Colt nodded. "Yeah. Couple days ago. Things are warm- ing up."
"In Antarctica? They're shooting at each other in an international zone?"
"Why not? World's biggest coal beds down there. They're gonna fight over it—or something else. Maybe the Middle East again; there's still a lot of oil left there. It's coming, man. Lotta hungry people and not enough resources to keep 'em all going. They're gonna fight over it, sooner or later. Nothing we can do to stop it. We gotta be prepared to win it."
Kinsman started to reply, but there was nothing he could say. He sat there, defeated. Then he saw Pat Kelly coming up, holding a dinner tray.
"Mind if I join you?" Kelly asked. He did not wait for an answer, but put his tray down next to Colt's and pulled out the chair.
"Frank, you know Pat, don't you?" Kinsman asked.
Colt nodded as Kelly sat down. "Just made major, didn't you?"
"Yep," Kelly answered. "Pretty soon I'll outrank you, Flash." His usual rabbit's face looked different: tense, almost angry, flushed with expectation.
Colt flicked him a lazy glance. "I'm not planning on retiring that soon. And what's this 'Rash' crap?"
With a shrug, Kelly said, "You're the hotshot rocket jock, everybody knows that."
"I don't know," Colt said. "Tell me about it."
Kinsman sat there and watched it happen. He felt helpless and fascinated at the same time. Kelly was a good man, bright and dedicated. Frank Colt was just as bright, maybe more so. And whatever was burning inside Colt was far hotter than Kelly's flame, Kinsman knew from long experience. Yet there was something about Colt that called lightning down from the sky. Men either loved him like a brother or hated him. There was no neutral ground.
Kelly was tight-lipped. "Look at you, wearing that uniform like you're at an Academy parade. You know damned well we don't do that up here. But you've got to be the superhero. All-time champion hotshot."
"And you keep your uniform stowed in a closet so everybody'll think you're Mr. Nice Guy, huh? Ever been shot at?"
"That's got nothing to do with—"
"Hell it don't! Know why you're here, Mr. Nice Guy? D'you know why you can dance around on the Moon and collect rocks and advance in rank every three years?"
"Now, wait . . ."
Colt silenced him with a long forefinger jabbed toward his face. "You're here on the Moon, Major Kelly, because it's cheaper to supply our space stations and orbital factories from lunar resources than from Earth. That's it. I don't give a shit 343 how many scientists you got up here or how many cripples you've saved. The only reason the taxpayers of the United States support this fairy palace is because it's cheaper than boosting supplies and raw materials into orbit from the Earth. Got that?"
Kelly was white-faced now. "That's about what I'd expect from you. Did you bring any bombs with you?"
Colt leaned back in his chair and laughed. "Shit, baby, you know nuclear weapons are outlawed in space. We signed a treaty with the Russians thirty years ago. No weapons of mass dee-struction. I bet if you swung a search-and-destroy patrol through Lunagrad right now you wouldn't find more'n three or four nukes."
