From:	"Paul J. Adam" <shadowtk@********.demon.co.uk>
Subject:	Chicago
Date:	Thu, 1 Aug 1996 22:57:36 +0100

*****PRIVATE: Blade
>>>>>[I gave the tape to Lilith, she gave it to Karlsbruhn, I paid him
some moolah and he actually got some usable video out of the last half!

I don't know what that kid does with the money. Takes it home and gives
it to his Mom, probably.

Anyway, here's what we got. Don't we look good?

+++++begin trideo
+++++signal/noise ratio 73%
The view fuzzes with static for a second and noise bars crawl over the
screen. Quinn and Blade are running along the darkened street in
alternate short rushes, cover-and-moving at a punishing pace: they
seemto be concerned about something behind them. Both are breathless and
Blade looks tired, as he motions Quinn into a doorway: they cover-and-
move through a gutted delicatessen to the rear, up a flight of stairs
into the deserted apartment above.
"Mom and... Pop store." says Blade, breathing hard.
"Hope Mom and Pop... both managed to get out." Quinn drops down, lights
a cigarette and draws hard on it, coughing, then offers it to Blade who
declines. He moves to the window, watching the street below.
"You know... you are one of the... fittest shamans I know. I thought
I'd... be carrying you... by now. "
Quinn chuckles tiredly. "Hang out with Lynch... and train to join his
squad all... those years ago... the guy makes a religion... out of being
able to cover a little more distance than anyone else... and the
habits... die hard." Quinn pulls a water blivet out of her coat, sips
carefully, passes it to Blade. They pass the water back and forth for a
few minutes as they rest and regain their breath, then both bring out
food.

"Can we risk a fire?"
"I wouldn't." says Quinn. "I'm still not sure we shook those bastards
off. Maybe they're tailing us, seeing where they're going. Ants are
devious bastards like that. Saw some Ant workers set light to a building
once, and they had soldiers around the ground floor grabbing people as
they came out. Maybe they think we're part of a larger group." She snaps
out a spur, slices open the top of her MRE.
"Wow. A cybershaman."
"You better believe it. Any asshole wants to ground shit out through
_my_ reflex enhancers, got another think coming."
Blade reaches into a pocket, brings out an empty magazine and a box of
shells, starts reloading. "I thought magic and cyber don't mix."
"They don't. I'm not as slick with a spell as some. But I'm plenty good
enough. And it's things like the way I see in the dark as well as you
do, and I can do magic on what I see. Or shoot it, because I got a
smartgun link two too, and a Viper .22, and it takes two to tango-"
Blade clears his throat and the shaman grins amiably.

"How far to go?"
"About another mile. I can't get over how quiet it is." Blade raps the
magazine against his heel to settle the rounds, begins reloading
another.
"It's night. Most people can't see in the dark, so they bunker up and
pray. If you have good night eyes and enough nerve, night's the best
time to travel." Quinn is transferring fat red shells from her pocket to
the loops on the SPAS-22's sling. "Course, it means anyone we do meet is
more likely to be trouble."
"Great." Blade grins. "You don't like a quiet life, do you?"
"I did a deal with Death and I can never die." Quinn grins. "And if you
believe that, I can give you an excellent deal on the Space Needle, but
delivery and giftwrap's extra."
+++++static
+++++signal to noise ratio 79%
"That's the building." whispers Blade very quietly as they look across a
smallish plaza.
"Can we shout 'Hut! Hut! Hut!' as we go in?" enquires Quinn.
"No. Can you risk a spell or something to keep us hidden?"
Quinn pauses. "Okay. But be braced in case anything comes out of the
walls." She concentrates for an instance and Blade disappears into a
shifting, slightly refractive blur. A strange clicking noise can be
heard, briefly.
"I give you... the Predator spell."
"The what?"
"Watch more old movies. Go." You realise Quinn is likewise hidden, even
in the infrared spectrum the camera picks up.

They run across the plaza, the screen fuzzing with static for a few
moments as they reach the base of tbe building. The doors hang on their
hinges and the building seems to have partly burned. Both rematerialise
in the lobby.
"No reaction. What did your contact say?"
"To deliver the stuff here." Blade glances around, the muzzle of his
rifle tracking his gaze.
"Then let's leave it and go." Quinn, likewise, has her shotgun in the
shoulder and is searching for threats. "This place smells bad. I don't
think we want to-"
The floor erupts around her feet and the audio track dies, the view
skewing and strobing through primary colours. You can make out flailing,
chitinous limbs and the huge muzzle flash of the shotgun, then Quinn is
backpedalling away from the three or four monstrosities that are clawing
up through the parquet flooring. The lead one oozes from three or four
gaping wounds, more of Quinn's twelve-gauge slugs blasting through its
body, and two turn to lunge at Blade.
The view stabilises for a few seconds and you hear more gunfire, and
Quinn slashing with her spurs at the nearest creature, severing antennae
and raking a gouge across one bulging compound eye. The spurs glow with
a reddish light, you notice, and the insect sqeals and lurches back as
Quinn drives tbe blades into where its throat should be.
+++++signal to noise ratio 29%
She whirls, the Anaconda huge in her hand, looking for another target.
Blade is butt-stroking a downed insect in the head, yellow ichor
splattering as the carapace breaks: the other spirits are likewise
downed. One twitches its limb and Quinn fires twice into its chest: the
foul creature's movement stops.

The view judders sideways for a few seconds, horizontal hold lost, but
the audio picks up the sound of Quinn feeding shells into the Franchi
shotgun.
"You okay?" she asks.
"Been worse." Blade sounds breathless. "Do we go on up or get out?"
+++++recalibrating video interface
+++++signal to noise ratio 29%
The picture returns, grainier and breaking to static every few seconds.
Quinn is reloading the two fired chambers of the revolver. Blade is
cleaning sticky yellow fluid off the stock of his M22.
"I guess we go up. We're here, we paid for the E-Ticket ride, might as
well get our money's worth. Gimme that." Quinn leand over, grabs Blade's
leg and concentrates; and for a few seconds a turban of bandages
encircles his head, crossed Band-Aids dot his face, and his leg seems to
be encased by a huge plaster cast. The illusion holds... and fades, as
Quinn relaxes. A bleeding gash in the mercenary's pants leg is no longer
dripping.

"Don't ask me to do that too often. You're wired up worse than Lynch."
Quinn shakes her head, rummages for a packet of instant coffee granules,
knocks it back Ranger-style again. "Gah. Yuck. Needs sugar." She
unslings the shotgun.

The jolting as they advance up the stairs keeps throwing the horizontal
hold of the battered camera off again.
"I don't suppose you know who you were supposed to meet?"
"This is the primary contact point. They did note that-" Blade, leading,
drops back. Quinn freezes too. There is a long pause as the camera view
shudders and breaks up into static, recovering slowly.

"Major Hunter. Delivering." says Blade softly.
"Hunter? Who's the Legless Lady, and where did she lose her limbs?" A
female voice from around the angle of the stairwell.
"Lo. Maxim Arms, Phnom Penh, perimeter minefield."
"Who's that with you?"
"The Mighty Quinn. She's ex-Company too."
"Come up. Slow."

Blade moves up. So does Quinn, seeing a solid barricade: mostly steel-
tube chairs lashed and welded into a solid mass. A small gap reveals a
FN MAG-5 on a bipod, trained on the stairwell.
"Climb over, it's solid." They do, squeezing through the foot-wide space
between barricade and ceiling. Behind are two ragged, dirty figures,
both young and fit-looking.
"Glad you made it, Hunter. Got the data?"
"Sure. Why's it so important?"
The woman shrugs. "Part of it's our supply schedule. Which means we know
when our ammo resupply is due. And the rest of it... believe it or not,
the Company's interested in keeping as many people in Chicago alive as
possible, and making as many bugs dead as possible. That's a directive
from the very, very top. The Man himself. This info helps us do that. We
look out for airdrops - the schedule for those is here, too - bust
hoarders, nail anyone trying to corner the market on food."

Quinn lights a cigarette, offers the pack around. "You do know you got a
lobby full of dead bugs?"
"Yeah. Bitch, ain't it?" The woman doesn't seem concerned or troubled.
"Thanks for taking them out, though. Need some ammo?"
"Twelve-gauge EX slug if you got it." The woman nods, tosses Quinn a
box.

"Yeah, they moved in a few days ago. We figured we'd take them down when
we sent the next patrol out. You gotta watch out. After a while you get
complacent, you think killing them's easy, you get careless. Then they
pull something on your sorry and you get dead. Or worse." The woman
shudders. "We took out a Wasp queen. She had all these people in
cocoons, all paralysed, feeling this thing growing inside them... all we
could do for them was kill them. I hate this place. You guys need
anything else? Food, water?" The two shake their heads.
"How were you planning to get out?"
Quinn points. "Head west. Get to the wall, climb over. Anyone asks who
we are, tries to stop us, we talk real fast."
"You think that'll work?" The woman seems amused.
"Did the last three times I was here."
"Okay. If it doesn't and you're still alive, link up with us. You just
got us our replen schedule, now we know when and where our next supply
run is due. When they bring us our beans, bullets and batteries, we'll
ask them to lift you out. Services rendered."
"And owe the Company another favour." mutters Blade.
The woman sits down beside the machine gun, looking tired. "You guys
want some coffee before you go?"

+++++static

The pair are skirmishing along the streets again. The camera image is so
poor you take a few seconds to realise it's nearly dawn. The soundtrack,
between bursts of static, picks up a thrumming drone and Quinn looks up,
alarmed, to see a crucifix, above in the lightening sky, trailing
dandelion seeds.

"Airdrops." says Blade. They carry on moving, rounding a corner-

Quinn glances around, and doubletakes: there are eight men and women
there, assorted races, all armed and all dressed in fetishistic arrays
of leather and studs. They notice her at the same time, and fan out
around the pair in a wide semicircle.
"What is this, a Road Warrior remake?" asks Quinn.
"Okay. Give us the guns and we let you live." says the leader, who has
his Sandler submachinegun trained on Blade. The others have a mix of
Army G11s and civilian firearms.
"No way." says Blade calmly.
"There's eight of us, and two of you. I'd say-"
"Seven." says Quinn brightly.
"Eight, bitch, can't you count? There's eight of-" The leader swings the
SMG to point at Quinn, but before it reaches her he's thrown backwards
in a blast of noise: it appears that Quinn's draw with her .44 is
_fast_.

"Like I said, seven. Anyone want to make it six?" She thumbs back the
Anaconda's hammer.
"What's up, slitch, you think you can kill all of us?" says another, and
Quinn shoots him in the head.
"Maybe not. But I'll get an 'A' for effort. Who dies next?"
"How far you think you're going to get?" asks one of the gangers,
nervously.
"Far enough. Turn around, walk away. Or else." Quinn glares at the six
gangers, who are still nervously pointing weapons at them. "Okay. I'm
going to count to three." She thumbs back the hammer again. "One. Two."
Quinn and Blade open fire simultaneously, Quinn dropping two with single
aimed shots as Blade rakes the others with automatic fire. Only one gets
a burst off, though you hear Quinn gasp and the view breaks up
completely.
+++++video signal-to-noise ratio 6.3%
+++++video unrecoverable
+++++audio signal-to-noise ratio 32%
"Quinn, you okay?"
You hear coughing. "Gimme a minute. Physician, heal thy-fucking-self.
Anyone notice us?"
"Probably. It's getting light, we should hole up."
"Quarter mile to The Wall, let's just get the fuck outta here."
"For Chrissakes, Quinn, you're coughing blood."
"And I'm not gonna get any better waiting around here." The coughing
does seem to have eased. "The camera stopped the worst one. I guess our
holiday snaps won't be coming out too good." Rummaging sounds. "Let's
go."

Again, you hear the sounds of the pair's progress, cover-and-moving
along the street. Quinn is still coughing, and sounds much more out of
breath than usual. At one point you hear a shout of alarm, and Quinn's
yell of "Get back inside! Stay down! Company, Blade!"
A burst of automatic gunfire from a M22, then the lighter, sharper note
of a G11. Quinn must have taken one from the bodies.
"Keep moving, keep moving!"
More gunfire. Ricochets nearby.
"Ready! Move!"
A long, hammering burst. "Magazine!" Scraping and clicking noises, the
sound of a bolt being racked, shorter bursts. Running noises, the scuff
of clothes on concrete.
Blade shouts "Sonofabitch, how many of these fuckers are there?"
"Too many! Keep moving!"
The firefight intensifies, dies for thirty seconds - you hear Quinn
running, then a faint shout of "There they are!" and more gunfire, then
heavier gunfire.

"Blade! Think Army thoughts!"
"Why? I - how did you - skip that! Move, I'll cover!"
More gunfire, suddenly intense with the sound of automatic gunfire,
grenade launchers and explosions, and the scraping, grating noise of
Quinn scrambling on broken rock, and her own rifle fire joining in. You
hear Blade following up, and an shattering concussion overloads the mike
for a few seconds, then the noises are abruptly fainter as the pair make
their way down the other side of the bank.

An unfamiliar voice. "You must have really pissed those guys off for
them to send so many at you." Gunfire and running feet around the mike.
"Some of them are good merges, not human," replies Quinn, still
coughing, "and I guess they liked the look of us. Or maybe they were
planning a rush and we got in the way."
"Could be. You're hurt pretty bad, here, let me." says the voice.
"...and you two aren't Army. Nice fake on the uniforms, though. Like to
tell me what's going on?"
"We're on a mission from God." replies Blade, deadpan.
"Listen, wiseass, we could just throw you back... wait up. The Cook
County tax office?"
"Yeah. Ex-Major Matthew Hunter, Ares Security, retired, unretired to be
a courier, looking forward to re-retiring as soon as he fucking can.
She's ex-Lieutenant Susan Rodriguez, also formerly Ares Security."
"Okay, okay. You're not bugs, I can tell that." The voice sighs. "And if
I shove you back in there you'll be dead by lunchtime." The gunfire is
still growing, you hear more troops arriving and vehicles pulling up.
The sound of mortar fire begins to add a bass counterpoint. "I guess I
can let you go. Only lose the uniforms, okay?"
"Sure. You want a couple of extra guns here, plus a pissed-off and tired
shaman?"
"No, too hard to explain when my CO arrives. Just fade. We're holding
them, they've tried this before. Hard part is working out what they're
trying to distract us from - yes, Sergeant? Send Second north and ambush
them, then..."

"I think we should go now." whispers Blade.
"Me too." replies Quinn.
+++++end of recording

Not the most entertaining of days out. Still, we made it.

Now Lynch and Lilith are back, you want to go on a double-date? Go see a
really stupid movie, have dinner somewhere like Gracie's and really
gorge, then the four of us go back to my place and settle in with a keg,
phone pizza, chips'n'dips, and a stack of Monty Python movies?

Or... you ever watch the Rocky Horror Picture Show? :)]<<<<<
-- The Mighty Quinn <22:54:53/08-01-57>