The sky belonged to the men who could take it, to the men with the Right Stuff. The wars were still being fought, the war for the ownership of the sky." Fonvielle still believed what he had heard all through his training.
This was America's purest conquest, the fulfilment of a national destiny. It wasn't just about data, either, but that was part of it. He understood the gleam in the scientists' eyes as they pored over the rock samples or the graph curves. Fonvielle was an old-time fighter jock himself, and the new math gave him a headache, but he could appreciate the beauty of the data. These days, if there wasn't any money in it, no one gave a damn. The base in the Sea of Tranquillity, so recently evacuated, would continue its measuring, evaluating and transmitting long after there was anyone on Earth interested in the data. Good steady signals."įonvielle could not reply. Eleven men and three women in a tin can, waiting to be choppered out before the spacecraft sank. This, he knew, would be the last.īobbing out there in the South Pacific in their Vulcan capsule were the last generation. He could not count the number of splashdowns he had anxiously lived through.
"The USS Eisenhower is deploying the Sikorskis to pick up Santini's men."įonvielle nodded. "We have a splash-down, sir," said Wardle, still monitoring the Big Screen. You couldn't be a Commander when the Suits took your command out from under you.
His title was almost purely honorary, now. They were as thorough and efficient as he would have demanded them to be, had he still been responsible for issuing their orders. The technicians were calmly proceeding with the shutdown, going from desk to desk, flicking switches and pulling wires. Yet, can he prevent the world being destroyed (further) while fighting off the KKK, swamp mutants and voodoo priests?Ĭommander Lawrence Jerome Fonvielle gritted his teeth and held back tears as the console lights went out, bank by bank. The King isn't dead! Elvis Presley might not be a Colonel in the US Army anymore, but he's got a reputation as being one of the toughest independent Sanctioned Ops in the South.
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