Piper Jackson didn't like the look that passed between her brother and the plant foreman, Mr. Sampson. She stood by them at a floor-to-ceiling window in the foreman's office. Twelve stories down, a pair of police cruisers and van with municipal markings had entered the circle drive.

"Marcus." Mr. Sampson backed away from the glass. "Can you get to the stuff?"

"Yeah yeah, on it." Her brother pivoted for the door. "Dumpster?"

"Right." Mr. Sampson ran to his computer, fingers jittery on the keys. "No! No they'll check the dumpster—do cellar. Cellar's better."

Piper eyed the pair of men. Well, one man. One almost a man, her brother. Nineteen.

She was seventeen. "What're you typing? Why are you running to the cellar?"

Mr. Sampson stayed focused on the screen. He pecked the keyboard standing up, tall like Marcus but stocky. Handyman mustache.

Marcus said from the threshold, "You didn't do nothing, Sis, remember."

Then he bolted.

Piper checked the window. Below, the cruisers had parked crookedly end-to-end. A woman burst from the van with a clipboard. She pulled on a hairnet, tucking in strands as she tossed hairnets to each of four officers, all hurrying for the entrance.

"I asked a question," Piper said.

Mr. Sampson finished typing something. Whatever it was, it didn't work. He cursed and banged the computer mouse.

"Stupid thing won't let me in. Can you get this file deleted, I go deal with this?"

"With what."

"This! These...ah, inspectors. Dang it. I gotta go. You try to delete the file?"

Piper said she would. He stabbed out one last command, got honked at again, then rushed off. She tailed him to the hall where footsteps cracked like rifle-shot from either end, Marcus beating it down stairs, Mr. Sampson to the elevator.

She walked to the computer. The file Mr. Sampson had been clicking was named Q3productionCosts_true.

Why exactly would a person stick "_true" at the end of a filename?

Piper's emotions were caught between vindication, dread, and plain old anger. She knew it—the second Marcus had been promoted out of mail to manufacturing trainee, even with the arrests, four lousy months on the job. The leading producer of organic food in North America was going to trust her brother: a kid with no college and a rap sheet?

Mom told her to quit being negative. "They're investing in this city. They want to keep jobs in America. Why not Marcus?"

Then they made him full-time. Two months later, he was deputy production manager. Manager? That was supposed to be legit?

Piper tried opening Q3productionCosts_true and got the same error Mr. Sampson must have.

FILE IN USE BY ANOTHER USER.

She logged in with the admin credentials they'd granted her for the summer. Piper was unpaid. Mr. Sampson had needed somebody to de-crud his departmental computers but had no budget, so Marcus had suggested Piper. She had computer skills to burn but not the school kind, meaning this "internship" was the best she could do resume-wise.

Decent gig. In this new economy, sometimes you had to scrap.

A simple scan showed which workstation was using the file. Piper remote-desktopped in, closed Microsoft Excel. Switched back to Mr. Sampson's machine and deleted the file.

As Q3productionCosts_true vanished from the screen, Piper felt a hiccup of doubt.

Was that smart?

Before she could worry, her phone buzzed. A text from Marcus.

need 10 minutes, keep cops away factory!

He'd sent it to both Piper and Mr. Sampson. Piper ran for the lobby. Secretaries and salesmen were leaning out of their cubicles to see what was up. Piper's elbow nicked a bowl of green apples. Three tumbled to the carpet in her wake.

She hit the stairs and bounded down three per stride, near free fall. The fourth-floor stairwell overlooked the factory floor; Piper could see Marcus struggling with a giant bag labeled Franklin Food Services, carrying it from the grinder with backward-chopping steps.

The other factory worker, Russ Doan, watched with hard eyes.

Piper kept pounding downstairs. Halfway through the last flight, she heard Mr. Sampson's voice in the lobby.

"...heads-up would've been nice," he was saying, "but of course we'll cooperate. Can I take another look at that paperwork?"

The woman handed over her clipboard peevishly. As Piper came to stand behind Mr. Sampson, the policemen raised their chins.

She raised hers.

Mr. Sampson took a while reading. He moved the document closer and farther like it was written in a foreign language. "As you know, ingredients are our top priority at Harvest Earth. We could've outsourced to China like the competition and saved—"

"We're on a schedule," the woman interrupted. "I need to see the factory."

Piper kept hearing squeaks from the direction of the factory. Marcus's sneakers? She didn't remember that sound carrying through walls before.

"Right, yes...the factory. We can certainly show you the factory," Mr. Sampson said, almost shouting in the direction of Marcus and Russ Doan.

How many of those Franklin Food bags needed to be moved?

Piper said, "No. You can't."

The inspector, snatching back her clipboard, looked at Piper. An aquiline nose and deep-sunk eyes all pinched together menacingly. One cop smirked like he'd heard this hustle before.

Piper shuffled close to Mr. Sampson until there was no space separating them. With one hand, keeping that side of her body perfectly still, she unclipped the keyring from his belt. To keep the metal from making noise as it disengaged, she pinned the mechanism hard against the small of his back. He winced but made no sound.

The keys were too big for a fist so she slipped them inside her pants. Over the underwear would've been better, but she misjudged the slot and dropped them down her bare butt instead.

"Keys are up in the office," she said. "I saw them hanging off the coat rack."

Through their touching sides, Piper felt Mr. Sampson stop breathing.

"Shoot, that's right," he managed. "Forgot to bring 'em down. Be just a sec."

The inspector said, "Surely one of your workers can let us in."

Piper started to answer, but Mr. Sampson had it. "They can't, it's a secure space."

"They're physically locked in?"

"Bath- and break-rooms are inside the perimeter. Got fire exits, but do we really wanna blow everybody's eardrums out for an inspection?"

The woman grimaced, but when Mr. Sampson gestured to join him at the elevator banks, she did. The cops followed. Mr. Sampson flashed Piper a relieved look, then snapped his fingers toward the factory.

The second the outsiders rounded the corner, Piper booked for the south entrance. Supply closets, printers, a water cooler—all this whizzed by in her periphery. She ran. Approaching the door she reached back for the key ring, metal raking her crotch.

Marcus was bumping back through the door, carrying two Franklin Food Services bags. Russ Doan watched with his arms crossed, thumbs tapping biceps.

"Dude," Piper said. "What's in there?"

"Cereal," said Marcus's voice from behind the bags.

"Cereal? Like Frosted Flakes?"

"No, like the cheapest crap there is by volume!" Marcus said, staggering to a nearby stairwell. "It's filler, now help me get the rest downstairs."

Piper puzzled a moment. "Where are you even getting that much cerea—"

"Who cares, grab a bag!" Marcus disappeared down the stairs.

Four more bags were stacked in an industrial metal locker, whose door was swinging open. Piper looked to Russ Doan, unsure why he wasn't helping and not psyched to ask.

She hoisted a bag of cereal—sixty pounds at least. She squatted, arms wrapping the base. The top teetered and tottered and then slammed back into her face; she both heard and felt crunching through the burlap. She lurched to the door, feeling her way by elbow, knocking a hard hat off its hook, crushing a sleeve of plastic packaging underfoot.

Marcus met her at the threshold. Without a word, they performed a hand-off—wobbling, awkward—and he took the load the rest of the way down to the cellar.

Piper caught her breath, then got another bag. Together she and her brother moved the next two without trouble. Piper thought her phone buzzed in her jeans but didn't stop to check. Working, her thighs burning, she flashed back to the long days they used to put in helping Mom at the nursery—before the box stores drove it out of business. Toting around mulch, sprinkling handfuls in each other's hair. Sweaty all summer. Before Marcus's arrests.

Swiveling from the locker with the final bag, Piper felt a hand on her sleeve.

"Time to face the music, you two."

Piper turned. Russ Doan's lower lip pushed up, dumb, righteous.

Marcus was back from the cellar. "She's got nothing to do with this." He approached Doan with wide steps. "Take your hands off."

Russ Doan tightened his grip, pinching the skin of Piper's arm.

"Ow!" she said. "Why don't you help? They find this stuff, it's your job too."

Russ Doan said nothing. She knew from Mr. Sampson, who dished gossip to her on slow days, that Doan had been with Harvest Earth eighteen years. The sole survivor from an original union workforce of three hundred. The production line, almost fully automated now, required only a certified machinist (Doan) and operator/manager (Marcus) to run.

That the operator/manager didn't have to be union was a sore spot for Russ Doan. Piper figured he had other beefs with Marcus too.

Marcus took another step, bringing their faces an inch apart.

"I said hands off."

Russ Doan sneered, all nose hair. "Figured it. Too good for honest work."

How he said it made Piper furious, something at the corner of his mouth.

"Shut the hell up," she said, flinching away.

The bag broke. Cereal cascaded to the floor, covering all their shoes and Piper's pants to the cuff in gray-yellow flakes. Dust filled her nose, dry corn-sweet stink. She retreated a step and trampled some, the sound like a million bugs festering in place.

Russ Doan smiled.

From the side, Marcus decked him. Right fist to the ear. Doan fell in a heap, slumping into the cereal—more crackling bugs—then didn't move.

"There's cops here!" Piper said. "Stupid. You got two strikes already."

They dragged Russ Doan behind the thermoforming machine, making a trail of flakes. Marcus found brooms and they pushed the cereal out of sight. He got some down the floor drain and underneath the sink station. Piper found a recessed area behind a spinning whiteboard, on which the plant's production goals versus realized outputs were scribbled.

Finally, they stuffed the ripped bag itself in a trash bin.

"Still a lot of dust," Piper said. "They have a Shop-Vac or something?"

"In the supply closet." Marcus wiped his brow and went for it.

Piper walked behind the thermoformer to check Russ Doan. He was breathing but still out.

She wondered how this would shake out, assuming they got past today's inspection. Would Doan keep quiet? Would Mr. Sampson have to pay him off or something? Maybe she and Marcus deserved hush money too. How much cash was this cereal-filler scam worth to Harvest Earth? What kind of bonuses was Mr. Sampson pulling in? The company had bilked the city for millions in tax breaks to keep the plant here. A city that was already bankrupt. Money that should've gone for roads, school lunches.

Returning to the grinder, Piper heard footsteps. She glanced at the door expecting Marcus.

It was Mr. Sampson.

"Right this way, please," he said, pulling his spare key from the lock. "Our wholesome-frank process is just over here."

The inspector and her police escorts entered the factory floor warily, eyes cutting to the sides and up the high ceiling. Marcus pulled up the rear—they must have bumped into him. His face was ice.

The woman said, "Marcus here runs the whole show? Single operator?"

Mr. Sampson said they did have a second worker, but yes, the level of automation was impressive.

He looked from Piper to Marcus. "Where is, uh...Russ?"

All four cops swiveled to Marcus.

Piper said, "Russ stepped out. Had to pick up flowers for his wife."

Mr. Sampson barely kept a straight face. Russ Doan didn't say much, but when he did it was usually to complain about Sheila the Spender.

The inspector paced the floor, jotting notes on her clipboard, mouth twisted in an ugly knot. The cops poked after her like ducks. Mr. Sampson volunteered tidbits about the operation—uptime, throughput—and suggested the way to really grok it all was to check out the data upstairs in his office.

When the walk-through neared the thermoformer, Marcus helpfully adjusted the lights, blocking line-of-sight behind the large machine.

"And every ingredient," the inspector said, her nose twitching, "is organic. Non-GMO. Gluten-free. As declared in the certification?"

Mr. Sampson coughed. "Y—yes. Correct."

The inspector exhaled, capping her pen with clear disappointment. "Everything seems in order. We had an anonymous tip about some impure inputs. Must've been a prank."

Piper and Marcus locked eyes, then looked without looking to the thermoformer.

One cop said, "Smells over here."

He was standing near the whiteboard.

Mr. Sampson volunteered, "Soy gets a little funky, very common." He placed a hand on the inspector's shoulder. "We should get y'on your way, that Friday traffic is murder—"

"Dust." The inspector frowned toward the whiteboard. "Dust all over the floor. Where does it come from? There aren't any machines vented nearby."

She shook off Mr. Sampson's touch and started that way. The cop gripped the whiteboard between thumb and forefinger and spun it parallel with the floor, revealing the mountain of cereal behind.

Piper felt her insides shrinking to a cold, brittle dot.

A different cop said, "What color is gluten?"

The inspector stabbed a cereal flake with her pen. As she raised it to eye-level, a lot was going on with Mr. Sampson. His hands rubbed in front of his shirt, a jumble of knuckles. His mustache twitched, and underneath it, the ingratiating smile that'd been plastered on his lips began fading.

Piper shuffled for the door.

"Obviously, there's been a mistake," Mr. Sampson said.

"So it seems." The inspector scooped a few flakes into a baggie. To the cops, she said, "Chain of custody becomes important now."

On her command, two officers donned gloves and began gathering samples. There was more cereal than they'd be able to take; after each baggie, they looked up at the inspector to see if they could stop yet.

The remaining officers reached to the back-left of their belts for handcuffs.

Mr. Sampson said, "We—er, that is, I pride myself on giving my team free rein, but I never imagined..."

Again, all eyes found Marcus. Piper expected her brother to shout, or run, or grab the steel pitchfork leaning against the mixer. Marcus did none of this. Just dropped his head.

The whole deal was rigged. Mr. Sampson had planned for this contingency, Piper saw now, recalling that he'd always given Marcus instructions privately, huddled in his office or some stairwell; that Marcus had taken pride in being the sole driver of the Harvest Earth van. She didn't need to check Outlook to know Mr. Sampson would not have referenced the cereal-filler scheme in email, that the only electronic trace he'd allowed was that file on his computer.

The one Piper had just zapped.

"This is junk!" she said. "My brother didn't do it—it wasn't his idea."

But Marcus was already cuffed. One of the baggie-filling cops had spotted Russ Doan, and Doan had revived enough to confirm everything Mr. Sampson was saying about Marcus: that he alone had managed the input stocks, that he sometimes acted shifty.

Piper ran at Mr. Sampson, driving her forehead into his kidney.

Marcus, wrists joined, managed to pull her off. "I'll be okay."

"No, this is bullsh—"

"It's how it is. How it is right now."

The cops were jerking him away, tugging by the collar, kicking the backs of his knees.

"But hey." Marcus resisted to face Piper, to look her square. "You get them back, Sis. Hear me? You get them back."

Tears streamed down Piper's face. "Get who back?"

Marcus's expression darkened—a hint of that rage she had wanted. His gaze traveled the factory walls, seeming to penetrate studs and plaster and glass.

"Everybody," he told her. "Get 'em all back. Every last cheat."