August 11, 2045

Property of Lisa Hartigan

Regina, Algonkian-Manitou Council

~~~

The past month had felt like a never-ending nightmare for Matthew and Lisa Hartigan. The funeral had taken place not long after Jack's death, and was a somber affair, dominated by cameras. Matthew hated it, as the whole thing felt fake and PR-driven, paying tribute to a "hero" that most of the damned attendees hadn't even heard of, or would've cared about before he died. No one knew his actual dad, the man who had taught him how to fish, how to hunt, how to protect himself, and who to protect. No one knew the dad that patiently helped him with his schoolwork, who taught him how to tie a knot, and who taught him how to be a man. They just knew the story of heroism and self-sacrifice, that was all they knew of Jack Hartigan.

Some vultures known as trideo reporters actually had the gall to ask Matthew for interviews, right before he entered the funeral house. Had Matthew been wearing a gun at the time, he would've seriously considered drawing down on them, and maybe arranging a couple funerals of his own. But he let it pass, with considerably more grace than the reporters deserved.

Still, it wasn't all self-serving nonsense from the other funeral attendees. Chief Robert Bear (under very heavy guard) gave an emotional eulogy for his bodyguard and friend that didn't leave a dry eye anywhere in the building. Several of Jack's colleagues also spoke respectfully over their fellow comrade, looking ominously all the while at the closed casket. The casket was draped with the Algonkian Council flag, although really the empty casket was such a symbolic thing, given that what was left of Jack Hartigan after the explosion could probably fit in several Neo-Tupperware containers.

Lisa couldn't handle the funeral at all, and after an hour of it had gone catatonic with shock. She had been in the hospital for two weeks after the funeral, before eventually being released. Lately, she had been improving in terms of her mental state, thanks largely to some high-powered drugs and teas to help alleviate the stress, although she tended to trail off in the middle of sentences sometimes.

Matthew had just felt like moping at first, and found it hard to be motivated to do anything but grieve. But Matthew could almost hear his dad admonishing him from the afterlife, telling him he had responsibilities to uphold. He needed to be a man now, the man of the house. So he mechanically practised his shooting, mechanically fed himself, and mechanically tended to the property's chores. Matthew also went through his dad's possessions, most of which were willed to him, and discovered some interesting and possibly illegal firepower in his dad's old arsenal, learning how to use it adroitly.

Matthew badly wanted to put that firepower to good use on whoever was behind the assassination attempt. The actual culprit had been blown to even smaller pieces than his dad, but they mysteriously lacked much of a background to go on. The suicide bomber's supposed name was Tom Shaughnessy, a 22 year old with a Social Identification Number, a credstick balance of 20 nuyen, and an address that led to a vacant field near Calgary, but nothing else. Surely he had to be someone sent in specifically to do this job, with some sort of mystery background not indicated in the Algonkian Council's investigations.

There was a trideo recording of the incident, as Lisa had made a habit of recording Jack's rare trid appearances where he was seen near the shoulder of Chief Bear. It was gut-grinding to watch the actual explosion, but Matthew had regularly taken stills from it, analyzing them to figure things out. There was a gold logo on the back of a leather jacket the suicide bomber was wearing, which looked vaguely like a distorted oval surrounding some type of hill or arch, it was hard to tell. Matthew had done some searches in the Matrix for the logo, and was led to some underground locations in his hunt, most notably the infamous Shadowland BBS forums. A couple threads asked about the logo, but a lot of the replies had an ominous message sprinkled with the tags [DATA EXPUNGED] or [DATA CORRUPTED].

Could the Chief have been targeted by some sort of evil shadowrunner group, who were now trying to cover their tracks?

Furthermore, there was some talk in the shadows about how other North American leaders had been targeted. The day after his father died, so did the Confederated American States President, Joseph Alexander, via unknown and mysterious causes. A couple chiefs in the Salish-Shidhe Council had almost been killed by amateurish, seemingly rogue assassination attempts, and a major mover and shaker in the Pueblo Council down south was wounded by an unidentified white man disguised in an AmerIndian dancing costume. All of this plus the Chief Bear attack, in the space of three days.

The shadows were hot with speculation over what was happening, but no other attacks or workable theories had come forth over the past month. No other copycats seemed to follow, and all the would-be assassins were dead. (Except for whoever killed Joseph Alexander...... assuming it WAS a whoever.)

As Matthew pored over the evidence, he got a sudden feeling he needed to do something important. One thing he had inherited from his dad were good instincts, and right now his instincts were screaming at him.

"Your mother's in trouble. Check on her now!"

Matthew strapped on his new gun, his father's old relic of a Walther PPK, and exited his father's garage, heading to the house. His mother Lisa was not in her bedroom, where she had been lying down just two hours ago when Matthew last checked on her. Lisa also wasn't in the living room, or the kitchen, or hell, ANYWHERE.

Something was up.

Matthew drew his gun and stalked around the property. There was precious little cover anywhere, but he kept on the alert. If some unfamiliar bastard was on the property, looking to take out his mom too, he'd send them to a worse afterlife than that suicide bomber was experiencing.

However, Matthew had looked around just about everywhere on the property, and couldn't find his mother. Until......

Matthew noticed some type of movement in an abandoned, burned out log cabin that had cluttered up the property for years. Matthew did not know the story behind it, and why it wasn't cleared out yet. But something was in there......

Matthew took cover behind a tall, jagged piece of wood, carefully peeked out, and the second peek stopped him cold.

Matthew dropped his gun on the grass and walked into the burned-out cabin, in sheer disbelief at the sight. His mother was dressed in her Sunday best, and was dangling by her neck from the end of a rope, strung out and tied tightly over the one solid overhanging beam left in the cabin. A large stepstool from the house lay at her feet.

Lisa had committed suicide.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Matthew howled in a mixture of sadness, frustration, and sorrow, falling to his knees and pounding the floor of the burned out cabin until his fists were bloody.

Why!?

Why was this all happening!?

~~~

(two days later)

The cloudy skies that had been present all week started pouring rain a bit today, but several men continued their work unabated. They were gravediggers, preparing a hole big enough to put in a pine box containing Lisa Hartigan.

Matthew worked feverishly alongside the gravediggers he had paid for their services. He could've left it to them, but felt a purpose in doing the work, in doing SOMETHING. Matthew put his frustrations into digging up this grave, wishing with every shovel hit that it would strike the face of that damned suicide bomber instead of just the ground.

Chief Robert Bear was nearby, surrounded by a dozen bodyguards, performing a magical ceremonial ritual over the pine box containing Lisa Hartigan's body. Robert hoped that Lisa could find peace with her husband, wherever they were.

The grave was finished, the pine box containing Lisa was lowered into the grave, and the gravediggers filled it. Chief Bear cast one final blessing spell over the mound of earth, and that was that.

Matthew had wanted this funeral to be very short and very not open to the public, given how Jack's funeral turned out for Matthew. Lisa had no family willing to attend anyways, they had no-shown Jack's funeral, and had cut Lisa out of the family tree entirely for having the audacity to marry a white man with vague Indian heritage. Matthew wasn't even sure they knew Lisa had a kid.

Matthew paid off the gravediggers, as Chief Robert Bear walked up to Matthew, smoking real tobacco from a pipe.

"Matthew, this is a huge loss, and I get you're upset......but you don't have to do this you know."

"......I have to, and I will. I'm heading to Seattle next week, and my mind's made up."

Chief Robert Bear sighed. Matthew had told him of his intention to head for Seattle and become a shadowrunner, feeling that getting involved with the shadows was the only way to find information on who killed his father. Matthew was convinced there was hidden information involving a logo on the bomber's jacket that was out there somewhere, but the limited Algonkian intelligence network could not find it or any other clues related to the bombing.

"We have agents on this case. We'll find the real culprit who killed your father, and tried to kill me."

"I want to believe that Chief. Really, I do. But these guys won't be found in the by-the-book way. This goes deep. You weren't the only world leader they tried to knock off."

"There's not even proof that those attacks are connected!"

"Except the fact that there hasn't been an assassination attempt since then, and there weren't any for three months beforehand. Something's up. Maybe if I go into the shadows, I'll find out who they are. Maybe I can join up with them. Maybe I can tear them apart from the inside."

"Matthew...... you're just a boy."

"My father taught me more about being a man than you think. I can handle a man's responsibility. And I have one."

"It's not your responsibility to go looking to avenge your father! Maybe in the time of my ancestors, sure, a young warrior brave would be allowed to seek his revenge. But times have changed! Let us handle this!"

Robert Bear was pleading with his eyes to Matthew, wanting him to see reason. But Matthew wasn't having it.

"Even if I wanted to, I can't!" Matthew shouted. "One of the last things my father told me to do before he died was to look out for my mom! How did that turn out!? The only way I can come close to granting his wish now is by avenging him, and avenging my mother!"

"Getting yourself killed and becoming a criminal wouldn't be what your father wanted!"

"I won't get myself killed." said Matthew, with all the youthful confidence of a vengeful 16 year old. "And I won't become a criminal either. I'll take care of myself and stay as much in line with the law as possible. I'll be fine."

Chief Robert Bear tried to put his hand on Matthew's shoulder, but withdrew it. He had the feeling Matthew had made his resolution, and short of arresting him right here, he couldn't stop him. Matthew was 16, and under Algonkian law could now be his own legal guardian. Part of him felt he owed it to Jack to keep him safe, and keep him away from that life...... but part of him thought maybe it'd be best to let the kid go out, get roughed up a bit, and then hopefully come back home in one piece.

"This is a bad decision Matthew...... but its yours to make. I'll hire a detail to watch over your property."

Matthew nodded respectfully at the Chief, took one long look at his mother and father's final resting place, and walked off to the cabin. Chief Bear stared long and hard at the grave, before heading off the property with his bodyguards to get back to his duty.

~~~

Many people of Matthew's age entered the shadows, thinking it would be just like the trideo shows, and that all they needed to succeed was a quick gun and a quick mouth. Most of them ended up dying in nameless alleyways, with their corpses sold unceremoniously to organ chop-shops and cyberware harvesters.

Matthew was the exception. His instincts steered him out of more trouble than his peers could handle, his diligence made him a reliable asset to all the Johnsons he worked for, and his sense of justice, while distorted over time by living in the shadows, held firm enough that he didn't often pull his gun on people who didn't deserve it.

He had left behind Matthew Hartigan forever in the Algonkian Council, and eventually became known as the ace shadowrunner "Wild Fire", a man to be feared, a man to be respected, and a man who always got the job done.

And then, in 2057, he returned home to his property after his runs on Renraku, and was now known as Leon Eagles. He was still no nearer to finding his fathers killer, as he had found a lot more nuyen than leads in the shadows. Further information on the coordinated 2045 assassination attempts and the gold jacket logo seemed almost non-existent.

But someday......he would find the group who murdered Jack Hartigan and drove Lisa Hartigan to suicide.

Someday......