"I don't know yet for sure. From his story, our boy is clearly one of these 'otaku,' or at least he thinks he is. We've gotten some unusual neural scans, and he does have some very high-grade cybernetic modifications. We're working on tracing them now. They might be Renraku or they might not. It's not likely they would have left the trademarks and serial numbers on them, and Renraku has been putting out a lot of new stuff lately. It won't be easy to track down." "That's just the point, isn't it?" Villiers said, looking Lanier in the eye. "Renraku has been putting out a lot of new patents, designs, and technology lately. Too damn much. It just doesn't fit what we know about their capabilities. It contradicts all the predictions and models I pay the marketing department so much money to develop. Renraku used to be so predictable you could set your watch by them, Miles. They were triple-A, but they had a certain pattern to them that we'd learned to anticipate. Now nothing is like we predicted and Renraku is breathing down our necks. You know that the Yamanas want me removed as CEO?" "They've wanted that ever since you got the job." "Yes, but now they might actually have a cause to rally around. We're losing market share for the first time in years and Renraku is starting to beat us at our own game. That hurts the bottom line and that's the one damn thing the Japanese can agree on. It's turning into a mob scene at the board meetings, Miles, and the mob is going to start howling for somebody's blood." Lanier tapped his fingers against his chin as he considered the implications. He hadn't known it was that bad, but Fuchi was good at keeping internal matters internal, and Lanier had definitely been out of touch for a while. Fuchi had always been a house divided, made up of the powerful families that controlled the megacorporation. Two of them, the Yamanas and the Nakitomis, were Japanese industrial families who'd provided much of the capitol and investment money to create the Fuchi empire. The third, Villiers, was the business genius who had made Fuchi the top corporation in its field and kept it there. Feuds and infighting for control over Fuchi brewed all the time between the three families, only now it looked like Villiers' seeming inability to slow Renraku's runaway growth was uniting the other families against him. Villiers controlled more of Fuchi than any one man, but it was still possible the Japanese could hurt him if they got their act together. "That kid is the only chink in Renraku's armor we've been able to find so far," Villiers continued when Lanier remained silent. "We know Renraku arranged for people to infiltrate the otaku." Villiers left unsaid the fact that Fuchi knew about Renraku's plan only because Lanier had been involved in the planning stages of it. Lanier's skills as an intelligence gatherer had been too useful for Renraku to pass up. They had never revealed to him why they'd wanted someone to infiltrate a scruffy tribe of techno-mystics living in the Barrens, but they did call upon Lanier's expertise to help set up the means to do so. "This kid has the profile to be the agent the corp chose," Villiers said. "If he is, then he could be the proof we need that Renraku has been overstepping their bounds. We need evidence that this is part of the project you've told me about, the plan to use the otaku to get leverage over the Court. We need to get him to name names and give us the information Renraku sent him to look for." "Part of the problem," Lanier said, carefully choosing his words, "is that we can't get any leads on our subject. We've run all of the usual identification checks on his fingerprints, retinal patterns, and DNA traces. There are no records in any of the national databanks or SIN files we've checked. Our mystery otaku just doesn't exist in any of them." "Could Renraku have erased those records?" Villiers asked, not hiding the note of concern. "All of them? In every database in the world?" Lanier shook his head. "I doubt it. If Renraku has that kind of ability, then this little game might as well be over. More likely he was born SINless. There are plenty of blanks who aren't in the records who they might have recruited. He could even be a shadowrunner." Lanier waited for Villiers to say something. When he didn't, he went on. "The other problem is that the kid's memory may really and truly be fragged up. Whether it was conditioning Renraku gave him or something that happened with the otaku, we just don't know yet. If it is, then we might not be able to get anything useful out of him. Unraveling the mess of his wetware is going to be difficult and take time." "Time is something we don't have a lot of," Villiers said, starting to look more worried. "The push is already on with the Corporate Court. If our case is going to be successful, we have to get evidence fast enough to present it to the Court before Renraku can make some kind of counter-move. That means doing some of this operation on the fly and gambling we can get what we need in time to make use of it. It's a big risk we're taking here, Miles, a high-wire act with no net. There's no margin for error." "You don't have to remind me of that," Lanier countered. "My position is probably the most precarious of all." Lanier had worked hard to get even a modicum of the Renraku board of directors' trust, and he knew if Renraku knew what he was up to they'd have had him killed long ago. And they still might. "I'm not so sure of that." Villiers' voice was cold. "Your seat on the board might protect you if this thing blows up in our faces. After all, if this operation fails and our case against Renraku collapses, you're still on the board of the corporation that's number one with a bullet. If it works, then you stand to be the one who knows when to jump before Renraku's ship sinks. It sounds to me like you've got all of your bases pretty well covered." Lanier was shocked at Villiers' comment. Even though it was delivered in a cold and even tone, to Lanier's trained ear it clearly carried a note of desperation. After all they'd been through, how could Richard even think to question his loyalty? How could he doubt Lanier's loyalty? Villiers leaned back in his chair, visibly settling himself. "I'm sorry, Miles. That was uncalled for. This whole mess has me on edge. We're taking a serious chance to get this whole thing cleared up."

Lanier leaned forward in his seat, his voice low but urgent. "We'll do it, Richard. We haven't come this far to lose it all now. I know in my gut that this kid is the one we're looking for. I'll get the information out of him no matter what I have to do, and then we'll be able to convince the Corporate Court to take Renraku down a peg or two. Renraku won't risk a corporate war when they've already gained so much. They aren't going to throw it all away." Villiers nodded soberly. "We'd better hope so. If we can't pull this off, there may be no stopping Renraku, and then the Japanese will probably have me for lunch. You've got to find the proof we need, Miles. And as soon as possible. If anyone can do it, it's you. I'll be waiting for your call." His virtual hand brushed air off to his left, and the image of Richard Villiers vanished. Lanier shut down the connection and reached up to pull the datacord from his jack. He held the plug in his hand and looked at it for a long moment before allowing the inertia reel in the desk to spool up the fiber-optic cable and stow the cord away. He stood up and smoothed "his dark suit, adjusted his tie, and looked around the dark, quiet office for a moment before returning to his work. Whatever it takes, he thought to himself. Whatever it takes, I'll find out the otaku's secrets.