Blanking the Slate

[aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato)]

Flora sat down and politely waited for whomever she was supposed to wait. "Do we have anything to drink?" she asked. "Wouldn't normally ask but I'm parched."

--------------------------

After Soren did nothing of particular interest for an indeterminate amount of time, Emilena drifted off to sleep.

(EDIT: crappy post I know, but Im super swamped right now and didn't want to be the stopgap)

[bushwacked]

The door to the room swung open and Metheun strode through, a satisfied smile plastered on his face. "Amazing! The toothpaste worked!" he announced, the click of his footsteps against the wooden floor echoing in the spacious room. He walked the length of the table before stopping in front of the chair adjacent to Flora. "You aren't just a pretty face, little miss."

The guard who'd been standing watch over her cleared his throat. "She says she's thirsty, sir."

Metheun paused, his hands resting on the back of the chair. "Thirsty? Well, of course! I suppose watching your friends die and almost getting your head blown off would have that effect on anyone." He considered. "Tell Felix to bring us a bottle of red. Something fruity. I'll trust his judgement."

When the guard hesitated, Metheun rolled his eyes. "You can leave us. Look at her, she won't try anything." Winking at Flora, he pulled the chair out and sat down in it with a sigh as the guard left. "Bloody hell. You know, whenever I talk to these guys I can't help but think, lighten up! Would it kill you to smile?! Ah, well, they're good at their job at least." He clasped his hands together on the table. "You don't need to look worried. Here, would some music calm you down?" Metheun tapped a small panel set into the wooden table, and from somewhere above soft classical music started to play. "We're just here to have a chat. A little... Q and A. Ah, that was quick!"

The guard had returned with the butler in tow, who was carrying a bottle of red wine with one hand, and two glasses in the other. Metheun kept his eyes on Flora as the butler set the glasses down, removed the cork from the bottle and poured for them. "Thank you again, Felix."

Felix inclined his head and retreated without speaking. Once the door closed behind him, Metheun raised his glass to Flora. "Well then! Cheers." He took a sip and nodded appreciatively. "Mmn. Subtle. Felix never lets me down." Once they'd both finished their glasses, Metheun poured again. "Good shit." He took another sip, appearing to consider something before setting the glass back on the table. "Right. We were supposed to wait for someone else before starting our heart to heart, but the sooner we start, the sooner we finish."

The guard turned and walked behind Flora, out of her line of sight. Metheun tapped his fingernail against the rim of his wine glass. "Let's start with the obvious. You're working with the Purifiers, aren't you?"

[aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato)]

"Yeah, I guess you could say that," Flora burst out, "though it's more right to say that my idiot caretakers worked for them and dragged me along for the ride!" Flora downed her wine in one gulp and started coughing uncontrollably. "So my dad Nigel," she spluttered incredulously, "he's a theater manager, he's worried about all this -hic- political shit going down in the news, and he doesn't trust the cops, right, so he pays this washout drug-addict ex-actress to keep me locked in her apartment!"

She looked around for an option to refill her glass, completely sick of being sober. "So for the last week she and her two batshit dyke girlfriends have been molesting me every night--hands up my shirt, tongue in my mouth, everything!-- and then they get this letter cause the Purifiers apparently had dirt on them or something? So they bundle me in a car and drive out to some alleyway, and there's these burly motherfuckers led by this ugly Doberman--"

As the wine overtook her, Flora completely forgot her original plan to store some good stuff for future bargaining, and instead took the opportunity to rattle off her huge list of complaints about the harrowing, dangerous, and unwilling adventures she'd been put through.

"--and so they're like 'Let's go to the strip club and find that dude so we can interrogate him,' and everyone's fine with this for some reason, and they make me wait outside the club as a lookout or something but I can't concentrate because my rapist grabby-handed caretaker is hovering around me like a helicopter trying to convince me to go into the club with her and pose as lesbian lovers, and I mean, the fuck right? I'm just trying to survive this shit," she hiccuped angrily, "and I wasn't even supposed to leave the apartment, dad was super clear about that and he's gonna flip when he finds out how incompetent Rose was. I mean, Jesus, when you're being paid to keep someone's daughter safe, bare minimum of the job description would be to not drag her into fucking firefights, I mean come on, am I crazy or is that fucking common sense?"

[Serris]

Anne she pressed the button to give her another dose of painkiller. She looked around the bland institutional setting of the ICU. The beeping of the the various monitors she was hooked up to blended into so much white noise that threatened to make her headache worse.

She snorted, wincing as the action sent a spike of pain through her shoulder. The mare looked around for something to occupy herself. She sighed as she realized all she came with was the clothes on her back. Hell, she didn't even have a name to the staff. Granted, she wasn't too keen on the staff knowing her identity.

Sighing, she turned on the TV in the room. Her ears pricked up in interest when a special report called "Rebirth. A New Era For Gene Mods?" On the screen was a Chinese man and Red Fox. Both of them were seated behind a desk.

"Hello. I'm James Xiang," the man said.

"And I'm Linda Burke." The Red Fox adjusted her glasses. "Tonight's special report is on the effects that current events have had on the augmentations industry. The past two years have been a very rough time for the cybernetic industry. The Lanthae Incident where hundreds of thousands of Augments were killed in a terrorist pulse-bomb attack in Lanthae and the subsequent rioting had dampened the enthusiasm for cybernetics. Albeit, only temporarily."

The screen then showed several clips of the reports that described the deaths from the Brennan augmentations. "However, the wave of deadly cybernetics failures that have plagued Brennan Synthetics's Aquila line of augments may spell the collapse of the cybernetics industries."

The TV then showed James standing in front of a large line graph that was projected on the wall behind him. There were two lines -- one red and the other blue. The graph in question depicted sales of augmentations (both genetic and cybernetic) in billions of credits plotted against time in years.

"As you can see here," James said. "The sale of genetic augmentations has seen a mostly downward trend with the exception of the spike during the time of the Lanthae Incident. The reverse is true for the cybernetic augmentations."

A gold circle was then drawn around the end of the graph that depicted the most recent timeframe. "However, that trend has started to reverse itself this year. Whether is is a statistical anomaly like the figures in during the Lanthae Incident or not remains to be seen.    

The camera switched back to Linda. "Joining us today is Doctor Satoshi Shimura of Seryet University's genetics department.

Anne tuned out the scientist's explanation about gene mods. Her own gene mod that gave her incredible endurance as well as high tolerance to low oxygen environments was made by Neogene in its only venture into non-medical genetics. The company was still around but the particular gene mod she had was long out of production.

It was then that her painkiller addled brain entertained an idle thought. Was Brennan Synthetics a shell company by a gene mod corporation that was purposely shoddy augments to make its parent look good?

She lay back on her pillow and the drugs soon took effect, sending her to sleep.

[Nick22]

Rose flipped though the news channels, before settling oin a channel. blacks face stared out at her " Hero cop Found dead" said the headline under the picture' a p[air of reporters were debating whether it was gangs, the mob, or some crooked cops that had done the deed. 'Police work is very dangerous, and officer black was involved in many dangerous operations that garnered him a lot of enemies. one, or more of them, killed him. His family is now in witnmess protection, for thier safety' one of them said.

[Serris]

(OOC - Metheun has been turned over to me temporarily by bushwacked.)

Metheun nodded as he swirled his glass of red wine and took a sip. "I see. Now I'm sure you feel a lot safer now that you're away from those two."

It was then he got an idea. He really didn't care too much for the girl but he could use her father to hinder the group after him. "Perhaps your father might be interested to know what the 'babysitters' he hired were doing to his daughter? Perhaps some video footage or other information might convince him to press charges."

The Human placed his glass on an elegant ceramic and glass coaster. "Now then, why don't we start with names?"

[aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato)]

"I hope he takes them to court and sues them for every nickel those assholes are worth!" Flora exclaimed hotly, downing another glass of wine. "None of them had actual jobs, I bet they're loaded. They never gave last names, but the Great Danes were named Marita and Rose, Rose was the former actress, and the third was like a yellow Labrador or something named Marie. Three fucking dogs, can you believe it? Have you ever been forcibly Frenched by a dog? It was absolutely disgusting!"

[Nick22]

Roses phong rang and on the Id It read Nigel Bailey " Oh damn : riose muttered before answering " Hello Nigel. " Where the hell are you' Bailey said, his voice coming across as very serious. Rose knew Bailey well, so she knew that she was in for a huge reaming, calls with this tone of  voice from him almost never ended well for the recipient. ' i'm in the hospital Nigel. 'what for?" I got shot, in the shoulder>" consider yourself lucky, because i have half a mind to put one a little higher Rose. i just got sent a lovely text messagre from flora claiming you did all sorts of things to her and that she ran away to , as she put it ' get away from that pervert' Where is Flora, Rose?' She.. was grabbed by the  people we're trying to catch>" Rose said " So she is now a captive .  Just fucking peachy. remind me exactly why I agreed to pay you , and you gal pals , large  sums of money to protect her?

 I put her in your care because I thought you'd be reliable, discrete and trustworthy. Well congrats, you've failed miserably on all 3 counts, and got shot up as well. Listen, and listen well. You get her back, PRONTO. I dont care how drugged up they have you, I dont care how many pieces of you are missing, you get her back.  Half of Flora is worth 100 times more than every inch of you and your friends. You have 48 hours to get her back, or else. If I don't hear back before then that you have her back safe and sound, not only is the money deal off, but so is any further consideration of you by me.Yyour life, and the lives of those around you, will be then  measured in lengths of hours. Because the people I hire to dispose of incompetents, they dont miss, and they dont leave traces. You fucked up hugely Rose, and I am enormously disappointed in you, I expected much much better from you. Now get out of that hospital, and get her back. You do so, and I may, MAY, Mind you, overlook this colossal snafu when  it comes times to settle accounts. but ONLY If You produce Flora and she is unharmed. Clock is ticking, Bailey, Out"  the phone clicked. and rose exhaled, she hadnt been able to get much in in her defense, and given Bailey's mood, It wouldnt have mattered if she had. Bailey was not one to accept excuses, he demanded results. We are in VERY deep shit' Rose muttered to herself.

[bushwacked]

Metheun grimaced in distaste. "I have, actually. Too much tongue, spit and..." he waved his hand, face creasing with unwelcome recollection. "Flappy bits. And that's why we don't have tequila tuesdays anymore, isn't it James?"

One of the guards on the far side of the room gulped nervously. "Yes, sir."

"Yes." Metheun downed another gulp of wine then plonked his glass down on the table. "Right, so two things, honey. First off, if your father only wants to pay some druggie rapists to look after you, then either he doesn't care about you that much, or he's a horrible, horrible person. I mean, maybe some counselling could help."

He leaned forwards in his chair, resting his elbows on the table and steepling his bony fingers. "Second. I don't give a fuck about who raped you. Now, what I do care about, as I mentioned earlier, are the Purifiers you were with. I want to know their names. I want to know where they call home. I want to know what their plans are."

Huge, strong hands suddenly grabbed Flora by her hair and across her chest, tilting her chair back.

"I'm really, really keen to get on with this so I can get some rest," Metheun was continuing. "Hanging around in some shit-hole club waiting to get kidnapped isn't all the brochure said it would be." He stabbed a finger in the air, indicating whoever had seized Flora. "So, what Eduardo is going to do is hold you in the fireplace until you start talking, alright?"

Whether it was alright with Flora or not, the guard pulled her backwards in her chair until she could feel the heat of the fire sizzling her fur. He started to tip her back.

"Let's start again. What was-"

"Albert! Stop!"

Metheun jerked in his seat, twisting around. Standing in the entrance of the dining hall, doors flung open, was a tiny old man. On either side of him were stood two huge men in dark suits; the old man between them barely came up to their waist. Hands clasped over one another, he looked slowly around the room, then returned his gaze to Metheun. "Albert, what are you doing?"

Metheun shrugged. "Getting answers."

"It looks like you're burning her in my dining room. When I specifically told you she wasn't to be harmed!"

"Dad, I'm getting close! If she just-"

The old man took starting walking further into the room, surprisingly quick for a man of his age. His bodyguards followed doggedly behind him. Approaching Metheun, he stopped before him and fixed the man with a cold glare. "I. Said. Stop."

Metheun stared back. After a few seconds, he shrugged, sitting back and picking up his wine glass with a bemused expression. "Whatever you say."

The old man looked up, and the guard holding Flora let her chair settle back on the floor, away from the fire. His expression softened. "I'm Edward Coxon. It's been a while, hasn't it Flora?"

[aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato)]

Flora stifled an embarrassingly scared whimper as her chair settled comfortably away from the fire that had almost singed her eyelashes off. But any relief from Coxon's rescue disappeared when he casually referred to her by name. "I...uh..." Fuck. They know who I am. There go any plans of keeping my identity secret. "Okay, so you know who I am, but that means...you don't want to kill me...right?" she stammered. "Think of how much money I'm worth! And I'll give you names! The big dude in charge was...uh...Marcus, and his co-captain, somebody said his name, like, once I think...and it was......Adrian? Aidan?...Started with an A, gimme a minute!" She glanced nervously at Metheun and his goon.

[Serris]

Soren awoke from a fitful sleep. The mattress he had been loaned from Emilena did practically nothing to cushion his back from the wood floor. He sat up and stretched his back. The Human peeked through a crack in the wooden walls.

Nothing except for the brilliant white spot of light on the horizon that that indicated the bustling core of Seryet City. Further out, he could vaguely make out shimmering towers of algal oil farms and refineries.

The Human looked around and saw that Emilena was still asleep. Sighing, he checked the smartphone still in his pocket. Mostly dead.

Shit. He thought. I forgot to charge it!.

He didn't have a charger with him and he doubted Emilena had one available. For that matter, it seemed unlikely that this shell of a church still had electrical power after decades of being neglected.

He shot a quick message to Axel.

"You okay"

He groaned as the battery died the moment he sent the text out. He tucked the now useless phone back into his pocket and lay back down on the flimsy mattress.

[bushwacked]

"Mmn." Axel groaned, face twitching as he stirred awake. He'd rolled over onto his side in his sleep, facing the window, and his wound ached from where he'd put his weight on it. The vague suggestions of early morning light were pushing their way through the closed blinds. Can't have been out too long. He gave another groan and rolled onto his back.

Someone was standing on the other side of the bed, looming over him.

Axel blinked. Oh shit. He tried to push himself up, opening his mouth to scream.

The person's arms shot down, one hand clamping over his mouth, stifling any cry for help he might have made. With a sharp snap, a switchblade deftly appeared in the other, the blade darting forward and pressing against his throat.

Feeling the bite of the metal, Axel stared up at the person holding him down and waited for the end. Much of the person's face was obscured in shadow, but he could see it was a man with a beanie hat pulled low and a dark jacket zipped right up. His eyes were dark pits. Couldn't you shoot me instead? Axel thought hysterically. He supposed it would be less painful than a blade through the neck.

"If you scream, I'll cut your head off."

The rat blinked again.

"Are you going to scream?" The man, his voice surprisingly soft, spoke slowly and carefully, as though speaking to someone particularly slow.

After a moment, Axel shook his head. "Nmphh."

The man took his hand away and withdrew the knife, although Axel noted uncomfortably that he didn't put it away.  "What..."

"Come on, don't act dumb. You know who I'm with. What the fuck happened?"

Purifiers. Shit. "Alright, look, it wasn't our fault-"

"What happened?"

Axel pushed himself further away. "It was a... an ambush or something! They knew we were coming!" He gulped. "Look, I don't know what you guys got told but we followed this guy Methson or Metheun or something to this club but when we followed him in they were waiting for us and then the shooting started..." Axel could hear himself babbling, his voice getting higher. "There wasn't anything I could have done!"

The darkness enveloping the man's face shifted as his expression hardened. "Or you lured our people into an alley and killed them. You thought you could get away."

"No! I mean, look at where I am! Does this look like something I'd plan?!"

"Maybe our people fought back," the man muttered.

Axel felt a flash of anger and started to sit up. "Fuck you-" Before he could finish, the Purifier slammed the hilt of his knife against Axel's wound, clapping his other hand back over the rat's mouth to stifle his scream.

"It's okay," the Purifier said over Axel's muffled, agonised squeals. It's okay, because I know you wouldn't be that dumb. And why wouldn't you be that dumb?" When Axel eventually stared up at him with tearful eyes, hands clasped on his thigh, the man continued. "Because you know we're watching you. We're watching all of you. You know that right?" Axel nodded, air whistling through his nose, and the hand came away again. "Good. Who ambushed you?"

Axel gasped for breath, his eyes squeezed shut. "Don't know... don't know..."

"Then you should find out. Soon. Time's running out." The man reached into his pocket. "One more thing."

When Axel opened his eyes, the knife was shooting down. He jerked, too shocked to scream - but with a heavy thud the blade buried itself in the pillow next to his head. Speared to it was a sheet of paper with something written on it.

"Be seeing you." The Purifier slowly turned and made his way over to the door, unlocking it. Casually, he opened it and walked out of sight, the door closing behind him gently.

He body shaking, Axel reached up and pulled the knife from the pillow, freeing the piece of paper. Unfolding it, he blinked at the message written on it: GOOD LUCK! WE'RE COUNTING ON ALL OF YOU! LOVE, R. Axel collapsed back down, whimpering. "Oh fuck."

[StarfallRaptor]

Outside the building where Flora was being kept, a lone figure paced a bit, the heavy exoframe he wore emitting a low, pneumatic hiss with each step.  After a few minutes of pacing, he finally sighed, shaking his head and leaning back against a column.  

"Of course.  Hire me to bodyguard some little starlet princess, and then they don't even let me in the fucking door.  Tch.  Typical."

He muttered to himself, shutting his eyes for a moment.  Just as he began to relax, a soft ping alerted him to an incoming call.  Flicking a cover on his left wrist open, he pressed a few buttons, and a youthful face popped up in the upper-right corner of his display visor.  

"Hey, Kintoki.  How's the new suit working?"  

He chuckled at the female's question a bit, rolling his shoulder as he flicked a glance at a set of small diagnostics.

"Raiko, for the dozenth time, it's working fine.  You know I'd contact you if something was wrong."

He said coolly, closing one eye for a moment.  The girl on the other end of the line nodded a bit, adjusting her glasses as they slipped down her nose.  Collecting herself, she gave Kintoki a small nod, disconnecting with a little salute.  Kintoki returned the gesture, then leaned his head back against the column again.

And now...we wait He thought to himself...

[Serris]

Anne groaned as the light shone in through the windows. Her back ached and she could feel the blood-soaked dressing sticking to her.

She pressed the button to dose herself with another bolus of narcotic painkiller. Her ears twitched as she slowly pushed herself to a sitting position. Almost immediately, she noticed that her horn had been placed on her hospital tray with a note skewered on it. The Shetland Pony reached over and carefully extracted the paper from the horn.

Her eyes widened as she read it over. "Fuck me," she muttered. "That guy's got eyes everywhere!"

Anne lay back, closed her eyes and sighed.

"Ms. Mare," a voice said. "We're here to change your bandages."

The mare snorted and did nothing as they slowly adjusted her bed to a reclining position.

[aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato)]

Emilena rose as soon as her cell phone vibrated, signifying 7am. She wasn't usually one to sleep in that late, but she'd had something of a difficult day.

She needed to get back into her exercise routine, it kept her sane. Making sure to keep silent so as not to wake Soren, who had shown signs of going back to sleep, she completed 25 pushups, 25 situps, and 25 crunches. Panting with exhaustion and drenched with sweat, she crawled to the crawlspace. At exactly 8:30am, she heard the door to the church swing open and shut with a bang.

"Hey, Almaya," she gasped. "Sorry to wake you, but if you want food, a shower, or an outlet, now's your only chance to get that. Follow me."

[Serris]

Soren pushed himself up. He worked out a few kinks in his back from sleeping on the terrible mattress. His stomach growled.

"It's fine," he muttered. "I was barely asleep anyways thanks to that shitty mattress."

He sniffed the air and wrinkled his nose at the musky scent of Emilena after her workout and combined with the pungent funk of his own unwashed clothing. I think we could both use a quick shower."

The Human took his phone out of his pocket. "Shit, battery's dead." He sighed. "All right lead the way."

[aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato)]

Emilena bit her lip. Now that he'd mentioned it, Emilena really should have warned him about how truly awful that mattress was. She would know, it was hers whenever she and Lily hid out in this location. Too late now...

"Keep your ear on the voice outside," Emilena muttered as she scaled the exit. They could both hear a pastor addressing a crowd. "He always addresses the crowd for ten or fifteen minutes before church starts, then there's a one-minute moment of silence. When he stops talking, we have sixty seconds to make ourselves scarce before they start filing in."

The inner church was lit up, a candle was glowing softly besides every pew, their shadows flickering around the room thanks to a central fountain that hadn't been running last night. Every single seat contained an old-fashioned tablet containing scripture. The tablets could draw power wirelessly from the charger seats on each pew, meaning the only outlet in the room was used to light up the overarching statue of J. Robert Oppenheimer looking somberly over the room. "Hope you're not religious, because we're about to score some extremely negative karma in the eyes of Father Atom," Emilena muttered, unplugging Oppenheimer's backlight and offering the outlet to Soren. "There's a large basket with communion crackers under the altar, and I'll setup the 'shower'."

Slinking delicately to the main entrance, Emilena snaked her hand under the massive stained-glass doors and pickpocketed the hand sanitizer dispenser while remaining invisible to the amassed congregation outside. Returning to the fountain, she stripped off her clothes and waded in, scrubbing herself down with sanitizer. With the time limit, there wasn't exactly time for decency. "Don't get too greedy, but you can help yourself to the coins in the fountain too," she added, dropping a handful on her pile of clothes.

[bushwacked]

Coxon smiled kindly at Flora as a guard pulled out a chair for him, helping him to ease down into it. He reached over to pat her hand with his own reassuringly. "Flora, you're worth more to me than any amount of money. It might surprise you but I actually knew you when you were... much younger." He looked at her approvingly. "You've grown into a fine young woman." Good bone structure... no obvious abnormalities. Perhaps it wasn't a complete failure.

Lounging in his chair across the table, Metheun rolled his eyes at one of the bodyguards standing behind the old man.

Coxon frowned at him then returned his attention to Flora. "It goes without saying that I'm extremely relieved you're safe. The people you were with are very dangerous. I want to protect you, but if you can tell me anything more it'd make things much easier. These two names you mentioned, that would be Marcus Hayton and Aaron Geasbrecht, correct?"

"That sounds about right," Metheun spoke up. "Junko would know for sure, but it's a pretty safe bet." He shrugged. "They're fairly dead though."

"I see." Coxon looked carefully at her beneath grey eyebrows. "Is there anything more? Can you remember if they mentioned where they're based? Was there anyone else noteworthy?"

[aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato)]

How the hell does this guy know me? Flora furrowed her brow. Is he a sponsor? Maybe his son went to my high school or something. Well, she wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth; if they didn't plan on killing her, they can have as much info as they wanted. "They said the name Ragson a lot, I think he's their boss and the non-Purifiers are reporting to him. They've got these other people who are being blackmailed into helping them. There's a former police officer named Emilena, she's got some sort of criminal record and she saved my ass like four times. There's these two grumpy guys named Soren and Axel, who don't talk much, and until recently there was this psychopath named Lily."

She shuddered. "Lily was just creepy. She kept talking about killing everyone, and one time she slammed me against the wall and I swear she literally sucked the energy out of me. Marita claimed she had healing powers, but I never saw her do anything but glare at people. But then last night, uh..." she shifted her feet, trying to figure out how to explain it without sounding insane. "She, uh, disappeared when like, her identical twin showed up, knocked her out, and dragged her off? I don't really get what happened, but Axel and I got paid to help her do it." She gulped. "I know that sounds retarded, but nothing about Lily ever seemed to make sense."

[bushwacked]

Coxon frowned. "A woman who could heal?" His eyes flicked across to Metheun, who'd suddenly leaned forwards, elbow on the table, his hand propping up his chin.

"It could be her... she mentioned an ex-cop called Emilena..." Metheun muttered, brow creased. "That can only be Emilena Echo. If she's there, it can't just be a coincidence."

"Flora, you said this Lily woman was kidnapped?" And there was a twin? This could complicate things... but the potential rewards far exceed the risks. And there are potentially two people who could help us locate the subject. Axel... Coxon smiled at the folf. "Thank you for this information, young lady. You've been very helpful."

The old man signaled to one of the guards standing nearby. "Could you please let our friend in please?"

Metheun spluttered as the man ducked out of the room. "Inside?! He'll wreck our floors again with his fucking suit!"

"It's important for her to meet her new protector," Coxon said. "Flora, I'm sure you understand - the ones who dragged you into all this will want you back. They'll want to make sure you don't reveal anything that could threaten them, and they'll likely do whatever it takes to accomplish this."

He spread his hands. "I intend to take every precaution to help you. But staying here wouldn't be safe. It's too well known. If you stay here, they'd likely hear about it before too long. So I've arranged for your transfer to a more secure location, and overseeing it will be someone I've grown to trust over the years. Someone who can guarantee your safety."