And suddenly, through his euphoria, Lee did see; he saw it in a flash of comprehension, all of it. “Oh, Christ, Art. Oh, no. You can’t do this.”

Cane reached out and spread his long fingers over Lee’s arm. “I’m sorry, JK. I think I have to. I’m looking at schedule and budget overruns. Shoddy manufacturing practices. A test flight that turned into a fiasco, almost a goddamn lethal fiasco at that.”

Lee looked at the back of the driver’s crew-cut head, at NASA Road One sliding by beyond the car windows. He tried to focus on the here and now: the leather smell of the upholstery, the air-conditioning’s crisp coolness. But he felt numb, as if he were insulated within some pressure suit, like Adam Bleeker and his crew.

“I almost gave my life for this goddamn project, Art.” And my marriage. “You know how close we are to the finish line, don’t you?”

“Yes, JK, I—”

“That close.” He held up thumb and forefinger a fraction apart. “And it’s me who got you there. The whole damn concept, the MEM design based on the old Apollo shape, all of that was mine, Art. And it’s me who’s been holding everybody’s feet to the fire ever since. Now we’ve built it, and it’s going to be the finest spacecraft ever flown. And you’re yanking me out of the saddle, all at the behest of some bunch of do-nothing jerk-offs in Washington who couldn’t find their asses with both hands—”

“Cut it, JK.”

“Who’s going to replace me? Bob Rowen? Jack Morgan, maybe? Or -

“No. Nobody internal. JK, I’ve decided we need a heavyweight program manager to follow you. A top guy, to step into your shoes—”

“Who? Who are you giving my job to?”

Cane looked away. “Gene Tyson.”

Lee stared at him, then laughed out loud. Tyson: the slick, fat veep from Hughes who had laughed Lee out of his office during the MEM bid. “Gene Tyson. Are you kidding me?”

“Gene’s a fine engineer, and a good man.”

“Sure, Art. But he’s no -

Cane looked at him. “No what? No JK Lee?”

“That’s right, damn you. Anyhow, it wouldn’t work. My people wouldn’t work with him. They wouldn’t—” Betray me.

Cane coughed and avoided his eyes again. “Tyson has already agreed to take the job. And I’ve spoken to your people.”

“I… you’re kidding me.”

“Morgan and Xu and Lye and Rowen and -

“And they agreed to go along with this?”

Cane shrugged. “I wouldn’t say they were happy about it. But—”

But they accepted it. And the sons of bitches never said a word to me.