Harry Turtledove - Second Contact

Brigadier General Charles Healey gave him a most unpleasant look. But this one, he judged, was aimed at what he’d said, not at him personally. “You have a nasty mind, don’t you, Lieutenant Colonel?” Healey said. “But you may have a point, too. We will have to keep an eye on outbound launches. And we’ll have to keep an eye on the Reich . The Germans could do something like this if they set their minds to it.”

“It wouldn’t be the end of the world if they did, would it, sir?” Johnson said. “If there aren’t enough asteroids to go around, we’re all in a lot of trouble, right?”

“I suppose so,” Healey said peevishly. “Asteroids.” Just for a moment, Johnson wondered if he cared so much about them as he’d seemed to a little while earlier. Then the commander of the Lewis and Clark said, “Well, the odds are the Nazis will worry about things closer to home. They have more to worry about than we do, and that’s the truth.” He pointed at Johnson. “Now-about you.”

“Yes, sir?” Johnson tensed and tried not to show it. The name-calling was over; he could feel as much. Whatever Healey was going to do with him or to him, he’d find out now.

“Pilot training.” The sour-faced brigadier general spoke as if the words tasted bad. “We’re already redundant there, but we can’t have too many backups. If the latest checks come back all right, maybe you can learn it. You have to learn something, that’s for damn sure. No drones here.”

“I don’t want to be a drone,” Johnson answered. “I’ve said that ever since I came aboard.”

“Talk is cheap,” General Healey said, and Johnson discovered the name-calling wasn’t over after all. But then Healey relented, ever so slightly: “If you work as hard now that you are aboard as you did to get aboard, maybe we’ll get some use out of you after all. Dismissed.”

Johnson saluted, unbelted, and flew out of the office-metaphor back on Earth, literal truth here. Healey would give him at least some of what he wanted, not least because he had no true choice… except putting him out the air lock. I’ll learn all I can, Johnson thought. Maybe I’ll even learn what the Lewis and Clark is really for.

Harry Turtledove was born in Los Angeles in 1949. He has taught ancient and medieval history at UCLA, Cal State Fullerton, and Cal State L.A., and has published a translation of a ninth-century Byzantine chronicle, as well as several scholarly articles. He is also an award-winning full-time writer of science fiction and fantasy. His alternate history works have included several short stories and novels, including The Guns of the South, How Few Remain (winner of the Sidewise Award for Best Novel), the Great War epics: American Front and Walk in Hell , and the Colonization books: Second Contact and Down to Earth . His new novel is American Empire: The Center Cannot Hold . He is married to fellow novelist Laura Frankos. They have three daughters: Alison, Rachel, and Rebecca.