Grell came through the portal, threw her duffel against Miller's station, and said, "Well?"

Miller looked at the duffel, raised fearless eyes to the Red Reaper of London, and replied. "Nothing is well, Senior. Pick up your duffel and go to Personnel. Senior Jacobs is waiting. Tell him I quit. And be polite to the little people, if there's any out there who haven't left yet."

Grell had always maintained that she was crazy but not stupid. She was looking at a Reaper who had decided that he had already taken all the abuse that he was willing to tolerate for the rest of his afterlife. His hands were still resting on the controls.

Even the meek can be very dangerous when they decide that accepting the abuse is worse than the consequences of defending themselves. Realizing she might find herself ported upside-down into a crocodile-rich section of the Nile River, she picked up her bag.

"My apologies, Junior." She looked around the War Room.

Second Shift security was gone. There were a few, too few, guards who had been called in from other shifts; they looked grim and exhausted. She nodded to them and left for the main Operations area.

Alan's office was nearly stripped. Maintenance was even tearing out the cabinets. A Reaper Junior was boxing the last of his files. As she passed, he murmured from the side of his mouth, "They got away safe, Senior."

The desks of Operations were mostly empty. The few workers remaining were concentrating on their work in a way that indicated they knew they were being watched. It was a frightened silence, which was becoming an angry one. DePoy in her doorway gestured towards Personnel before ducking back into her office. Her door closed quietly. Grell noted that Bookkeeping was locked down, as were the other Administrative sections, and the visible Admin desks were deserted. If the portal at the end of the floor had been active, she would have thought they were expecting a demonic invasion.

She walked back to Personnel, where Slingby's desk was gone. Liz Brodie had shoved her own desk in front of Slingby's cabinets; two Reapers stood guard, as two Personnel Admins helped Brodie move folders into boxes. "Grell, I am so glad to see you. Drop your bag on those boxes, please, it'll keep Maintenance off them. Go on into Avram's office. I have to stay here to pack up Eric's files. They are all student records and employee evaluations, and absolutely confidential. We're setting up our own private room in the Stacks. We'll have it all safely away as soon as possible, and then we have to consider moving the whole department downstairs or to another building."

Grell knocked and was admitted. Avram, weary and worried, offered her a chair and tea from his lovely little Turkish samovar. "Thank you for coming so quickly, Senior. The Branch is in great difficulty. We ask your help. We do not demand it, but we need it badly. The Director has gone mad. My hope is to get him safely into Medical's hands as quickly as possible."

"Tell me everything, Avram. How long has this been going on?"

"He hosted a site visit for a number of Directors and Uppers beginning at eleven this morning. Do you know we had a demonic invasion last week? We handled it very well, no fatalities on our side, and all our defenses worked perfectly. The visitors wanted to see those defenses and talk to the designers, Brock and DePoy. Director Spears was perfectly normal for most of their visit but became somewhat distracted by the end of it. When they left at about fifteen-thirty, he returned to his office. At sixteen hundred Humphries returned from the Academy. Director Spears interrupted Mister Knox's handover report and ordered Mister Humphries into his office. Ten minutes later, Humphries emerged. He surrendered his keys to Mister Wójcik. He went to his own office. He left his scythe, glasses, and a borrowed Angel blade on his desk, with a letter of resignation. He ported home. Slingby met him there.

"They boobytrapped their door, indicating they feared pursuit. Once that had been disarmed, we found that they had divested themselves of all clothing and equipment that could be tracked. A pair of suitcases indicate they had secured uniforms and equipment not issued by London. They are gone, leaving no trace, and taking nothing we can follow. The suitcases are untagged by any Branch."

"Well, finally. I was wondering how much longer they would stay here."

"Spears gave orders of banishment for both, ordered removal of their names, histories, files, and furniture, and returned to his office. Senior DePoy requested all orders in writing, in an effort to recall him to his senses and to give him time to rethink his options. Fifteen minutes later, he called for Humphries, apparently having quite forgotten that the man was gone. He then remembered, became furious, then escalated the banishment to execution."

"Oh, that's not good –"

"He went looking for Slingby, found Bradshaw setting up tea, fired him as an unnecessary service to lazy employees. He then tried to fire DePoy for promptly hiring Bradshaw into Admin and sending him to brew the office tea in the safety of the Stacks. She pointed out that the Director has no power over her and that she still did not have his written orders. He returned to his office, and told Mister Wójcik to take the names of any employee who went down for tea. At that point Chief Accountant Brock locked down Bookkeeping. Senior Auditor DePoy locked down Documentation.

"The Director then went to the Head of Security and demanded that he track and execute Humphries immediately. Mallory is Humphries' man. He walked out. His partner Duncan and all of second shift Security went with him. Bad timing for the Director, because Humphries did something last week that the Director would have forbidden – he sent a rescue team after a Reaper that the Director would have written off as a deserter. Got him back, and his partner too, who had been falsely reported as killed. Another instance of Alan overstepping his authority to save an individual. The Director returned to his desk to find that Admin had gone into lockdown, with only Wójcik, DePoy and Brodie remaining available to him. He then attacked Ten Hagen. Ten Hagen blocked his strike, knocked him down and left for the Stacks. From there he called Medical and reported a breakdown in progress."

"Is Medical here?"

"They are. At the moment they are downstairs tucking into Bradshaw's tea and finger sandwiches. Thank heaven for Bradshaw, who is bribing them into giving us extra time. The Director's been locked in his office ever since. Presumably he is writing out his orders. He's called Judicial himself. They called DePoy. She filed a counterclaim of temporary imbalance due to increased stress levels caused by the demonic invasion. They are following up but are not yet interfering here."

Grell snorted, in a reasonably ladylike fashion. "And what, exactly, do you think I can do about all this? I can tell you without even looking that Alan was protecting somebody. I can tell you he won't come back, and Eric will kill anyone who tries to arrest them. I can tell Judicial that Will is angry with me. I can tell them that he traditionally vents his anger on his subordinates, with the exception of those Admins whom he cannot offend because they can make real trouble for him; DePoy, Brock, and Wójcik. I can tell Judicial that Will bullies any Reaper who will not face him down. Since his office was moved into Operations, he rarely sees the Senior Reapers who work in the outside offices and bullpens. The ones he deals with daily and respects are reduced to yourself, Cortland, sometimes Knox and now probably Ten Hagen. I have no idea what set Will off. But I've been on foreign assignment, not here. All I can offer is stale gossip and hearsay."

"Grell, we need you to get him out of his office. We don't want him to hurt anyone, we don't want anyone to hurt him. We certainly don't want Judicial to break down his door and subdue him. Ideally, we need him to surrender himself peacefully to Medical. It's the best thing for him, fewest consequences and injuries. In order for us to win back the people who have quit or walked out, he has to be gone with no chance of returning while still enraged."

"Good luck with that. Are you sure he didn't port out an hour ago?"

"Actually, yes. His glasses are still there, showing that he is moving about. At his rank, he's entitled to an office that is port-proof, to keep unwanted visitors out. His only exit is through his door and his window; we have his window under surveillance."

"Has he opened it to feed the pigeons?"

"Yes."

"Then he's not completely mad. Just mostly. He's caring for his pets. He's very fond of them, you know; they are unquestioning and predictable." She sighed. "Let me go to our apartment, Eldest. I'll bring back some special-treat birdseed. It should get me in the door. I'll try to talk him down. Be patient. Clear everyone else out. Please don't pounce on him if I bring him out – greet him quietly, formally introduce the one nurse, no more, pretty, female, nonthreatening, who is there to help him. Let her give him a pill for the headache I guarantee he has. We'll get him to the first-aid room. No groups of enforcers, no sudden movement, no shouting, no grabbing because I will help him hit anybody who tries. I have to be his ally, you see, and if he bolts I will go with him, to keep persuading him that things will be better if he gets medical attention. Agreed?"

"Bless you, Grell. Agreed."