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  SHADOWRUN : 28

  CLOCKWORK ASYLUM

  Book 2 of the Dragon Heart Saga

  Jak Koke

  For Frances Cogan, who showed me love for the written word, and for Thomas Lindell, who encouraged me to try it myself.

  This book would not have been possible except for the generosity of Jonathan Bond. The effort he put forth for me was indispensable, especially on the outline and the first draft. Credit should also go to Mike Mulvihill for his great help with the plots and characters in this trilogy.

  I'd also like to thank Tom Lindell, Nicole Brown, Seana Davidson, Don Gerrard, and Marsh Cassady for their insightful critiques of the manuscript. My appreciation also goes to Donna Ippolito at FASA, who originally made it possible for me to play in this wonderful universe, and who has kept me focused on character and clarity.

  Foreword

  The year is 2057

  And magic has returned to the earth after an absence of many thousands of years. What the Mayan calendar called the Fifth World has given way to the Sixth, a new cycle of magic, marked by the waking of the great dragon Ryumyo in the year 2011. The Sixth World is an age of magic and technology. An Awakened age.

  The rising magic has caused the archaic races to re-emerge. Metahumanity. First came the elves, tall and slender with pointed ears and almond eyes. They were born to human parents, just as were dwarfs shortly thereafter. Then later came the orks and the trolls, some born changed, like elves and dwarfs, but others goblinized—transformed from human form into their true nature as the rising magic activated their DNA. Manifesting as larger bodies, heavily muscled with tusked mouths and warty skin.

  Even the most ancient and intelligent of beings, the great dragons, have come out of their long hiding. Only a few of these creatures are known to exist, and most of them have chosen a life of isolation and secrecy. But some, able to assume human form, have integrated themselves into the affairs of metahumanity. They have used their ancient intellect, their powerful magic, and their innate cunning to ascend to positions of power.

  One is known to own and run Saeder-Krupp—the largest megacorporation in the world. Another—Dunkelzahn—is the most controversial creature to ever to have been elected to the presidency of the United Canadian and American States. Dunkelzahn was assassinated in a mysterious explosion on August 9, 2057

  —the night of his inauguration.

  The Sixth World is afar cry from the mundane environment of the Fifth. It is exotic and strange, a paradoxical blend of the scientific and the arcane. The advance of technology has reached a feverish pace. The distinction between man and machine is becoming blurred by the advent of direct neural interfacing. Cyberware. Machine and computer implants are commonplace, making metal of flesh, pulsing electrons into neurons at the speed of thought.

  People of the Sixth World are a new breed—stronger, smarter, faster. Less human.

  The Matrix has grown like a phoenix out of the ashes of the old global computer network. A virtual world of computer-generated reality has emerged a universe of electrons and CPU cycles controlled and manipulated by those with the fastest cyberdecks, with the hottest new code.

  It is an era where information is power, where data and money are one and the same. Multinational mega-corporations have replaced superpower governments as the true forces on the planet. In a world where cities have grown into huge sprawls of concrete and steel, walled-off corporate enclaves and massive arcologies have superseded two-car garages, vegetable gardens, and white picket fences. The megacorps exploit masses of wage-slaves for the profit of a lucky and ruthless few.

  But in the shadows of the mammoth corporate arcologies live the SINless. Those without System Identification Numbers are not recognized by the machinery of society, by the bureaucracy that has grown so massive and complex that nobody understands it completely. Among the SINless are the shadowrunners, traffickers in stolen data and hot information, mercenaries of the street—discreet, effective, and untraceable.

  The Sixth World is full of surprises, not the least of which is the recent discovery of a Locus by Aztechnology, a megacorporation with a dark and bloody core. The Locus serves as a focus for metahuman sacrifices. It gives the puppeteers who control Aztechnology the power they need to construct their metaplanar bridge to the tzitzimine—demons who live off torture and suffering. When the bridge is completed, the demons will come into this world and ravage it. Aztechnology believes it will be rewarded as the tzitzimine scourge the land, bringing a millennium of pain.

  Only Ryan Mercury can stop them. He is an undercover operative who worked for the recently assassinated great dragon, Dunkelzahn. Ryan must take the Dragon Heart—a magical item of immeasurable power—to the metaplanar bridge and give it to Thayla, the woman whose song protects the world from the demons she calls the Enemy. The Dragon Heart will give Thayla the power to destroy the bridge.

  Recently, Thayla's power over the bridge was breached by Aztechnology. And at the same time Ryan Mercury struggled to overcome the selfish personality inside that inspired him to keep the Dragon Heart for himself. The evil part of him that allowed the cyberzombie, Burnout, to steal the artifact.

  Ryan defeated Burnout, throwing him into the depths of Hells Canyon, but the cyberzombie reached out and snatched the Dragon Heart. Burnout plummeted into the chasm, taking the salvation of the world with him.

  Now, Ryan Mercury must get the Dragon Heart back.

  Prologue

  Lethe fell.

  The last crimson rays of the waning sunset painted the walls of Hells Canyon. The dark scar of the Snake River below grew thicker as he plummeted toward it. He willed himself to follow Burnout into the abyss, pushing his spirit close as the cyberzombie dropped. The cliffs on either side narrowed, and the universe contracted around Lethe as he fell after the cyberzombie called Burnout.

  The cyberzombie looked human for the most part, but Lethe felt a cold, inhuman radiance from him. In the physical world, Burnout was very big, at least two and a half meters, with a density to him that spoke of cybernetic limbs and torso. His bald head was perfectly symmetrical and looked tiny on his massive shoulders and chest. His legs were strangely proportioned, with elongated shins and shortened, overly muscled thighs.

  This ... creature is perhaps the opposite of me, Lethe thought. Lethe was pure spirit, and unable to manifest in the physical world at all.

  In the astral, Lethe saw that most of Burnout's spirit was gone. His aura was a dark shadow amid a glowing constellation of magic and spells. His true spirit was somehow separated from his body. Out of phase.

  Lethe had never seen anything like it. He noticed a slight hazing in the astral wherever the cyberzombie passed. This creature was polluting astral space by its mere existence. Highly unnatural.

  In one hand, Burnout clutched the Dragon Heart—an artifact that glowed gold and white-hot in the astral. Very powerful magic.

  Lethe willed himself into Burnout's body of metal and flesh. He possessed the cyberzombie and overwhelmed the man's spirit, which flickered like a weak candle, barely tethered to the meager amount of natural flesh that remained inside the machinery.

  I must protect the Dragon Heart, Lethe thought. I can still save Thayla.

  Burnout's body crashed into the cliff wall, bouncing off with a grinding crunch. Lethe tried to extend his will into Burnout's cybernetic arms, to make the man bring the Dragon Heart close to his chest. To protect it. Despite massive exertion, Lethe could not influence the creature's metal parts.

  That brought the first wave of panic. Lethe was a powerful spirit, a creature of will and energy who was not bound by flesh and could not influence the physical world except by possessing the bodies of living creatures. He had only tried it twice before, that he could rememb
er, and only in emergencies, but each time he had gained full control over the host body.

  Here he was merely an observer. A passenger.

  The canyon walls closed around him. Narrower and narrower. It was pitch dark; Lethe didn't know when he would hit bottom. Burnout was falling like a bullet now, his metal growing hot from the speed. He impacted on the rock again, smashing his left shoulder. And again, scraping a wide patch of skin off the shiny metal sheathing.

  Still he did not drop the Dragon Heart. Lethe felt its power close. Saw it through the cyborg's artificial eyes.

  Somehow that visual information made its way into the organic brain and Lethe could tap into it.

  Burnout hit the black water and should have died. Water like duracrete. His hot metal casing warped under the impact, and Lethe knew that much of his cybernetics were destroyed. But whether it was Lethe's presence or the Dragon Heart, the man's spirit decided to stay with his remaining flesh.

  As Burnout's body sank into the depths of the Snake River, Lethe panicked once again, not in fear for his own existence, but because he couldn't imagine anyone finding Burnout's body in time to get the Heart to Thayla at the magical spike.

  The memory of Thayla came to him as he sank. He remembered when he had first awakened and been named by her, the goddess of the light and the song. Thayla had stopped her singing to speak to him. A song so perfect, so painfully wonderful that he could not move.

  She had stood on the hard, cracked ground of a stone outcropping, framed by a colorless sky. A deep chasm surrounded her on three sides, the chasm dropping away in front of her precipitously. Lethe had no concept of the depth of this chasm; he could not see the bottom. The out-cropping thickened into a broad arc as it stretched away behind them, widening ever so slightly as it extended. Until finally it connected with solid land in the distance.

  "This outcropping is the result of unnaturally high magic," Thayla had said. "The Chasm, here, is the gap between our worlds and those of the . . . the ..." She faltered, pain evident in her speech.

  Lethe remembered looking out across the abyss. In the absence of Thayla's song, wind roared around them, throwing her hair across her face. The far side of the chasm was barely visible in the blowing distance, but Lethe could make out a similar cliff at the reaches of his perception. He could see a similar outcropping protruding toward them from the land on that side. Darkness clung to the distant cliff, and as Lethe looked across that space, revulsion rose inside him. A desperate nausea as he glimpsed the creatures writhing on the other side.

  "I am here to prevent them from completing their bridge," Thayla continued. "They are evil and horrifying and more powerful than we can imagine. If they can finish the bridge, they will come in droves. And when they come, they will destroy everything they can touch. They will torture us. They will make us all do things ..." Again her voice wavered.

  Lethe shivered at her distress. Her voice was powerful even in shock.

  Thayla took a breath and composed herself. "As the natural cycle of mana increases, the Chasm will grow narrower.

  But these outcroppings are unnatural—spikes above the normal mana level. The result of blood magic. Our worlds are not ready."

  "But your singing .. ."

  She smiled at him, the light beaming from her and warming him. "My song stops them. You see, they cannot stand to hear it, and my voice carries even across the Chasm."

  Lethe knew it to be true: her song was the light.

  "There are those on our side who are working to accelerate the completion of the bridge, those who are puppets of the Enemy and who are trying to hasten their coming. Look." She pointed back down the outcropping.

  At first Lethe didn't see it because it was so small, a shadow among shadows. But when Thayla began to sing again, filling the world with light and beauty, a tiny blemish of darkness remained. It was almost insignificant, and it lasted only briefly, but Lethe had seen it—a flaw in her song.

  "They have found one who can withstand the song," she said. "She is not strong enough to stay long, but I fear her strength will grow. And when it does, others will come. They will kill me."

  Lethe's spirit sank as Thayla's song died away.

  "Unless you stop them," she said.

  "How?"

  "You must find the great dragon called Dunkelzahn. He came to me not long ago and told me that I would not be able to hold off the Enemy's forces for longer than a few hundred years. He said they would find a weakness in my song. He said he needed more time.

  "Dunkelzahn promised to create an item that would keep the Enemy from crossing over prematurely. The Dragon Heart."

  Thayla bowed her head. "But that was some time ago, and the dark spot is growing. I fear something has happened. Will you go and find Dunkelzahn? Will you bring the Dragon Heart to me?"

  "I will," Lethe had said. "I promise."

  Now, trapped inside Burnout's metal husk, sinking toward the cold heart of the river, Lethe wondered how he would be able to keep his promise. He couldn't move the cyberzombie and he had no one to help him.

  Ryan Mercury certainly couldn't be trusted. Lethe had seen the human claim the Heart for his own. Mercury had succumbed to the power of the Heart; he had simply jettisoned any pretense of carrying out the quest Dunkelzahn had given him. He had refused to take the Dragon Heart to Thayla, and Lethe would never trust him again.

  Perhaps the other gifted one, Nadja Daviar, could be convinced to help him get the Dragon Heart to Thayla. She had always helped him in the past. Yes, he thought, I will go to her.

  Lethe willed himself to flee Burnout's body.

  Nothing happened. He couldn't move.

  By the goddess! What is going on?

  Lethe kept sinking inside the unconscious metal corpse. Then he noticed a spectral mesh of magic, barely visible.

  Like a gossamer web of fine strands, the mesh held Burnout's spirit to his body. The web kept Burnout's spirit from leaving the too little flesh. It was part of the cybermancy that allowed the man to be alive even with all this hardware.

  Now that same magic blocked Lethe from getting out.

  Lethe struggled, exerting all his power against the magic that held him. The gossamer strands stretched and bulged, but they would not break. Lethe was trapped.

  An inmate inside this metal asylum. This clockwork prison.

  Part 1

  20 August 2057

  1

  The air in Hells Canyon blew hot and dry even in first rays of the morning sun. The fiery ball crested the peaks behind him as Ryan Mercury walked along the edge of the cliff face. The sun battered down on him with its relentless scorching blaze.

  Ryan stood on the edge of the Assets Incorporated airstrip, a hidden ledge of rock cut into the eastern cliff face of Hells Canyon—deep in Salish-Shidhe Council lands on the border of what used to be Oregon and Idaho. The compound included a modest underground shelter, an old corrugated metal hangar, and some ramshackle storage sheds. Ryan had commissioned the expansion of the underground facilities, but so far only the command room had been completed. There was a lot of work to be done.

  He looked over the edge of the cliff and down at the thin line of the Snake River a thousand meters below, taking a long drink from his water bottle and forcing himself to chew a soy protein bar. He wasn't hungry, and his stomach hurt so bad he wasn't sure if he was going to be able to hold anything down.

  Ryan was two meters and 130 kilos of well-conditioned muscle, magically enhanced and accelerated flesh. No cyber, no bio. He swallowed, knowing he needed to eat in order to keep up his strength.

  The buzz of Dhin's drones came to his ears. The ork rigger was remote-piloting the surveillance vehicles, scouring the canyon floor. Burnout must be down there, Ryan thought, and he must have the Dragon Heart with him. But why can't we find him?

  Ryan and the Assets Incorporated team had been searching for the cyberzombie's body and the Dragon Heart for almost three days, with no progress. It was as if they had simply d
isappeared, swallowed into astral space or disintegrated into their constituent atoms and blown away in the hot wind.

  The memory of his final battle with Burnout flashed into Ryan's mind. The colors of sunset, the sounds of wind. The canyon walls glowed deep crimson in his memory, and Burnout's chromed parts reflected the blood-colored light.

  It was two days ago in the memory. A hurricane of wind blew through the open side door of the Hughes Airstar helicopter as Ryan had fought with the cyber-zombie. As Ryan's final kick sent the overlarge metal body sailing out into the air.

  Burnout plummeted, falling into the black fissure of Hells Canyon, an expression of sheer hatred flashing across his inhuman face.

  At the last second, the cyborg's telescoping fingers had shot out from his bloodied hands. The prehensile metal snakes flashed toward Ryan. Aiming for Ryan's belt. They curled their sharp and mangled ends around the nylon net bag that held the Dragon Heart. And when they snapped taut, the whole weight of Burnout's body came down like an anchor.

  Ryan jerked forward at the waist, pulled off his feet, flying for the door. He scrabbled for a hold, frantically grabbing for anything. He found nothing but grooved flooring. He fell out the side door, the hot air of Hell baking around him as he followed the cyberzombie down.

  The helicopter's runner caught Ryan in the gut, knocking the breath from his chest. But it slowed him enough so that his hands found purchase, wrapping around the hot metal. Then he slid over, and their combined weight pulled at his grasp, his sweaty fingers slipping on the runner. White-hot needles jabbed the back of his hands and arms as he tried to focus, tried to hold on.

  "I will have your magic, Ryan Mercury," said Burnout from below, his voice the grating of metal on metal.

  Ryan looked down. Below him, Burnout hung suspended, his metal parts tinged with the pink of the dying sun. Framed by the impenetrable black of the abyss. Ryan felt his fingers giving way, slipping on the smooth round metal as his strength waned.