The world doesn’t end with a bomb. It ends with a whisper.

The General is walking toward a mobile command center. I adjust my aim. My finger is a hair’s breadth from the trigger.

I peer through the cracked scope of my rifle. Down the autobahn, a convoy of US Paladins sits dormant. They’re too clean. Too quiet. They’ve activated the Zero Hour ability: are inbound. I can hear the supersonic hum three minutes before they arrive. Stealth bombers that fly so fast they outrun their own sound.