Anand locked eyes with him. “It’s been a long time since we had one of those.”
“The Second Saurian War.”
“Yeah, fifty-five years ago, and it fell apart during the conflict.”
“So, it’ll be up to us to ensure it succeeds.” Nolan spread his hands out on the desk. “I’m going to ask my vice president to resign. For the good of the nation. In her place, I’ll nominate someone from a center-right party.”
Anand gaped at him. “Seriously? You expect her to resign? Just like that?”
“For the good of the nation,” Nolan repeated. “And a promise that when my second term is up, I’ll endorse her candidacy for president. That’s her end goal, of course.”
“Remind me not to play poker with you,” Anand replied. “I’ll put some feelers out and see if I can help you find someone that understands the concept of unity.” He paused. “Tell me—have you thought about a strategy for how to fight this war?”
“Beyond surviving whatever they throw at us next?”
Anand nodded.
“I have,” Nolan said as he steepled his fingers. “Earth. If we want to defeat this League of Sol, it must be done by taking Earth.”
“Crossing the galactic arm… I can’t even think about the logistics of such an endeavor.”
“That’s up to the military,” Nolan replied. He’d already ordered the chairman of the Joint Chiefs to begin planning. It would take at least five years to build up their fleet properly, and it would also take that long to beat the plowshares of the Terran Coalition back into swords and truly go on the offensive—maybe less, if the entire population mobilized. “Our job will be to galvanize the people.”
“On that, we agree, my friend.” Anand sat back in his chair. “What can I do for you? Anything?”
“Well, you are the de facto leader of your party, as I am of mine,” Nolan said. “I want a message to go out from both of us to every operative, talking head, and political commentator we have, respectively. Unity, not attacks, and no cheap political points.”
“Conservatives aren’t monolithic, you know.”
“Nor are Liberal-Democrats. We’ll have some stragglers, I’m sure.”
Anand smiled in return. “Done.”
Nolan inclined his head. “One other thing.”
“Name it.”
“Pray for me. Pray to God that I will have wisdom and that He will guide me to make the right decisions.”
Anand furrowed his brow. “I will spend a lot of time in the temple, praying to Waheguru, asking for His guidance. I would only ask that you do the same for me when you pray.”
Nolan stood and extended his arm. “I promise I will. Daily.”
Anand shook his hand warmly. “May you walk in the path.”
“God bless and…” Nolan thought of an old phrase. “Godspeed.”
“Godspeed, indeed.”
Following the somber ceremony to remove the honored dead from the hangar bay, Justin wandered the ship. Many of his fellow pilots had gone to a multifaith service organized by the chaplains, but he didn’t see the point of going. He’d never been much on religion and typically only went on Easter and Christmas with his family. To him, it was more of a cultural celebration than anything to do with faith. To join in on the service seemed like hypocrisy. He walked for a good hour, down a corridor filled with printed images of those lost. They’d been hung up as a memorial to the fallen. In the quiet of his mind, even as soldiers milled about him, Justin pondered how he’d survived the last forty-eight hours but found no easy answers.
Justin ended up on hangar deck B. Hundreds of enlisted personnel in brightly colored jackets delineating their different departments of the space aviation force worked feverishly. The deck plating was scarred with black carbon scoring from energy-weapon hits, while holes were visible in the superstructure. He found it something of a miracle that the ship had survived in the first place.
After strolling around for a bit and taking in the scene, he arrived at his Sabre. Though battered and scarred, the fighter was still space worthy and looked like it was already under repair. Justin glanced for a moment at the distinctive red stripe painted onto the vertical stabilizer on the back of his craft. It reminded him of the long and storied history of the Red Tails squadron. The unit's lineage traced back to 1940s Earth—during a time when humans still sorted superiority by skin coloration and creed—an idea that was ludicrous on its face, now. I hope to do their memory justice.
A technician rolled out from under the craft and sprang to his feet. “Sorry, Lieutenant! Didn’t see you there.”
“Oh, I got lost on my way to the mess deck. I found myself here and thought I’d look around. Don’t mind me,” Justin replied as the technician interrupted his thoughts.
“We’ll have your bird back in the fight inside of two days. We already did most of the work, but I need a couple of spare engine parts the Greengold is out of. Thankfully, we’re about to resupply.”
The man’s chipper attitude shocked Justin. They’d been fighting for their lives—no quarter asked or given—and the letdown from the rush of combat was intense. He stared at the fighter. “Not bad, Chief. Thanks for getting her back into fighting shape.”
“Have you given some thought to how we’re going to mark your kills?”
Justin hadn’t considered the custom. Typically, when a pilot notched the solo kill of an enemy craft or ship, he was entitled to a decoration under the cockpit canopy. He had seen pictures of dozens of markings from the fighters of the so-called “mega-aces” that had fifty-plus confirmed victories each in the Saurian Wars. Something about it bothered him suddenly, as if a voice in his soul said he shouldn’t celebrate the killing of others. He furrowed his brow. “I hadn’t thought of that yet.”
The technician shrugged. “I’ve got lots of designs to choose from. Let me know what you want. We’ll get it painted. How many did you notch? Sixteen?”
“So I was told. Roughly
