint from his cuff. "However, I can assure you that once engaged, I am the epitome of diligence."

"No more games then?"

"Sir, I am always serious."

"Well . . ." hesitated Two Bears. "Okay, done and done. You're hired."

"With the understanding," added Silver quickly, "that you're part of this team, one of us, with all that implies and infers."

Silence from the dapper norm in the chair.

"Agreed?"

Without comment, Delphia stood as if to leave. Then formally retook his chair, sitting in it properly this time. "I am yours to the death," he said quietly.

"That's fine," said Two Bears, passing over his credstick for a transfer. "Cause the very first thing we're going to do is kill me."

9.

The afternoon sun was low in the sky, but still blazing like a fireball from hell, and everybody on the open streets was moving as little as possible. Night couldn't come soon enough. Sporadically, an enclosed vehicle would hum by, radiating even more waste heat and fumes from the internal cooling system, making the passengers nice and comfy but adding the waste heat to the streets, turning the usual summer simmer into a momentary broil.

Wesley was sweaty in his macroplas crate when he saw them go by, walking fast and sure as if they owned the world. Every so often, one would stop and let the others go by, and then do it again. Just like on the trideo. Rotation surveillance, or some kinda fancy drek like that. It was a military thing. Rigidly casual, the six took positions across the street from the Biscayne Bar. One of the bigger guys, an ork, was standing in direct sunlight and not sweating a drop. As if he was poured from solid rock. Or had an internal cooling system. Was that possible? Wesley guessed so. Heck, anything was possible these days. Just ask Rich the slith. There was one chummer who'd never mouth off to a lady shaman again.

Could this be a raid? Nyah. Here? This dump? What were they gonna liberate, the cobwebs? Yet this weren't the neighborhood watch checking for solos cutting in on their gambling. No smell of the street on 'em either. Not a rival gang. Something big was going down right here and he had the best seat in the house. Pulling his sweat-stiff rags tighter around him, Wesley hunched lower in his box.

Someday, he would run the shadows and the whole world would know and fear him. He even had a name picked out: Attila. Some brass warlord from dusty times. But it had a sound, a feel. Attila. Yeah, solid. Abso-fragging-lutely solid as steel.

The gunshots from inside the doss did not come as much surprise when they started, and they didn't last very long. But then the screams began. Not the angry shouts of battle, or the sharp yelp of a wound, no, these were the long, drawn-out howls of someone getting their living guts ripped out. A few of the folks on the street glanced toward the old apartment building, but that was all. Such things happened in Overtown. As long as it wasn't happening to them, life went on.

The blood-curdling noise rose and fell in horrible waves, fast becoming the inarticulate squealing of mindless agony. Whimpering himself in sympathy, Wesley closed his eyes tight and stuffed fingers into his ears, fervently praying to anybody listening to please-please let the poor sodding chummer flatline. Nobody deserved to get scragged like that, no matter what they did.

The sun was finally starting to dip behind the skyrises of downtown Miami, the sparkling colored vista spread out below her windows like a miniature dynarama at World Park. Sheathed in only the sheerest gossamer silk, Erika Johnson stood before the Armorlite windows sipping a perfect iced gin and tonic, the limes fresh and cut with a silver blade. Ordinary steel ruined the flavor. How many bartenders had she fired over this obvious and important point? Too many. How ironic that she could find competent help on the street to do a run, but for inside her penthouse? Ichi.

Softly, the oak-paneled wall telecom hummed for her attention, and Erika sauntered over, loosening the ribbon at her throat a bit. If this was her current bedpartner, she wanted to look a little slottish for the man. He might bring a friend along tonight, and if she was going to be the toy of a couple of nastyboys, then she should seem properly gutter.

Just a touch, of course. Nobody actually wanted to play in the street, only to pretend they were.

Then the second circuit beeped and Johnson went cold. The private line. She knotted her robe shut, then put the first call on hold while setting her drink on a shelf full of BTL simsense chips. Hitting the VR mode and scrambler, Erika took a chair and wondered if the dwarf had something to report already. This was good work. Unless it was trouble.

However, the pixels on the telecom screen did not show the Overtown halfer she'd hired, but an extremely handsome norm in a hand-tailored suit. Dull yellow that was almost white, with a raw silk tie, and what looked like a Gibraltor VPR2 holstered on his belt. Impossible. Nobody outside of Japan had those. And a gaijin? It was beyond impossible into the fantastic. He also appeared to be calling from within a tent. Who the frag was this?

"It's your nuyen," she drawled. A bad habit of hers to begin to talk in the manner of the VR simulation that her caller would see-a scruffy old norm, unshaven and with lots of scars. Let the machine do the work, damn it, she scolded herself. That's what it's for.

"Two Bears is dead," said the man bluntly. "Killed by an assassin from a local policlub. I'm his partner and in charge of the job now."

Now, that was interesting. If true. "Do partners have names?" Erika inquired politely, knowing her alter-ego said something along the lines of: "Slot me, chummer. Sowaz's yor mudder call ya?"

"Delphia." The man's space-black eyes showed no emotion, but he seemed to be intently studying the background of the image she was sending him. If he was looking for a way to ID her location, he'd need precog to do it. The VR doss shown was totally false, a composite from hundreds of the more interesting layouts offered by decades of Architectural Digest chip. No way a gutter samurai could know those. She sat up straight in her chair and stopped herself just in time from tugging on her earlobe thoughtfully. Her other self would have copied the action and Erika didn't want this Delphia person to know her telltales. Possibilities were opening here, most of them unpleasant. Did he somehow know this was a VR telecom?

On the screen, Delphia removed a bloody credstick from his inner jacket pocket. Erika nearly recoiled from the ghastly object. Taken off a dead man, obviously. Somebody cut to ribbons. Or was he scamming her?

Stolidly, the shadowrunner told her about Sister Wizard and the instantaneous arrival of both Lone Star and the corp limo.

Pursing her lips, Erika leaned back in her chair and thought about this update. It could only be Atlantic Security. That had to be where the decker had gone hunting. This whole run was starting to sound like a bad idea that should be punted. But that wasn't up to her. She worked for James Harvin, and he was the one who'd given her the order to hire runners to find IronHell. But if AtSec was somehow involved in this, why would Harvin need to hire runners? Gunderson owned fragging Atlantic Security. Anything they knew Harvin would know. Did he have some other hidden agenda?

"I am, of course, sorry to hear of his demise," she stated blandly. "Has this change affected the status of the assignment?"

Delphia barked a laugh and jammed the stick into his telecom. Erika's beeped to show the transfer of nearly all the nuyen back to her. "It was supposed to be a dataswipe, not a hardprobe." She knew that was street slang for a war. "Deal's off. I quit. Here's your down. Haveaniceday." And he actually reached to cut the connection!