(12:46:18 EST)

Jackpoint: Toronto, United Canadian and American States

Dark Father stared at the creature that waited for him below, in the private conversation pit. The thing was a strange blend of two different paranormal creatures. It had the squat, heavily muscled body of a gargoyle, as well as that creature's large leathery wings, pointed ears, forehead horn, and jutting muzzle. But its flesh was covered in the green and black scales of a mimic snake, and a forked tongue slithered in and out of its hinged jaw. Its neck was just a little too long, and its beady eyes were serpentlike slits under heavy brows.

The combination was probably intended to be doubly unsettling. Had the creature actually existed in nature, its victims wouldn't know whether they would be constricted to death and then swallowed whole, or dive-bombed from above and raked with talons and claws.

In fact, the creature was a construct within the Matrix, an icon representing a computer decker. But even though it was unreal, composed only of pixels of light, it had the capacity to be deadly, just the same.

Dark Father descended a spiral staircase made of floating white rectangles. When he reached the bottom and stepped onto the green marbled floor of the conversation pit, a metallic boom echoed overhead. He looked up and saw that the sub-processing unit had been sealed off with what looked like a gigantic metal hatch, octagonal in shape. Eight black pillars had appeared to hold it in place. Jagged blue bolts of electricity rose one after the other between the pillars, crackling as they wavered their way from floor to ceiling.

Dark Father recognized the program: a form of barrier IC named Jacob's Ladder. It was intended to guarantee ab solute privacy to the two occupants of this SPU, one of several secure nodes on the Virtual Meetings host, Hidden away in a remote corner of the Seattle telecommunications grid, Virtual Meetings' black pyramid contained a number of private iconferencing sites, making it a favorite meeting place for shadowrunners.

And for blackmailers.

The gargoyle leaned against a sundial that was set into the middle of the conversation pit's floor. Glowing white numerals announcing the time of day encircled its rim, patterns of white against the sun dial's black marbled finish. They crawled with painful slowness around the rim; seconds always seemed slower in the Matrix, where words and deeds were accomplished with the speed of thought. The conversation pit was theirs until ten a.m.-ample time for them to conclude their meeting.

Dark Father stared coldly at the gargoyle. "Well? Here I am." He stood with hands folded in front of him, an ebon-black skeleton with yellowed eyeballs, wearing a tall top hat and a black suit that hung loosely upon its bones. A pale white hangman's noose, knotted around his neck like a tie, was a stark contrast to bones and cloth so dark that they were difficult to see against the backdrop of inky blackness that lay beyond the sub-processing unit.

The gargoyle-who went by the handle Serpens in Machina-flashed Dark Father a quick smile, revealing needle-sharp teeth. "There you are," he said. "So that's what you look like." The gargoyle shifted his wings slightly and Dark Father heard the creak of leather and smelled the dry muskiness of snake. The persona icon was high-rez enough to include aural and olfactory components, in addition to its visual and tactile presence. Serpens in Machina must have some mighty state-of-the-art equipment. He was not someone to be trifled with.

But Dark Father already knew that. He had come prepared.

"Have you arranged for the credit transfer?" the gargoyle asked.

Dark Father nodded. "Nine hundred thousand nuyen is waiting in an account in the Zurich-Orbital Gemeinschaft Bank. All you need to access it is the passcode."

"Wrong," the gargoyle said. "You'll be the one accessing it. I have no intention of getting hit with whatever IC you've loaded the account with. At precisely noon today, Pacific Standard Time, you will transfer the money in three equal portions into the accounts of three organizations: the Ork Rights Committee Seattle chapter; VVA-MOS-Victims of Violence Against Metahumans and Other Species; and the MetaRights League of Boston."

Dark Father shuddered at the list. Neo-anarehists, metahuman agitators, and terrorists. In the real world, his lip curled at putting nuyen in their coffers.

"And your take?" he asked.

"Nada," the gargoyle answered. "I'm like Robin Hood. Take from the rich, give to the poor…"

"You're targeting the wrong person," Dark Father countered.

"You are rich, Winston Griffith III."

Dark Father's eyes narrowed at the use of his real name. He was at a disadvantage; despite his best efforts he had been unable to learn the real-world identity of Serpens in Machina. He was not the world's hottest decker, but he did have the very best hardware and programs that nuyen could buy. He had every electronic edge available. And still he had failed.

"I am wealthy," Dark Father agreed. "But I'm already a philanthropist, so there's no need to blackmail me. It was my charitable donations that enabled the establishment of three separate Informed Parenting clinics in one of Toronto's poorest neighborhoods. The orks and trolls of the Vaughn warrens now have free birth control and counseling, regardless of their SIN status or…"

"Free abortions and sterilization, you mean."

Dark Father bristled. "Those are the most effective methods, yes. Orks and trolls aren't the most intelligent creatures. You can't expect them to remember to show up every six months for another implant needle. And with the average litter comprising four or more offspring, the pressures on Toronto's social systems are tremendous, not to mention the personal hardships faced by the young ork mother who finds herself with too many mouths to feed when she's still only in her teens."

"Bulldrek," the gargoyle said sharply. "Your clinics are nothing more than a Human Nation front. And you're a known HN sympathizer, despite your… personal background."

The gargoyle snorted. It cocked its bullet-shaped head to one side. "Ironic, isn't it? If you weren't a member of one of Toronto's wealthiest families, you'd be on the streets like the rest of us. Without your inheritance to buffer you from the unpleasantness of the world, you'd be a target for every bounty hunter in UCAS. Like the one who tried to gun you down a year ago."

Despite himself, Dark Father shuddered. How could Serpens in Machina have found out about that as well? Winston had been feeding, late at night in the hospital morgue, when his unknown assailant had surprised him. The gunman's comments had made it clear that he was a bounty hunter and that he knew exactly what Winston was up to. He had taken a moment to gloat at catching Winston in the act before unloading an entire magazine into Winston's chest.

The surgeons who saved Winston's life that night were his personal physicians. They knew that their hospital's wealthy patron was a ghoul-and were paid top nuyen to keep that knowledge a secret. They sympathized with Winston's plight-they were the ones who, over the years, had helped him to pass for human by performing delicate laser surgery to correct his reduced vision and treating his allergies to sunlight with gene therapy. They were discreet and professional, and had no reason to betray the trust Winston placed in them. No reason to bite the hand that fed them a steady diet of nuyen.

The hospital's security staff were also in the clear. The woman and man who had been on duty the night Winston was shot had taken down the gunman quickly and efficiently. Theirs had been a clean kill-the bounty hunter had not lived to spill Winston's secrets to them. And it was doubtful that hospital security had seen anything incriminating. There had been no vidcam monitors in the morgue itself, and Winston had been careful to choose as his meal a corpse that had already undergone an autopsy. The scalpel cuts he made in the body would surely have been mistaken for wounds made when the body was dissected.