SQUATTER
(Zolaesque slice of life.)
by shapcano
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fraggin shadowrunner. Knows da fraggin shadows. Works 'em. Lemme tell ya, chummer, YOU don't know drek. Ya wanna know da shadows, ya don't leave 'em. Ya don't finish a run and go back to yer condo or some fraggin warehouse ya own. Ya don't get all cleaned up and go fraggin club hoppin or dinin in some fraggin fancy restaurant. Ya don't go shoppin fer ammo and wiz toys and guns and spell crap and da rest a dat drek. "
"NO. Ya stay put. Ya learn da alleys, da streets. Ya find a squat dat ya can hide in. Good enough ta keep ya mostly dry but not so good dat ya gotta fight for it. Cause fightin gets ya weak and weak gets ya dead. End a story. See, it ain't da chip head wit da lead pipe who tinks he's Neil da ork barbarian dats da problem. It's probably not even da burnout stewbum wit da blade dat's waitin till chiphead's done so he can cut ya dat'll ice ya, see. It's da fraggin old hag wit a sock fulla sand. Da one who's too weak ta even defend herself when Solly and da gang are feelin frisky. Who only gets at da dumpster after it's been raided twice. Yeah. Da patient one. She's how ya get dead. After ya take care a Neil and fragger wit da blade. After yer cuts have bled a little and yer bruises have made ya stiff. Dat's when da fight fer yer dry squat gets ya a ride in da organlegger's van."
"In da shadows, da real shadows, not da fraggin trid shadows, not da shadows from da newsfaxes, dat's how da reaper finds ya. Not in a fraggin standup fight wit da opposition, not in a blaze a glory, but in da bite of a devilrat in yer sleep dat gets infected and makes ya too sick ta defend yerself. In da unguarded moment when yer congratulatin yerself on a win or thinkin about what ya can do wit da cred ya scored. Dat's when death tiptoes up behind ya and takes ya out. In da real shadows....."
"Cutter, what are you doing?" The voice cut through the monologue like a knife. It belonged to an elf woman with the shaved head. She had a nice figure which her jade green synthleather outfit did nothing to hide. A cyberdeck draped casually over one shoulder was balanced by the SMG on the other. The look in her eyes betrayed a certain eagerness to use the more lethal of her accessories.
"Be right with you, Corey." The young black norm replied. "Just checkin ta see if I might find a lead on who iced those couriers."
"From Ichimon Nashi? Good luck, my friend." Corey replied with a laugh. "Just don't get so distracted by his bullshit that you forget where you are, kid."
The muscular young samurai bridled at the elf bitch's lack of confidence in him as much as at the word "kid". He was a well to heavily armed street soldier with newly implanted smartgun links and cybereyes and was insulted by the implication that this broken-down, babbling old Asian squatter should be considered some sort of threat. He'd only stopped to listen to the poor slot's rambling on the off chance that the alley monkey had heard or seen something of the package that he, as the latest addition to the Blue Crew, had been tasked with retrieving.
Putting his irritation aside, Cutter turned to see that his possible contact had disappeared. His cybereyes' thermal imager indicated the squatter's path and with the speed born of youthful self-confidence the sam took off through the burned out tenement in pursuit. Although intent on his quarry, Cutter's youthful imagination let him see fleeting, corner-of-the-eye images of the other shadow denizens that Ichimon had described.
The sound of the slide going back on Cutter's Baretta 200ST had it's desired effect when it froze the darting squatter in his tracks. "Okay, chief, Okay. No need ta get violent, chummer. I ain't goin no place. I just wanted ta get away from pryin eyes is all. What was yer question, again?"
"I just asked if ya lived in these shadows, old man, but now that ya mention it, I do wanna know if ya heard anything about a pair that got killed a couple a blocks from here."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Trid shadowrunners." the squatter replied, "Couple a slots in 400 nuyen synth-leather suits, carryin hardware out where everybody can see it, just like yer elf slitch, tryin ta play tough in a world dey don't even know. Wha.... suddenly slapping his neck the squatter fell to the ground like a sack of wash.
Cutter moved like lightning, dropping down and quick crawling away from his last location. He wanted to call for backup but knew that the slightest sound might give him away. Using the patience he had developed while waiting for his last surgical alterations to heal, he remained completely motionless in the shadows as Corey walked right through the room looking for him. For an instant he thought she might have been the one who tranqued the squatter, but she didn't even recognize the pile of rags on the floor as a human being as she moved through the room. Cutter also noticed that she had both hands on her SMG and that her outfit clung tightly enough to her form for him to be confident that she was not carrying a concealed narcojet gun.
After a few more minutes Cutter moved over to the form on the floor. He squatted down and as he turned the body over felt a pinprick on the back of his hand. Surprised as he was by the hatpin in the filthy squatter's hand he was not alarmed until he realized that the man was conscious and uninjured. "Wha...." he croaked as his throat locked up.
Cutter's eyes bulged as he realized that he had no control of his muscles and that he was locked in a squatting position. Ichimon got up and began searching the samurai's helpless body.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. It ain't fair." The ragged man said as he went through the motionless Samurai's pockets. "Ya got cyberware and reflexes and guns and creds. Yer supposed ta be da master a da shadows, an it turns out ya got iced by a hatpin. Ain't life a bitch?" Nashi asked with a surprising degree of sympathy. "I'd let ya go, ya know, but you'd come back an kill me, so even though I hate doin it, I gotta cack ya. Let's see...... This will do." The squatter took an empty plastic water bottle from the refuse strewn floor and jammed the end of Cutter's own Baretta into it. "Silencer" Ichimon explained, and then added, "the hatpin's just got a muscle paralyzer on it. Junkie traded it ta me fer a hat. 'salmost gone. I gotta use your gun to finish the job. Nice gun, too. I won't get ta keep it, though. Too tempting for the other squatters around here, make me a target like you were. No, I'll just take yer coins and maybe yer wrist phone ta sell. Da rest will get grabbed by somebody else. Da leggers may give me a few creds fer yer organs and cyber, if I'm the first one ta bring dem to ya. Sometimes dey don't give ya nothin. Dat's da real shadows for ya. Well......bye." Carefully pressing the end of the empty water bottle against the bottom of Cutter's chin, Ichimon Nashi pulled the trigger and with a soft "cuff" sound, blew off the top of Cutter's head.
End Trans
This story is copyright of the author. Shadowrun is a Registered Trademark of FASA Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Used without permission. Any use of FASA Corporation's copyrighted material or trademarks in this file should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks.
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