Tails You Lose (13 page)

He was wearing gray slacks, a white shirt and a plain black tie flecked with red. Even his shoes—which were obviously expensive, given the soft creak of new leather—were nondescript. It was the sort of outfit that would allow him to blend into any crowd—just toss a black leather jacket over it and lose the tie, and he'd even be able to hang with runners. But while Kageyama could fade into the background better than anyone else Night Owl knew, he also had the ability to turn on the charm. When he wanted to, he could conjure up a presence that made people instantly stop, listen and nod.

He was turning it on big time tonight. "Night Owl," he said, striding forward and drinking her in with his eyes. "Good to see you again. Thank you for bringing the egg to me, instead of taking it to your patron. Will that place you in any danger?" His voice was rich and his smile genuine. Just as she had the first time she met him, Night Owl found herself getting a sensual buzz off the man. Kageyama had something about him—tailored pheromones, maybe—that caused both men and women to instantly warm up to him.

"I had a little trouble from gangers on this run, but the important thing is the egg," Night Owl answered. "Do you think it might still be alive?"

"We'll see," Kageyama said. He nodded at the case. "Open it."

Keeping her face carefully neutral. Night Owl did as she was instructed. As she flipped back the lid of the case, she kept an eye on Kageyama. His nostrils flared—just for a moment—and she realized that the odor-masking spray hadn't worked. Her right eye began to twitch. Time to accelerate her plan.

"That's an Awakened reptile egg, all right," Kageyama said. "Very rare, and quite valuable in its own right. But I'm afraid it's—"

Before he could finish his sentence, Night Owl reached into the packing case and lifted the egg from it. She heard Kageyama gasp—he knew what was coming, as well as she did—and saw his eyes widen. In that same instant the fragile egg ruptured in her hands like a rotten melon. Putrid jelly squelched out onto the front of Night Owl's cheap cotton jacket and smeared her hands and arms; a squirt of it even landed on her cheek. Gagging at the smell, she dropped what remained of the egg onto the floor, where it landed with a wet
splotch
, spraying her boots.

When she'd planned this run, Night Owl figured she'd have to fake her revulsion, but now she found that no acting was required. The smell of the egg was worse than anything she could have imagined, and the liquid that covered her hands was slimy and hot.

Kageyama backed away, holding a hand in front of his mouth. He looked as though he was about to vomit.

Night Owl glanced around, as if searching for something to wipe her hands on. "I'm so sorry," she croaked. "I didn't know . . ." She swallowed back the bile that rose in her throat. "Is there a washroom . . . ?"

Kageyama pointed to the door. "Down the hall," he gulped, pinching his nostrils shut. "Turn right, then left. It's the third door on the left."

Night Owl hurried from the room. As soon as she turned the corner, she headed for the room where she'd spotted the greenish shapes. It was some distance away, but the rotten egg would give her an excuse to be away from Kageyama for some time. As she hurried through the corridors, she pulled a package of sani-wipes she'd placed in her pocket earlier and ripped open its foil seal. By the time she reached the door she was looking for, her hands and face were clean. She stuffed the egg-fouled wipes back in her jacket pocket and zipped it shut.

The door she was looking for wasn't locked. Night Owl pushed it open and walked into a room filled with Chinese artwork. Delicate yellow and pink vases, intricately carved ivories and painted silks were everywhere. The floor was set with a gold-tile mosaic of a snarling dragon, and enormous wooden statues of men and animals filled the room like a forest. Against the opposite wall stood a huge wooden bookcase, elaborately carved from polished red wood. On it were a number of smaller statues, in ceramic, bronze—and jade.

Just at eye level were three statues, each about a foot tall. Carved from pale green jade, they depicted three men: one with an enormously domed bald head who leaned on a staff; the second wearing richly decorated robes and an elaborate winged headdress; the third holding an accountant's scroll. Night Owl recognized them at once as the three gods that decorated every Chinese home, although they were usually in the form of holopics.

As she stood in the doorway, Night Owl felt a tickling on the back of her neck. She had the sudden feeling that someone was watching her. She glanced over her shoulder, worried that Kageyama might have followed her, but didn't see him. Then she listened through the amplification plug. Aside from the dripping of water into a bucket in a nearby room, everything was quiet. The feeling of being watched, however, wouldn't go away.

Night Owl's gut told her to abort the run. Kageyama was a millionaire with resources she couldn't even dream of. If he caught Night Owl trying to steal from his home, she'd be in deep drek.

Her head, however, told her to stick to the plan. The statue in the middle—Fu Shen, god of good fortune—had to be her target. It was sitting right out in the open, just begging to be boosted.

Continue . . . or abort? Night Owl thrust a hand into her jeans. She'd popped open a parking meter earlier that evening and pulled a fistful of tokens from it. The one she pulled from her pocket now had a longhouse on one side and the smiling faces of the Salish-Shidhe Council on the other. Night Owl flipped it into the air. Heads, she'd steal the statue. Tails, she'd walk out of here and take her chances with the Red Lotus and their dragon master.

The coin landed council-side up. Heads.

Night Owl strode toward the display case, picked the middle statue up—it was surprisingly heavy, for something that was supposed to be hollow—and gave it a slight shake. She didn't hear any rattle, and when she turned it over in her hands and examined it closely, she couldn't see any joins: the figure of the god had been carved from a single piece of jade. She did notice one thing, though: the character "bat" engraved on the god's back. That made her grin. The word bat, which in Cantonese was pronounced
fu
, was a homonym for "good luck." Even if it wasn't hollow, this was definitely the statue the dragon wanted her to steal.

Night Owl wondered what was inside, and for just a moment was tempted to try to break it open. Then she decided that it might be better not to know.

Now that she had what she'd come for, she had to move quickly. Stripping off her jacket, she wrapped it around the statue. Fortunately, the piece of jade was neither big nor bulky—the jacket hid it entirely. Carrying it under one arm, she ran back to the bathroom. She made it back just in time; as the door clicked shut behind her, Kageyama knocked on it and asked if she was all right.

"I'm fine!" she called out, running water into the marble sink. "It's more difficult to get the smell out than I thought. I'll be right there."

She wadded her jacket into a garbage chute in the wall and hit the disposal icon. The chute closed and filled with seawater, pumps gurgled, and the jacket was swept out of sight.

Night Owl sighed with relief. The statue was on its way. She knew where it would wind up: inside a metal mesh bag that, when it was full, would be automatically lifted by balloon up to the surface, where a garbage scow would pick it up. Night Owl knew the junker who operated the garbage scow that serviced the West Vancouver waterfront—Skimmer was a chummer of Wharf Rat's. She'd already made him promise not to collect any of the trash bags that rose from Kageyama's condoplex until she gave the go-ahead. That favor was going to cost her a couple hundred nuyen, but it was worth it. She relished the thought of Wu having to pick through Kageyama's garbage to find the statue. It would serve the fragger right for forcing her into this run.

When she'd realized that the garbage-disposal system was a hole in the condoplex's security, the discovery had seemed too good to be true. Then she realized that Kageyama's security depended not on keeping track of what left the building but on screening those who came in. Night Owl, thanks to the PETAB run, had managed to slip through the cracks.

Kageyama was waiting for her when she stepped out of the washroom and immediately noticed that she'd trashed her jacket. He seemed to have anticipated it, in fact: draped over one arm was an expensive-looking jacket cut from soft brown suede.

"Please," he said. "Allow me to lend you this."

He held it out in front of him, and Night Owl slipped her arms into the sleeves. The jacket was a perfect fit and smelled of new leather. Although it looked like something a corporate slitch would wear, it was seductively soft. Night Owl found herself leaning back into it until she and Kageyama were nearly pressed against each other. Kageyama let his hands linger on her shoulders for just a moment longer than necessary before he stepped back and bowed.

"It is a pity about the egg," he said. "Even though it turned out to be rotten, I appreciate you bringing it to me. How much was your patron going to pay for it?"

Night Owl shrugged as if cred didn't matter. She told him the first figure that popped into her head: "Three thousand nuyen."

Kageyama nodded. He slipped a hand into the pocket of his trousers and pulled out a credstick, offering it to Night Owl. "This should compensate you." Night Owl started to reach for it and then paused. Her fingers ached to take the credstick; to Kageyama, three thousand nuyen was no more than petty cash. But her gut told her to be careful—she'd bought her way into the condoplex, albeit unwittingly, by refusing payment for liberating the dour. She wondered if Kageyama was testing her. Maybe her ticket out of here was to . . .

Kageyama pressed the credstick into her palm and used both of his hands to close hers around it. "Take it," he whispered. "If you don't want the credit yourself, you can always give it away to charity." His lips twitched into a smile.

She gave him a wary look, wondering how much he really knew about her. To everyone she rubbed shoulders with in the shadows, Night Owl was a spendthrift who frittered away her cred as soon as she earned it. If they ever found out she gave the bulk of the cred from each run to a charity that provided medical care and cybernetics to third-world children, she'd be laughed off the streets.

She found herself regretting having stolen from Kageyama. Then she mentally shook her head. Biz was biz—and the goal of this particular run was to keep herself alive. Kageyama was a fool to have trusted her—and more of a fool to have given her the nuyen. She pulled her hand away from his and shoved the credstick into her pocket.

"Thanks for the cred," she said. "I appreciate it. If I find any more eggs, you'll be the first to know."

As Kageyama walked her back to the elevator, Night Owl caught a glimpse of an elderly Asian man peering into the entry hall through one of the glass walls. He looked ancient, with a bald, age-spotted head and hands as withered as fall leaves, and he wore clothing that was at least three decades out of style. The man raised a hand and waved at her, a bemused expression on his face.

"I thought you lived alone," Night Owl said. "Who's that? Your grandfather?"

"Who?" Kageyama glanced at the wall, but the elderly man had disappeared. Then he laughed. "Ah, you mean Kelvin. He's the man who created the glass for this building. He was a master craftsman before the Awakening and became a master mage after it. I am told that he somehow managed to fuse his essence with the glass and lives on inside these walls in astral form."

Night Owl swallowed nervously. "He must be . . . interesting company." Why was Kageyama telling her this?

Kageyama's green eyes twinkled. "Not as interesting as some."

The elevator door sighed open. Night Owl stepped inside and nodded goodbye to Kageyama through the window in the door as the elevator began its ascent. Only when she'd stepped out onto the rain-lashed platform at the surface did her shoulders begin to unknot. She'd done it: the run was over and she could fade away into the night.

She still couldn't shake the feeling, however, that Kageyama had put one over on her—that he wasn't nearly as stupid as he made himself out to be.

5
Gradual Progress

Alma
walked into the fitness center and looked around at the straining, sweating bodies, wondering which one was her "Johnson." The gym was an old-fashioned one, with equipment several decades out of date. Weights clanked against each other inside exercise machines, shadowbox booths pinged whenever a point was scored against a virtual opponent, and exerflexers creaked as people strained against a spiderweb pattern of stretchable bands. The room smelled of machine oil, rubber and sweat.