He shrugged. “They’re willing to fold themselves completely into us,” he added, “or continue to operate, as long as they can base themselves on the moon. Our taxes are lower and our regulations pretty much non-existent.”
“It will do,” Steve said. The more businesses that had interests on the moon, the harder it would be for Earth-bound politicians to interfere with the settlers. “What about recruitment?”
“I will be going,” Romford said, shortly. His tone didn’t invite disagreement. “I’m building an army here, sir. I’m damned if I won’t lead it into battle.”
“Or at least some elements of it into battle,” Steve commented. The aliens hadn’t been too clear on what they actually wanted from their human mercenaries. Reading between the lines, Steve had a feeling they didn’t know themselves. “We still don’t know precisely what they want from us.”
“Shock troops, I suspect,” Romford said. “I’ve studied recordings of enemy cyborgs in action, Steve. They’re hard to kill — they’re amazingly durable — but apart from that there doesn’t seem to be much about them that an unaugmented soldier with intensive training couldn’t duplicate.”
Steve frowned. “Implanted weapons and neural links?”
“The former we can match with handheld weapons, the latter we may not need,” Romford disagreed. “They also don’t seem to be long-term thinkers. I suspect they’re programmed to be instinctive fighters, but not to think past the current battle. Which could cause us problems, sir. They don’t seem to have any concern about committing small atrocities.”
Steve winced. “And we will get the blame?”
“Perhaps,” Romford said. He looked thoughtful for a long moment. “Or at least we will be considered tainted. But how much freedom of choice do they actually have?”
“Maybe too much,” Steve said, remembering just how close he’d come to committing genocide. “Or maybe they’re just not programmed to give a damn about civilians in their way.”
The thought made him shudder. Someone who grew up in a brutal and ruthless society would probably become brutal and ruthless himself, but there would always be an element of free will. The cyborgs, on the other hand, might have certain fundamentals hardwired into their heads. They might not be able to question their orders, or hold doubts about the justice — or even the expediency — of mass slaughter of innocent civilians. Did that make them guilty? Or was it the aliens who bore the guilt? How could one blame a gun for firing when it was its user who pulled the trigger?
Didn’t stop people being afraid of guns, he thought, cynically. Or trying to ban them… and hanging out their own people for slaughter.
Romford cleared his throat. “We have two thousand volunteers so far from people who applied to join the lunar society,” he said. “Charles has sent out a general request to the other people waiting in line, with the promise of lunar citizenship for them and their families if they accept. Quite a few old-timers have accepted in exchange for rejuvenation treatments, so I’ve authorised them. I’ve limited recruitment to Americans, so far, but I would like to change for the second batch. There are quite a few potential recruits in other NATO countries. After that…”
He shrugged. “We’ll have to start inviting Russian, Chinese and Indian soldiers,” he added. “And probably soldiers from quite a few other countries. There will be problems.”
“I know,” Steve said.
“But we’re not the UN,” Romford concluded. “Anyone who causes minor problems will be booted out — and sent back home, if they have been real assholes. And anyone who breaks the ROE will be interrogated, then summarily shot if they fucked up badly enough.”
“Just make sure you devise a sensible set of ROE,” Steve advised.
“The aliens might devise them for us,” Romford said. “But as long as we have a say in the decision, we shouldn’t have a problem.”
Steve nodded. “Keep me informed,” he ordered. “I want to know about any problems as soon as they appear.”
“Understood,” Romford said.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Heinlein Colony, Luna
“You do realise,” Kevin said, “that this is still quite distressing.”
Steve looked unsurprised. He’d grown up a little in the last few weeks, Kevin noted, even though he was still being far too casual about his decisions. But at least this would — should — cause fewer immediate problems. The nanotech had hunted down North Korea’s stockpile of nuclear warheads and casually disarmed them. It would take a careful inspection to reveal there was a problem and, somehow, Kevin doubted the North Koreans would dare to report any problems if they found them. The Dearest Leader was far too fond of lopping off his subjects heads for them to dare to face him with bad news.
Idiot, he thought, as he stood up. If you kill the messenger, the only thing you get is less mail.
“But it’s done,” Kevin said. “The North Koreans will be unable to fire nukes in all directions, should war break out.”
The President had been right, he’d decided, after catching up with the torrent of information from Earth. North Korea was starving, there were threats of revolution and the Chinese were completely distracted. Why wouldn’t the Dearest Leader gamble? Better to go out in fire than be torn apart by one’s own people. But now, between the nanotech and the handful of automated weapons platforms deployed to a position over North Korea, any major offensive across the DMZ would become a squib.
And countless North Koreans will die because of their leader’s madness, he thought. It would be simple, almost too simple, to remove the Dearest Leader too. But it would almost certainly result in outright civil war and hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing into the south. It could not be risked until war actually broke out. At that point, the Dearest Leader’s lifespan would be numbered in seconds.
He smiled, then led Steve through the network of corridors into the small factory complex. Building it up had required the dedicated use of four shuttles — and he was so glad they’d been able to obtain more shuttles on Ying — but it had been completely worthwhile. Now, they could start putting together a handful of nasty surprises for the next Hordesmen to come calling at Earth.
The nuclear techs looked up from their work, then nodded. Most of them had worked for the American government in one role or another, before being invited to come to the moon as part of the joint weapons research program. Not all of them were lunar citizens — they were still loyal to the United States — but as long as they worked on joint defence, no one actually minded. Besides, the more people involved in the theoretical part of the program, the greatest the chance of a significant development.
“These were backpack nukes,” Doctor Quinn said. He was younger than Kevin had expected a nuclear scientist to be, with a face that was surprisingly handsome. Some of his female research assistants were absolutely stunning. “Thanks to our modifications, they’re now bomb-pumped lasers.”
“Excellent work,” Steve said. “How do you propose we use them?”
“At the moment, I was going to suggest using them in minefields,” Quinn explained. “Our missiles are nowhere near as capable as Galactic-level weapons… and even Galactic missiles are slow, compared to point defence systems. We would need to lure the enemy towards the mines, rather than anything else.”
He paused. “The good news is that we can start mass-producing these weapons very soon,” he added. “And, with a little reprogramming, the fabricators can actually turn out the nukes.”