Zero-One-Zero greeted them when they stepped off the elevator. He held his hand out to Kathryn, and she shook it. “Pleasure to meet you in person. A true pleasure.”
Zoze was an obese black man. His large, round head was completely bald and as smooth as a bullet. He turned to Peter and smiled as if they shared a secret past, better left unspoken in front of the lady. He never looked directly at Peter, but instead took furtive peeks. He seemed a man in complete control of himself—happy and devious.
“You’re a man of the streets, I see,” Zoze said. “Good. I like men of the streets. Come.”
He waddled down the hall toward an open doorway, Peter and Kathryn following him. The dwarf brought up the rear.
Frighteningly white walls crowded a large conference room, putting the sterility of Peter’s room to shame. The hardwood floor reflected the overhead lights like a mirror. The furniture, made only of chrome and glass, dissolved into the spotlessness of the area.
No dust. No objects. No stuff.
The only ornamentation in the room was a glass bowl filled with glass marbles sitting on a small glass table near the glass doors. Peter knew with a sudden flash that no one fidgeted with the marbles. They remained as they were. If they were dusted, someone was responsible for putting them all back the way they had been.
Zoze gestured to a chair at the end of the table. “If you would, my friend, it’s been reinforced to handle someone built as impressively as you.”
Peter took the chair, and Kathryn took one near him. Zoze sat at the other end of the table. Peter noticed a small silver box rested on the table near Zoze.
“Soykaf?”
Peter shook his head. Kathryn nodded.
“Changes?”
The dwarf slipped on a pair of white gloves and walked over to a cabinet built into the wall, which opened to reveal a kitchen area. He pulled a stool out from the cabinet and got busy with the coffee.
“Now,” Zoze said, placing his hands in his lap. “What can I do for you? I can tell you now, Miss Amij, that the shadowrunners I hired for you have made no progress in tracking down Dr. Clarris.”
“First, we would like you to step up the efforts to find Dr. Clarris.” Kathryn’s voice was crisp and clear.
“Oh?”
“Yes. We must find him quickly. Peter can help.”
“Can he?” An amused smile cracked Zoze’s round face in half.
“Yes. Second, our lives are in danger.”
Zoze leaned in, pleased and curious. “Because of this search for Dr. Clarris?”
“Indirectly.”
“I was asked to kill Miss Amij for the Itami gang,” Peter said. “I was a member of the gang up until—” he glanced at his watch, “—two hours ago.”
Zoze’s eyes widened. Peter couldn’t tell if it was because of fear or interest. “I see.” A smile formed on his face. “You wouldn’t happen to be the ‘Profezzur,’ would you?”
Peter nodded, embarrassed. “You’ve heard of me?”
“Who hasn’t?” He turned to Kathryn and laughed knowingly. “And what do you want me to do about this new development?”
Peter turned to Kathryn. She looked back at him.
“We don’t know,” she said, turning to Zoze. “We thought you might have some ideas.”
He laughed. “I see.” The dwarf served Kathryn and then Zoze their coffee. “Do you have any other enemies at this point?”
“A man on my board of directors. He found out I’d helped Clarris, and that I threw the company off the trail in its search for him.”
“That’s bad.”
“It is?”
“These two forces could well cripple you economically.”
“They could?”
“Yes, indeed.”
Peter was amazed at how calm the man was as he ticked off the potential pitfalls that awaited Peter and Kathryn. Peter had never thought of someone freezing up his bank accounts. The threats he’d faced had always been bullets, not electric impulses.
“The first thing we’ve got to do is get the money the two of you possess into accounts safe from the hands of Itami and Cell Works.”
“I don’t have enough money to make it worth the time,” said Peter.
“You’ll set up dummy accounts?” asked Kathryn. Peter suddenly felt ignored.
“Yes. We’ll transfer your funds as quickly as possible. There’s usually a ceiling on the amount you can withdraw in a given time frame, but we’ll dump a program into your account that’ll pull out the dollars the second it’s officially okay to make the next withdrawal. Seconds will count on this one. It’ll cost you. Twenty percent of everything withdrawn, you lose.” He looked at her fixedly. “All right?”
Kathryn paused, and Peter could see her mentally clicking off the dollars she’d be handing over to Zoze. But it was either that or risk losing it all.
“Yes.”
“Fine,” Zoze said. His face revealed no pleasure, but Peter was certain the man was leaping for joy inside his plump body. As the fixer reached over to a small red stud on the silver box, the sleeve of his jacket caught on the tip of his coffee cup.
A bit of coffee spilled onto the glass table.
Zoze looked down at the spilled coffee and froze. An expression of silent horror crept up over his face, starting at his neck, crawling up his chin, over his cheeks, making its way over his eyes and stopping at his forehead. He looked at the coffee as if it were a thing alive—a dangerous monster that might leap off the table and kill him.
The dwarf turned from the counter and saw what was happening. Quickly grabbing a towel, he jumped off the stool and rushed over to his employer’s side. With a bit of effort he reached up and wiped the spilled coffee off the table.
Zoze remained frozen, still looking down at the table with obvious terror, even after the dwarf pulled back. The dwarf stuck his head under the table, spotted a bit of a coffee smear, reached back up, and wiped off the last bit of the liquid.
As soon as the table was spotless again, Zoze blinked once and then completed the movement of his hand toward the button on the box.
Peter and Kathryn looked at one another; Kathryn raised an eyebrow.
When Peter looked back at Zoze, he saw a keyboard made of lights appear inside the glass of the table in front of the man.
“I’ll take care of the money first. After that, however, the two of you should consider dropping your identities and getting new names and IDs. I don’t know what your long-range plans are, but if you’re going to be pursuing Dr. Clarris, you’ll have to stay in Chicago. The shadowrunners I have on the case have determined that, wherever Clarris is, he hasn’t left the city. If you’re going to be staying here, you can’t be yourselves any longer.”
“I want to be me,” said Kathryn.
“Kathryn Amij,” said Zoze coldly, “has a contract out on her by the Itami gang. Believe me, you don’t want to be her.”
“What about my company?”
Zoze stared at her as if she were a single-celled creature he’d never seen before. Then he said, “Let’s take care of the money first.”
His fingers started to fly over the glass keys. The thickness of the fingers belied their practiced command of the keyboard.
“I’m going to put one of my better deckers on this. But I’ll need some information, if you don’t mind.” He waited a moment, then said, “Good, he’s awake. Very well, your mother’s maiden name?”
The questions went on for about ten minutes. Kathryn had to pull out her pocketbook to get her account information. It was all very dry and straightforward, much like opening a bank account.
At the end of the questions, Zoze said, “We’re going to put it all into an account under the name of Jesse Hayes. We have several accounts we keep open for situations like this, and that one is currently available.”
“Would that be my name if I changed it?” Kathryn asked the question with distaste, but curiosity as well, as if warming to the idea.
Zoze laughed. “No, no. The Hayes account is temporary. Just a convenient place for shuttling the funds into. We’ll have to move them quickly to another account—one we’ll make in the next hour.”
He paused and pressed his hands together. “But now we come to the matter of leaving behind Kathryn. And, of course, you, Profezzur. Is that an official handle or just a nickname?”
“Nickname.”
“And you’ll want to change your name as well?”
Peter had to think about it. Eddy, along with a lot of other people in the gang, knew his name. Electronic money transfers had been put into an account with his name. They knew who he was. Things would be easier if he dumped his ID and re-tagged himself.
But if he did that, if he became someone other than Peter Clarris in name as well as in form, what would remain? His whole quest for the last dozen or so years had been to return to his former identity. If his researches were sound, and he actually was going to be able to transform his body back to human, who would he be by the time it was all done?
“Peter?”
He snapped out of his reverie, Kathryn’s voice drawing him like a spirit calling him from a dangerous dream.
“What?”
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah, sure. Sorry.”
“Well? Do you have a decision? Are you going to re-tag?”
“Yes.”
“Very well. I assume, Miss Amij, that you’ll be financing this?”
She looked to Peter, then to Zoze. “Yes.”
“Fine. What’s your name, Profezzur?”
“Clarris. Peter Clarris.”
Zoze raised his left eyebrow, delighted with the complexities of the operation that had wandered into his establishment. Peter knew that Zoze’s joy came from the fact that he was in control of the situation, safe on the outside.
“All right,” said Zoze when he finished typing Peter’s information into the table. “And now, Miss Amij? I’ll warn you now, you have the option of going to the authorities, confessing your crimes and taking the heat for them. Corporate law, as you know, is very harsh these days on the illegal transfer of intellectual property.”
“But I have enough clout to pull out of it.”
Zoze shrugged shoulders. “True. I won’t use the scare tactics. Given that one of your own board members has ties with the gang and put out a contract for you, I’d say you could wrangle some kind of deal. You’d probably keep control of Cell Works, if from a new position behind the scenes. I could toggle the proper switches to help make your slide back into society easier. It might cost more than the new ID, but in the long run your life would be much easier. Because of your family ties with Cell Works, I suspect you’d remain Kathryn Amij.”
Peter looked at Kathryn as she thought the situation over. He found himself desperately wanting her to choose the new ID. She would be a fugitive along with him. She might stay with him simply because she needed somebody with her. But why should she when she could fight to get her company back?
“New name,” she said. “New identity.”
Peter exhaled sharply.
“I may not have explained the conditions of the re-tag fully. Once you say yes, I will send instructions to a very talented woman who will, over the course of this night, track down and delete every trace of your existence in all electronic records. Is this what you want?”
Kathryn held her breath for a moment, then said, “Yes,” her voice firm but quiet.
Zoze rubbed his hands, delighted beyond belief. “Wonderful, wonderful. Things are very odd now. Wonderful.” His fingers flew over the keyboard.
It was late now, one in the morning, but only Zoze seemed to be getting sleepy. Fear of being found by the past and apprehension of the future gripped Kathryn and Peter.
When Zoze hit the RETURN key one final time, Peter said, “Now what?”
“You tell me. People are working on trying to keep you two safe from Itami. What else do you want?”
“To find Dr. Clarris,” said Kathryn.
“I already told you, my people haven’t found him yet.”
“Well, give us whatever information they’ve got,” said Peter. “We’ll track him down.”
“All they know is that Clarris is still in Chicago. We don’t know anything about the corp involved. You cut a deal without getting enough facts, Miss Amij.”
“Yes.” She looked down, her expression a mixture of annoyance and shame.
“Well,” said Peter, “we’re not going to get anywhere without one more bit of information.”
Kathryn’s face become emotionless. “I…Peter, I told you your father was working on the same research you are—the means to transform a complex organism genetically. To remove the metahuman genes.”
“Yes.”
“Years ago, he persuaded my father that it was viable. But this year the board said there was no way to justify the cost in the face of the small return.”
“Small return?” said Zoze. “Wouldn’t people be desperate for that technology? How many metahumans want to be metahuman?”
“I don’t know. But that wasn’t the problem. The project was cut because it was too expensive, a ‘cure for the rich.’ It would become a class issue, and the negative PR would have hurt us. Besides, no one is even sure if it’s possible.”
“I know,” said Peter.
She smiled at him. “Yes. You know. You figured it out. But have you figured out the cost of doing it your way?”
He hadn’t, and the question threw him. “I…I’ve just figured out the means… I didn’t think about manufacturing it.”
“No, of course you didn’t.” It wasn’t a criticism, just a statement. Even an encouragement. “You’re a theorist. I could see that in the pages I read. Just like your father. But my job, and my board’s job, is getting the theories applied. And if the price point is so high that only the ultra-rich can afford it, then it becomes a dubious research project for which no one is going to want to front money.”
Peter hadn’t given any thought to the “price point” of his idea, either. Frag, it had to be astronomical. “It would involve nanotechnology,” he said, thinking aloud, “a technology that has yet to pop off the drawing board. And magic—to get the body into a kind of suspended animation.”
Kathryn nodded. “It’s not impossible, though. There are economic theorists—people who sit around and figure out how to make research and product economically viable. You didn’t think of how to do it. That’s all right. It’s not your job.”
“But your board scrapped the research. They couldn’t see a way to do it.”
“And one of those board members put out a contract to get me killed. You’ll forgive me if I think their decision-making leaves a bit to be desired.”
Peter returned to her. “You said you helped my father jump contract because Cell Works wouldn’t conduct the research…”
“Right,” she said with an impish grin. “But someone else wanted to do the work. And they wanted your father to help them.”
“Who?”
The smile melted from her face. “I don’t know. I took a chance. I took lots of chances. And I lost. They took him, and they were supposed to keep me updated. But that was two months ago. Haven’t heard a thing.”
“But,” said Peter, becoming excited, “we know we’re looking for a corp with access to practical nanotech. Maybe just prototypes, but workable nanotech.” He turned to Zoze. “Anything?”
“Don’t look at me. That stuff is so new it’s still in diapers. Anyone who’d know about it would have to be on the inside. And they wouldn’t talk.”
“Dr. Landsgate,” Peter said aloud.
“What?” said Zoze.
“Dr. Richard Landsgate. He was in the same league as my father, and I know him.”
Kathryn was looking at him strangely. “Peter,” she said slowly, “how well did you know him?”
Her tone chilled him. “What are you telling me?”
“He…transformed last year.”
“What? That’s impossible!” Peter’s mind reeled at the odds of both of them goblinizing. He remembered only too well the doctor telling him how rare goblinization had become. In 2053, most metahumans were born that way.
“He became a ghoul. No one knows why, but last year there was a sudden surge of transformations into ghouls. Maybe another cycle, like the birth cycles in 2011 and the transformations in 2021. I don’t know.” She touched his hand. “I’m sorry.”
Peter’s thoughts reeled. No one was left, all his moorings cut. Now he had only Kathryn, who he didn’t want to trust because of his attraction to her. “What happened to him?”
“He was teaching at Northwestern at the time. The University kept it quiet, the PR… Then Landsgate ran off. Maybe he wanted to spare his family when he realized he was changing into a ghoul…or maybe he only craved his own kind by then…”
“The bounty,” Zoze said sagely.
“It’s rumored he’s down in the Shattergraves,” said Kathryn. “The ghouls have practically owned the place since the IBM Tower went down.”
“Hang on,” said Zoze, and he typed out the name Landsgate while mouthing it to himself. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?” Peter was incredulous. “Nothing? The man was at the top of his field.”
“See for yourself.” Peter got up and crossed around the table. “He’s listed,” Zoze said as Peter studied the screen, “but they deleted his files. He’s listed simply as a ghoul. They dropped him.”
Peter looked down at the screen. The letters floated in the glass. “Landsgate, Richard,” he read aloud. “Goblinized, ghoul, 02-06-51.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it. Ghouls. No one wants them around. And not just because of their nasty habits. They remind people too much of how dark a place the world is now. They’d rather cut and forget them.”
Peter looked over at Kathryn. “The Shattergraves?”
“It was just a rumor.”
“Best we’ve got though, right?”
“Um,” said Zoze with a hungry grin, “I haven’t got anyone who’ll go in there with you.”
“That’s all right.”
Zoze raised his fleshy hand and placed it on Peter’s arm. “Let me repeat that. I don’t know anyone who would go into the Shattergraves with you. Don’t be a fool. If no one else will go, you shouldn’t either.”
“I’m going.”
Zoze looked to Kathryn. “Peter, there are other ways,” she said.
Peter looked down at Zoze. “How many of them practical?”
“Well, honestly, at this point, given the circumstances, a randomization is usually called for. I’d generally have someone other than the client go in for the action, however.”
Peter thought for a moment. It occurred to him that he didn’t have to be the client. “How about this? My identity just got erased. I’m good with a gun. I’ve already got a handle. Take the other people off the case. I’m Kathryn’s shadowrunner now. She’ll pay me through you. You’re my fixer, I have access to your network.”
“You want him?” Zoze asked Kathryn.
She looked at Peter, annoyed. Did she think he was just trying to get money from her? “He’s done a pretty good job so far.”
“Done.”
“The money I earn from her is applied against anything she’s shelled out for me so far.” He turned to her. “All right.”
She eyed him, curious. Then she nodded. “So you’re a shadowrunner now?”
“That’s right. I’m Profezzur. By the way,” he said, turning to Zoze, “most people don’t think I’m very bright. I’d like to keep it that way.”
“Hell, chummer, you’re going into the Shattergraves. You could have fooled me.”