|
Nigel Findley is the author of multiple Shadowrun books. The novels 2XS (1991), Shadowplay (1993), Lone Wolf (1994), and House of the Sun (1995). Sourcebooks: Paranormal Animals of North America (1990), The Universal Brotherhood (1990), Native American Nations 1 (1991), Native American Nations 2 (1991), Neo-Anarchist's Guide to Real Life (1992), One Stage Before (1992), Tir Tairngire (1993), Corporate Shadowfiles (1993), Lone Star (1994), Paradise Lost (1994), Double Exposure (1994), and Aztlan (1995). Nigel Findley died in 1995, but remains the most prolific Shadowrun author.
Dirk's first-person narrative gives the reader a lot of clues into the necessary and peculiar paranoia of the SINless. Descriptions of the barrens, the dominance of gangs within their turf, the usefulness of a diverse network of contacts, the process of obtaining telecom service and other utilities, etcetera. Life in the shadows.
The first scene in the book is so classic it's almost cliché: Beautiful woman with gun tries to kill the Hero and fails, cries on his shoulder, hires him to find the person who killed her sister. Is it the beginning of a shadowrun or a Bogart movie?
p.12: UCAS law requires contract law enforcement agencies to notify subjects of a telecom line tap of the tap's existence within four months of the tap's removal. So via an obvious legal loophole, by maintaining a phone tap indefinitely the agency in question will never have to notify the suspect.
Dirk's knowledge of Lone Star procedures and organizational structure is completely consistent with the Lone Star sourcebook (also written by Nigel D. Findley, but 2 years after this novel). Dirk makes the occasional runner's comment in that sourcebook, including an extended monologue on working a crime scene that should be required reading for wannabe shadowrunners (LS, p.46).
Nigel seems to be making careful use of his Seattle Sourcebook; news affiliates and various locations appear in the novel exactly as described there. He also writes about Seattle's topography with the familiarity of someone who lived there.
An amusing anecdote on p.53: "something big and tentacled had slobbered its way out of Lake Washington and onto the deck of the Route 520 bridge, the floating one connecting Bellevue and Downtown. After eating a couple of cars, the thing had slobbered its way back into the water. The traffic advisory was recommending that drivers select an alternate route. No drek. Ah, the wonders of the Awakened world."
One of the better depictions of a Matrix run (first-hand, experienced via a hitcher jack) can be found beginning on page 60.
p.77: today's Westlake Center has by 2052 evolved into Westlake Tower, a 60-story building on the monorail line in the heart of downtown Seattle with office space starting at thirty thousand nuyen per month.
In the category of background technology, there's a throwaway reference to autocabs on p.94. Like the "Johnny Cabs" in Total Recall, apparently, only much less cheezy.
"After flagging down one of the new autocabs, we were heading back toward Bellevue. Jocasta had jammed a credstick -- not a personalized one -- into the foul machine's maw, and pointed out our destination on a touchscreen. Then she'd settled back into the seat and withdrawn from further intercourse with anything, flesh or otherwise."
So for the guy who was asking whether cab companies might be relying on autonav and gridguide systems to the exclusion of drivers, there's your answer.
Patrick Bambra plays a minor role in the Universal Brotherhood adventure scenario, Missing Blood (MB, p.46). The Universal Brotherhood source material was written by Nigel Findley in 1990, but the adventure was written by Chris Kybasik (author of the next shadowrun novel, Changeling, though his name changes from "Kybasik" to "Kubasik"). The events of Missing Blood would be more or less concurrent with those of 2XS, so it's not beyond the limits of possibility that he could be a participant in both plot lines.
Other elements from Missing Blood appear in 2XS -- the nightclub Superdad's and the UB chapterhouse in Redmond are featured exactly as described in the adventure.
p.109: "The Universal Brotherhood was one of the few rays of light that shone into this part of the sprawl. They gave food to the hungry, shelter to the homeless, and medical aid to the sick or damaged. Sounded pretty good to me. Oh sure, I'd heard rumors that they'd managed to cut themselves a sweet deal when it came to dodging taxes, but what organized religion hadn't?" --In the category of nifty little ironies, tax evasion was the official reason given when the UCAS government eventually shut down the UB.
One of the minor street gangs in Puyallup is the Night Prowlers, mostly ork and troll, leopard-pattern colors.
p.150: Sympathetic-Parasympathetic Integrated Suprarenal Excitation System (SPISES) is designed to provide a non-invasive alternative means of reflex enhancement. Through the use of a datajack or chipjack, SPISES stimulates the body's natural energizers in a method related to the effects of better-than-life simsense. Over the long term, however, the system has the same debilitating effects of BTL abuse.
On page 154, there's a description of the pseudoscience behind wired reflexes that might prove interesting. I'm tempted to cry bulldrek from the highest available hill, but I really don't know enough biology to do so with complete confidence. You be the judge:
"With standard boosted reflexes, you've got to drop tiny little devices called 'initiators' right into the cortex of the adrenal glands -- the suprarenals -- and other glands. When you want to kick into overdrive, a neuro-electrical interface picks up the appropriate neural activity -- the 'go-code,' as it were -- and triggers control chips implanted in the brain, which then activate the initiators. Your suprarenals pour out adrenaline, and you get jazzed ... Installing standard 'wired' or boosted reflexes is an enormously invasive procedure ... Interface, control chips, and initiators, plus all the support technology, 'glue chips', and wiring to get them to hang together. It's even more invasive than skillwires or even muscle replacement -- and that's saying a lot."
p.181: all public phones in the Seattle area have a 9 as the third digit of their LTG.
As far as I can tell, this novel is the first mention of Yamatetsu. There's a quick profile of the megacorp on pages 187-188. Findley will write the Corporate Shadowfiles sourcebook a year after 2XS, expanding upon it. The novel does establish that Yamatetsu is a monster megacorp, but one with a very low profile. As Dirk puts it, "Yamatetsu appeared to be almost twice as large as Mitsuhama. And I'd never even heard of it before a couple of days ago. That was terrifying."
p.235: Dirk's personal telecom LTG number is 1206 (87-6603). This jibes with the Seattle Sourcebook -- all the LTG numbers listed for Auburn start with the prefix 1206.
p.252: Jocasta is reading The Neo-Anarchist's Guide To North America. Dirk calls it "pleasant light reading."
p.253: Manga fans will be pleased to know that the art has survived through 2052 more or less unchanged.
Nice comparison between varsity and bush-league shadowrunners on page 273.
The Wasp spirit hive under the Yamatetsu ISP complex is similar to the Fly nest located beneath the Universal Brotherhood chapterhouse in Redmond (Missing Blood), albeit on a larger scale. The Wasp hive is guarded by powerful astral barriers and multiple true-form Wasp spirits, including a Queen.
During their penetration of the Wasp hive, the Wrecking Crew and Lone Star troops face several insect spirits. The combat demonstrates that, while spirits may be resistant to weapons like conventional firearms (Immunity to Normal Weapons), big guns can still get the job done.
p.309: the insect shaman, Dr. Skyhill, refers to his totem as "Ichneuman Wasp." An ichneumon is a wasp-like insect. I'm curious why he makes the distinction. You don't see "Poodle shamans" or "Doberman shamans" -- the totem is simply Dog. Seems to me that by the same token, ichneumon should just be Wasp.
This Wasp hive is unusual in that it is located underground. Bug City (p.142) states that "Wasp spirits prefer to build their hives in the upper stories of buildings and other high places open to the air." Magic in the Shadows (p.129) goes one further and states that "Wasp hives must be built in high places, open to the air." Of course, both of these products follow 2XS by several years.
Nightsky contributes the following information:
I've come across some information that might clear this up. Ichneumons are from the insect family Ichneumonidae. These wasps are harmless to people. There are over 3300 speices and they are all parasites on other insects and many do bury into the ground. These wasps also range in size from microscopic to several inches in length. This would explain why the hive in the book was underground. Either this particular kind of ichneumon is the burrowing kind, or it took over another insect's hive. This could be the reason for the distinction in the book.
Aftermath: The events of 2XS shake up Yamatetsu a bit, according to its profile in Corporate Shadowfiles, p.151-152. Jacques Barnard is promoted from Yamatetsu's Seattle subdivision to head the North America division. Cleaning out the hive seems to affect him badly. ISP is gutted and reorganized. Crashcart, though still a Yamatetsu company, ceases its aggressive campaign against DocWagon and becomes a third-rate player. Comments by Quincy and Argent make a lot more sense knowing story behind them.
By 2061, Jacques Barnard is promoted to Chief Operations Officer of Yamatetsu Corporation (Corporate Download, p.115).
Dirk Montgomery is a "Prime Runner" card in Shadowrun: The Trading Card Game.
Dirk returns as the main character in House of the Sun, Nigel Findley's last Shadowrun project before his death in 1995.
Argent also appears in Shadowplay and Lone Wolf, and is featured in Mel Odom's Run Hard, Die Fast.
Finally, I have two words about the cover picture: All Wrong. The cover allegedly depicts the Wasp Queen blasting Dirk's arm off with a Power Bolt (or some waspy equivalent), but the Queen pictured on the book cover bears little if any resemblance to the one described in the text. And it's Dirk's LEFT arm that got fried, not his right.
|
