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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleSong Ai lets Al pick his food choices and orders room service from the kitchen. While waiting for the food, she motions for Al to accompany her to the large table in the living room. Sitting at a chair, she opens a console and taps some commands onto the keyboard that pops up. A holographic image begins to form on the center of the table, as if a building was being constructed before their eyes. It is several stories tall, made of stone and glass, but with a traditional Chinese influence to its design and decorations.
When the image is complete, Song Ai pauses her fingers on the keyboard and looks at Al. “What you are looking at is the nearly completed design for a hospital I would like to build in Chinatown. It would have clinics in the building as well as small satellite clinics scattered about the community to provide medical care to the people here. It would also serve as a major center for cybernetic, bio, and gene research and implementation. I have sources established for materials for the building and for the equipment to go into it. I have investors lined up to help fund the project and I am hoping to find enough qualified people to man it. I have been working on this for several years and my team of architects and engineers is nearly finished with the design process. I will be sponsoring scholarships for locals who wish to earn medical degrees and who want to return here to work. I believe that this project will accomplish three things. First, it will provide employment opportunities and incentives to the local area, improving the quality of life here. Second, it should provide the incentive for the Triad to give up most or even all of the illegal activities they are currently involved in. Third, I hope that the hospital and research facility will draw attention from people outside of Chinatown who want decent and reliable ‘ware at a cost that will not bankrupt them. Those are the three legs of my project. What do you think?”
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“Well, as broad solutions an’ lateral thinkin’ go, I reckon she’s constructive, an’ potentially honest. More’n that, could do a hell of a lot o’ good. I also think I underestimated yer wealth some. Shee-it, woman, even ta git the permits fer this sorta place….an’ ol’ Al can’t start ta imagine the capital outlay, even if’n ya got investors. But if ya got it, spend it, I reckon.”
He stood up and walked around the holographic model. “Sorry ta hear yer only hopin’ ta find the bodies, cuz a few hunnerd top notch medics ain’t gon’ fall out’n the sky. But maybe you could tap the home country, lure some Chinese over here with dazzlin’ Western standards o’ livin’ an’ so forth. Too bad about they patients back home, though.”
He chewed on his dying cigarette. “Investors gon’ want paid back, though. Place like this, with servicin’ yer interest-bearin’ debt, payin’ down yer capital, an’ then depreciation, yer gon’ be inna red fer a decade or so ta come, barrin’ some crazy favorable terms or some very creative accountin’. But that’s nothin’ new. Hospitals git built, eventually pay fer themselves. That’s realistic. What I simply don’t see is how any o’ this – what’d ya say? – how any o’ this incentivizes the Triads ta give up they illegal activities. None of ’em got medical skills, nor are many innerested in givin’ up they thug life fer three squares a day an’ better self-esteem. An’ while a facility like this turns over millions a year, it’s got a lotta shareholders an’ politicians an’ doctors an’ whatnot with they hands already out. It ain’t gon’ keep a whole organization o’ criminals in the lifestyle ta which they’ve become accustomed. An’ I think yer third point’s jist as much a pipe dream – ya wanna tempt folk with affordable prices an’ quality? Shee-it woman, what makes ya think ya can beat the prices an’ quality of innernational outfits like Whole New You, Nightengales, an’ Red Star, with they bulk procurement, economies o’ scale, an’ big data marketin’? Breakin’ into legit – an’ by legit I mean corp-dominated – fields makes takin’ over the Chinese Mafia feel like a walk inna park.”
He shrugged. “Still, they’s a few cards you could play with somethin’ like this. An’ it’s a damn sight better’n limpin’ along all hokey-pokey like, one foot inna rackets an’ one foot out.”
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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleSong Ai nods and grimaces. “Yes, I do believe that this will still be a tough sell for the crime lords, but I think that I can give them projections that will show that profits from the hospital can be greater than what they are making on slaves and drugs and chips. Granted, it is a long-term investment, but it will pay out well, especially for those who get in at the beginning. Start up costs will be significant, but I think I have to try to sell it to them as an investment in their future and in their children’s future.”
She sits back in her chair and gives Al a long look. “You mentioned a few cards I could play. I am certainly open to advice and suggestions, if you want to give that to me.”
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“Well, ol’ Al ain’t no captain of industry, so jist shootin’ from the hip here, but seems ta me ya want this place to be competitive in any money-makin’ way ya gotta think about differentiation. What’ll set ya apart from much better capitalized an’ established rivals onna crowded playin’ field. An’ fer that I’m thinkin’ ya play the race card. Ya already done gussied yer flagship facility up like somethin’ out’n the Ferbidden City. An’ one o’ the only legit industries ya got here in Chinatown, aside from restaurants, o’ course, is yer herbal remedies an’ so forth. So ya make this place the premier Chinese medicine researh center inna Western Hemisphere. Ya don’t actually sell herbal remedies, cuz you’ll put a dozen o’ yer only legit shops outta business. But ya mainstream they remedies. Better yet, ya do yer Western medicine alongside it, an’ pioneer fusion medicine – no more East vs. West on the treatment front, ya meld the best o’ both worlds, do research on synergizin’ the two medical philosophies. That’ll give ya a shot at grant money, an’ it’ll attract researchers like flies since new fields is where they can make they names. An’ that in turn’ll generate demand fer the remedies yer local shops sell. Acupuncture, kampo cures, hell, ain’t no end ta the hippy quackery the Chinese done dreamed up, an’ I’m told a good deal of it actually works. This takes off, it’ll save ya goin’ crawlin’ fer capital an’ pertection from Wuxing, cuz then ya’d be in they pocket ferever an’ a day.”
He stubbed out his cigarette.
“Jist an idear. An’ good business or not, it won’t do squat about all the damned criminals that form the backbone o’ this little organization o’ yours. All yer crazy schemes, ain’t none addressed what is basically a human cancer in the neighborhood. Even if ya git the higher-ups on board with promises o’ wealth ten years down the road, ya still got a whole bunch o’ guys don’t know nor want nothin’ but violence, carnal reward, an’ cheap prestige. They ain’t gon’ wanna be shopkeepers or hospital orderlies, they ain’t nursin’ dreams of a more respectable lifestyle, an’ yer people’re actively recruitin’ more into the life as we speak.”
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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleSong Ai grins at Al. “Brilliant, Al! Just brilliant. I was leaning to something different and you have helped provide me with a very good idea. Thank you very much. As to your very real concern, I can only say that I am not sure that we can afford to get rid of the soldiers. This is a very violent world and there will be people willing to take it all away for themselves. I will need a trained security force to be able to repel the invaders and I need to be actively doing so now. I will have to try to instill a different philosophy about life and how to treat the people that look to them for security.”
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“Different philosophy o’ life? Heh heh. Ones that got that, they already done chose ta work fer a livin’ rather’n join yer pack o’ thieves an’ child traffickers. Ones joinin’ yer fold is what’s left. But ya got an incurably optimistic view o’ human nature, I’ll give ya that.” Al spoke around a mouthful of buttered crab leg, barely intelligible, a thin stream of drool lengthening past the corner of his overfilled mouth. Wiping it absently, he continued, “Yer neighborhood rejuvenation program may have some merit in a pie-inna-sky sorta way, but when it comes ta Egg Fu an’ his ilk, ol’ Al’s way’s the best an’ only way. But I said I’d play it cool, go along with yer master plan. So they can go on offendin’ God, justice, an’ America with eve’ry breath. Leastways till they step wrong, show they colors in a way even you can’t blind yerself to….Until such time, jist point me at what ya want done.”
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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleSong Ai smiles grimly and points to herself as she draws a circle about her face. “See this, Al? This is the face of the new Triad and I will[/i} bring this organization into a different way of doing business and I will help the people here become better than they are. There will be those here who do not want to change, who will do whatever it takes to bring Fu Shing and me down, and they will die and be buried in unmarked graves for doing so. Either that or I will be in that unmarked grave. Working the odds and stealing something valuable is what I do, and I will steal the old Triad and make it something new and better, or die trying.”
She pauses and calms herself, folding her hands in front of her face for a few moments. “I am sorry for this outburst, Al. I know that you are trying to help me and I wish to thank you for what you have already done. I am not angry at you, but at the sort of world we live in where what the Triads do is accepted as normal. This plan is not something I have just tossed together overnight, but it does need additional refinement. You have given me some good advice and I will act on that by incorporating it into the master plan. I appreciate very much your honesty and your blunt manner. I know that this is going to be a long, uphill battle, but I am convinced that it is the right thing to do and I will not swerve from the goal. As I see it, the next step is to have Fu Shing attend the Triad meeting on Saturday evening and be voted in as the new head of the 88s. We will move on from there, depending on what sort of resistance he gets from the others. I thank you so much for staying with me on this and for wanting to be part of what is happening on Saturday, regardless of what happens afterwards.”
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Massive piece of steak inches from his open mouth, Al answered, “Saturday night it is then. Reckon I can squeeze lots o’ free eatin’ an’ drinkin’ in betwixt now an’ then.” He popped the meat into his mouth, but that didn’t stop him talking. “Now seein’s I got quite a bit o’ work left ta do on this here surf an’ turf, reckon you got some entertainin’ ta do. So what say ya either switch on the trid or else tell ol’ Al how a do-gooder such as yerself done got yerself so far into the good graces o’ the likes o’ Egg Fu.”
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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleSong Ai chuckles. “A good story, that. The short story is that I used my Song Ai persona to get into a small brothel that was known to be frequented by the 88s. I suspected that it would take some time to be noticed, but it all happened quicker than I had expected, and I was summoned to service Fu Shing, one of the 88s lieutenants. He liked what I did for him and had me back. In case you did not know it, prostitutes are as invisible as any other servant or slave and I heard things that led me to believe that Fu Shing’s security chief was going to betray him. I interceded and saved Fu Shing’s life, for which he was very appreciative. I have been working with him since and have stopped several assassination attempts, further strengthening my position with the man.”
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Al licked his fingers. “So, jist preppin’ ya fer what might be comin’ at Saturday’s powwow….at best yer a whore that was lucky enough ta be inna right place at the right time ta catch the boss’s eye, an’ at worst yer a plant from a rival organization, with yer one-in-a-million moment o’ glory havin’ been orchestrated ta win ya some trust. I mean, they’s gon’ be some powerful fellers in that room that din’t git where they are by believin’ in luck or coincidence.”
He held up his hands in peace.
“Ain’t sayin’ that’s how it is. An’ in light o’ what ya done since assumin’ yer current status, none o’ that might be fair. But ya gotta know some o’ that or somethin’ very much like it’s gon’ be brought up.”
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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleSong Ai chuckles. “Yes, you are almost certainly dead on the money. I know that I would be suspicious of myself. It is bad enough that I was able to stop Fu Shing’s assassination, but then to go on and survive the explosion of the social club, be involved in destroying the chip and snuff film lab, Los Lobos, and the Butcher of Kiew? Yeah, all a bit much. I never really wanted to move this fast, but the situation really took on a life of its own and I just rode the wave, so to speak. I will probably need to be able to talk fast at the meeting. Fortunately, I am not putting myself up for the position of lead of the 88s and it may simply be seen as Fu Shing planting me here, which might just work in my favor. Still, I cannot shirk the meeting or I give up on everything.”
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“Warn’t sayin’ diff’rent, jist wargamin’ it some.” As Al cut another piece of steak, Tanya’s comm chirped. She routed the call to her headphones, but Al could hear the noisy agitation in the caller’s voice. He walked over to the window. The angle down to the street on the casino side sucked. At best he could see the sidewalk across the avenue. People were running.
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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleSong Ai swears silently as she stands up. “Looks like some people just refuse to accept the situation. It seems like some elements of Rick’s inside clique are making another attempt at scarring people away. Lei Tung may need some assistance. Would you accompany me?”
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Al shrugged. “Reckon that’s what I’m here for.” He picked up his rifle. The one good thing about consorting with scum like the Triads was that you didn’t have to worry so much about cops. “Kynos an’ Feral goin’ down? They even still around?”
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Feral
Thursday Mid-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Bright Path Casino and Hotel, Chinatown, SeattleAfter a relaxing night enjoying the Triad’s dubious hospitality Feral had been in the process of packing up his meagre possessions and getting ready to go back to his normal life when the commotion outside kicked off. Peering down from the suite’s main window he could see running figures. He was so tempted just to leave the Triads to deal with their own mess but Silk had asked him to help stabilise the situation here (not that he was in any way sure that the senorita’s plans were going to lead to any kind of stability!) and it seemed his work was not done…just yet.
>Al, looks like the embers have flared up, we still in this game?
>Feral#91
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<<Yeah, I seem ta have signed on fer the duration. Headed down now. Know if the keeb’s still in play? Or anything about what’s what down there?>>
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The muffled rumble of an explosion found its way all the way up to the penthouse suite, telling Al there was no time for a powwow. He and Tanya jogged out of the suite to the elevator landing, where the two guards were waiting with the doors open. They looked like they were itching for a fight, but Tanya ordered them to go into the suite and stay close to Fu. Foolishly disappointed to miss the fight and even more foolishly delighted to be honored with such a task, they assumed their new stations.
The elevator was fast. Al had just enough time to check his ammo before the doors pinged open to a pitched gun battle. A few dozen people were arrayed around the casino’s entry hall exchanging fire, their enthusiasm matched only by their inaccuracy. Showers of glass from shattered chandeliers rained down on the piled red carpeting. Shot bodies lay here and there around the room, some dead, some not yet. To Al, all the combatants looked the same – Chinese were virtually indistinguishable to Al, and it didn’t help that they were all dressed in gaudy suits, were predominantly young, and, with a few notable exceptions, male. The only way Al could tell who to shoot at was by general positioning around the room. He figured people shooting at folks near the entrance were on his team, and anyone shooting into the casino was the other guys.
There were a hell of a lot more of the other guys.
Al was picking a target and thinking how much this was just like that really fun day when this had all started – a few dozen Triad thugs jumping him and Jan in a big casino a lot like this one – when one of the few female fighters (one of the beneficiaries of Tanya’s enlightened recruitment policies) decided it was time to prove her gender’s worth and charged the enemy line with a bloody hatchet and an ear-splitting scream. She was cut down almost immediately, her upper body transformed to a crimson mist, but her move drew fire momentarily off of her comrades and inspired them to greatness: the other two of Tanya’s women likewise broke cover and charged the doors, followed by most of the men.
And damn if it didn’t work. The unmasked ferocity of ten or so shrieking thugs charging toward them broke the line of shooters at the door and the interlopers turned tail. Ten chasing away thirty – Al almost gave a shout before realizing it was too good to be true.
“Hey, stop. STOP!!!” he shouted. He grabbed one passing teen by the back of the collar. The youth turned and lashed out blindly with a machete. Al ducked and shoved the frenzied boy to the ground, trying to catch one more before he ran any farther. He tried to think of how to say ‘stop’ or even just ‘no’ in Chinese, but of course he’d never known either. A couple of the older men, including Lei Tung, caught on, stopped running, and started to yell something, but most of Team Tanya was out the door now. Which was exactly when the Claymores went off….
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The veterans had wised up in time, but the eager new recruits were decimated by the blast.
Al saw red.
Hard to say why. He hated all these gangsters – yellow or black, tusked or round-eared, Russky or Injun, spaghetti-eaters or sushi-chompers. Every one of those degenerates that had just gotten themselves killed he’d have just as soon done himself. Maybe it was because, whether he liked it or not, they had for the moment been on his side. Or maybe, bad as they were, he was starting to see Tanya’s crew as the lesser of evils. Or maybe he just didn’t like losing. So before the smoke cleared, hell, before the blast’s echoes had stopped reverberating around the huge casino floor, he was on his feet.
Pounding toward the charred, blood-drenched entryway, Tanya was only a few steps behind him. But just as he was about to exit into the killing zone – which was to say, the zone in which he planned to do some killing – in an eery moment of deja vu from not a minute earlier, Lei Tung was yelling something in Chinese. Al couldn’t make out a word of it, but as he ran into the street he realized that Tanya was no longer with him. The voodoo gods didn’t fail him, and he dove flat under a burning car just as explosions started going off – again – all up and down the street. Rather than steel balls from Claymores directed at the entrance, the blasts originated from behind shop windows, saturating the street with vicious sprays of shattered glass. Moving at 47 meters per second, the shards found their way into every corner, stoop and alleyway, and so just as surely found their way into the flesh of every opposing Triad – the very ones that had hunkered smugly outside the Claymores’ carefully planned killzone following their feint of a retreat.
And just like that, the battle was over. Al came out from under his flaming hidey-hole and looked around. Mangled bodies of Tanya’s youthful rookies were everywhere, but they were outnumbered by the corpses of their killers. All up and down the street was utter devastation of life and property.
But the casino had held. That had some value – if it had been a military installation. As a commercial venture, Al supposed it was as good as destroyed. At least until Tanya found some way of luring customers back…again. But then, she had a talent for that.
She and Lei Tung were hustling out to meet him, flanked by other survivors of the casino’s security detail.
Al lit a cigarette and waited for them.
Tanya, looking around at the carnage, asked, “Al, are you all right?”
Before he could answer, Lei Tung was addressing him, a formal air to his voice. “Mr. Guthrie, please accept my most humble apologies. I tried to warn you, but…” The words were honey, but his eyes were poison, and he made no effort to keep Al from seeing it.
Tanya said, “Wait. Lei Tung, you triggered the second blast?!”
“Yes, mistress,” he replied. “I prepared the charges some time ago, against just such a contingency.”
“Damn fine work of it, too,” Al broke in. “Usin’ the glass thataway, smart. An’ not easy ta git it jist right like ya did. Seems I underestimated ya, kemo sabe…..in more ways than one.”
“Thank you, Mr. Guthrie.” Turning to Tanya, Lei Tung added, “I waited until it was clear that all civilians had fled the street for cover.”
“Yes,” Tanya retorted, understanding flooding her mind, and with it, anger. “But you detonated the charges when you knew my trusted associate Mr. Guthrie had just stepped into your kill zone….”
“A thousand apologies, mistress. My only excuse is my single-minded desire to see you and our organization’s people and assets safeguarded. In my excitement, I gave my warning only in Chinese, not thinking whether Mr. Guthrie spoke that language. By the time I realized my mistake, he was out in the street, and had I not acted, he would have been riddled with bullets as surely as he would have been by the glass. And now we can thank our ancestors that he miraculously emerged unharmed.”
Tanya looked far from satisifed, but Al stopped her from berating Lei Tung further. “Yer boy here saved the day, I reckon. Tough call, but the right one. Ya got a top-notch man here.”
He couldn’t have Tanya killing the guy.
That was something he planned to do himself.
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Four hours later, Al was sprawled at the top of a broad, curving marble staircase, his back against a cool, polished stone wall and a cigarette in his hand. His shotgun was on the floor next to him.
Across the landing from him there was a shiny mahogany double door. Big brass knobs. Shut. Seated at a little round table on the landing with the door basically between him and them were two guys in business suits: a tall, bulky ork and a taller, rather less bulky elf. In front of them on the table were their weapons. Five pistols in total. A bit down from them, a human female leaned against the marble railing overlooking the ground floor. She was wearing a suit too, the kind with a skirt. A light automatic pistol and a very compact SMG were balanced on the rail. Once the principles had gone through the big doors, the three men and the woman had laid their weapons out in plain view – some sort of ritual. Al had seen it in some trids. It didn’t make any sense to him.
Tanya had asked him to accompany her to a “business meeting” here in Bellevue. She’d left the hotel in her Chinagirl guise and they’d had to stop in a cheap hotel for her to switch to her real (???) appearance. Not that any of it was real. She’d made no attempt to conceal herself when changing (clothes….and face, and hair, and body….), but Al had concentrated on the trid, not caring to see any part of it. She’d told him who she was meeting, but the names hadn’t meant anything to him, except that they were the sort of names used by people that lived in big walled estates like this one – Maddox and Xavier and so forth. All three were white human males. One lived here. Only one bodyguard each was allowed in the house, but the guy that lived here had maybe thirty outside around the grounds, and the others had come with escort vehicles full of guys. Tanya had just come with Al.
He congratulated himself on the confidence he inspired.
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Song Ai & Al
Thursday Late-Afternoon, 28 November, 2075, Chinatown, SeattleThe other bodyguards all give off a quiet appearance of being perfectly incapable of reacting to any threat, the Elven male even appearing to be asleep at the table and the woman casually watching what is below her and ignoring the others nearer her. Al picks up on several very subtle hints that all is not as it appears; the Ork’s left ear twitches at just about every sound and the fingers on the woman’s right hand tap out the rhythm of some faint music drifting up from below but those of the left hand are calm and steady at her side. The sleeping Elf may indeed be incompetent as he has not given away anything to deny that, yet.
It seems like several hours pass by, but Al knows from experience that he has only been waiting for just less than two hours when the doors open and the three men and Tanya walk out of the room. She maneuvers her body to take in the scene before her and smiles at Al while motioning for him to accompany her. She may be an expert at keeping her emotions concealed and, of course, her face would not display anything she did not wish it to, but her smile seems a bit forced as she shakes the hand of one of the men. Cheek kisses are exchanged and Tanya moves carefully from the small group to the marble stairway leading down to the ground floor.
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