Preying for keeps

26

They'd been in the drainage tunnels for almost three hours, but Skater finally found the drainage system trunk line he was looking for. He'd discovered that some of the access drains were marked and some of them weren't. The one he wanted wasn't. He was bone tired, feeling the effects of the last couple days. Adrenaline could be pushed only for so long before it gave out too.

The beam of his weakening flash was turning dirty gray as it splashed across the narrow breadth of the drain. This one was older, constructed of masonry rather than plascrete. Keeping the flash down, he used low-light vision to scan the ladder leading up to the manhole five meters up. There was no reason to think that Border Patrol guns were waiting at the top of the climb.

Still, he took a deep breath before shutting off his flash, grabbed the first rung and headed up. At the top, he gently shoved the manhole cover up and peered about. As he'd hoped, they'd come up in an alley beside an office building. Satisfied that he wasn't being watched, he pushed the cover to one side and climbed out.

The alley was narrow, framed by a tall hurricane fence and a three-story office building. One end was blocked by a plascrete wall that had been badly damaged in the past, and the other fronted a two-lane street. Cracks splintered the ground, allowing weeds to grow through. Some of them were almost knee-high.

Swan Island industrial Park had become economically disenfranchised when the Council of Princes had moved the Tir's main port to Seattle. As Swan Island was one of the highest crime districts in the city, the police only came here when they had to-or so Kestrel had told Skater. He was sure they weren't very popular when they did, and that the locals would act as an alarm system if blue crews did start rolling the streets.

"Lights out," he told the others over the commlink, "and let's move. Elvis, you're up first. I need the lock on that building taken out pronto."

The troll surged up the ladder, full of vitality even after drekking around in the sewers for hours laying down false trails before finding their way here. "Which one, chummer?"

Skater pointed at the one back toward the ill-used Dumpster already filled to overflowing. Experience had taught him that all rear doors with Dumpster access were wired, but usually with dog-brain security systems instead of anything too exotic. Since employees used them frequently, they were generally set up user-friendly and not complicated.

Archangel followed the troll.

"I want a telecom line up and running as soon as you can get it," Skater told her. "I need to call a guy in Seattle."

"I'll take care of it. I've got a telecom swap utility that should do the trick."

"Good enough." Skater had hoped she would. A lot of deckers did. Usually such things were holdovers from their early days of prowling the Matrix and charging their time to other accounts.

When Wheeler, Duran, and Trey were topside, they closed the manhole. Elvis had the lock and the door to the office building open and they went inside.

The office belonged to The Chipped Pachyderm, a small company specializing in panic data-retrieval system software. It was divided up into twenty small cubicles, but only fourteen had computers. A quick inventory of those showed only five with personal effects hanging on the wall, suggesting that they were the only ones staffed.

"Wheeler," Skater said, pointing to the two security cameras hanging in opposite corners across the big room. The dog-brain alarm Elvis had taken out hadn't activated them. "They've got 'em inside, they've got to have 'em outside. Make them ours."

The dwarf gave him a brief salute and moved off. Skater scanned the office. It would only be theirs free and clear for another few hours. By then they'd have to find another hiding place or some way out of the walled city. They had to make the most of it. "Trey. Start an inventory. Let me know what we have to work with."

"Done."

"Elvis, is that a trideo I see in that back office?"

The troll looked, then nodded.

"Scan headline news and see if we're anywhere near the top of the hit parade. Faces, names, or SINs."

"You got it." The troll lumbered off.

"Duran, security's yours until Wheeler brings the systems on-line."

"Right." The ork slipped back out into the alley and closed the door behind him without making a sound.

"Good news already," Trey reported from the other end of the office. "Place has fairly spacious washroom. No shower, but we can clean up a bit when there's time."

"We'll make time," Skater replied. Feeling clean meant feeling confident. He wasn't going to forego that easily accomplished weapon in his arsenal. "We'll go in shifts." He walked to the front windows and avoided skylining himself for anyone outside the building to see.

The street was mostly empty, and dark. None of the street lights worked, and there were none of the beautiful spires for which elven architecture had become famous. Along two of the thoroughfares he could see, there were huge cans of fire with transients gathered around them. It was the same kind of gutter scene you'd find in any of the darker comers of the sprawl. Skater figured that those pockets of humanity were the common denominator beyond all racial, political, or religious fervor. The problem was, that that common denominator stayed hungry, and compassion had generally been leeched out of them.

As he looked out over the unfamiliar city and recognized some of the familiar riffs, he had to admit he'd never been more afraid in his life. He'd led the team here, and he'd endangered them. And now he didn't have a clue how to get them back out again.

Archangel had most of the files she'd stolen from NuGene deciphered less than two hours later. She'd had to run a sample of them by a chummer in Seattle who specialized in biomed datasteals, and he'd given her a utility designed to get through the file encryption and archiving. It also had a special UnZip utility on it that she hadn't seen before. She'd handled that on her own.

When all that was done and the file open to them, the laborious reading gave Skater a headache.

"This could be worth millions," Archangel said, looking at the information. "Provided the research is on the money."

The files contained reports and documentation concerning new organic tissue implants that would end the need for immuno-suppressive drugs that caused almost as many problems for transplant patients as they solved. Skater didn't understand it all, but the gist was that NuGene had discovered a means of over-writing the DNA in the patient and in vat-grown donor tissue to create a hybrid that allowed the co-existence of both systems.

Usually, a transplant patient lived the rest of his or her life with some sort of immuno-suppressive drug, such as cyclosporine that prevented the granulocytes within the patient's body from attacking the new organs or tissues and in effect cannibalizing itself. However, that lowering of the body's defenses often resulted in reactions that could be just as life-threatening in the long run.

NuGene's new tissue was independently and singularly DNA-encoded to be absorbed by the host body. It wasn't a simple process, because the body's natural response to reject the new organic material as invasive wasn't easy to mute. The new organic material was recognized as antigens, and the granulocytes ingested it and killed it. But the research, including a bout of radiology to reorganize the tissue DNA, allowed the T-lymphocytes to rewrite the tissue as acceptable through phagocytization, altering the destruction of the new material to one of accepting.

"Okay." Skater said, looking at the material, "say a shadow team has this biotech in their hands. Why haven't they sold it to someone else?"

"No reason not to." Elvis said. "I'd have done it and gotten the hell out of there."

"Yeah, but this wasn't a simple run," Skater said. "We were set up to take the fall on this. It means there was a specific target in mind before the run. If NuGene can actually produce this new tissue, what's it going to mean for them in profits?" "Through the fragging roof," Archangel said.

"Right. But what if these runners simply sold it to another corp?"

"Simple math," Duran said. "The profits get divided even if NuGene and the other corp don't try to cutthroat each other by lowering the prices."

Skater grinned to himself, feeling it now, knowing he was somewhere close to the target zone. "Right. If this was a simple shadowrun, the runners would have already fenced the files and pocketed whatever they could make on them, but the person behind this is in it for more than just the onetime score."

"How?" Duran asked.

Archangel paused at her deck and looked up at him, a puzzled look on her face.

"We agree that a corp's profits go down if it can’t control the output of its product, right?"

Archangel and Duran agreed.

"Where are a corporation's profits shown? What are they put back into?"

"The company," Duran answered.

'The stocks." Archangel said.

Skater could tell by the look on her face that she'd followed him. "Dividends, yeah. Big money if this tissue replacement tech is really wiz."

"But it wouldn't make sense for one of the shareholders to arrange something like this," Archangel said. "The profits were already theirs."

"What if news leaked out that NuGene just lost its little gold mine?" Skater asked. "How about this scenario: everyone who's been holding onto their shares for sentimental reasons or because they like backing a dark horse decides to dump them on the market. Whoever has arranged to steal the files, or even only give the impression that they've been stolen-which is a wiz little curve in the scheme of things all by itself-can then go and buy up the stock at cheap prices, then return the files to NuGene and watch the returns go through the roof."

"Frag, kid, do you know how risky that would be?" Duran asked.

"For the profit potential we're talking about, do you think anyone in a position to do this would think more than twice?

We hit the Sapphire Seahawk hoping the tip would pan Whoever did this would have a lock."

"But we can always fade the heat," Duran said. "If they own the stock, their name is going to be written down somewhere in black and white."

"You have to know to look for them first. If you play for high stakes, you've got to be willing to stick your neck out. And remember, most of the time they've had our necks stuck out there."

A silence followed, and Skater knew they were thinking it over. Now that he'd said it out loud and fought for it, he felt more secure about it. The stolen files hadn't been about a simple datasteal; it had been a vicious and nasty play, thought out from the very first.

"At this point," Skater said, "everything NuGene's done so far indicates they thought we stole their tech. So now they think they're behind in the game and that someone sold them up the river. They might decide to rush their new discovery onto the market. To do that they're going to have to raise some capital."

"New stocks," Archangel said.

"Maybe." Skater stopped packing and looked at her. "We'll need to check that out."

She nodded. "Telecom's ready when you are."

He crossed the room and used it, accessing one of Kestrel's drops. Archangel was already working her deck with a vengeance. After Skater left a message for Kestrel to call him here at The Chipped Pachyderm, he walked into the office with Elvis. The troll had been waving to him.

The office showed an old pride. Documents and holopics lined the walls, as well as downloaded newsfaxes concerning deals the firm had made in the past. Most of them were more than five years old. The seat behind the desk was worn and comfortable, even though it was too small for the troll, who was perched on the edge of the desk.

"Starting the recap of the headline news," Elvis rumbled. "We made the cut."

The news bytes were announced by an elven male with capped teeth and broken veins in his nose from too many nights out late drinking that makeup couldn't quite cover. The crash landing of the arms dealers' plane, shot down by the ever-vigilant Border Guard, warranted some trid footage that showed the flaming wreckage and the shock troops beating the brush. So did news of the birth of a little girl to Ariadne and Tavis Silverstaff in Seattle. Stock footage rolled of the couple at public gatherings, as well as some stills from his sports career. And on an international note, a breaking story announced that the so-called laughing death disease had been traced to tainted DocWagon vats. The disease was caused by a new subvirus that converted healthy tissue into dangerous tissue, which then spread throughout the body, attacking muscle tissue and finally, the brain. The side effects of a body turned on itself were very disturbing. Seattle Governor Marilyn Schultz was attempting to suspend DocWagon's activities in the city.

Skater felt a sick cloud rise up inside him and spread through his guts, and he tried to force it out.

"Jack," Archangel called as the telecom beeped.

Skater shook himseif and hustled, over. "See if there's any more info on this laughing death disease. Something doesn't wash." He turned to the telecom. "Yeah."

"Where are you?" Kestrel asked, speaking only in audio mode.

"Would you believe, Portland?" Skater had no reason to hold back. NuGene already knew they were here. It couldn't cause more people to start looking for them. "I need something."

"Didn't have it figured any other way. What?"

"NuGene's Seattle operation. Has it become active since

"You got a specific field, or do I just run this blind?"

"Stock," Skater said. "I think they may be out fishing for start-up capital."

"I thought they had that." In the background, keys clicked.

"They're thin for a really aggressive move. I'm guessing that whatever timetable they originally had has been drek-canned."

"I'll look around. Get back to you. This number still good for an hour or so?"

"Yeah. I'll be here."

"Wait," Archangel said, staring at her deck monitor. "Ask him about a stock called ReGEN." She spelled it.

Skater relayed the name as well as the spelling.

"It's a new player as of today. Not OTC stuff. It's selling at a fair piece of change, but the stock precis is pretty vague. New company, outstanding new product, blah-blah-blah, yahdee-yahdee-yahdee. I don't see anything exciting here."

“Tell him to track it back," Archangel said.

Skater did.

Kestrel sounded bored, and a little tense at having to stay on the line so long. It took him seven minutes to make the corporation behind the issued stock certificates even with Archangel guiding the way. Skater timed him. "Son of a slitch. NuGene. How'd you know?"

"Never mind. It's too long to go into. How's the stock trading?"

"For a new stock, it's done okay. Plus there's the fact that they issued a lot of it. Should I buy into this? I wouldn't mind a quick turn-around on something a little insider trading could guarantee.

"When I find out," Skater said, "I'll call you."

"Do that, kid, because you're going to owe me more for this than you can ever pay me. Is there anything else I can do?"

"I want to find a street guy, named Synclair Tone. Hard-case. He's in Seattle by way of Puyallup. I got a number off some of his yabos, that was my last line on him." Skater's stomach tightened when he thought of the man. But he was the last lead to Larisa that he hadn't checked out.

"I'll look around," Kestrel promised. "Let me know about ReGEN."

Skater said he would, then broke the connection. He looked at Archangel. "Where did you find the stock?"

"Here in Tir Tairngire. It went on-line this morning. Evidently issuing it had been in the works all along, just not so soon."

"They're in frenzy mode." Skater looked at the stock quotes culled from the Tir Tairngire exchange boards.

"I think so. The stock isn't selling so well over here."

"Less people wanting to take the risk."

"Or that can," Archangel agreed. "I also noticed something else." She punched the keyboard and brought up another screen of figures. "There's no tech info available on the laughing death subvirus, but it seems to be the evil twin of NuGene's. Also, DocWagon has been aggressively buying up NuGene stock here in Portland, spurring a resurgence of interest. Considering the pile of drek DocWagon's in, you wonder if they don't have an inside line. But it seems like a lot of NuGene's stockholders are seeing this as a chance to unload shares that haven't performed in years."

"Think DocWagon could be after a hostile take-over?"

"I don't see how. Tavis Silverstaff still owns over fifty percent of NuGene."

"But they could buy their way into being something more than a silent partner," Skater said.

"Yes."

"But they aren't taking any of the action on ReGEN,"

"No. The information I turned up hasn't been released widely into the public." Archangel gestured at the deck. “Takes some concentrated digging by someone who's very good, and who is looking."

"How can the ReGEN stock be different from NuGene stock?"

"The way it's set up, NuGene represents the parent company. The Seattle office is going to be called something else, operate under different guidelines."

"Then Silverstaff doesn't own fifty percent of that company."

"It depends on how much stock they let out," Archangel said. "If they have to cover what the paper's worth and they're short, they're fragged."

Skater considered that. "So they're vulnerable now."

"Very. If anyone knew for sure they have something worthwhile. When they release the news that they've got this new tissue replacement, and it's as good as they say, that paper will turn to gold and they may be able to buy most of it back. Or at least issue and buy enough of it themselves to maintain controlling interest."

As he looked down the list of names. Skater saw one that caught his attention. "Saeder-Krupp was interested in acquiring NuGene at one time." Archangel nodded.

"Want to find out if they still are?" Skater asked.

"What?" Her disbelief was evident. Looking at the name of the German-based multinational corporation on the screen, Skater made himself believe it could happen. The art of the deal was in having something to sell to someone who wanted to believe you had something they wanted. "Saeder-Krupp is aggressive." he said, "and they own a few hundred other corps. If they were interested in NuGene before, they ought to really have a jones on once they find out about this new biotech."

Archangel stared at him in disbelief. "Have you gone totally glitched?"

Skater looked at her. "There's a wall between us and home, and a drekstorm waiting on us once we get there. I'm thinking that a partner at this time could be a good career move."

"Lofwyr?"

Skater nodded. "He carries a lot of weight. Fragging Charles Schwab of the Awakened age." Saeder-Krupp, the mightiest megacorp in the world, was Lofwyr's own personal plaything.

"He's a dragon." Archangel stared into his eyes. "He's a dragon, for frag's sake. No one ever knows for sure what they're going to do. The way they see the world, what they want out of it. You can't-."

"He believes in profit," Skater argued. "I'm prepared to give it to him. What more could he ask for?"

"Your stripped and bleached skull as a bedpan." Skater looked at her, then lowered his voice. "It's a chance. Maybe the only one we've got. I'm not going to turn my back on it." He tried not to listen to the desperation in his own voice. Thankfully, Archangel didn't argue and just went to work.

Everyone knew that Lofwyr, a member of the Council of Princes who ruled Tir Taimgire, maintained an estate in the Royal Hill region of Portland. Skater couldn't be sure whether Lofwyr was actually there now, and he was even less sure whether it would be good luck or bad to find the dragon at home.