I stared at Walker for a second, expecting him to burst out laughing, but I spluttered when he didn’t. “W-wait, you’re serious?”

“Mostly.” His boots thumped on the floorbaords as he stood and grabbed his broad-brimmed hat. “But we gotta get goin’. I’ll tell you on the way.” Shaking my head, I grabbed my saw and waved to Dezi as we left the building. Ishimura Street was busy, being a well-lit thoroughfare near Central Ward. The Pall was black as a pimp’s heart above, but ample lifelights kept the shadows at bay down here. It was a little after noon and fourth shift had just gotten off, so the street was full of paste-vat workers walking home, many still in their heavy yellow coveralls. The food carts did a brisk trade with them. Some were pretty nice, including the one Dezi and I’d grabbed lunch from, but others were little more than wheelbarrows full of charcoal and covered with scraps of wire fence.

Across from Walker’s brownstone was the Cage. It was a huge truss of acid-streaked metal bars, made in the shape of a flat rectangle. The thing was nearly ten stories high and studded with little cylindrical gratings all along its length. People thought it used to be a radar array or radio antenna, but it was long since defunct. I was always a little surprised it hadn’t been hacked up for scrap, but people were superstitious. There were all kinds of creepy stories about what happened to those who tried. The superstition didn’t apply to getting near it, though. There was a bare-knuckle tournament going down in the Cage’s gravel lot, a circle of shouting spectators surrounding a pair of dusty, shirtless men that punched and grabbed at one another. A skinny woman sat cross-legged on the ground nearby, wailing on a lap steel and collecting tossed chits in a plasfoam tray.

I’d done a few fights when I was younger and made good money, but it was too dangerous to make a career out of. Win too much and you’d start to piss people off, maybe end up with a knife in your back after a match. Plus, the big promoters were always linked to the gangs, and my dad had told me to stay out of gang business if I could. I snorted. Easy to see how that worked out.

“What?” asked Walker, glancing up at me as he headed east.

“Nothing. Just thinking about how I got here.” I stuck my hands in my jacket pockets and followed, shaking my head at a kid selling ink-smeared broadsheets.

“Walked, dincha?” I scowled at him. “C’mon, you fed that one right to me. Sharkie, you get to be my age and you realize life is like, well, it’s like…”

“Hurry up, Walker. I’m eagerly awaiting this latest piece of old man advice.”

Now it was his turn to shoot me a look. “Don’t pay you for snark, do I?”

I cracked a smile. “No, you get that for-“

“Aw, shut it. Now I’m the one walkin’ into things.” He lit a cigarette and let it dangle from the corner of his mouth. “What I was tryin’ to say, is that life is like slidin’ down a hill, a scree so steep you can’t slow down. No, all you can do is try and push this way ’n’ that, and hope dodgin’ that first rock don’t send you right toward the next one. You do your best with what you’re given and what you can take without gettin’ caught, and ain’t no point pinin’ after what could have been.”

Damn, Walker, sounds kind of personal is what I would have said if I didn’t think it actually was. I remembered what Yera’d told me about him, that he was loyal to the Holy Bones as an institution above all else. I guess even he had second thoughts like I did sometimes, or dwelled on decisions he regretted. “That’s all we can do, isn’t it?” I finally said.

He nodded, hat pulled low. “And speakin’ of what people take and what they’re given, we’re goin’ to meet a true-blue Vitroix samurai today. A bona-fide aristocrat, imagine that.”

“I got a few questions, Walker, but I bet you’re about to answer them.” We stopped to let a trailer full of meat ‘zards go by before crossing the street. The huge, fat reptiles hissed at us as they passed.

“Ayup. Out in the quarries, we have to deal with rock raiders, right?” He reached into his pocket and a pair of headlights flashed ahead of us. It was the same vantablack coupe he’d driven to the Runes meeting.

“Sure, sure. Are they really that big of a problem, though?” Rock raiders occupied that weird, half-lit space between the quarries and the Glasslands themselves. They made a living stealing what they could from Savlop-2’s outskirts and trying not to get shot.

“Yes and no. There’s more of ‘em than you’d think, but it ain’t like they’re well-equipped.” I hopped into the shotgun seat and Walker got us fired up and moving, heading further east towards Quarryside.

“Point is, sometimes a few a’ the more martial samurai’ll come down from Vitroix and help us out with ‘em. For us it’s survival but for them it’s a game- a chance to show off, use all that fancy war-tech. Not much some half-blind fucker with a rusty kalash can do to you from the other side of ten tons of Praetor armor, right?” I snorted. “Yeah. Still, though, they ain’t half bad to have on your side in a fight. Some of the ritzy fuckers are almost tolerable once you get to know ‘em.”

“I’ll take your word for it.” With everything going on in the past few days, let alone the rest of my life, I wasn’t feeling too charitable towards Admin at the moment.

“Good, cause it’s one a’ them we’re ‘bout to meet. The Montesquieu, he’s called.” He waved a hand about flamboyantly as he turned north, taking us even farther towards the outskirts of the city. “Heir apparent to the Montesquieu family line and a spot on the Yakkorp executive board, along with a bunch of other shit I could care less about.”

“Couldn’t,” I muttered. The lights outside were few and far between, and abandoned buildings hulked out of the pitch-dark like giant’s gravestones. I spotted a fire burning in a torn-up drum, and in the instant it flashed past the window glimpsed a single figure squatting beside it- pale, naked, limbs bent and deformed. With a shudder I turned to look straight ahead, where there was nothing but blasted pavement. Anything you met in a place like this…well, it was something you’d regret meeting.

“Whatever. We’re talkin’ to him ‘cause he’s got the intel we need for our next job. Boss Moses and Venya clued me in to most of it, but the exact time and place- we gotta talk to him. I met ‘im a few times back in the quarries, dropped him a line through certain channels…expected I’d have to do ‘im a favor in return, but it turns out our interests line up real nice on this one and he’s givin’ us the goods for free.”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “That sounds real convenient, Walker. Why’s he need to meet in person, too? Just send a fucking netmail.”

“You think I didn’t think so too?” He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. Probably wanted a smoke, but he was too focused on dodging crater-size potholes to get one lit. “But here’s the thing, little miss. Admin ain’t a monolith. They’re a bunch of backstabbin’ rats just like us, they just can’t be so open about it. Gotta keep up appearances ’n’ shit.

Menschenjaegers in D-block, that fuckin’ arm…we know some aristo bastard’s got his fingers all over this thing, and odds are it’s someone the Montesquieu don’t like. Someone’ with enough slicers on the payroll that Monty can’t trust anythin’ except a meat conversation. Sides, he’s got no grudge against us. Us deeks are so below ‘im, the way he sees it, we ain’t worth grudgin’.”

It made a twisted kind of sense, put that way. “Just don’t expect me to be nice to the fucker.”

He chuckled. “I’d be disappointed if you were, Sawyer. All you gotta do is stand still and look scary.”

“Is that the only reason you brought me along? Should I have dressed better?”

“Naw. Do I look dressed up?- an’ that’s rhetorical, before you say anything smart. And we each get to bring ourselves and a second, no one else. That’s the deal.”

We were pretty far out, now. I thought I could see the lights of the quarries way out on the horizon, but otherwise the headlights were the only illumination for miles. “And you just take that at face value?”

“Pff. Hell no.” Walker slowed down and hit a control on the dash, dimming the headlights almost to nothing. “I’ve had Monta and a few others staked out around the spot for almost a day. No doubt he’s got guys out there too, Masks or private guards. But don’t worry about that. This is gonna go real smooth.”

“Oh, now we’re fucked for sure.” Walker snorted at that. “So what’s the job we need this blindie to tell us about?”

He flashed that nasty time-to-break-shit grin. “A bank heist.”

“Huh.” That wasn’t what I’d expected at all, and it kind of worried me. “A heist? Like with disguises, and hacking, and sneaking in from the ceiling, and-“

“And some roach-brained plan so complicated King Irem couldn’t understand it and you could only pull it off in a holo? Hell no. Mostly. We’re fuckin’ Holy Bones. We’re gonna bust in there hard ’n’ fast, grab what we need, shoot anyone in the way and skedaddle.”

“Oh, okay. That makes more sense.”

“Firmly in your wheelhouse, I figure. And start gettin’ excited. Found a few things to help you out, and I think you’ll like ‘em.”

“What things?” I asked warily.

“It’s a surprise, a surprise.” He winked at me and I rolled my eyes. “I’ll show you when were done with this shit. And don’t you want to know what we’re heistin’?”

“Well, money, right? It’s a bank.”

“No-Fuck!” He swore as we thumped over a big dogroach skittering across the road. “No, we got plenty of deng. This is the same kind of deal as your and Monta’s last outing. The Fomorii- those dickheads from K-block- they’re passing something valuable to their friends uptown. High-placed friends, accordin’ to our intel. We fuck over the Fomorii, that means they can’t help the Blues and we fuck over whichever aristo is supportin’ ‘em and sendin’ Menschenjaegers onto our turf.”

“That last part sounds like we’ll have Admin gunning for us,” I pointed out.

“No, no. If they were doin’ anything legitimate they wouldn’t be going through the Blues in the first place. We chuck a big enough monkey wrench into their plans, they’ll have to cut and run. The law actually matters uptown, at least if you get caught.”

“Sure, Walker, but I meant in the moment. At the bank. Literally gunning for us.”

“Oh, yeah. Don’t worry about that. This’ll allll make sense real soon. But for now, we’re here.”

Walker stopped the car with a jerk and killed the engine. “C’mon. I’m tryin’ to be late but not too late, you know? Just tiptoein’ the edge of offensive.”

“Alright, alright.” I hopped out and looked around- not that there was much to see in the blackness. Just the glow of the pits to the south, so faint you weren’t sure if you were imagining it, and the dull red of Walker’s flashlight. We seemed to be in a giant parking lot, its pavement riven with cracks and scabby potholes. A few burnt-out vics lurked at the edge of visibility. I peered around, looking for any trace of Fidi or other snipers, but I saw nothing. “Where are we?” I asked as I got out my own light and followed Walker.

“This is the old Sou’west Automatics plant.” He flicked his light upward, sending a dim circle of red flashing across a huge factory building in front of us. “Used to build domestic robots for uptown before they pulled the high-tech jobs out of D-block. Must’ve been eighty years ago.”

“Robots. Great.” I grimaced. Creepy fucking things. I was glad we didn’t have them in D-block. I’d seen one or two at junk dealers with my dad before, always broken, with tufts of wire jutting from the stumps of their limbs and flat doll eyes jittering back and forth in their cracked plastic skulls- ugh. “I hate robots.”

Walker smirked at me, the bastard. “Bit of a robophobe, are ya Sharkie? Better be careful when we go inside. I hear they made some of them things with nuclear batteries. Maybe they’re still walkin’ around in there, even-“

“Come on, quit it!” I gave him a good-natured shove. “I can’t be intimidating if I’m jumping all over the place, can I?”

“Fine, fine. I been in here once before and never saw a thing still movin’ around, bein’ honest.” He angled the beam of his light up, illuminating a gaping loading dock in the factory’s side. “We’re gonna have to give up our weapons when we get in there, Sharkie, but so will they. I’ll ask you not to make a fuss out of it.”

“Mm…I don’t like that, Walker.” I ran my fingers over the hilt of the saw, the Ultima’s grip.

“I don’t either, but that’s the deal. We got Monta to be our ace in the hole.” He vaulted into the loading dock with me on his heels, and we entered what looked like a shipping area. Its floor was scattered with toppled metal shelves and robotic limbs- hands and feet and heads, their unfinished white plastic pale as a drowned corpse. I shook my head. Fuck this place.

“We’re headed for the main floor.” Walker shone his light at a sign overhead that read “ASSEMBLY AREA” with an accompanying arrow. We followed it down a broad concrete hallway and through a heavy plastic curtain labelled “DECONTAMINATION.” Past it was a small room with a matching curtain on the other end. Dust-choked sprayer heads lined the ceiling, but that wasn’t what I was looking at. In the middle of the room was an old folding table with a very new and bright LED lantern resting in its center. Past that stood someone who looked eerily familiar.

They bore a great resemblance to Pengyi, not just because of their catlike ears but the pale, almost preternatural beauty of their features. They were taller, a hair over six feet if I guessed right, and their hair was dark as oil rather than red. They wore a black suit that made the one I’d worn to the Runes meeting look like something fished out of a paste vat. It oozed a level of quality that went past ostentation and right back around to elegant simplicity. The expression on their face was studiously cold and neutral, their eyes slate-gray and dark in the lantern’s stark shadow. I couldn’t tell if they were a man or a woman, and the tenor of their voice didn’t help me make the distinction. Northmarch had said genemods like Pengyi had gone out of fashion, but the Montesquieu hadn’t got the memo. I got a sick feeling just looking at them.

“Greetings.” Their tone was smooth, perfectly modulated, devoid of life. I couldn’t even tell if it was artificial or not. “Lay your weapons here, please. All of them. I will know if you attempt to conceal them.”

Must be the Montesquieu’s second, I realized. I tore my eyes away from them long enough to glance at Walker, who didn’t move.

“You first, if’n ya don’t mind.” Was he playing up the accent? Kind of sounded like it.

There was no hesitation before the reply, as if the second had expected this. “As you wish.” From within their suit jacket they pulled out a large caseless-loading automatic, a stubby machine pistol, two combat knives of ludicrously fine make, a garrote wire that sparkled like diamond in the lantern light, and a pair of strange throwing knives from within their sleeves. “That is all,” they said, stepping back from the table.

“How do we know you ain’t hidin’ anything?” Walker asked suspiciously. He was really hamming it up.

“My master has sworn you safe conduct at this meeting. His word is inviolate. This is more than enough.” They said it like they were explaining a fact of the universe, sure as gravity. It was creepy.

Walker spat on the floor and I had to resist rolling my eyes. He didn’t even chew. “Fine.” He pulled out his UZ target pistol, a pocketknife, a small revolver from his belt and an even tinier one from his boot. “Shit, almost forgot.” He reached for the small of his back and came back with a huge clip-pointed knife, a brass-spined job broad as an axe and long as his forearm. “That one just disappears in your pocket.”

No laughs from my counterpart. I wondered if they were even capable. “You as well,” they told me. Moving with reluctance, I added saw, Slukh, my fixed-blade, and the Ultima to the pile. The genemod remained impassive, though they raised an eyebrow at the huge Admin-issue revolver.

“Very well. This way.” They turned to the huge steel door on the other side of the room, throwing the rusty lock lever and pulling it open with a screech. It didn’t take them any apparent effort. Pengyi was fit, but he didn’t have strength like that. I had to assume this genemod was a cyborg too, or enhanced in other ways. A thought struck me- if their eyes could see if we were hiding weapons, could they see my skeleton? Realize it was made of something impossible? If so, they hadn’t mentioned it.

Walker and I followed them onto the cavernous factory floor, lit only by another lantern farther in. Most of the machinery seemed to have been ripped out, leaving the place almost empty. The ceiling was dim and high above us, crisscrossed with hanging tracks. Half-built robots still dangled in a few places like hanged corpses nobody’d bothered to cut down. The genemod led us straight towards the light. It rested on another old folding table, on the opposite side of which sat a man- the Montesquieu, apparently.

I zoomed in my eye, taking in my first sight of one of our glorious rulers. He didn’t rise to greet us, instead just watching coldly. His skin was a deep brown, his build spare, his hair a dark ponytail pulled tightly back. A thin-lipped mouth, sharp nose and severe widow’s peak gave him a harsh aspect, like the hunting birds I’d seen in Sun Age pictures. I thought he was in his thirties, but that expression made him look older. His fine clothes reminded me of a uniform: pants and a double-buttoned jacket, both dark and austere. The only bit of color on him came the striped fur half-cape clasped over one shoulder. It was orange and black- there was some big cat creature from the Sun Age with fur like that, though the name escaped me. As we got closer I saw his eyes were the color of steel- not just the irises, but the whites and pupils too. A close inspection with my own bionic eye revealed tiny Yakkorp sigils etched around their centers. Yakkorp didn’t make too much of their own chrome- they preferred to license components out to the other corps- but what they did make was the highest of the high-end. I didn’t see a weapon, though an empty hotwire sheath was on his belt.

Those weird eyes lit briefly on me before fixing on my boss. “Mister Walker.” His voice was slightly raspy, though its accent was refined. “You’re late.” Something else was odd about his manner, though I couldn’t place it.

“Sorry ‘bout that, Montesquieu. I’m a busy man.” And you aren’t, was the implication I got. Maybe a bit of rudeness was par for the course. Walker flopped into the chair placed for him and I took up station behind him. The genemod did the same thing opposite, giving me an expressionless look.

“Quite. Shall we get to it, then?” At least he wasn’t wasting time. Probably afraid he’d catch something off us.

“I ain’t here for the pleasure of your company, that’s for sure.”

The aristocrat didn’t react to the insult. “You contacted my staff regarding the…transaction occurring at the Crockett Bank and Safe headquarters in Kilo block. Am I correct in assuming you intend to disrupt it?”

Walker crossed his arms and kicked back. “We’re considerin’ it. Nothin’ carved in stone yet. ’Sides, we ain’t got enough information.” I resisted glancing down at him. As far as I knew, there was no consideration about it, but if Walker acted desperate he’d certainly get the shaft end of this deal. Across from me the genemod remained still as death. Their resemblance to Pengyi was really weirding me out- the two could have been siblings.

“I see.” The Montesquieu steepled his fingers. They were long, carefully manicured, and threw spidery shadows in the light of the lantern. “There is perhaps a deal to be had, then. Kafka?” He held a hand up towards the genemod, though he barely gave them a glance. Finally I realized what was so strange about him: he saw himself as the only person in the room. The rest of us were…animals, objects, I don’t know. It wasn’t just his metallic eyes. It was all in that brief look he gave the genemod- Kafka, I guess. He didn’t look at them like a companion or employee or even pet. They got the same distant consideration I might give a chair or table in my apartment. Yes, this thing is mine. Even Kafka’s fine suit suddenly rang hollow. I am so far above you, the Montesquieu was saying, that even my slaves dress better.

Dead Kings in their tombs did I want to kill him.

I stared the aristo down as Kafka pulled a single sheet of paper from their coat and handed it to him. Real, expensive, wood-pulp paper, not our plastic stuff. So petty. “The date and time planned for the exchange. My staff remains unsure what is changing hands. The object is referred to only by the code-name GLASSEYE.” The Montesquieu placed the paper on the table and Walker took it, read briefly.

“That’s all well ’n’ good, I suppose, but who’d your slicers steal this off of? The Fomorii got the message, but which of your buddies sent it?”

The corner of the Montesquieu’s mouth twitched downwards, and Kafka’s dark eyes angled at his face. “That is not necessary for you to know. Just disrupt the transaction and secure the object.”

Now it was my turn to look at Walker. With deliberate slowness, he pulled a hand-rolled cig from his pocket, stuck it in his mouth, got out a matchbook, struck one, got the burner lit, shook out the match, and put away the matches. Kings, it’s a production every time. He took a deep drag, held it, blew it out right at the Montesquieu’s face. When he spoke, it was low, serious, without affectation.

“Y’know, it’s funny. That almost sounded like an order- but somehow I don’t recall you bein’ in charge of me.”

For a few moments, silence reigned. Though the Montesquieu’s expression didn’t change, Kafka’s eyes narrowed and I tensed up in turn. Finally the aristo leaned forward, placing his palms flat on the table with careful precision. I noticed bronze-colored contacts on his fingers, left proudly unconcealed- Praetor pilot interfaces.

The Montesquieu’s lip curled. “It doesn’t matter what you do or do not recall, Mister Walker,” he said softly, his voice like freezing lead. “I am in charge of you because I am an Administrator. I am in charge of you, just as my father was in charge of your father and my children will be in charge of your children. I am in charge of you, just as I am in charge of your freakish servant, your pack of mentally stunted miners, and every other degenerate in this cesspit of a district. You are allowed to exist only so that you may gratify your betters. Your life is worth less to me than Kafka’s, and I could have Kafka replaced ten times over by tomorrow morning if I so desired. I do not need to give you orders, Mister Walker. I speak, and you obey.”

“You finished?” drawled Walker. “Or d’you need a few more strokes? I can wait.” Silence from the other side. I would have laughed if I wasn’t completely focused on not flipping the table and pulling the Montesquieu’s heart out through his mouth.

It was tough.

Walker leaned forward too when the Montesquieu still didn’t reply. “It was a fine enough speech, Monty, very cool. But look at where you’re givin’ it. You came out to my ‘cesspit’ because you need me. You ain’t on that executive board yet and you ain’t got the clout to move on whoever’s doin’ this deal yourself. You want me to knock over this bank, you tell me who I’m gonna fight to do it.”

The aristo’s eyes narrowed, though Kafka remained still behind him. If their boss’s declaration had offended them, it didn’t show. That freaked me out more than anything else. Were they brainwashed? Programmed? Somehow designed to be perfectly obedient? Was it still slavery if you were created to like it? Didn’t matter, I decided almost immediately. It was all fucking wrong.

After a long moment, the Montesquieu sighed. “Crude, Mister Walker, but I suppose you can drive a bargain. My staff intercepted this communiquè from an encrypted server registered to the Cromwell family.” A jolt of recognition went through me. The samurai I’d seen on our trip to the ancient temple in the Park was a Cromwell too. He’d taken something from the icon wall there, some old piece of metal. Add in that the arm we’d captured was from the Sun Age and I’d bet a real steak that GLASSEYE was an artifact too.

“And you’re sure you don’t know what it is they’re after?”

“As the lights come on in the morning, Mister Walker.” The two men stared at one another for a few seconds.

“Fine,” Walker finally said. “The job’s a go. Whatever this GLASSEYE is, the Crommies won’t get their hands on it.”

“Wonderful. I will be in touch.” The Montesquieu stood without offering to shake hands. Suddenly he looked at me, that same expression of cold disdain on his face.“I’ve not seen this one with you before, Mister Walker. I find the way she’s looking at me quite disrespecful.”

Disrespectful? I was insulted. I was glaring like I was trying to drill holes through him.

“My heart weeps,” Walker yawned and glanced up at me, still in his chair. “Y’know- Huh. She’s usually a nice young lady. Never seen that kind of look on her face before. Must be somethin’ to do with you.”

“I bring it up not because I’ve taken offense, but as advice. Exercise better control over your servants. If a dog is poorly behaved, the blame lies with its master.” He held out a hand, and on cue Kafka handed him one of those nanotech-powered flameless cigarettes.

Walker watched him calmly, remaining seated. “She ain’t a servant or a dog, but thanks anyway. Have a safe ride home, would you? This is a rough neighborhood.”

The Montesquieu regarded us a second longer, then turned and walked the opposite way without a word. Kafka held a flashlight for him as the pair of them crossed the factory floor and left through another door. Neither looked back.

They’d left the lantern- yet more flagrant waste as self-aggrandizement. Walker stared into it for a minute or so, then spat on the floor again, with feeling this time. “The blame lies with the master, huh?” he muttered. “The fuck’s that say about him, then? Sheeeit.”

“I really hate that we have to work with that guy,” I whispered back. Something about this huge, abandoned space made one want to stay quiet. Like being in a room with a corpse.

“An’ you think I don’t?”

“I thought you said he’s one of the nicer ones.”

The look he gave me from under his hat was serious, his deep-set eyes dark. “He is. You don’t want to meet the nasty ones. Take my word for it.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah.” He stood, stretching with a groan, then checked his slab. “Right. Looks like the coast is clear. Let’s grab our shit and get out of here.” Didn’t have to tell me twice. We geared back up and were on the road in a minute or two, leaving the creepshow robot factory behind.

“So when’s the job going off?” I asked Walker once we were back on semi-lit streets.

“Four days, noon sharp.” He patted the pocket where the paper from the Montesquieu rested. “If our friend’s telling the truth, which I’m almost sure he is.”

“Oh.” I’d expected it to be farther away for whatever reason. “Guess I have to earn my keep somehow.”

“You do that already, little miss,” he said with a sidelong look. “You ever need more deng, just ask. Kings know I got more of it than I know what to do with. More than you could even spend around here, unless you really tried.”

“Not now, but…thanks, Walker.”

“Ain’t nothin’. Now, ‘less you got somewhere you need to be, I want to have a little briefing at the office. Get the team together and show you your new stuff- Kings damn, I can’t wait.” He even gave the steering wheel a whack for emphasis.

“E-easy, Walker.”

“Hon, you’re gonna be more excited than I am when you see it.”

“So just tell me what it is!”

He grinned so wide it reflected in the windshield. “You’ll see soon.”

A little while later we got back to the office and Walker sent me down to the basement. “Rouenn says we’re just waitin’ on Vandermaas yet. I got to make some calls, but you can head on down.” So Tanje’s coming too. That was interesting- probably something to do with this surprise Walker was so excited for. I stuck my head into the office but Dezi wasn’t there- maybe she’d gone home early or something. Upon reaching the basement- a wide-open concrete space that was more like a small parking garage complete with ramp- I was greeted by two familiar faces.

“Sharkie!” called Fidi, getting out of his folding chair and coming over. I wondered how he’d beaten Walker and I back. “Sorry it’s been so long, Walker’s had me busy. How are you? Healing up? You were a mess the last time I saw you…”

“Don’t remind me.” I smiled, pulling him into a brief hug. “I’m fine. You a dad yet? Sorry, I forget how long you said it’d be.”

“Not quite, not quite. Another three months or so. And don’t worry about it, you were- Reyes, you were pretty fucked up.”

“You drank some of that heart-attack-in-a-bottle Walker makes, didn’t you?” By now Willy had come over too, a sardonic smile on his handsome face. “You’re lucky you ever came down.”

“Yeah, lucky, that’s me.” Wasn’t wrong, in a way. “’Sup, Willy.” We shook hands, his grip firm.

“What, no hug for me?” he said. Fidi snorted.

“Nope. I’m still pissed at you for popping me in the nose last time. That was a cheap shot.”

He shrugged still smiling. “You should have seen it coming.”

“I will, next time.” Honestly, I wasn’t sure. He was a lot faster than his powerful frame would suggest. “So, you guys got any idea what we’re doing?”

“Some sort of bank job,” Fidi said. “He hasn’t told me much else. You got what you needed earlier?”

I nodded. “That’s right.”

“Oh, my, Ofidio. How very cagey,” said Willy, sprawling across a couple of the folding chairs. It was a reminder that he wasn’t one of the Bones, just a mercenary- albeit one Walker trusted.

“Can you blame us?” Fidi asked. “In fact, why are you here, Willy?” His tone stayed light, but he still watched the freelancer carefully.

“Walker needed someone competent, so he was forced to look outside his own organization.” He winked, the expression devilish on his fine-boned features. “In all seriousness, I’m not sure. He paid well, though, so here I am.”

Fidi squinted at him a moment longer, then shook his head. “That man…whatever.”

“Never argue with the stupid or the insane,” Willy proclaimed. “They’ll drag you down to their level and beat you with experience. Now, I’m bored already and I haven’t had any exercise today. Who wants to spar?”

We spent the next half-hour or so trading slow-motion blows and talking shop. In his ninja gear, Fidi was the only one dressed for it- Willy and I had street clothes- but I still got some useful practice out of it. Fidi had me in a rear triangle choke when the garage door opened and a dark-brown box truck came through. Walker hopped out of the passenger side and Tanje’s pale, dark-haired form climbed down from the driver’s. Walker stopped to observe with his hands on his hips. “Shit. I leave you alone for five minutes…” Tanje surveyed the scene with an unreadable expression on his face, and Fidi and I scrambled to get up.

“Your sense of time is shot,” Willy opined from where he leaned against a pillar. “Hello, Tanje.”

Tanje gave him a careful nod. “Wiremu.”

Walker waved the comment away with a flick of his hand. “Whatever. Bodine, Boukari, and Ximena are s’posed to be here too, but they got caught up in an emergency so we’ll catch up later. For now, though, let’s get your goodies.”

“Gentlemen-and Sharkie- if you would?” Tanje beckoned us around to the back of the truck. Within were a gun case, two bigger boxes and a pair of huge crates taller than me.

“Those too, Tanje?” I asked, pointing at them.

“In a few minutes,” he said, looking pleased with himself. “I’m a bit late, but consider these my Pact Day gifts to you, Sharkie. I’ve always liked practical presents the best.”

“Uh, thanks, man.” I said, feeling very inconsiderate. “Sorry, I didn’t get you-“

“It’s fine, Sharkie, truly.” He shook his head gently. “I am a rather introverted person, it’s true- but on occasion I do get lonely. Having someone I can call when I do is gift enough. It’s been a while since I’ve had a friend.”

“N-no problem, man.” Embarrassment made my voice awkward. I’d make it up to him somehow. “I’m glad to hear it. I have fun hanging out.”

“It’s the same for me. Now then.” He came round to the table we’d set up in front of the truck and set the gun case on it. “Yours first, Wiremu.” The case opened to reveal a short but bulky weapon made of gray polymer. The color was familiar: it was the same as my old coil pistol, the one Arcadia had destroyed. The Ultima was nice, but I still kind of missed that thing. “The newest model of SiKaHae coil shotgun. They’ve adapted the dual feed from the pistol model, so you can switch between depleted uranium flechettes and fin-stablized slugs on the fly.”

“Veeery nice,” murmured Willy, picking up the weapon and clearing it while Walker watched with approval. “I’ve used the old one a few times- found it pointed rather awkwardly, to be honest- but this one feels like a fine piece indeed.”

“Quite. Your turn, Ofidio.” Now he heaved the first of the larger boxes onto the table. It looked more like a very long piece of armored luggage than a rifle case, and the faceplate for its electronic lock was missing.

Fidi stepped up and undid the clasps. “What have you found for me this time, Vandermaas- Huh. What exactly is this thing?”

“Get it out, get it out,” Tanje urged him. With some effort Fidi lifted a huge rifle out of the case, longer than even I was tall. Most of it looked like a rectangular beam of silvery metal, more like construction material than a weapon. Only the stock, grip, and bulky scope gave it away.

“That thing is a Kayne Kinetics prototype railgun. It fires a fifty-gram ferro-uranic penetrator at, oh, about three thousand meters per second.”

A railgun? Holy shit. Supposedly some of the Praetors mounted them, but I’d never heard of one being man-portable. “What is that in units that make sense?” I asked. Nobody used the metric system but very old Sovlanders- and, I supposed, scientists.

“Very heavy and very, very fast.” Fidi murmured. “Vandermaas, I don’t have power armor. This thing will tear my arm off if I shoot it.”

“It won’t,” said Tanje, smiling wider. “I’ve shot it twice myself, and it kicks like a regular anti-materiel rifle. As for how…well, there’s a black box in the stock, very tightly sealed. That’s what seems to be reducing the recoil. I’ve no idea how it works and I’m too worried I’ll break it to try finding out. In fact, I’ve got a hunch the Kayne engineers don’t know either.”

“What do you- ohhh.” Willy looked down at the railgun, fingers tapping his chin.

Walker nodded. “Oldtech. Spacetech. Sun Age tech.”

“Damn.” Maybe that was why Admin wanted all these artifacts. To make them into weapons? Seemed too simple to me- they had plenty of fancy hardware already.

“Mmm…” Fidi frowned. “I do not like this, taking a weapon I don’t understand on an op. But if it’ll go through a Mask’s armor without slowing down, maybe it’s worth it.” He stowed the railgun and got it out of the way.

Willy perked up when he heard that. “We’re fighting Enforcement?”

“Maybe,” said Walker, eying him up. “That a problem?”

“On the contrary. You ought to have told me sooner, gotten yourself a discount.”

He just shook his head. “Okay, your turn, Sharkie. This one comes courtesy of me, not Vandermaas. Saved my life more’n’ once, in fact-rrgh!”

With a mighty heave he got the biggest box onto the table. It was a wooden crate with a hinged lid and I had no idea what could be inside. “Can I…”

“Go for it.”

I opened the box and my jaw dropped. The gun inside was…Well, first of all it was fucking massive, five feet of oily black steel with a brick-like reciever and long, heavy barrel. A stock, grip, and set of sights had been somewhat crudely attached to its frame- something this big was probably supposed to be on a tripod or vehicle mount. Brazed to one of its sides was a nameplate in fancy cursive: Agatha.

Reaching down I manged to pull it out of the box. “Thing’s fucking heavy,” I go out before letting it thunk down. There was enough steel there it wasn’t going to get hurt.

“Ninety pounds less ammo, in fact,” said Walker proudly. Tanje shook his head while the two others watched with equal fascination. “Agatha there’s a .50-cal machine gun. In the quarries we call ‘em a deux. Couldn’t tell you who makes ‘em. They just always been around, like kalashes. She’s got some heft to ‘er, don’t get me wrong, but she packs a punch and she’ll never let you down in a scrap. That gun’s older than my grandpappy, too, so you treat ‘er with respect.”

“Promise I will, Walker. A machine gun…” I liked the sound of that. “What’s she shoot?”

“I think there’s a spare belt in the crate,” he said, craning his neck to look inside.

I rummaged around in there, pulled out a big tin box and cracked it open. Within was a linked belt of huge steel-cased cartridges, long as my hand with bullets even bigger across than my revolver’s. “Holy shit.”

“Only the best for my Sawyer. What kinda bullets are those again, Vandermaas?”

“Alternating saboted tungsten penetrator and high-explosive incendiary armor-piercing tracer,” rattled off Tanje.

Walker smirked. “Nasty shit, is what he means.”

“Cool, man, but…is a heavy machine gun really the best weapon for clearing rooms?” I asked.

“Sure it is. Touch that fucker off inside a room and it’ll clear out right quick.”

Willy laughed, but Fidi and I shook our heads- we knew he wasn’t kidding. I looked back down at the gun and ran the big, crank-like charging handle. It made a slick metallic shak-CHAK: the sound of heavy metal firepower.

“It’s a nice gun, Walker. For sure. And I may be strong. But I’m not shoulder a ninety pound gun for ages strong, you know? It’s like Fidi said. I don’t have power armor either.”

The grin that passed over his face was that of a cat who’d broken in to a maximum-security chicken farm. “You sure about that, little miss?”