Take the Money and Come

Chapter 8: My Buddy Buzz

Chapter 8: My Buddy BuzzByron was waiting at the elevator door for her, half dressed. He looked like he’d been interrupted mid-way through and forgotten to finish.

He pulled her close. At first he just squeezed her tight, then he whispered into her hair:

“Fuck.”

“Oh my god I know.” She sighed, leaning into his arms. “I’m so sick of this spy shit.”

“I’m sick of being worried sick about you.” He told her solemnly. She believed him.

When they were seated at Byron’s kitchen table she spread out the printed sheets. Byron leaned on the polished table top, hands splayed. His face was hard, his jaw clenched.

He stood up straight when he finished reading, and their eyes met over the smooth plains of evidence before them.

“This is bad.”

“Yeah.”

“Worse than the rumors, even.”

“What rumors?” Olivia’s head shot up, shocked to hears Byron talk about the matter. She didn’t know he was all that familiar with Black Earth’s products.

“There have been rumors on the grapevine that the little dirt-sifting drone Black Earth was putting on the market left the treated soil contaminated. “

Olivia’s mouth dropped open.

“How do you know about this?” She demanded.

“I told you, I’m good at finding information. The environmental cause I’ve been working with, one of my contacts mentioned he had heard about it when I asked. He’d also heard it was being kept very hush-hush.”

Olivia’s head swam. She rocked her head back, closing her eyes.

“Well that would explain the encryption, now wouldn’t it?”

“You need to run.”

The declaration was made forcefully and without warning. Olivia stared at him.

“I’m not going to run away.”

“I’m not saying you don’t take them on. We get this data out there, and everyone will know what they’re up to. The whistleblower laws in this country are a mess, though, and we need to get you out of here before we expose them.”

Olivia’s mouth opened twice before she managed to make a sound.

“So I’m supposed to give up my whole life because I took the wrong IT ticket? None of this makes sense. All I did was move the files, I didn’t even look at them until today. If this is some grand conspiracy, why did they think I was interfering before I actually did? Better yet, what kind of big conspiracy gets outed by the IT girl?”

She was shouting by the end. Not at him, but at the whole world around her. She was not giving up her job, she was not leaving Rita and Nelly to fend for themselves, she would never.

“You have to!” Byron shouted back. “You are not safe if you try to release this information here, Olivia. You won’t be safe.”

“Who says I need to release it?” She cried, rocketing to her feet. “We know nothing. We have no idea what any of this really means, we’re looking at it with no context. Maybe if I just bring it to someone’s attention...”

Byron looked furious, and she couldn’t help taking a step away from him. His face immediately softened, not much, but enough to show he wasn’t trying to scare her.

“Olive, people get killed over this stuff.”

He stepped forward, taking her shoulders in each hand.

“They die, Olive.” His throat worked silently for a moment, and she realized he looked suddenly pale. His hands were clammy. She led him to the sofa and sat down next to him, hands coming up to hold his head against her.

He pulled away.

“They die, Olive. A man in the UK who found evidence of vote tampering was killed months later. It only happened three years ago. If they don’t get you out here, you can be sure you’ll end up in prison. If you keep being a problem in prison they’ll get you in there.”

Olivia shook her head, dumbfounded. His eyes were pleading with her, his hands clasping hers desperately.

“I can’t.” she told him, breaking eye contact to stare at her hands. “Rita and Nelly--”

“We can move them too!”

Olivia stumbled over her words. “What do you--”

“We can move them to. Wherever we go, they can come.”

“They can’t--”

“I’ll pay.”

She watched him in stunned silence.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I have enough money to keep us safe for a long time. Me, you, Rita, and Nelly.”

“I can’t take my baby niece on the run! Byron, what are you thinking? I’m not tangling them up in this!”

“Then you have to leave without them. Because you’re in this, Olivia. It’s on you, now, and there’s no way out but this.”

He suddenly seemed exhausted, chest heaving as he rested his face in his hands. “I love you, Olive. I do. You’ve gotta trust me on this.”

She did, didn’t she? Yes, of course she loved Byron. She couldn’t deny, however, that he wasn’t acting one bit like himself. Something bigger, something beyond what they were discussing had him worked up.

“What aren’t you telling me?” she asked.

Byron let the question hang in the air between them for a beat too long before answering.

“I’m just pretty familiar with this subject, and I‘m scared for you.” He told her with a huff, face dropping once more into his hands.

“Why are you familiar with this? What does this have to do with charities?”

“I don’t work on behalf of charities.” he explained, in the most straightforward way she’d ever heard from him. “I work on behalf of causes. I lobby for their priorities with the right people.”

What’s the difference between charity and a cause? She wanted to scream and shake him. “Why are you always so goddamn vague about everything you do? I’ve never met a coworker or one single relative! What on Earth am I supposed to think about that?”

Byron growled aloud.

“Are my communication issues really what you want to talk about right now?”

Olivia threw her hands in the air.

“So what do you do for these causes, then?”

“I advocate on their behalf by helping them get their cause in front of the right people.”

“Who are the right people? Politicians, the media, what?”

“Technically, it’s just as many people as possible, I guess.”

“So you want to help my cause get out there, do you?”

“Of course, don’t you?”

“I don’t know!” She exclaimed. “I know these people. I’ve worked with them, they’re not evil! They wouldn’t make people sick on purpose.”

“No, I know these people, Olivia. I know them, and I know what they’re capable of. I know how dangerous they are when you mess with their secrets.” His voice was grave, his brow heavy. “This isn’t the lunch lady or your manager. Stuff like this gets covered up by much bigger people.”

“So I’m just supposed to be OK with going on the lamb like a criminal? How much is that trust fund of yours? Christ! I can’t just abandon my life because some asshole doesn’t understand data storage.”

Byron’s mouth was set in a firm line, his eyes hard where they met her gaze.

At some point they’d both shot to their feet. They faced off like duellers in the wild west.

“You’re not a criminal. You don’t need to be OK with it, you just need to be safe. My trust fund is worth just over 1.2 billion dollars, which I assure you is more than enough to make sure we can get lost without being found.”

Olivia stood firm despite a jagged pounding in her chest.

“Did you say billion?”

Byron nodded.

“With a ‘b’?”

He nodded again.

“Well,” she muttered. “That would do it. That could make us and all of this disappear. It’s not going to, though--” Olivia waved a hand, shutting her mouth with a snap to silence Byron’s oncoming attempt to interrupt her. “It’s not going to, because I’m going to stay here. I’m not going to let these assholes take my life away from me.”

“They’ve already taken it!” Byron half-yelled, hands out in front of him to plead with her.

“Have they? Or was it you?”

His features closed off from her immediately.

“What? I’ve been trying to help you. I love you!”

“Do you? You walked into my life around the same time all this started. Just tapped me on the shoulder and said hello! Then the next thing I know I’m thrown into some kind of nightmare where I’m forced to choose between blowing the whistle or letting people die. I have been followed, I have been frightened and threatened. Then, surprise, your top secret not-a-career happens to become exceptionally relevant. Am I supposed to believe that?”

Olivia had started to walk away from him as she raved, and when she turned back to face him he looked entirely different. His face was exhausted, head forlorn and defeated in the way it slumped on his shoulders. His lip was between his teeth, and his eyes were downcast, looking at his shoes.

“No.” He told her, still looking down like he couldn’t bare to meet her eyes. “You’re not supposed to believe it. You're far to smart for this game plan, aren’t you?”

Olivia felt her stomach drop into her shoes.

“What game plan?” She questioned, determined to keep the hard edge in her voice.

“I haven’t been completely honest with you.”

“I’m getting that.”

“I want to start... I want to start by saying that I do love you. My love for you is genuine, possibly the most genuine thing about me.”

“OK.”

“I did seek you out. I did meet you on purpose, and it was to convince you to obtain files from Black Earth.”

Olivia already felt like she might faint, so she leaned on the sofa for a moment before sliding down into it.

“You’ve been lying.”

“Yes. I promise, I never meant to put you in any danger. You must have scared them when they found the files had been moved, and once they figured out that it was you they must have had you tailed. They must have seen us together. Most of the time nobody recognizes me, but someone at Black Earth must have.” When he met her eyes his face was earnest. “I never would have guessed that they would let you continue after they found out about my presence, so I assumed we were safe. I’ll never forgive myself for that.”

She wanted to believe him, she really did, but their entire relationship was built on the rotten foundation he’d laid. She felt dizzy. She wanted to scream, to cry. She buried her face in her hands instead.

“You’re right to be mad. I kept things from you that I never should have, not after things got serious. I should have told you more about myself. I should have told you more about my job.”

“What? What is your job, really?” She barked.

Byron gulped, licking his lips before folding his hands in his lap.

“I...” He sighed. “My friend Greg and I started World Leaks in 2010. The idea was to have a truly untraceable receptacle for all the dark, dirty secrets of the world. We wanted to light up dark places, change the world. It... grew, of course.”

He was clearly having trouble ignoring her dumbfounded expression.

“I’m... I’m guessing you might know the rest.”

She had heard of Greg Warhammer for years before his disappearance. He was the kind of person everyone talked about differently. Some said his name like he was a king, others said he was a scumbag.

The speculation over his disappearance created a media circus like nobody had ever seen before. Eventually he was found dead off the coast of Scotland, but World Leaks had kept running. there were rumors that Greg Warhammer had a partner who had taken over operations, but she’d never given him much thought. She wasn’t sure she’d ever even heard him named. Her head was swimming again.

“Are you alright?” Byron asked timidly.

“No.” She answered him, eyes dull where they were boring a hole into his wall.

“I know you’re mad at me--”

“Really? You think?”

“--and you have every right to be. You do. but you have to let me keep you safe, Olive, please. You don’t have to ever see me again, just but you’ve got to let me help you.”

“I don’t.” She insisted, tears in her eyes.

“I love you--”

“No! No, you don’t, because you wouldn’t have lied.”

Olivia realized that if she didn’t leave right then, she wouldn’t be able to. She rose from her seat, put on her shoes and walked out the door.”

So she wouldn’t be safe? Well, she’d hide , then. Just not with him.”

She didn’t pause to have words with the doormen today, and they must have seen the tears on her face because they averted their eyes. She felt better the second she burst into the street, cool breeze brushing away any leftover tears and drying her eyes. Olivia was halfway home when she saw them again.

This time both the navy car and the man in the hat were in plain sight, him sitting at a table outside the corner cafe while the car idled in the driveway of a pizza place. She stopped short, feet together on the pavement. She looked back towards Byron’s shining building, then at her familiar pursuers.

Instead of walking in either direction she ducked down the side street between them.

It was a move she regretted almost instantly. Only two blocks down the street ended instead of taking her to Main street like she’d hoped. Worst of all, the end of the street was capped not with another road, but by an alleyway that ran behind several residential properties. Her heart sped up, and even though she knew there was no-where to go, her feet kept moving. If they were following her, they’d know she’d seen them if she stopped and turned. She kept walking, footsteps getting smaller and slower the closer she got to the ally.

She stopped to look at the map on her phone, trying to pause as casually as one would read a text message. She used the opportunity to look over her shoulder with a side-glance, immediately noticing the man in the hat where he stood several blocks behind her.

If she went into the alley, she might be dead. If she didn’t, the man in the hat would know she’d seen him. She bit her lip, deciding that she wasn’t ready to show her cards just yet. She looked at the map again.

If she went into the alley and started sprinting as soon as she rounded the corner, she should be able to run the two blocks to the main road. If the man in the hat caught up with her when she was back there, then she was dead.

“Don’t get killed.” She whispered to herself, barely moving her lips. “Don’t get killed. You can deal with everything else later, just don’t die.”

By the time she rounded the corner of the alleyway her eyes were squeezed tightly shut. As she started to sprint, legs pumping, she wished she’d had them open to gauge the distance the man in the hat would have to cross before he was sufficiently out of site to hurt her. As it turned out, she needn’t have worried.

Olivia was sprinting with her head down when she caught the squeal of tires. The navy sedan pulled into sight, blocking her from getting to the main road. Despite the buzz of the city in the afternoon, the alleyway was suddenly very quiet, but that could have been the blood pumping in her ears.

There was a soft tap on the pavement behind her, and she spun just in time to see the man in the hat stroll into the alleyway. At the same time a car door thumped shut, revealing the driver.

They were both very alike. The man in the hat was older, but other than that they were as nondescript as they come.

“Hello Miss Burnard.” The driver of the car spoke to her, and she recognized his voice from the threatening phone call that had come to her office.

“What do you want?” she asked him, voice meeker than she meant it to be.

“We want the files you have saved, and we want you to never, ever speak about them again.” The man in the hat answered, sports jacket shifting to show her the gun at his belt.

“I don’t have them!” She insisted, though she only realized a split second later that it was true. She’d left the paper copies of the files on Byron’s table.

“I think I’m going to have to ask for your cell phone, then.” The man in the hat said with a creeping smile, hand held out to her.

A flash of anger erupted like a firework in front of Olivia’s face. He wanted her cell phone? She was the tech goddess of Black Earth. Did he really think that taking her cell phone would keep her quiet? How did a man who worked on corporate blackmail not know how a backup disk worked?

It was clear that he didn’t. It was clear he didn’t expect that kind of forethought, that kind of determination from her. She pressed her mouth into a firm frown, keeping her eyes wide to feign fright for his benefit. Her hand reached into her purse, sliding past the cell phone and grasping a tiny metal body. Then she pulled.

The man at the booth hadn’t been kidding when he’d refused to set off the Buzzbud indoors. The second the pin was pulled the little bug started to scream until she felt like she was standing next to a police siren. The lightning-bug body started to flash as it rose into the air, stopping to hover just out of reach.

They were in a residential neighborhood. It took the men threatening her five full seconds to realize what she’d done, and by that time there were already concerned faces popping out of windows and doors all the way down the street. Both men leapt into their car and ran away from her.

A few minutes later the Buzzbud was sitting safely back in her purse, having descended after about three minutes of shrieking alarms. She wasn’t the least bit surprised to see a police car approach her. She explained to the officer that she had been attacked, showing him her little gadget and listening to his praise.