The situation room emptied slowly, each general and advisor departing with the measured steps of men afraid to turn their backs.
Roosevelt did not dismiss them with words, only a curt wave of his hand, a gesture sharp enough to cut conversation short.
When the final door clicked shut, silence swallowed the room.
Roosevelt remained still for several seconds, his knuckles white on the armrests of his wheelchair.
The dim light cast long shadows across the scattered reports, cables, intercepted communications, and intelligence summaries spread across the table.
The projector, left on, flickered with the last image it had shown: a burning U.S. tank in Sicily, its turret torn open like the shell of a crab.
He stared at it as if the machine itself had personally betrayed him.
Then he spoke, barely audible.
"…1905."
The word trembled.
Roosevelt turned another page of the confiscated financial reports, his eyes frozen on the date stamped in bold ink at the top: 1905.
