From: friedman@news.cis.ohio-state.edu (Mark  Friedman, Crimson)
Subject: 21st Century Schizoid Man [part 07/21]
Organization: The Ohio State University Department of Computer and Information Science
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 05:18:54 GMT

	Freddy got a ride to work with Dirk's older brother, who he
first tested his "partial amnesia" story on.  "Man, they just kept
beating the shit out of me.  They just wouldn't stop!  Then I blacked
out and woke up in a dumpster..."

	"Fuckin' trogs."  Rock grumbled.  "Don't worry, we'll pay back
those abominations in spades."  He turned to Freddy, "Though that
*was* a pretty stupid stunt you pulled.  What were you *thinking*?"

	Freddy shrugged, "I dunno.  I just followed the others in.
Didn't even think about it..."

	"You're lucky you're even alive, even though you don't have
all your memory back.  Hell, we thought you were all gonners from what
Stinky told us.  We just about wrote you off.  At least you're
remembering stuff now..."

	"Yeah.  After I look at stuff for a while, sometimes it
clicks.  I guess I'll have to just ask stupid questions for a while
until everything comes back..."

	\	\	\	\	\	\	\	\

	Lisa was right: 'Dirk' did have a hell of a lot of explaining
to do that day.  He'd been missing for about three days, and his
employers weren't too happy about it, though they did accept his
excuse, since his absence was caused "in the line of duty."

	"Anyway, Marx has been neutralized by Fuchi already," said
'Feeby', who he remembered from the picture of her and Bob Travis from
the Zerpso commercial.  "So we don't have to send you guys out on
patrol looking for him.  We got lucky, though we haven't found the
money he swiped..."

	"Yeah?  Wow, a *half* a billion dollars..."

	She frowned, "Or so the word on the street goes..."

	"So what exactly am I doing here?"

	Feeby sighed, "Those mutants really *did* fry your brain, huh?
Oh well, I'll give you the novice overview..."

	/	/	/	/	/	/	/	/

	Freddy sat by himself in a corner of the warehouse during his
lunch break.  During the day, he'd talked to other workers about
anything he could, gathering information about the operation.  Now he
was putting this info together with what he found out from Dirk in the
Rhino.

	The main thing that Freddy had learned was that the "Tacoma
Bob" rumours about the Crushers were a ruse: they only went through
the motions of being bouncers at the "Fast Flicks" houses.  The real
job was that they were to put pressure on Federated-Boeing Division
heads to step down through various intimidation tactics.  Apparently
Feeby was an official at Fed-Bo and was looking for a big promotion...

	Dirk had worked at a warehouse near the Auburn Fed-Bo plant,
unloading aircraft weapons for smuggling out of the city.  Feeby had
told the Crushers that she had "special powers" in Fed-Bo that let her
do this without suspicion.  Freddy didn't doubt it, since the
operation had been continuing successfully for over a year.

	"Hey Dirk!" yelled his mid-level boss from across the room,
"Got a job for you."

	Freddy finished his pimento cheese sandwich and threw his
trash into a can.  "Yeah, boss..."  He walked over to the foreman.

	"It's an easy one: you can even do it in your condition.  All
ya gotta do is take Bob's pets to Feeby's mansion."

	"No prob boss.  Where do I go?"

	"Office J on the east wing.  Rock's going with you."  The
foreman walked back into his own office.

	|	|	|	|	|	|	|	|

	"You go herd 'em outside, Dirk.  I'll go pull the van up."

	"Sure."  Freddy turned to the door and then back to Rock,
"What am I doing?"

	"Just bring 'em out!  I'll be back in a bit.  Sheesh..."
Rock walked out the door marked <EXIT>.

	Freddy shrugged.  "These pets better not be snakes.  I hate
snakes."  He shook off the chills and opened the door.

	He looked across the room and was dumbfounded: Kelly was
sitting there on a cot looking back at him.  His mouth formed the
syllables to say her name, but no sound came out.  Suddenly he was hit
in the face with a chair by someone he didn't see standing beside the
door.  He fell to the ground and heard a woman yell, "Let's go!", and
then two people ran past him out of the room.

	After a few seconds he struggled to his feet and out into the
hallway.  He saw Kelly and another woman running towards the exit.
But they didn't make it: Rock stepped in through the out door and
outstretched both his arms, clothes-lining both women.  They fell to
the ground, grasping their throats and coughing.

	Freddy ran up and checked if Kelly was okay.  He turned to
Rock.  "What the hell you do that for?"

	"Hey, they were gonna escape!  I really don't need Feeby on my
ass for letting them get away.  And what the hell were *you* doing?
They're just two chicks: how the hell did they get past you?  I swear,
you're *such* a pussy..."

	Freddy snapped at him, "Hey! *You* try getting the shit beat
out of you by a pack of orks and then move like nothing happened..."
He helped Kelly to her feet, who was still dazed.

	Rock started to pick up the other woman, who suddenly grabbed
his leg and flipped him over on his back.  She then got to her own
feet and started to run away, but Rock was too fast for her: he
grabbed her ankle and yanked her back down to the ground with him.  He
then turned her face up and hit her in the face, hard.  She quickly
went limp and lied motionless on the floor.

	"Bitch," Rock muttered as he stood up.  "Well, let's haul 'em
into the van..."  He hefted the woman over his shoulder.  Freddy led
Kelly, still dizzy, out the door.

	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*

	Freddy sat in the back of the "plain brown wrapper" van with
Kelly and the other woman, who were handcuffed to one of the bench
seats.  Rock was driving up front, so Freddy decided to talk with
Kelly.  "How are you?"

	"Oh, starting pleasant conversation now?  Brute force not
working well enough for you?"  She snarled at him.

	He sighed, "You know I didn't try to do anything!  It's my
brother that goes around hitting people.  Besides, *she's* the one
that hit me with a chair..."  He pointed to the unconscious woman.

	"You sure fell for that one.  Sucker..."

	"Wait a sec, what did I do to you?  I would've treated you
okay..."

	"Are you kidding?  You Crushers are all alike!  You're scum,
and order-following scum at that."

	Freddy grumbled and tried to change the subject.  "You know
who she is?"

	"Not really.  I saw her once at some sort of doctor's office
when she was being taken out while they brought me in.  Besides that
time, we were just thrown in that room a little bit before you got
there.  She just started talking escape strategy and didn't introduce
herself.  Pissed off the wrong people, I guess..."

	"Maybe.  They don't tell me everything that happens around
here.  So how 'bout you?  What got you into this?"

	"Me?  I guess I just keep bad company: they're probably using
me to get at someone else.  I know this decker that kinda works the
fringes.  I really don't have many good friends in this town, but I've
known him since I came here.  He's a selfish bastard most of the time,
but I kinda like his sense a humour.  He works as a musician on the
side, too.  Cool tunes..."

	"Klone Crimson,"  Freddy said flatly.

	She peered at him closely, "Huh?"

	"That's his stage name right?"

	"Yeah, but how did you know?"

	"Believe it or not, I know more about him than most people..."
He decided not to tell her that the whole world though he was dead.

	She shook her head to clear the haze.  "Whatever you say..."
She decided to change the topic herself this time.  She moved closer
to the other woman and looked carefully at her face.  "She's gonna
have a black-eye, you know."

	Freddy went for the opening.  "How much blacker could it be?"

	This stunned her, memories coming into her head.  "Huh?"

	"None-black," he replied.  He hoped she made the connection.

	She looked at him even closer this time...

	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*

	Freddy ended up not telling Kelly who he really was.  He
decided she'd either freak out or just not believe him.  Besides, this
way she couldn't spill her guts if asked about him.

	The other woman woke up when they unloaded the van at the
mansion.  This time she was a bit more subdued.  He guessed that she
was Xavier's wife (or whatever), Ariel: she was about as violent as he
was, though considerably better looking.  He'd get a confirmation from
X later.

	The mansion was huge and luxuriously furnished.  Freddy and
Rock handed over the women to the security guards there (who looked
more like professionals than Trog Crushers), who gagged them and led
them up some stairs.  After that he waited around to get his orders to
return to the warehouse.  In the meantime he looked around for clues.

	He asked one of the guards that returned, "Hey, what are the
chicks for?"

	The man looked around conspiratorially.  "Well I hear that
they're going to be Bob Travis' new toys.  Feeby and he used to have
this thing, ya know?"

	"Oooh!  Really?"  Freddy was genuinely interested.

	"Yeah, but then this mage gave him this magic power or
something and he started to...errr, 'change'.  Feeby was all disgusted
and stuff, so she got these chicks for him instead..."

	"Yeesh.  Harsh realm..."

	"Yeah."  The guard nodded to him and walked from the room.

	He continued looking around the foyer and came to a plaque on
the wall.  It had a holo-pic of Feeby in a business suit, and a metal
etched plate on the bottom.  It had her name, a date (two years ago),
and a position title: "Director - Division of Aircraft Weaponry,
Federated Boeing."

	His jaw dropped.  "Cryminee..."

	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*

	Mortis was sitting in his van, listening and waiting (as
usual).  He'd moved his vehicle to the back parking lot of Sybrespace
when the Fuchi cops had shown up.  He'd wait until they left before he
went in to finish the night's job.  For now he'd keep track with his
surveillence equipment.

	He was eating a ZubmarineZandwich when his voice-mail
receiver clicked on.  A red light blinked on it and the transmission
came though: {{{ Why, I'll THROTTLE you, deck-boy! Why, I'll THROTTLE
you, deck-boy! Why, I'll THROTTLE you, deck-boy!... }}}

	The voice was Mortis' own.  At first he was a bit confused,
but then he forcefully spit out a bite of Zandwich when it hit him.
"Well I'll be screwed, blued, and tattooed!  Crimson's alive!"

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Comprehensive scripting and color commentary here is Copyright by Mark
Friedman 1991, all rights reserved.  Basic story plot  and Matrix help
was by Jerry Weiler, but he won't mind: I'm giving him all the profits
from the venture. Let's  see,  what's 100% of  $0.00?  :-) Also, basic
Shadowrun backdrops are in extensive use, so them FASA dudes might get
a small cut as well...

Any questions, comments, requests, criticisms, and Chapman Sticks will
be accepted and appreciated at the address in the sig.

					- Mark "Crimson" Friedman

Mark "Klone Crimson" Friedman is friedman@cis.ohio-state.edu .................
"There is nothing former   "Beat poets,    "If you put a hungry ferret in your
 about King Crimson."       not children."  trousers, he'll run around..."
 - Robert Fripp, 5/11/90    - anonymous     - Nigel Tufnel (Spinal Tap)
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo