The library of the Administration Wing is a sanctuary of dust motes and quiet.
I sit in a high-backed leather chair near the window, a heavy, leather-bound tome on pre-war agricultural logistics resting forgotten on my lap. My left shoulder throbs with a dull, rhythmic ache, the nerve damage from the Mariana Trench frostbite flaring in the damp autumn chill. My ribs, finally healing from the lunar mission, protest every deep breath. But the physical pain is entirely eclipsed by the profound, heavy pressure of the afternoon.
Across the room, my children are working.
Asher is thirteen now. He has shot up three inches in the last six months, his shoulders broadening, his voice dropping into the awkward, cracking register of early adolescence. He is sitting cross-legged on the floor, his ey
