On the rounds I learned a lot about Reis that made my experience with him seem benign. He’d always been bad, but really had let his power blossom in the south when Helen got cut out of the net. The arrival of a Knight-Errant must have filled him with dread until he managed to seduce her into thinking he was the second coming of Devlin Stone. With Lakewood backing him, no one could oppose him.

Except for the Gaia Guerrilla Front. After the incident on the mountain they laid low for a bit. Reis was at his pompous best during the funerals for the constables he’d lost on his raid. He delivered a eulogy that would have made a rock cry and then sign up to join the CDRF to avenge fallen comrades. Even the barflies watching the funerals on the Tri-Vid were thinking Reis was doing a good job until they were pointedly reminded that he’d already done a job on them.

That wishy-washiness really brought the worst out in me. I was good and vocal about what I’d do with him. My plans had progressed well beyond sawing his house in half. In bragging about my plans I showed a little bit more in the way of technical expertise in some areas than I should have, but I was hoping word would get back to Reis and he’d start sleeping with one eye open.

As it turned out, I should have been the one who avoided sleep. My seventh night in the shelter I was awakened by having a rough canvas hood pulled down over my head. I heard Andy wake up, ask what was happening, and get a punch for his trouble. My covers were ripped away, I was rolled over and placed in cuffs, then dragged from the mission.

About the only words I heard my captors speak were a stern warning to someone. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll forget this ever happened.”

I got stuffed into the trunk of a hovercar and it took off. I tried to memorize the route, but we sped up, slowed down, circled left and right, so I had no clue as to how far we’d gone or where. After ten minutes I surrendered and pretty much decided that I wasn’t going to be killed immediately. Given that they’d pulled me from a mission in the slums of Overton, if they wanted me dead, they’d have just blasted coherent light through my skull and left me in the gutter.

Since I wasn’t dead, I had to assume I had information my captors wanted. It was pretty obvious that no one was going to be paying a ransom for me, after all. I could only think of three people who would think I had something valuable between my ears. Lady Lakewood wouldn’t have used a midnight snatch. Reis would, but he’d have made it a public event.

That left the Gaia Guerrilla Front. It made perfect sense for them to tag me. As the saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, and I’d made it pretty well known that I considered Reis just this side of Stefan Amaris in terms of evil. I’d also turned out to be pretty lethal when it came to dealing with their ambush.

That thought caused me to pause. It could be they wanted me alive for some sort of sham trial, then they would execute me. Then again, I was nobody. If they wanted to attract attention to their cause by trying me for crimes against nature and their organization, they’d have been better served to kill me first, publicly, and then send out a media release explaining why I was a target.

The hovercar stopped and I heard the clanking of a panel door being cranked down. The trunk popped open and I was yanked out, my shins scraping over the lip of the trunk. I cried out and caught a cuff for my trouble. It wasn’t a Reis-quality cuff, but hurt enough to make me quiet down.

They sat me in a chair, then pulled the hood off. A bright light blinded me. I shied away, then sucked in as much good air as I could. Good, in this regard, has to be qualified, since we were in a large warehouse that had been built to house ’Mechs, but clearly had been unused for a long time. Roof leaks had left pools of standing water ringed by rusty shores.

Once my eyes adjusted I looked about. Five people stood around me and right off I noticed a bad sign. None of them wore masks which, in a kidnapping situation, is not good. It means your captors don’t care if you can identify them, and the easiest way for them to make sure of that would be to kill you.

I did recognize one immediately. Red stood there, absolutely boiling. She still had two black eyes and her jaw had been wired shut. She folded her hands beneath her breasts and tapped a toe. I was fairly certain she was eyeing me with the intent of planting that toe where it would do a lot of damage, and I did not like that prospect at all.

The other four were unremarkable save that they looked pretty fit and tanned. I guessed they spent a lot of time in the outdoors, which would fit with devotees to the GGF philosophy of loving the earth and hating the metal maggots that chewed into it or cut the trees down. A couple of them watched me very closely, which suggested some military experience, but I didn’t see anything like a convenient tattoo to give me a clue as to where they might have gotten it.

What I did note is that the four of them had on jackets with CDRF insignia. I had no doubt that the story of my snatching would make it through the Overton slums quickly, building more fear and resentment against Reis. No mention of it would appear in any public media, but the honest folks in Overton would have a hard time believing anything bad about Reis anyway.

Another man entered the warehouse from a small office. He kept to the shadows mostly, though light did glint from glasses. I wasn’t sure if he needed them to see, or thought they would serve as a disguise, but it didn’t matter. I couldn’t see enough of his face to recognize him later anyway.

He spoke and his words buzzed through a voice-modifier worn at his throat. “Good evening, Mr. Donelly. So glad you chose to join us.”

“I’m usually a wallflower, but your people were convincing.” I sniffed and tried to wipe my nose on my right shoulder. “So, is this the meeting of the Ichabod Reis Appreciation Society?”

“Please, Mr. Donelly, do not insult my intelligence. I have not insulted yours. Letitia here you recognize, of course. She has volunteered to kill you if necessary. You know who we are.”

I nodded. “I do, and your girl there knows I don’t care about the Mottled Lemur or anything else. I was working for ARU because it was a paycheck. I don’t care about politics or anything, just getting by.”

The leader wore black, so his long-fingered hands showed up as white spiders as he pressed them fingertip to fingertip by his breastbone. “You again misspeak, Mr. Donelly. You do care about some things. You care about seeing Ichabod Reis get his due, correct?”

I frowned. “Okay, maybe, yeah.”

“Splendid. And you care about money, clearly.”

“Who doesn’t?”

“A point that could be argued, but I have neither the time nor the inclination.” The hands spread apart. “My associates and I take action because of our deep commitment to the preservation of the environment. We believe deeply in the sanctity of life, in all its forms.”

The image of the constable rolling through the pine needles flashed into my brain. “The firefight on the mountain was holy hell.”

“Unfortunate, yes, and unintentional. The hovercars were to cover our retreat once your ’Mech had been disabled. It was a debacle to which you contributed, though I bear you no malice for the casualties incurred. You were merely reacting in self-defense, as you did with Letitia. Had the strike team been acting as per orders, they would have been away before your attack would have proven effective.”

I nodded. “These are the survivors of that cell?”

“Oh, very good, Mr. Donelly, you know about cell systems, do you?”

“I’ve read Word of Blake histories. Every one of them tends to go on and on about how elaborate their system was. Couple of the books might as well be texts for revolution.”