My liaison at Rainey Personnel took the news peevishly. The contract he had negotiated with First Mutual specifically called for 36-hour cancellation notice, he snipped—reliability and professionalism were what made Rainey the crème de la crème of Eastern New Jersey temp agencies. He was taking me off their list. He hoped I enjoyed slumming it with Kelly and Manpower; next time I needed work, he expected they'd have some half-day collate/staples for me.

Wincing at the dial tone, I phoned the guys next. Quaid answered with an irritating lack of surprise, which caused me to bump up my cash demands by 20%. "Feel like I'm back dealing with the pipe-fitters unions," he grumbled, but did agree to my terms.

I started immediately. The first part of the infiltration plan was to familiarize myself with the Blind Mice. Mainstream news provided the basics: the Mice ranged from tween to mid-twenties, motivated by financial disparity, attacks concentrated against their "Despicable Dozen" multinationals. The nose-eyes-whiskers symbol had become ubiquitous, graffitied across bank billboards, digitally plastered over health-insurance websites. Public reaction had been mild. Corporations pulling down billions of dollars annually did not engender much sympathy, and people tended to view the Mice as high-tech Robin Hoods. (Minus the part about giving to the poor, it seemed to me.)

As I expanded my research to the Dark Web—installing something called Tor and probably flagging my computer with Homeland Security—a gauzy picture emerged of a band of true believers promoting their philosophy through savvy social media, using cloak-and-dagger methods to hide their identities. Only a few names surfaced, and who knew if those were real. Piper Jackson, the über-hacker embittered by the incarceration of her brother. Hatch, no last name given, Libertarian blogger at detonatetheworldorder.org.

The most renowned was Josiah, the supposed leader. Some said he was autistic. Others albino. The prevailing rumor had it he'd studied a year at Brown before becoming disillusioned and crossing Asia on foot, eventually joining a hacktivist faction of Anonymous.

Nearly every account mentioned his temper. "He chawed this businessman's iPhone," said one commenter. "Literally, teethmarks in gorilla glass."

I happened to be eating lunch as I read this, tunafish sandwich. The bite turned slimy in my mouth, and I experienced that unique brand of queasiness that accompanies giant leaps that aren't turning out well. Think "apple flame" highlights in the moment the stylist pinches off those tinfoil wrappings—multiplied by a thousand.

Josiah, under the handle josiahTheAvenger, proselytized on greed and revolution. Ten months ago, he had held an open invitation at the Brooklyn café Lewd Brew and an 800-strong mob had jammed the entrance. By the end of the night, all had been inked with the nose-eyes-whiskers symbol and the Mice had themselves a motto: Nibble, nibble. Until the whole sick scam rots through.

Today, of course, with the FBI issuing statements on the Mice's possible whereabouts, there were no open calls. Realistically how was Molly McGill, mother of two and a decade past my mid-twenties, supposed to join up?

After a long afternoon of research, the screen door wheezed open and I heard the familiar sound of dragged footfalls.

"Zach," I called, shutting my laptop. "Could you join me in the kitchen?"

He slinked to the threshold.

"Tell me more about these Blind Mice."

"Nobody cared about the shirt! None of my teachers said a word, okay? It's so not an issue."

I flashed a surrendering smile. "If this group is important to you, if their message speaks to you, then I want to educate myself." I pretended to casually check the backsplash for grime. "How do they find new members? Is there an application process?"

"Nobody applies, Mom. They come to you. Mostly it's big-time progressive bloggers. If a regular person does something amazing? They could get in. It's rare."

Zach gave two examples: the kid who posted YouTube videos of himself dropping water balloons on Goldman Sachs traders leaving their offices, and a girl who, after waging a semester-long crusade against her university's file-sharing policy, received a couriered piece of cheese.

A blog, then.

I took a couple days getting the lay of the blogosphere, batting around ideas with Quaid and Durwood. Having already created a website for McGill Investigators, I was the expert of the three. I chose the domain mollyforchange.org. We couldn't register it under my real name—a simple background check would give the Mice my true age and milquetoast public record—so used "Molly Wixom" instead. (Quaid: "Best fishing hole back home, Wood?" Durwood: "Elk Fork for walleye. Trout better over Wixom Lake." Quaid: "Wixom it is.")

Together with Durwood, whose grease-lined fingers were unexpectedly deft on a keyboard, I got a staging site up in fifteen minutes. I typed my first post on the spot, slamming hedge funds who manipulate distressed municipal debt.

Quaid stood behind my kitchen stool. "Right up their alley. Well done, McGill."

"Thanks." I moved my cursor over the Publish button. "Now pay me and I'll push it live."

He reared back as if I had suggested he give up alcohol. "American Dynamics is good for the money. Come on—just go, let's bait the trap."

He flitted his fingers at the screen. I crossed my arms across the "boob sweater" he had complimented ten minutes earlier. The terms of my participation had been made quite clear: $1200 upfront, the amount I was behind on mortgage payments; and $2000 each week thereafter. I was still waiting for the $1200. Monday, Quaid had told me he'd left his checkbook home. Yesterday he had said his bank, wary of the recent run-up in fraud, was still dragging its feet releasing the funds.

"Twelve hundred," I said. "Cash, check, or Paypal."

Quaid patted the pockets of his sportcoat until it became apparent he had nothing. "Wood—what's your, ah ... cash flow situation?"

Durwood pulled a money-clip from his bluejeans. Peeled off twelve crisp bills.

That settled, I got cracking.

I pushed myself to write at least two stories per day, every day, no matter what. This forced me beyond easy topics and into territory I had no credentials whatsoever to write about. Harsh interrogation techniques. Medicare reform. I opined right away, tap-tap-tap, on a binge to make my blog gain weight.

Quaid called in favors across his vast network of opinion-makers, and soon I was being linked and boosted and retweeted all over the web. My page-rank skyrocketed. Quickly I gained readers.

Which was amazing. I loved the affirmation of that first comment, how people got into fights over what I said, the idea that this thing I created every morning in my kitchen—magically, out of coffee and my own snap reactions to current events—could bring about intercoastal arguments. I loved it when Jake from Baton Rouge said my post on usurious college loans JACKED HIS WORLD!!! Of course it was a double-edged sword: I loved it less when Bone Daddy from Mendecino, CA said I should loosen up about sex tourism to Thailand—don't knock it till you've tried it, wink emoticon.

I grew my online persona elsewhere, commenting widely on other sites, finding kindred spirits in the mass of overheated rhetoric. The fact that I was interacting with screen-names instead of real people made connections strangely easy, like during confession where the priest's anonymity, his lack of body language or eyes judging, always reassured me.

Two weeks in, Quaid grimaced at my Recent Comments. "While I commend you on securing the devotion of Stay-At-Home Dad from Phoenix Who Wants Single-Payer Healthcare NOW!, you should know American Dynamics is breathing down our necks. The Mice crashed another server, set back their steel and lumber production six weeks. We gotta goose this blog."

I looked wistfully at my homepage, that plum and gold color-scheme I'd agonized over. "Some of my positions could really appeal to the Mice. Like on Dodd-Frank? Nobody's talking about how the state insurance reforms have gotten watered—"

"Molly," Quaid said. "Have you ever taken a look at detonatetheworldorder.org? The guy promotes ripping wallets out of the pants of anybody who's wearing a suit."

"True, but he posts some thoughtful pieces. Like I was saying, the original intent of Dodd-Frank—"

"Moll." Now it was Durwood. "These kids're hooligans. Only thing they appreciate is devilry."

Quaid scratched under his collar. "Now that's unfair. While I doubt they're interested in Lincoln-Douglas debate with Technocrat McGill here, they clearly possess morality. It may be tortured and self-absorbed, but morality it is. They have six million signatures on that manifesto, right? It's not ten kids following Charles Manson."

Durwood grunted. Sue-Ann held a ramrod sit at his side. "Six million on the internet."

"Six million anywhere is a lot."

"Not necessarily. Indonesian fella rig up some bot, get you there."

As the two argued, I found myself on Quaid's side—and not just because of the way his blond hair re-tousled after every rhetorical head flick. Now that I had dug deeper on the Mice's issues, I had to admit: I sympathized. The odds were stacked against working people. The stories you could find—people kicked off insurance on their deathbed, pensions earned over a lifetime vanishing because of some CEO's derivatives gamble—broke your heart.

Weren't we supposed to live in the greatest country on Earth?

I said, "Do you think American Dynamics would consider mediation? If they agreed to rework, say, their fracking practices, I wonder if the Mice might take them off the target list."

The guys fell silent. I felt instantly stupid.

"I know that sounds naive, but maybe things have swung too far. Since I've been temping, I've seen it up close—these bosses who breeze into your cubicle, dump paperwork on your desk without even looking at you. Like you're subhuman."

My words withered. Sue-Ann slogged over and slumped down against my shoe.

I wished I could take this too-personal utterance back. I wished my kiddos were here. Does this ever happen to you—this sudden, inexplicable urge to have your children near? For me, it always came in raw moments when I felt embarrassed or vulnerable. No matter what else you aspire to, if you have been the primary caregiver to a child, there is something deeper than love between you and that human being. The days, the hours and minutes and seconds—they bind you. My house felt sad without them. The walls here didn't have plaques or work awards. The men across the table had ascended to the top of their fields—Quaid the 65th governor of Massachusetts, Durwood a legend in the marine corps—and what had I done? Struck out as a P.I. and fallen flat on my face.

The only antidote for these poisonous comparisons, I knew, was Zach and Karen. The magical quality of their laughter. The shape of their eyes, different from any others in the world.

Quaid saw my tears before they hit my cheeks. "Think about your kids. You pour yourself into them, right? You love 'em and fight 'em and sacrifice for 'em, and now Zach wants to go around wearing a T-shirt from the Blind Mice. Thinks breaking the law is cool. He's a teenager, he's impressionable—it's perfectly normal."

I nodded, crossing my legs. It was almost eerie how consistently Quaid did this, reached straight into my head.

He continued, "You've been amazing. You've done everything we've asked. Now we just have to finish the job. The Mice, their message—it's pernicious. The system is broken, it's all a big scam. You're right, these big companies are wrong. So easy, it's catnip to young people. We have to stop it, McGill. We have to bring them down."

The words ached forth from his mouth. His palm had found my knee.

I took a last look at my plum and gold color-scheme, jaw tight.

"Alright," I said. "I can do it. I can do angry."