Eisenhower interposed himself between the two volatile tempers. "We're going to have a hell of a time making this work, gentlemen. I suggest we stop beating up on each other and think about how we deal with the Japs. And with the Nazis, God help us, if they can lay their hands on any of this."

Roosevelt gripped the wheels of his chair and spun himself around with some difficulty on the thick carpet. General Marshall helped him with the last part of the turn, until he finished up facing King and Kolhammer directly.

"Ike's right. It looks like you're here for good, Admiral Kolhammer. I don't imagine for a second that it's going to be easy. I can already think of dozens of problems, and those are just the ones on the political side. The military implications of scattering your technology all over the globe… well, I don't even want to think about that right now. But I suggest you and Admiral King quit sniping at each other and come up with some plan to smooth your transition here, and get us back on the front foot."

Kolhammer gave King the benefit of a very long stare before slowly turning away.

"I've been thinking about that, Mr. President," he said. "I need to get back to Pearl right away. I have an idea I'd like to discuss with my people."

Apart from the gray metal bulkheads and exposed piping overhead, the main conference room in the USS Hillary Clinton looked like the meeting space at a business convention center. A semicircle of Ikea workbenches curved around in front of a video wall. When Kolhammer walked in, all his surviving commanders were present; the captains and executive officers of the Multinational Force had gathered in person, a rare occurrence, to discuss their options and settle on a course of action.

No '42 personnel were present.

Kolhammer thanked Captain Halabi for filling his seat while he'd been gone, and then launched straight into the meeting.

"Right. You've all read the condensed report from the Physics Research Group. Anybody still think there's a chance we can get home?"

He waited for somebody to put up their hand, but this was a room full of professional realists. They'd all studied the video of the Nagoya crumpling down into a singularity. They'd read the classified material about the sort of research Manning Pope's team was supposed to be carrying out. And they'd read the report of the Physics Group, explaining why that experiment had probably gone wrong. Having adjusted to the miracle of their arrival in 1942, nobody was holding out any hope for a second miracle to carry them home.

Kolhammer gave it ten seconds. He could see individuals searching within themselves, counting up their personal tally of loss and pondering the consequence of their bizarre fate. But no one seemed as if they were about to jump up and demand that a new time machine be constructed.

It just wasn't possible, and they knew it.

Finally Kolhammer broke the spell.

"Okay," he said. "Options. We fight or we don't."

He waited for a return but none came. A couple of officers threw a quick glance at the Japanese representative, Lieutenant Commander Mitsuka. The young man stared fixedly back at Kolhammer. The Multinational Force commander had commissioned him "in the field"-over Mitsuka's own objection-arguing that it simply wasn't practical to have an ensign in charge of the Siranui. What active role the ship and her crew might play, however, was another matter.

"Well, then, I guess that means we fight," Kolhammer said. "I don't see much of an alternative either, given the damage we did to the Pacific Fleet and the fact that the Japanese found the Nuku on top of that mountain. We have to assume they'll have salvaged material and information from the ship. It won't make an immediate difference, but if they share it with the Nazis, and we have to assume that they will, we could be looking at a greatly accelerated German rocket program, followed by a viable nuclear threat."

There was, at last, some reaction; an uncomfortable murmur and a noticeable number of men and women shifting about in their seats, almost as though they were trying to squirm away from the implications of such a nightmare.

"I'm not here to impose my will on anybody today. There is an option I want to discuss. But it's only an option. I'm going to throw the floor open to anybody who feels the need to speak first."

He leaned up against the edge of a desk and swept his eyes over the room. There were no assigned places, but almost everybody had grouped together by nationality. Americans, making up three-quarters of the group, all sat along one side of the room and around the curve of the desks. Next to the last of them was Lieutenant Commander Mitsuka. On the other side of him sat the Australian commanders, Willet, Sheehan, Captain Tranter off the Ipswich and an army officer, Brigadier Barnes. Captain Halabi and her XO, Commander McTeale, were ensconced with Price Harry, the senior SAS officer.

Halabi raised an eyebrow at Kolhammer. He nodded at her and resumed his seat next to Mike Judge.

"Captain."

"Thank you, sir."

The Royal Navy officer pulled an envelope out of her jacket and dropped it onto the table.

"I have an order from the first sea lord in London, via Rear Admiral Murray here in Hawaii, directing me to detach the Trident from this force and return with all dispatch to Portsmouth. My crew and I will be 'evaluated' and reassigned to training duties pending the outcome of those evaluations. Sir Leslie phoned me this morning to make sure I'd received the orders. He helpfully pointed out that disobeying them could be construed as mutiny, a capital offense."

A few people snorted and laughed. Some swore. Prince Harry rolled his eyes.

"I see," said Kolhammer. "What about you, Captain Willet? Have you had anything similar?"

The Australian submariner shook her head.

"No, but Commander Judge tells me that Canberra is very keen to see us back in home waters. They're not putting pressure on yet, but you can bet they will if there's any concerted Japanese push south. At this time, mid-nineteen-forty-two, they very likely think of themselves as facing a full-scale invasion."

Commander Judge spoke up from beside Kolhammer.

"That's about right, Admiral. They'll take their lead from Washington for now. But MacArthur is down there banging the drums, desperately trying to get his hands on the whole force. If he thinks he can get in Prime Minister Curtin's ear to recall the Australian national contingent, I'm certain that's exactly what he'll do. He wants Brigadier Barnes's battalion and the SAS under his wing as soon as possible. If he can get the Eighty-second as well, he'll be in seventh heaven."

"He only thinks so," said Colonel Jones.

Kolhammer nodded as he digested the information.

"This isn't an immediate issue-at least not yet," he said. "For now, unless anyone has any drastic objection, I don't intend to split our forces. Captain Halabi, you leave London to me."

He looked at the foreign commanders. None of them said a word. So Kolhammer stood up again and walked around in front of the wallscreen.

"We agree we're stuck here, for the moment," he said. "Effectively forever. Even winning this war and accelerating the rate of technological development in this time line, the best guess says we won't be able to build anything like the Nagoya for thirty or forty years. I'm not just quoting from our own amateurs in the Physics Group we put together. I spoke to Professor Einstein and a whole bunch of other eggheads back in LA, and they agree. They're champing at the bit to pore over the information we brought with us. But even leapfrogging their theoretical understanding forward by three or four generations, we have to wait for the industrial base to catch up."