Vortex

Tom shrugged modestly. “I do what I can.”

“It’s easy for you to say!” Wyatt protested, turning on Vik. “You got invited back to all those companies.”

“Yes,” Yuri added. “You are quite eager to downplay this, but I have been noticing you are not experiencing this issue yourself.”

“Tom has every right to feel depressed,” Wyatt insisted.

“Why would Tom be depressed?” Vik said, exasperated. “Yes, he had a setback, but it’s not like he woke up in Connecticut.”

There was a moment of silence as Wyatt processed his words, then her face grew very grave. “That’s how you’re using the Connecticut thing.”

“That’s how,” Vik confirmed.

“Don’t, Vik. It’s terrible.”

“Terrible? No, Enslow. You’re confusing Tom’s situation with living in Connecticut,” Vik said.

Wyatt hit his arm and stormed from the bunk.

Yuri sighed and patted Tom’s back. “Stay strong, my friend.”

Tom felt a bit sheepish as Yuri walked away, because obviously the big Russian kid thought Tom needed an encouraging shoulder pat. This really must be bad. As he and Vik launched into playing some games, the images blurred before his eyes.

“You’re in poor form tonight, Doctor,” Vik noted.

“I’m winning.”

“Poor form for you. Hey, you’re not really depressed, are you?” He sounded awkward just asking it. Tom shook his head.

“No, man. I’m good.”

“I figured. You’ll come back from this, Doctor. You always do.”

But later, when he was alone again, Tom stared up at those five reasons he was so, so screwed. He desperately wanted to be proud of it like Vik said, but the smile on his face made him feel like some sort of demented gargoyle, and the knot in his stomach was made of pure dread.

TOM WASN’T LOOKING forward to General Marsh’s reaction to his disgrace. His stomach plummeted when the summons appeared in his vision center. This meeting would not bode well for him. He was sure Marsh regretted recruiting him, wasting time on him. His legs felt like lead the entire walk up to the twelfth-floor observation deck, where General Marsh waited.

The night air was chilly, and Tom shivered a bit when he stepped out and snapped to attention. Marsh waved for him to be at ease, so Tom settled there, resigned to his fate.

“You wanted to see me, sir?”

Marsh beckoned him forward. “Do you know I have a grandson your age, Mr. Raines?”

Tom hesitated, then joined him by the railing. “I didn’t know that.”

“A little younger than you, but he’s a good kid. Very smart. If he’d been born at a different time, there’s no knowing what he could’ve gone on to be.” Marsh nodded up at the sky. “What do you see up there?”

“Uh, the moon, sir.” In the clear skies around Washington, DC, it looked stark, vivid, and full, and with a proper telescope, Tom was sure Chinese equipment could even be seen.

“Not the moon. That is Russo-Chinese territory and the end of this war.” Marsh jabbed his finger up at the rounded rock. “While we were busy shoveling money hand over fist to Wyndham Harks, gutting our schools and bombing people in deserts for Nobridis, the Chinese were busy training up millions of scientists, building their space program, and claiming the most strategically vital territory in a war we weren’t fighting yet. Whoever holds the moon holds the solar system, Mr. Raines, and whoever holds the solar system holds the future of humanity.”

He waved his stubby finger like he could point out the equipment, the weapons, the armaments.

“It’s their perfect, low-gravity launching pad, but there’s more. They could turn around tomorrow and destroy every one of our ships as they approach Earth. If they wanted to, they could probably turn those weapons outward and rotate around and around our planet, taking potshots at all our other bases in the solar system. This war could all be over in a few days.”

“They signed that treaty,” Tom said, remembering it from Tactics. “They agreed to a neutral zone.”

“What’s a treaty? It’s a piece of paper. An agreement means nothing in itself. It’s the power to force others to comply with that agreement—that’s all that counts. That’s the sham of this whole thing.”

Marsh leaned his elbows on the railing, his face bathed in moonlight.

“The fact is, son, we fight the Chinese because they’re letting us fight this. They hold that final punch because this war isn’t ultimately about China winning the solar system. It’s not about America. It’s not about any countries. It’s about those men and women you met on those meet and greets.”

Tom was a bit relieved, because he’d come here expecting to be bawled out, but Marsh seemed more introspective than angry. “Yeah, I know that, sir. And I know I screwed up with them.”

“I know why you find those people contemptible. So do I. They want a crack at all those resources in space, yes, but do you know what they want even more, Raines? They want a war that never ends. That’s why we’ve got that moon up there the Chinese aren’t putting in to play. That moon ends the gravy train and everyone knows it. You know what I’d do if I ran this boat?”

Tom shook his head.

“I’d muster our forces, feign an assault on the shipyards near the Gauntlet—”

Tom recognized the term for the intensive free-fire zone, encircling the neutral zone. It was a hazardous, combat-intense stretch of space that had to be survived to get home free to the safe haven around Earth.

“And then, Raines, I’d assault the Chinese fortifications on the moon. Sneak attack, and let history call me a backstabber. I’d destroy every single piece of equipment they’ve got. Find anything they’ve got beneath the surface, blow those up, too. Scar that beautiful, rocky face, but, by God, I’d take that advantage for our side. And then I’d use it. I wouldn’t fight with one hand tied behind my back, and they wouldn’t do it anymore, either. Someone would win, and someone would lose.” He was silent a moment. “You know why I’d never get put in charge?”

“Because you’d blow up the moon?” Tom guessed.

“Because I would end the war. That’s what destruction does. This war ends, then so do the taxpayer-funded contracts, the drumbeats in the media, the nice Combatant faces, and the patriotic cause to lull the civilians and shame the dissenters. The other thing that comes to an end is all the justification for why this country’s run the way it is. People will wonder why their paychecks are still getting halved to pay off the men who own their utility companies, their roads, their national parks. They’ll wonder why they’ve got to work eighty-hour weeks to support the folks who took their houses and destroyed the middle-class jobs. There’s not going to be an enemy to point a finger at anymore. People will see the real problem.”

“Or a new enemy can get created. A new war could get started,” Tom pointed out, remembering what Neil always said on this subject.

Marsh rubbed his fingers over his chin, still gazing up at the moon. “You know, when I was a cadet, there were thirty thousand drones in US skies. Now there are thirty million. People protested by the thousands against the brand-new, all-US firewall. Now, the DHS dispatches a drone or two, fires a microwave weapon into the crowd, and no one will stick around when they feel that burning sensation. All these changes were done because someone cried wolf. Over and over. But you know how that story ends?”