The Invasion of the Tearling

She nodded and smiled mechanically, wondering if Arnie had noticed the splints on her knuckles. The flunkies left, and Greg and Arnie disappeared upstairs. Lily stared at her plate for a moment, considering, then grabbed the edge of the table with her uninjured hand and levered herself upward. Leaving the dirty dishes scattered all over the table, she hurried through the kitchen and into the small guardhouse that housed their surveillance equipment. Jonathan was supposed to be on duty tonight, but Lily was hardly surprised to find the alcove empty. She wondered how many nights the house had been left unguarded while Jonathan was out running errands for the Blue Horizon.

Tapping at the screen, Lily brought up Greg’s study, a dark, mahogany-filled room that tried too hard to be masculine. The walls were paneled with bookshelves, but they held no books, only Greg’s old football trophies and pictures of Greg and Lily with important people at various events. The walls were covered with plaques; Greg liked to show off his awards.

Arnie was sitting in one of the big armchairs in front of Greg’s desk, and Greg was behind the desk, with his leather executive chair tilted back. Both of them were smoking cigars, and the haze had drifted up toward the camera, making Greg’s features indistinct.

“The building blew and collapsed,” Arnie said, “just like it was supposed to. They clearly had an escape plan, but it got botched somehow. I’ve got to hand it to Langer; much as I hate that bastard, he pulled off a pretty good trick. It looked like all of them died, but Langer managed to grab one alive, some guy named Goodin. They’ve been working on him for the past four days, and he finally broke last night.”

“What broke him?” Greg asked, his voice crawling with eagerness, and Lily closed her eyes. How long would it have taken them to break Maddy? Forever, Lily thought, but deep down, she knew that wasn’t true. She wiped her forehead and her hand came away wet.

Arnie looked uncomfortable too. “I’m off duty now, man. I don’t want to talk about that shit.”

“Yeah, I suppose not,” Greg replied grudgingly. “So what did he say?”

“He wasn’t high up or anything, but he gave us a lot.” Arnie’s face became animated again. “The leader of the Blue Horizon is some guy who calls himself Tear. A Brit, if you can believe it.”

“I do believe it. The UK and their fucking socialist experiment.”

“Well, this Tear is apparently the big money. The separatists think he’s some kind of god. Blue Horizon sprang up out of the old Occupy movements, but you know they didn’t know what they were doing. This Tear, though, he’s a trained guerrilla. That’s why they’ve been such a pain in the ass the last few years.” Arnie lowered his voice, and Lily thumbed the volume control on the screen. “They’re holed up in an abandoned warehouse down on Conley Terminal.”

“Where’s that?”

“Port of Boston. I’ve spent all day looking at maps. That warehouse has been condemned for at least ten years, but Frewell’s boys took all the money Boston was supposed to use for a new container facility and put it into some God crap or another, so all the containers have just been standing there. Goodin said they’re using the warehouse as a headquarters. We’re going in at dawn.”

Lily stared at the screen, frozen.

“They’ve put Langer in charge of the whole thing; it’s his baby now, and he wants prisoners. We have to surround the Terminal on land and water, which is no easy trick … lots of boats and lots of men. My division is supposed to provide a secondary perimeter tomorrow morning.” Arnie sighed and stubbed out the remains of his cigar. “So no booze.”

“Want to play some poker? I’ve got a game downtown.”

“Can’t, really. I have to be in Boston in two hours. My copter’s waiting down at the pad.”

Greg nodded, though his lip had pushed out in that little pout that Lily had come to know so well lately. “Fine. I’ll walk you out.”

Lily shut off the screen and hurried back into the dining room, where she set the washer to begin clearing plates. When Greg and Arnie’s voices had disappeared out the front door, she dug her phone from her purse and called Jonathan, but he didn’t pick up; there was only his dry, deep voice, a generic greeting. Lily couldn’t leave him a real message; her calls were monitored. Trying to keep the panic from her voice, she demanded that he call her back immediately. But she couldn’t escape the feeling that wherever Jonathan was, he wouldn’t get back to her in time. She could see it now: the darkened warehouse, Dorian inside with William Tear. Dorian had said that she wasn’t going back into custody, not ever again. The Boston waterfront. The Blue Horizon. Lily closed her eyes and saw the tiny group of wooden houses beside the blue river, bathed in sun.

I have to do something.

And what can you do, Lil? Maddy asked, her voice jeering. You’ve never had the courage to do anything in your entire life.

I did, Lily insisted. When Dorian fell into the backyard, I did.

But deep down, she knew that Maddy was right. Dorian had been a low-risk decision, almost a game, insulated in the relatively safe environment of the nursery. What Lily was contemplating now was something else entirely. She formulated a plan, rejected it, formulated another, rejected that, formulated a third and examined it, turning it over for flaws. It was a stupid plan, no doubt. It would probably get her arrested, maybe even killed. But she had to do something. If the better world was real, it was also unutterably fragile, and without Tear, there would be nothing.