The Atlantic Ocean looked like liquid slate.
Jason Underwood stood at the railing of the RMS Olympic, gripping the freezing teak wood. The wind bit at his face, but he didn't go inside. Inside was champagne, victory toasts, and the suffocating weight of being Ezra Prentice.
He looked out at the dark water. A mile off the starboard bow, a destroyer cut through the waves.
It wasn't just a Navy ship. Below the Stars and Stripes, a second flag snapped in the wind. A blue flag with a white "S."
Standard Oil.
Jason took a drag of his cigarette. The smoke tasted bitter.
He had bought the German economy. He had stopped the Holocaust before it began. He had ended the Great War.
And in exchange, he had turned the United States military into his private security firm.
"You're shivering," a voice said.
Jason didn't turn. He knew the cadence of her steps. Sarah.
She leaned against the railing a few feet away. Close enough to talk, far enough to look like a stranger passing by. In the moonlight, she looked exhausted. The war had aged her. Her eyes held shadows that weren't there in 2025.
"They're calling you the King of Europe in the wireless room," Sarah said softly.
"Kings get beheaded, Sarah."
"You bought a country, Jason. Krupp. IG Farben. You own the chemical plants and the steel mills." She lowered her voice to a whisper. "You stopped the Nazis, but you created a monopoly that spans two continents. Do you think the world is just going to let you keep it?"
Jason flicked his cigarette into the abyss. "I didn't do it to keep it."
Sarah froze. She looked at him, searching his face.
"What does that mean?"
"I'm tired," Jason said. The confession felt heavy in his chest. "I'm tired of playing God. I'm tired of Alta checking the stock price before she kisses me good morning."
He glanced around the deck to ensure they were alone.
"I set up a blind trust in Princeton," he murmured. "The Institute for Advanced Study. It's insulated. Standard Oil legal can't touch it. I moved the physics patents there."
"The atom bomb research?" Sarah hissed.
"The energy research," he corrected. "And the money. Enough to disappear. Enough to live without looking over our shoulders."
Sarah's breath hitched. "You want to leave? You want to leave the Rockefellers?"
"I want to divorce the Empire," Jason said. "But I have to be smart. If I just walk away, Alta will destroy me. She'll have me committed to an asylum. I need to make them push me out."
"That's dangerous, Jason. Junior hates you. If you give him an opening—"
"I'm counting on it."
The heavy iron door to the first-class lounge swung open. Light and jazz music spilled onto the deck.
Alta Rockefeller Prentice stepped out.
She was wrapped in a fur coat that cost more than an average American earned in a lifetime. Her posture was rigid. Perfect. Predatory.
She looked at Jason, then slid her gaze to Sarah.
There was no jealousy in Alta's eyes. Only the cold irritation of a manager finding a janitor in the boardroom.
"Nurse," Alta said. Her voice was glass. "I believe the wounded in steerage are complaining of the damp. You should attend to them."
It wasn't a suggestion.
Sarah stiffened. She looked at Jason. He kept his face blank. He couldn't defend her. Not yet.
"Yes, Mrs. Prentice," Sarah said. She turned and walked away, head down, fading into the shadows.
Alta moved to the railing. She didn't touch Jason. She didn't ask how he was. She opened a silver cigarette case.
"We have a problem," she said.
"Junior?"
"The public." She handed him a folded piece of paper. A radiogram from the New York office.
Jason unfolded it. The text was short.
RIOT AT BATTERY PARK. EFFIGIES BURNED. PRESS CALLING IT 'THE KAISER'S MERGER.' SENATE THREATENING HEARINGS.
"They aren't cheering the peace treaty, Ezra," Alta said. She lit her cigarette, the flame illuminating her sharp cheekbones. "They think you sold out the American soldier to buy German factories. They're calling you a war profiteer."
"I saved the German economy from collapse," Jason said. "I prevented a second war."
"The mob doesn't care about your logic. They care that bread costs ten cents and you just bought Bavaria."
Alta exhaled smoke. She looked at the destroyer escorting them.
"I've authorized Gates's old crew to hire extra security for the docks," she said calmly. "Pinkertons. Maybe some of the Italian gangs. If the crowd tries to breach the perimeter, they will open fire."
Jason gripped the rail. "No shooting, Alta. We are not massacring civilians in New York Harbor."
Alta turned to him. Her eyes were voids.
"We are Standard Oil, Ezra. We do not let the rabble touch the merchandise. Fix the PR, or I will let the security teams handle it their way."
She turned and walked back inside. The door clicked shut.
Jason was alone with the ocean and the sickening realization that he wasn't the driver anymore. He was just the hood ornament on a tank.
The next morning, New York rose from the mist like a jagged set of teeth.
Jason stood on the bridge of the Olympic. The skyline had changed in the two years he'd been in Europe. It was taller. Darker.
To the left, the Statue of Liberty stood green and proud.
To the right, on the Jersey shore, a new smokestack belched thick black clouds into the sky. It was part of the Bayway Refinery expansion Jason had authorized.
The smokestack was higher than the torch.
The symbolism made his stomach turn. He had choked the sky to fuel the war.
"Captain," the first mate shouted. "Small craft approaching off the port bow!"
Jason looked down. A fishing trawler was cutting across the water toward the ocean liner. It wasn't an attack. It was a protest.
A banner hung from the mast: NO KINGS IN AMERICA. DOWN WITH PRENTICE.
Men on the boat were shouting, throwing rotten fruit at the hull of the massive ship.
"Ignore them," Jason said.
"Sir," the Captain said nervously. "Look."
A sleek speedboat, painted black, roared out from the Standard Oil docks. It didn't have police markings. It had a mounted water cannon and four men with shotguns.
"Stop them!" Jason yelled.
He was too late.
The security boat didn't slow down. It rammed the fishing trawler. Wood splintered with a sickening crunch. The protest boat capsized instantly, throwing the men into the freezing, oil-slicked harbor.
The security men didn't help them. They circled, pointing their shotguns at the heads bobbing in the water, daring them to swim closer.
Jason watched from the high tower. His hands were shaking.
This wasn't protection. It was intimidation.
"Welcome home, Mr. Prentice," the Captain said, sounding uneasy.
The Olympic groaned as tugboats guided it toward the pier.
Usually, a returning tycoon would be met with streamers and a brass band.
Today, the pier was silent.
A chain-link fence had been erected to hold back the crowd. Thousands of people stood there. They weren't cheering. They were staring.
They looked hungry. They looked angry.
In the center of the VIP area, a single black limousine waited.
Leaning against the car was a man in a pristine gray suit. He held a Bible under one arm and a bowler hat in his hand.
John D. Rockefeller Jr.
Junior looked up at the bridge. He locked eyes with Jason.
He didn't wave. He didn't smile.
He looked like a priest waiting to perform an exorcism.
Jason straightened his tie. He felt the phantom weight of the atomic secrets in his pocket.
The war in Europe was over. The war for his soul was just beginning.