Mitch Moonlake was tearing shoe leather down the Regina streets, looking over his shoulder occasionally to be sure he had given the Aztechnology guards the slip. It looked like he had, but one couldn't be too sure.

The run had gone to hell, no surprise there. Moonlake held out a little hope for success when they made it near an elevator, but then they were stopped by three Aztechnology guards, who clearly looked surprised to see them there. Lex gave them the pre-prepared spiel on Garcia, the guard radioed dispatch to verify the story, but probably called for backup instead because two guards drifted over, with one trying to be sneaky about it by crouchwalking behind some guest chairs.

Moonlake drew his heavy pistol and blew that guard away with a headshot, before screaming "RUN!" and ditching his comrades, casting a Barrier spell behind him as he went to prevent himself from being shot in the back. Mitch's head was still pounding from the effort involved in the spell, but it had probably saved his life.

Lex noticed what Moonlake had noticed about the guards, and managed to actually draw down on two of them and kill them both before being ripped apart by SMG fire. Rick backed off and was heard screaming in terror by Moonlake, before the scream was abruptly cut off by more SMG fire. Moonlake busted through the door they had entered to get in, and scrambled through the hole in the fence, possessing enough werewithal to grab one of the rifles as he went.

Moonlake assumed Lex and Rick had been fragged up by the guards. No big loss there in the end, although making some actual money had been nice for a while, even if he had to put up with their incompetence to do it.

But now what the hell would Moonlake do? Maybe he could sell the rifle for some small change and get out of town, but it'd have to be in a place outside the Algonkian-Manitou Council, otherwise he'd have Aztechnology Strike Teams up his backside. Instead, maybe he could call in a favour from a friend of a friend of the AMC War Chief, Carl Hillborn. Maybe he could get a reprieve. Maybe he could get out of this and make some money with actual shadowrunners elsewhere. Maybe he cou-

That thought exited his brain at about the same time a bullet did.

~~~

A shadowrunner was watching the sprinting Mitch Moonlake gun it down the street, looking wildly over his shoulder. The shadowrunner ducked behind a brick building in a side alley before Moonlake noticed him. Time to earn some pay.

The runner's plan was an old classic: wait for Moonlake to pass the dark alley he was hiding in, then emerge and backshoot Moonlake from short range. The shadowrunner had a Browning Max-Power Pistol fitted with a smartgun system to ease aiming, and it could blow a hole clean through a man's unprotected head from up to 75 yards.

The runner steeled himself, and slowly screwed the silencer on his pistol. His pre-kill reverie was broken though, by the sound of three loud gunshots.

What the hell?

The shadowrunner peeked out the alley to see some moron in a trenchcoat putting his gun away and looking over the body of Mitch Moonlake. The shadowrunner was almost certain it was not another shadowrunner. There were two assassins besides him elsewhere in the city, covering other probable escape routes for the three idiots dumb enough to run Aztechnology and get away with it, and a bounty would go to whoever was in the right spot to get the kills.

Some mugger was gonna take his 2,000 nuyen prize? The hell with that!

"Hey frag-face!"

The mugger turned around, and knew he was in trouble when he saw a man walking towards him with a gun already drawn. The mugger clawed at the American L36 Light Pistol he had just put back in his trenchcoat, but took a round in the throat, followed by one in the heart. The shadowrunner walked over and put another round in his head, just to be sure, before turning over the mugger and raiding his corpse for goodies to supplement his income for the run.

2,000 nuyen wasn't much for some contract killings, but pay did depend on the target and some other factors. The shadowrunner jumped at this contract though, mostly because jobs were down due to the arrival of some hotshot runner named Leon Eagles. Regina's small shadowrunning community suspected (but could not prove) that he was an infamous runner known as "Wild Fire", a man who had been building up a rep for hitting Seattle, Boston, and Miami harder than most runners could, but who really knew for sure. Point is, work was sparse, and wasting the stupider members of their competition for jobs was a harsh, but good way to stay alive. It happened every week around the world for free, so why not make a little profit on the side for clipping this guy?

The shadowrunner quickly filled a burlap sack with two credsticks, four guns, a maglock passkey, some drugs, and a few low to medium-level talismans. Most of the good stuff was still on the corpse of Mitch Moonlake. The shadowrunner photographed Moonlake's body, per the Johnson's request, and then slunk off into the alleys, looking for all the world like a drifter with a bag of clothes slung over his shoulder. He'd take the goods to a fixer about 20 blocks away, and could possibly make 5 times the killing fee for selling this stuff.

The shadowrunner really wanted a piece of Rat-Face Rick and Lex Overstreet for an extra 2,000 each, but guessed (correctly) that they probably got fragged up by Aztechnology and were dead now. Overall though, still a good night's pay for a good night's work......

~~~

A phone rang on the desk of Kenta Kawasaki, a highly-ranked executive with the Yokogawa Corporation. He had been expecting the call, and promptly answered it, hoping for good news.

"Kawasaki home office."

"The run's gone to drek."

Kenta closed his eyes, leaned his head back, and sighed. He had expected this, deep down, but it still hurt to not be successful. Tomorrow's meeting with his superiors would not be pretty.

"Two of the runners bought it, the third one's in the wind, or at least that's what I'm hearing through the lines. But listen, there was an insider in your side of things that seemed to leak details of the run. Word came to me just now that they knew what the run plans were, and I'm also hearing they're sending a Strike Team after Freddy Garcia. If they find out that I shut off the cameras remotely, I'm probably next."

Kenta's mind raced wildly. An insider? He was certain Aztechnology could not have gotten the shadowrun plans through the Matrix, as all the plans were committed to paper only, and were known to four people in the entire company: Kenta, two bosses, and a Yokogawa Strike Team captain posing as the false front "Mr. Johnson". They had tracked the activities of the three runners they hired and were sure they didn't spread the word. Surely his bosses didn't sell him out?

"I'm bailing out on this, they might not suspect me cause I phoned in sick for a few days beforehand, but I'm through with Aztechnology anyways. I'm heading to Calgary to stay with a cousin until the heat dies down. Sorry the run didn't work out well. Don't contact this number again."

Kenta's inside man hung up before Kenta could respond. The insider was actually lying to Kenta about his getaway, and was headed for Thunder Bay, a premier smuggling location in North America, but the insider felt Kenta or any Aztechnology goons that might be wiretapping the conversation didn't need to know those particular details.

Kenta didn't care about his insider in Aztechnology anymore though. He was far more concerned with who the hell the insider was in his own corp. Yokogawa had a chance to do some damage to their rivals, to maybe start work on getting rid of Aztechnology's foothold over the Algonkian-Manitou Council. Then an insider blew up the plan. Fantastic.

Maybe it was a rival within the company that found it out somehow and leaked it. Kenta had a few in the company that resented his promotions after all. Maybe some stooge was refilling water glasses nearby and heard their plan. He would have to investigate tomorrow, and it would take up his life for weeks now, no doubt.

Kenta sighed. He needed a cup of sake. Badly.