I prayed six times over the next hour. For strength. For more trees. For fewer trees. For better shoes. For a redo of that first morning Quaid and Durwood had showed up on my front porch so I could've gotten us out the door just five minutes earlier and missed them altogether. And finally for my children to live happy, full lives in case I died.

The "mayhem"—that was the perfect word—did not start immediately. After his ominous welcome, Josiah left me to rejoin the head group. They continued their debate, whispering heatedly over Piper's laptop. She and Josiah seemed to be the principals. She grimaced and jabbed out commands; he flailed at the mansion like some mad wizard issuing curses.

When a long black sedan approached, the leaders rushed us all behind the azaleas. I hunched low and waited, tensed, crowded by knees and elbows. The sedan's headlights swiveled and swelled as the car turned the bend ... then disappeared.

My fingers released a clump of grass.

I eavesdropped as much as possible without giving myself away. Others near me were peeking over their phones at the leaders too, going silent when they spoke loudly enough to hear. The argument intensified. Josiah made swoopy gestures around one side of the house. Piper Jackson shook her head vehemently. Hatch stepped between the two, mediating, clapping bear-claw hands over their shoulders.

"Stay simple," I caught Piper saying. "This here's plenty bad."

Josiah urged up by sinewy calves. "Insufficient, P. We're talking atrocities. Atrocities deserve atrocities coming back."

The hacker said more but Josiah didn't hear. He hurtled ahead as though unable to stop his own legs, up the drive, around the side of the mansion. Gone into darkness.

The group waited. A bat flitted overhead, but no one jumped. One of the oblong, pike-mounted cameras whirred; we all squirmed and made skinny to avoid its eye. Besides Hatch, I recognized a few other bloggers with impressive followings—a contributor to Daily Kos, a section editor for HuffPost.

As Josiah's absence stretched on, I began hearing murmurs. One kid stepped outside the taped-off wedge to glimpse around the mansion. At one point, I thought I heard the spring of a kickstand and somebody pedaling off.

Fifteen minutes later, Josiah had not returned. It was 11:10.

A cacophony of phone chimes shattered the quiet. The others looked down at their screens, then back up with cryptic expressions. Had I missed a text? Was I off the list already?

My consternation must have shown. A guy next to me, early 20s with great hair, said, "Twitter."

I swiped until the app appeared, then tapped. josiahTheAvenger had tweeted:

THE TIME OF ATONEMENT HAS ARRIVED. EXQUISITELY, THEY SHALL PAY.

Squinting at my screen, I felt a bone-deep chill. A subscript showed 8,420,199 followers for Josiah's feed. I realized that his message was being read in bars, in suburban bedrooms, in Singapore, in Arizona ... and that whatever "ATONEMENT" Josiah had in mind, I was about to participate in.

The rest of the Mice seemed to be having similar thoughts.

"What's the plan, you heard?" someone said.

"I don't think he wants a plan."

"They know what they're doing. No sweat."

"But what if—"

Piper Jackson's voice cut through the hand-wringing. "Shut up, y'all!"

The chatter stopped.

"You nervous, right? We're all nervous. Suck it up and deal."

Piper was no any taller than me, 5'3" tops, but projected towering authority. Her look was fierce—tight cornrows, eyes wary in their sockets. When she wasn't typing on her laptop, she held it overhand like a crowbar.

At last, a dark figure appeared moving away from the mansion. Josiah picked his way down the lawn, prancing between feet like some half-frog superhero villain on speed.

Breathless, he joined us behind the cover of the azaleas.

"In his study. On his computer. Probably denying claims for kicks." He spat the consonants. "P, check it out." He gripped Piper's wrist. "Tell me what filth he's up to."

Piper opened her laptop and tapped a few keystrokes. "Unsecured Wi-Fi. I got the bitstream." Her eyes bore into the screen, steady. "URLs look like money stuff. Bank of America. Vanguard—stocks, money market accounts."

Josiah's whole face squeezed as though the skin could barely contain the energy boiling inside. He took out his phone.

He tweeted, PAYMENT DUE. THE CORPORATE MASTERS OWE US IN SO MANY WAYS. IN ALL WAYS.

Again phones buzzed through the group, a cacophony of digital cicadas.

I read the message with dread. I considered sending Durwood an update—since he could no longer hear without the earring mic—but decided the moment was too tense for texting.

Josiah turned to Piper. "Miss Jackson, would you please relieve this Viagra-pushing douchebag of his spoils?"

Piper didn't argue with this.

As she got to work translating Josiah's directive into action, it occurred to me where I knew the name Blackstone. Blackstone Health Management. Of course! I remembered from the forms—my temp agency used them for health benefits.

But Blackstone Health Management wasn't a member of the Despicable Dozen. Could they be owned by one of the Dozen?

Piper Jackson offered a flat, blow-by-blow account as she typed. "401K, gone ... long-term bond fund, gone ... Emerging Markets Challenger fund, see ya ..."

Josiah's mouth stretched in a bright-sick grin. He glared at the mansion.

In another minute, Piper clapped shut her laptop. "That's it. We good."

As she started for the curb, a collective breath eased from the Mice. I checked the time. 11:25. Perfect. All I needed to do was separate from the group long enough to get Durwood a text. He would swoop in and nab Josiah while I slipped away in the Prius. With luck, I would be home and kissing Karen and Zach's warm foreheads before midnight.

"No," Josiah said. "We're not good. We are nowhere remotely close to good."

He stared ahead at the mansion. Every few seconds, his left elbow spasmed as though some live current ran loose inside.

Piper, seeming to speak for all, said, "What're you thinking, a break-in? You know he's going to have crazy security."

Josiah said nothing.

She nodded at her laptop. "We nailed him. Let's roll back to the joint, I'll hack the website. Be serving up 404s for two days."

"Same song we've been playing for eight months," Josiah said.

"Because it's a good song. Cost companies a mess of coin to fix."

"Not enough." Josiah turned away from the mansion. "Not for him."

Acidly he continued, "Tonight we raise the stakes. Tonight we graduate from netroots pranks. These corporations don't change unless they have an in-cent-ive"—he growled the word—"to change. You have to change their equation, and do you know where you change it? At the top."

He tweeted, YOU CHANGE THE EQUATION AT THE TOP.

As he spoke, the group's jitters hardened to resolve. Josiah's argument, the sheer force of his outrage, was spreading like rain over the lawn. Jaws set. Backpack straps were cinched. Despite my fear, despite not really being one of them, I felt it too. I followed Josiah's words around the showy wealth, the burnished-brass streetlights, the tennis courts, the inground pools with black-shimmer surfaces and lane buoys.

"... how perfectly comfortable here," he hissed, "never mind the sick in India who can't pay his ransom, or working poor in Indiana. You know what they should do with the bodies? They should mulch 'em. Use them to fertilize these chem-perfect lawns, right? Maybe those petunia beds."

Josiah's pink pupils danced back to the mansion. "Our next phase demands pure hearts. The purest. If you're unready, if you don't believe, then go. We bear you no ill will."

The Aspens rustled, but otherwise the neighborhood was silent. Not one sneaker, phone, or kickstand made a peep.

Blood beat in my eardrums. It occurred to me to beg off, retreat to the Prius and text Durwood from there. Maybe he could capture Josiah before this—whatever it was—happened.

Surveying the faces around me, though, I didn't think so. I didn't think Josiah's pledge of "no ill will" truly reflected the group dynamics. They were in. Anything less than perfect solidarity would be unacceptable. I'd never make it off the grounds.

By some tantalizing momentum, my feet were carrying me up the drive.