Sam understood that this hookup would allow him access to only a limited selection of controls, but it still seemed a dangerous risk. Sensing the man beside him becoming impatient, however, he decided that not jacking in would soon become an even greater risk.
As Sam snugged the plug into the jack in his temple, pain flashed through his skull, but faded swiftly. Like an afterimage, dials and control information appeared in his mind, projected onto his optic nerve by the aircraft’s computer. He could shift his head and “see” different portions of the imaginary control panel. Spotting the help panel, he reached out toward it, mentally “pressing” the button. The computer fed him instructions on basic aircraft operation. The machine’s voice in his head was cold and alien, unlike the tones it gave through the speakers. The uncanny nature of his rapport with the Commuter unnerved him and the back of his skull began to ache.
Bullets pattered against the armored cockpit glass in a hasty rhythm seconded by the Amerindian’s urgent, “Get moving!”
Sam reached out to the control yoke. Whether it was real or a computer simulation, he no longer knew. He ordered the engines to rev, and pulled back. The counter-rotating blades of the Commuter’s twin engines spun faster, quickly creating enough lift for the craft to clear the pad. With the autopilot doing the real flying, Sam commanded the Commuter up into the night sky.
“Where to?” he asked Ghost Maker.
“North over the plex. For now.”
Sam complied.
They had been in flight for five minutes when Sam decided that the anti-aircraft missiles he had been expecting were not coming after all. The Elf was evidently as good as his word. Calling up the radar, Sam could find nothing that looked like pursuit. He was equally surprised at the lack of challenges from the Seattle Metroplex air traffic controllers. The Elf decker must have inserted a flight plan into their computers as well, concealing the hijacked shuttle VTOL among the normal traffic.
They were passing over a suburban residential district when Ghost Maker ordered Sam to extinguish the running lights and change course to head for the Redmond Barrens, that desolate sprawl of shanty towns and abandoned buildings. The autopilot attempted to turn the lights back on, but Sam overrode it.
As they headed across the district, the lights of the apartments and homes of corporate salarymen became rarer, replaced by the garish neon and corpse-gray glow of advertising tridscreens near the edge of the Barrens. Out beyond the commercial zone, the lights were few.
Sam watched the Amerindian scan the darkness below. He wondered if his captor had augmented eyes to go along with his reflexes. Most of the adventurers and museleboys who called themselves street samurai did. This Ghost Maker was certainly one of that breed.
“Lower,” Ghost commanded.
As Sam directed the Commuter to comply, the autopilot whined, “Altitude becoming dangerously low. Do you intend a landing?”
“Shut it up.”
Sam flipped the rocker switch to silence the cabin voice. “Are we landing?”
“Not yet. Head northeast.”
Sam adjusted the craft’s headings telling the autopilot that landing was not imminent and that the altitude was intentional.
They flew for another ten minutes, making several more course changes, some to avoid the burnt-out shells of buildings and others to satisfy some unknown whim of Ghost Maker. When the samurai finally gave the order to land, Sam was glad to engage the Commuter’s automatic landing routine. The long minutes of dodging the darkened hulks had worn him down to where, even had he been familiar with the aircraft, he would not have wished to land it manually.
“Damn it! Kill the lights," the samurai snapped as the autopilot engaged the landing lights.
Startled by the man’s vehemence, Sam complied, cancelling almost as quickly the Commuter’s complaints about safety and FAA regulations. The VTOL settled unevenly on a field of rubble, close by a row of boarded-up tenements. The samurai popped the jack from Sam’s head and urged him out of the pilot’s seat. Sam reached to cut the engines.
“Leave them.”
Sam shrugged and headed for the cabin. The others had already deplaned, leaving the interior empty save for the dead.
“Why can’t you just leave us alone?” he heard Jiro say. The response came from the Ork. “Let’s just call it a little insurance.”
The Renraku employees were hustled into one of the derelict buildings just as the Commuter lifted off again. From the doorless entryway, Sam watched as the VTOL went straight up until well clear of the low buildings, then turned south and shifted to horizontal flight mode. The Commuter climbed away into the sky, its dark bulk eclipsing the few stars that shone through the breaks in the cloud cover. A shadow ship, crewed by ghosts.
The samurai materialized in the the doorway, silhouetted briefly before slipping inside. Once safe in the darkness, he spoke. “The veetole’s on its way out to sea.”
“Think it was on the ground too long?” Sally asked.
“We’ll know soon enough if it was,” he replied.
In the silence that followed, Sam could hear the Ork changing magazines for his HK227. The other two followed his example, then silence fell again.
It was less than a minute before the Ork complained, “We can’t just haul dis lot down de street.”
“Cog is sending a car.”
“We’re supposed to wait around? Frag it! If de badges or de Raku samurai are on our tail, we’re meat sitting here.”
"We can’t move our guests safely without a car," Sally insisted.
“So who needs dem? We’re back on our own turf. De’re dead weight now.” The Ork’s slight emphasis on “dead” made it clear what he considered the proper way of disposing of the Renraku prisoners.
“I think you underestimate their value.”
“We did de job we was paid for. And we got de disks dat Ghost grabbed. Dat’s plenty. You’re looking for too many extra creds.”
“I have expenses to meet.”
“I ain’t paying your expenses with my life.”
“You want to buzz now? Give me your credstick and I’ll give you your cut,” Sally said, holding out her hand. “Of course, you’ll only get the standard one on ten for leaving before the goods are fenced.”
Sam could feel the tension mount as the magician and the Ork stared into one another’s eyes. Finally, the Ork looked away. He shrugged, mumbling, “Job’s a job.”
“Sally smiled. “Don’t worry, Kham. This one’s going to finish just fine.”
The Ork snapped her a sullen look as if he had heard it all before, then he vanished, grumbling, into the dark interior of the building.
While they waited, Sam looked after Jiro’s wound as best he could, ripping up a piece of his own shirt for a bandage. The salaryman seemed dazed by the loss of his wife and still said not a word as Sam worked over him. Having done what he could, Sam sat down cross-legged on the filthy floor, his thoughts as dark as the room.
Ghost appeared in the doorway again, startling Sam, who had not seen the Amerindian leave.