Freezing Shadows, Chapter 51

Chapter 51: Settled Business

Kole Malone nodded as we stepped through the doors of the Redmond Towers hotel and casino. The troll who attended the needs of the resident dragon, Ivaeth, looked just like he had the last time they’d been here, with a slight grin on his overly large face. “Ah, Iceblade, and friends. The Lady is expecting you.”

The troll’s eyes turned to Kenzie Lyons, the technomancer we’d gone to Detroit to rescue. She was the only one not wearing armor, but we had swung by a Quick-Print clothes vending machine on the way to the airfield back in Detroit. The basic clothes were neither stylish, nor protective in any way but to her modesty, but they beat the hospital gown she’d been wearing, and she had shoes and undergarments. “And Ms. Lyons, it is good to see you back where you belong. Please be assured that the team who abducted you had the Lady’s full attention as she worked to bring you home. The Lady wishes you to know that you may observe the rest of her business with these Shadowmen, or retire to your room to change into different clothes and rest, if you wish. It has been kept ready for you.”

“Thank you, Mr. Malone,” the technomancer said respectfully. “I want to thank the Lady for her rescue before going to my room.”

Malone nodded, and turned to lead the way to the same elevator we’d used the last time we came here, the one that led to the dragon’s lair at the top of the hotel. As the doors closed behind them, he said, “I was a little surprised to see that it was just Ms. Lyons and your team, Iceblade. The information we had said that there was another member of your group, coming back from Detroit?”

I smiled at the question that wasn’t a question at all. “We are professionals, Mr. Malone. While looking over the initial datafiles, we determined that the best way to ensure the experiments were thoroughly wrecked was to use controlled demolitions to eliminate the lab, and the stand-alone servers the data was on. However, bringing down the entire building would have been… outside the scope of the job. We would have been as radioactive as the area inside the Red Line. So, we hired an outside contractor, in order to ensure the job was done right. The contractor wished to relocate to Seattle, so we brought them back with us.”

“And you did not bring them to meet with the Lady?”

“With respect, Mr. Malone, as I’m sure you already know, our contractor has issues with most radiation-resistant gear, and while the area within the Green Line is technically safe, there’s no reason to go exacerbating things. Also, there were prior commitments made, as part of getting them set up in Seattle. They needed to check in with some locals in order to settle those obligations, especially as your Lady did not make any arrangement with them, and we did not speak on Her behalf. Meanwhile, it would be rude to make Her wait to get reunited with Ms. Lyons.”

Malone nodded once, as the elevator stopped, and we stepped out into the dragon’s lair. As before, Malone led the way. I stayed a step behind him, and Kenzie stayed beside me, with the rest of the team behind us. Like last time, Malone bowed to the dragon, who was watching us intently. “My Lady, your guests have arrived.”

Excellent. Ms. Lyons, I am pleased to see you’re as undamaged as could be expected. Do you know what the goals of the experiment were?

Kenzie took a breath, and said, “It is good to be back, my Lady. And while the scientists did not tell us their goals, the ‘testing’ they did suggested that they were looking for ways to contain or control my kind, without doing things that would strip our abilities.”

That matches the information I received, then. The dragon turned her gaze towards me. And the status of the experiments?

“We eliminated all the guards and scientists on site, including the scientist in charge of the experiments. With the services of a contracted professional, we used explosives and flammable gas to destroy the testing equipment, the stand-alone servers, and any physical records we could find, while avoiding damage that might have brought down the building itself. The other test subjects were released, and went off in their own directions, after being informed that anything which threatened the return of Ms. Lyons would be dealt with accordingly.”

The dragon nodded slightly. Your actions have not made the news, but my sources have confirmed that the underground lab was attacked. Nightelligence Solutions and NETworks are looking into the attack, but have not found any information on who did the job. I am pleased with the speed and efficiency of your work.

She motioned to Malone, who reached into his coat and pulled out a series of envelopes. The troll handed one to each of us, before moving back to the side, so that the Dragon could look at us directly. As promised, each of you has received a letter of introduction to individuals who will be useful in gaining greater power, or in expanding your abilities in different ways. I believe that you have the wisdom to understand how this is more valuable than simple nucred, for those who can think ahead.

In addition, I have spoken with the one you had a ‘misunderstanding’ with. He has agreed to not seek out further action against your group. You were pawns in a greater game, and there is no reason to continue after the pawns once the king is dead. However, he has neither forgotten, nor forgiven. Take care to not cross his path again.

“With respect, my Lady,” I said, meeting her golden eyes with my own, “I believe I can safely speak for all my companions when I say that we would gladly go the rest of our lives without seeing him again. We are well aware that it was not greater power or skill that allowed us to escape that first meeting, and we know that any second meeting will be far from pleasant.”

And you would be correct in that. Now, I believe our current business is concluded. I shall keep your names in mind, should further endeavors fitting your skills come up. Malone, see them off appropriately. Ms. Lyons, remain for a moment.

Taking the obvious dismissal for what it was, we turned, and walked back to the elevator, the troll attendant escorting us to the door. Not in an unfriendly way, but definitely in a manner that would not allow us to get ‘lost’ and start poking around. We had proven ourselves as being shadowmen who did acceptable work, but we weren’t ‘her’ people. As evidenced by the fact that she was keeping our contact information for possible future work, but we weren’t getting her information in return. If we wanted something from the Dragon, we’d have to approach as normal supplicants.

Once we were back in the vans, I pulled up a group chat, so we could talk on our way back to base.

Iceblade: So, that went pretty much as well as could be expected.

Babydoll: Gods, meeting a fucking dragon never gets any easier, even when you know they’re pleased with you. At least we don’t have to worry about that Mixsanto feathered serpent coming after us, though.

Sexkitten: Yes, but she implied that if jobs take us into his path, then the restriction is void.

Twilight: We can probably manage that risk by limiting the jobs we take against Mixsanto, especially ones crossing over into Vancouver or the tribal lands.

Shadowgirl: Fortunately, we weren’t completely out of pocket on this run. The credits from the safe, a focus for me, and some spell formulas for our big man.

Iceblade: Don’t forget the introductions. That’s the big payday, in my opinion.

Berzerker: Looking at my envelope, and inside it just has an address, a name, and a password, along with another, sealed letter, probably the introduction. And it is all on physical paper!

Babydoll: No, that isn’t paper, if it is anything like mine. That’s parchment.

Berzerker: There’s a difference?

Iceblade: Parchment is more difficult to make than mass-produced printer paper, and is a subtle sign of status since it costs a lot more, per sheet. It also holds up better than copy paper does. But the real reason they’re using physical media is because not even Twilight can track messages on paper through the Matrix.

Twilight: As much as it annoys me, that’s true.

Berzerker: So, what do you think this address is?

Iceblade: My bet would be either an arms dealer, or someone with access to alphaware or maybe even betaware mods. The kinds of things that could open up more room in your soul for extra ‘fun’.

Iceblade: Going down the line, Babydoll is probably going to find her contact is an arms dealer, probably with more of a focus on vehicle weapons, or someone who can better source the big time drones or vehicles. We’d still need to pay for it, but they’d be the types who could get us our own plane, or similar.

Iceblade: Sexkitten, your letter is probably going to focus on weapons and armor. Though possibly spy gear, and stuff like that, as well. The kind of stuff that would be damn near impossible to get without connections to an agency.

Iceblade: Looking at my own letter, I can already tell that this is going to introduce me to a group of like-minded mages. That means an initiation group. Joining a group will cost me karma, but initiating with a group and an ordeal is a 40% discount on the karma costs for each step.

Iceblade: Shadowgirl’s letter probably has a similar setup for an adept initiation group, and Twilight’s probably has an introduction to the technomancer equivalent.

Twilight: Looks like it, from what I can see.

Sexkitten: So, what’s the plan, Master?

Iceblade: Well, we’ve had an ‘exciting’ couple weeks. Those of you with Day Jobs will probably need to attend to them, if you didn’t manage to sneak in some time between jobs.

Sexkitten: No worries, there. We had a couple days between getting back from Yakima and our meet with the dragon. Got my time in, then.

Babydoll: Same here.

Twilight: My Day Job is virtual, so I was able to keep up on it during our downtime while we were out. Don’t worry, I properly routed the blog posts through a Seattle site, so I wasn’t giving away location data.

Babydoll: Speaking of things from before our trip to Detroit, I just got notifications. We should be seeing deliveries to our base and your waterfront property soon. The big ticket items we ordered before the dragon business are coming in.

Iceblade: So, the ‘playboy water home’, speedboat, and military grade combat drone?

Babydoll: And a maintenance drone for the warehouse. But yeah, this will be the last of our big ticket items pre-screwing to come in.

Shadowgirl: Considering we survived getting screwed, with a dragon involved, and managed to make it out the other side without having the dragon looking to make an example out of us, I’m calling this a win.

Iceblade: And you’d be right. So, here’s the plan. We are taking some time off. Wish I could say it is all R&R, but shouldn’t be too much work-type stuff. Just stuff where we’ll probably be doing our own things for a bit.

Berzerker: Going and chatting with the people we just got that introduction letter for, right?

Iceblade: Right. And you all have some nucred banked. Some more than others. So, for those of you who aren’t going to be looking into group invites, if you see something that is an upgrade for you in your new contact’s catalog? Go for it. Just remember to have someone on hand if you’re going under the knife.

Sexkitten: How come? Beyond just general buddy system stuff?

Iceblade: Because if someone is opening up your meat to stick things inside you, it is really easy to drop a cranial bomb or similar nastiness in alongside. Or they might just straight up kill you. Not saying these contacts will do that, but it is something to be prepared for. In the beta, there was a big stir from a few serial killers, cannibals, and worse working as street docs, and more than a couple people got sent for a reroll because of it.

Berzerker: Yeah, I’ll make sure to have someone with me if I go upgrading.