Can Long Endure

The soldiers of the Colonial Defense Forces signed up to protect humanity from hostile aliens. Instead, Lieutenant Heather Lee and her squad keep being sent to put down human colonies that want to leave the Colonial Union. With Earth no longer sending recruits and the Union's ranks thinning, the missions grow harder to justify, and Lee begins to ask what she is really fighting for.

Can Long Endure is the third of the four novella episodes that make up John Scalzi's The End of All Things, the sixth book in the Old Man's War series. It follows The Human Division.