“We have another strike planned,” says Arthur.

And Jim replies, “Listen, Arthur, I want to know more about who you are, who we are. Who exactly we’re working for and what the long-range goals are! I mean, the way it is now, I don’t really know.”

Arthur stares at him, and Jim swallows nervously, thinking that he may have gone too far somehow. But then Arthur laughs. “Does it really matter? I mean, do you want a name? An organization to pledge allegiance to?”

Jim shrugs, and Arthur laughs again. “Kind of old-fashioned, right? The truth is that it’s more complicated than you probably think, in that there is more than one so-called group doing all this. In fact, we’re stimulating a lot of the action indirectly. It’s getting so that half of the attacks you hear about are not actually our doing. And it seems to be snowballing.”

“But what about us, Arthur. You. Who supplies you, who are you working for?”

Arthur regards him seriously. “I don’t want to give you anybody’s name, Jim. If you can’t work with me on that basis, you can’t. I’m a socialist and a pacifist. Admittedly my pacificism has changed in nature since I’ve decided to join the resistance against the weapons industry. But like I told you, the methods I tried before—talking to people, writing, lobbying, joining protests and sit-ins—none of them had any tangible impact. So, while I was doing that I met all sorts of socialists. You wouldn’t think any existed anymore in America.”

“I would,” Jim says.

Arthur shrugs. “Maybe. It’s almost a lost concept, that individuals shouldn’t be able to profit from common property such as land or water. But some of us still believe in it and work for it. There could be a combination of the best of both systems—a democratic socialism, that gave individuals the necessary freedoms and only prohibited the grossest sorts of profiteering. Everyone has a right to adequate food, water, shelter and clothing!” Frustration twists Arthur’s face into the intense mask Jim remembers from their poster raid on SCP. “It’s not that radical a vision—it could be achieved by votes, by an evolutionary shift in the law of the land. It doesn’t have to be accomplished by violent revolution! But…”

“But it doesn’t happen,” Jim prompts him.