Ricky had learned the rules long before he ever became involved with the breeding houses. The instructions had been drilled into him by people who knew exactly how Novaterra operated—people who had been doing this for years, who had seen their colleagues disappear and never return.
If Novaterra caught you, you didn't cooperate. You didn't give them names. You didn't tell them where the money went. You didn't tell them who was involved. You said whatever you had to say to make yourself seem useless.
The idea was simple. If they couldn't get anything valuable from you, there was a chance they would eventually let you go. They would decide you weren't worth the resources, that keeping you was more trouble than it was worth.
At least, that was what Ricky had been told.
There was another possibility, of course. Death. But Ricky preferred not to think about that one. He kept it locked away in a corner of his mind, a door he refused to open.
