Desdemona had Tinker Tom under lock and key, in a manner of speaking. After he snapped and murdered a fellow Railroad agent, she had the quartermaster's hands and legs bound, tossing him into an isolated corner of the HQ's catacombs. Glory, a synth Railroad agent, kept watch on Tom, trying with all her might to ignore his incessant ramblings. The quartermaster wasn't always quite right in the head, but over the last few months his mental stability declined from questionably eccentric to outright deranged.
There were warning signs that preceded Tom's attack on one of his comrades. For instance, he'd been more frequently glued to his computer monitor than usual, and his dependence on chems took a turn for the worse. Tom hardly slept as it was, but his recent state of mind was uncharacteristically sleep deprived. He repeatedly dosed himself with heavy chems just to feel a moment of calm, but all too often the sensation quickly wore off. As soon as it did, Tom's mind would leap right back into its current state; high strung and babbling like a maniac.
Deacon took it upon himself to visit Tom, grasping at some small hope that the quartermaster would help him make sense of things. Deacon couldn't imagine Tom killing another agent – not in his lifetime. Tinker Tom was not a killer. He was a good guy. Sure, Tom was weird as hell, but he was intelligent, funny, and most importantly – he was dependable. You could trust him. Deacon insisted on having a talk with Tom, much to Desdemona's defeatist warnings.
"You won't get anything out of him, Deacon," she'd said. "We've tried."
Deacon ignored Desdemona, following a familiar path back through the catacombs, spying Glory as she paced from right to left, then left to right, cradling a hefty mini-gun in her arms. The synth agent gave a smile when she saw Deacon emerge from around the bend.
"Something tells me you're not here to see me," she said in that relaxed, smoky voice of hers.
Deacon nodded. "Give me ten minutes with him, Glory. That's all I ask."
"Hell, have twenty," she sighed. "He's not goin' anywhere..."
Tom was huddled in the corner, wide-eyed and shaking like a man suffering through the worst phase of chem withdrawal. His lips were dry and cracked, and his gaze stared upward at the ceiling, not quite focused on any one thing at all. Tom's chest heaved rapidly, like a dying cat panting through its last hour of breath. And all the while he rambled words, muttering them in a quiet voice, just audible enough for Deacon to catch every other syllable. The closer Deacon moved toward Tom, the clearer the words became. But in spite of their clarity, their meaning was lost on the Railroad agent.
"Angel of death!" hissed Tom, still staring hard at the dusty ceiling above. "The angel of death is here! She knows it. She's telling me all about it!"
"Who, Tom?" asked Deacon, his eyes locked onto his friend. Deacon's composure fought back an overwhelming ache of sadness. "Who's telling you all about it?"
"She knew about my farm – about my life." Tom jerked. "Oh god! Where is it?!"
Looking around, Deacon asked, "Where's what, Tom?"
"She knew she could take it. Where did she put it? The numbers! Under the purple? Under the green?! I lost him!" Tom slid downward, his back now flat against the floor. He coughed.
"He's not gonna explain himself," Glory called over her shoulder.
Deacon shook his head, refusing to give up. "What's the purple? What's the green?" he asked Tom.
Tom stared at the ceiling, unblinking. He hadn't blinked once since Deacon arrived, in fact. "Deacon, I'll tell you what she said," he spoke in an eloquently lucid tone.
Hopeful, Deacon knelt down, leaning closer to Tom. "Tell me," he begged.
Tom stiffened and shouted, "Erufi ohm daesohn!" His eyes narrowed and his voice lowered. "Vocu eshtik molkhun..."
Deacon stood and scrunched his brows. "Tom! What the hell does that even mean?"
Glory shook her head. "Nothing! It means nothing. He's been saying it since the attack. It's bullshit gibberish." She sighed. "I told you – this is pointless." Glory shook her head again. "I'm sorry, Deacon."
Tom, still flat on his back with his wrists and ankles bound, squeezed his eyes shut and shook furiously as if he'd worked himself into convulsions. His dry lips widened and screamed, "Erufi ohm daesohn! Erufi ohm daesohn! Erufi ohm daesohn! ERUFI OHM DAESOHN!" He gasped for air, then dejectedly mumbled, "...vocu eshtik molkhun..."
"He's insane," Deacon said to Desdemona, lighting himself his third cigarette. The Railroad agent's hand shook as he eagerly sucked down a lungful of smoke. Dez reached for her own pack in her front pocket and lit up alongside her comrade.
"I'm sorry, there's nothing we can do for Tom." Dez exhaled a breath of smoke. "Now," she continued, "What's the story with the Wonder Twins over there?" Dez ashed her cigarette, nodding into the direction of Cicero and Cat. The two lounged on a dilapidated mattress, keeping to themselves in such a bustling, unfamiliar place.
Deacon took another drag from his cigarette and began to feel ill. He carefully pressed out the glowing red orb at the end of his drag, leaving the cigarette to rest in the ashtray for later use. With a cough and a nod, he explained what he knew of Cicero's abilities. He explained what he had seen. Dez listened intently, convinced by the genuine expression on Deacon's face that he was, in fact, telling a feasible truth for once.
The strange red-headed man was able to get inside the Institute. Furthermore, he was acquainted with Patriot, the name of an inside source by which Dez was all too familiar. Before he went mad, Tinker Tom monitored every code sent from Patriot from within the facility. Patriot was Tom's top priority since he had liberated so many Institute synths, sending the desperate captives into the direction of the Railroad's assistance. Desdemona was relieved to hear that Cicero had seen Patriot not too long ago. She reported to Deacon that it had been some time since Tom received any encrypted messages from the insider. It was as if Patriot's codes had stopped overnight, which coincided with Tom's stability growing shorter and his time spent on the damned computer growing longer. Dez admitted she wasn't aware that Patriot's codes had stopped so suddenly – not until it was too late. Tom hadn't been receiving them for a very long time. Instead, he reported that he'd received other messages, new messages but Dez never had a chance to look at them. Tom ended up wiping everything from his computer's database in the midst of his madness. In the end, the mysterious codes from the unknown source were not a priority. The quartermaster was becoming unhinged. He was disjointed in the mind – no longer an asset to the Railroad. The priority was to get him out of HQ. If only Dez had noticed it all sooner, she reiterated over and over. The Railroad leader felt she could have prevented Tom's attack on a fellow agent.
Nevertheless, plans now unfolded before Deacon, Dez, Cat, and Cicero. They conspired, organizing a rescue team to infiltrate the Institute. With Cicero's ability to teleport, and his familiarity with the layout of the facility, the jester had become a valuable advantage. Cat insisted on joining the mission, much to Cicero's chagrin. But the jester knew this was, essentially, his Wanderer's objective. Getting the synths out of the Institute was Cat's entire reason for leaving the Shivering Isles. Cicero would not stand in her way.
"Cover Cicero at all costs," Deacon sternly advised the team just before heading out. "If he's captured or killed, then none of you – and none of the synths – will be leaving the Institute."
Cicero understood the importance of his role. Regardless, if protecting Cat meant sacrificing his own life, then to the Void with these Railroad agents – and to the Void with every single one of those Institute synths.