Pent Up

Cormac Sterling went from playing empty Chicago bars to selling out Madison Square Garden, and then, on a dare from a late-night host, all the way to the White House as America’s first independent president since Washington.

In Niger, an Islamic State affiliate backed by the remnants of Wagner topples the junta, seizes the uranium mine that fuels France, and sends millions fleeing toward the Mediterranean.

Then the networks break. Satellites are hacked out of orbit, subsea cables are cut, and Russia pushes into an Arctic that America’s underfunded icebreaker fleet can barely reach.

In the South China Sea, a skirmish with Vietnam becomes a proxy war fought by millions of Chinese drones. With every crisis, the President’s cabinet must decide which defense projects Congress funds, and which it leaves behind.