| From: | Rand Ratinac docwagon101@*****.com |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Reunion - Part 5 |
| Date: | Tue, 11 May 1999 21:23:06 -0700 (PDT) |
Now let me tell you something about shadowrunners. There are two kinds
of them – those who can outwait a constipated turtle and those who have
a life. Oh, sorry – that could be construed as offensive, couldn’t it?
Let me rephrase that.
There are two types of runners in this world – those who were trained
by a corp slash government slash buncha geeks and those who learned
from the streets (read as ‘outwait a constipated turtle’ and ‘have a
life’ respectively – but only when your corp-trained buddies aren’t in
the room). Now, one kind of runner is content to sit on his hoop for
days on end, just waiting for his target to make a move slash mistake
slash six-foot soydog with the lot. The other kind was never trained
for such a mind- (or hoop-) numbing job. That kind of runner needs to
get out and do something – anything. Guess which category I fall into.
Look, chummer, if you EVER compare me to a constipated turtle again,
I’ll rip your lungs out through your nose, ‘genuine mistake’ or not!
Okay, now we have that little misunderstanding cleared up, I’m sure
you can see what I’m getting at. Even the best of us can only take
sitting around for so long. And I was dealing with a pair of the most
irritating slots on the planet. Okay, in all honesty, Micky wasn’t that
bad. At least, not compared to Jimmy D. He understood that I have my
limits and, what with Jimmy being one of the most paranoid creeps on
the face of the planet, it wasn’t all that easy to get to him. So he
wasn’t too put out when my original estimate of a week went up to two,
then three and so on. What got to me, on the other hand, were his
continuous whining, questions – "Has Mr. Darcy-Rutherford called off
the contract?", "Couldn’t we just talk this out?", "Are you sure
there’s no other way?"
All right, I’ll admit that keeping him in the dark about it all wasn’t
exactly the nicest thing to do – but at the time, it seemed the best
solution. And by the time I was starting to regret my decision, it was
a little late, don’t you think? I’m not sure how you’d take it, but if
I’d been in Micky’s shoes and he said to me, "Oh, by the way, Bobby,
I’ve taken out a contract on you, but I only did it for your own good,"
– well, it wouldn’t have been pretty.
And then there was good old Jimmy D. Tell me, have you ever heard the
old joke about looking under the lowest form of life in the universe
and finding a lawyer squatting there? Well, let me put it this way.
After a week, Big Jimmy no longer ranked as highly with me as a devil
rat down the front of my pants. By the end of the third week I would’ve
married a lawyer if it would’ve kept him away from me. I’m sure he felt
the same, but then, what do I care about his feelings? He demanded I
keep him completely up to date on every aspect of our assignment and
then – get this – whenever I stopped by to fill him in on said
non-existent operation he berated me for wasting time when I should
have been out taking care of his problem. A couple of my teammates had
to drag me out one time before I killed the little slot myself – and
I’m normally the most even-tempered one in our bunch.
Anyway, this went on for six weeks. SIX WEEKS! Can you believe that?
Running back and forth between the two of them, listening to their
whining day in, day out. By the end of the sixth week, Micky just
wanted to go home, Big Jimmy D still wouldn’t call off the contract and
I was getting to the stage where I just wanted to kill them both and
get back to my normal, weird life. I think that’s what finally
precipitated my somewhat unorthodox solution to the problem.
Oh, there was one silver lining to this particular cloud. I managed to
crank Jimmy D’s fee up to five million nuyen, half up front. But still,
I would’ve given it all back if the whole fraggin’ situation would just
go away.
What? The solution? Hold on, I’m getting to it. Well, basically, the
first step was getting Micky and Big Jimmy D out of their respective
holes in the ground. I couldn’t solve anyone’s problems while the two
of them were sitting on their hoops, quaking at every little noise. Now
Micky didn’t know any of the other members of the Service, so I had the
boys get Big Jimmy while I took care of Micky.
==Doc'
(aka Mr. Freaky Big, Super-Dynamic Troll of Tomorrow)
.sig Sauer
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