Hey, were friends, right? Erich said.
Timmy turned back. Sure.
Weve always watched out for each other, you and me.
Timmy shrugged. Not always, but when we could, sure.
Dont tell him where I am, okay?
Security crackdowns, like plagues, had a natural progression. A peak, and then decline. As terrible as they might be at their height, they did not last forever. Burton knew this, as did all of his lieutenants, and he made his plans accordingly. Burton moved through his safe houses, playing shell games with the security forces. The first night, while Erich and Lydia slept in their respective rooms in the little island ruin and Timmy tried to find someone in the organization to report to, Burton slept in a loft above a warehouse with a woman named Edie. In the morning, he moved to the storage in the back of a medical clinic, locking the door and hijacking an untraceable connection so that he could speak to his people with relative safety. Little Cole had closed down her houses, locked away her reports, buried a months supply of drugs, and taken a bus to Vermont to stay with her mother until things died down. Oestra was still in the city, moving from place to place in much the same fashion that Burton was. Ragman and Cyrano were missing, but it was early enough that Burton wasnt concerned yet. At least they werent in the newsfeeds. Liev and Simonson were.
And there was other evidence, indirect but convincing, of where the little war stood. Even in the first morning after the catastrophe began, security teams were calling on Lievs underlings, sweeping them up for questioning. Some, they held. Others, they released. Burton had no way of knowing which of those who had been set free had cut deals with security and which had been lucky enough to slip through the net. It hardly mattered. That branch of the business had been compromised, and so it would die. The demand for illicit drugs, cheap goods, off-schedule medical procedures, and anonymous sex could be neither arrested nor sated, and so the thing that mattered most for Burtons little empire was safe. Would always be safe. The question of how to feed the citys subterranean hungers was only a tactical one, and Burton could be flexible.
The temptation, of course, was to fight back, and in the following days, some did. Five soldiers from the Loca Griega left a bomb outside a Star Helix substation. It exploded, injuring two of the security contractors and damaging the building, and all five bombers were identified and taken into custody. Tamara Sluydan, who really should have known better, organized street-level resistance, starting a two-day riot that ended with half of her people hospitalized or in custody, eighteen local businesses looted or set afire, and the goodwill of her client base permanently damaged. Burton understood. He wasnt a man without passions. If someone hurt him, of course he wanted to hurt them back. Phrases like even the score or blood for blood came to mind, and each time they did, he made the practice of tearing them apart to himself. Even the score was the metaphor of a game, and this wasnt a a game. Blood for blood made it sound as if through more violence, past wrongs could be balanced, and they couldnt. The hardest lesson Burton had ever learned was to endure the blows, accept the damage, and let someone else strike back. Soon, very soon, the crackdown would shift from its great, overwhelming force to individual struggles. It was in his interests to see that those struggles were with the Loca Griega and Tamara Sluydan, not with him. As soon as the enemy was clearly defined in the collective mind of Star Helix and Burtons name and organization were not central to their plans, the storm would move on and he could begin to reopen the folded fronds of his business.
In the meantime, he moved from one place to the next. He told people he would go one place, and then arrived at another. He considered all his habits with the uncompromising eye of a predator, and killed the ones with flaws. Anything that connected him with the patterns of the past was a vulnerability, and wherever possible, he chose to be invulnerable. It wasnt the first time hed been through this. He was good at it.
And so when it took Timmy the better part of a week to find him, Burtons annoyance was balanced against a certain self-centered pride.
The office was raw brick and mortar, newsfeeds playing on five different screens. A sliding wooden door stood half open, the futon where Burton had slept the the night before half visible through it. Oestra, whose safe house it was, sat by the window looking down at the street. The automatic shotgun across his legs seemed unremarkable. Timmy had been searched by three guards on the street, and hed been clean. Even if hed swallowed a tracking device they would have found it, and the big slab of human meat would have been bleeding out in a gutter instead of smiling amiably and gawking at the exposed ductwork.
Timmy, right? Burton said, pretending uncertainty. Let the boy feel lucky hed remembered that much.
Yeah, chief. Thats me. The openness and amiability was annoying. Burton glanced toward Oestra, but the lieutenant was squinting at the brightness of the day. Burton scratched his leg idly, his fingernails hissing against the fabric of his pants.
You got something for me?
Timmys face fell a little. Just news. I mean, I didnt have any stuff. Nothing to deliver or anything.
All right, then, Burton said. Whats the news, Tiny?
Timmy grinned at the irony of the nickname, then sobered and began his report. Burton leaned forward, drinking in all the words as fast as they spilled from Timmys lips. When Oestra risked a glance back, it was like watching a bird singing away while a cat stood in the too-still pose of a carnivore waiting to pounce. The details came out in no particular order: Erich was in a safe place, Timmy had been taking food to him, the fake profile deal had been interrupted by the security crackdown, Erichs original deck was gone but he had a replacement, the police probably had his DNA profile now. Oestra sighed to himself and looked back out the window. On the street, a half dozen young men who hadnt just condemned their friends to death slouched down the street together.
Hes sure about that? Burton asked.
Nah, Timmy said. We didnt hang around and watch them find the deck or anything. I figured itd be better, you know. To get out.
I see.
Erich wanted to go get it. Grab the hardware, I mean.
That would have been a mistake, Burton said. If security had the deck and the man, that well, thatd be bad.
Was what I thought too, Timmy said.
Burton sat back, the leather of the chair creaking. Back past the bedroom, Sylvia started running the shower. Sylvia or Sarah. Something like that. One of Oestras, provided with the bed. Wheres the safe house?
Im not supposed to say, Timmy said.
Not even to me?
The boy had the good sense to look uncomfortable. Yeah, not to anyone. You know how it is.
Is there anyone there with him?
Yeah, I got a friend there.
A guard?
Not really, no. Just a friend.
Burton nodded, thinking hard. But hes secure?
Hes on the water. Anyone starts coming in, hes got a boat and about a dozen decent places to hide. I mean, nowheres a hundred percent.
And youre protecting him.
Thats the job, Timmy said, with a shrug and a smile. Burton couldnt quite put his finger on what it was about the boy that was so interesting. Over the years, hed had hundreds just like him who came through, worked, disappeared, died, were fed to security or found God and a ticket out of town. Burton had a nose for talent, though, and there was something about this one that kept bringing him back to the sense of the boys potential. Perhaps it was the casual logic hed used when hed killed Austin. Maybe it was the deadness in his eyes.