“I understand,” Steve said. “Just don't tell me you want to open a McDonald’s franchise up here.”
“It would be better than the crap from the food processors,” Rochester pointed out. Steve had his doubts, but held his tongue. “But I was thinking more of someone experienced in operating a small eatery, rather than a fast food place. Hell, get three or four of them and let them compete for customers. Of course, we’ll need a monetary system first ...”
He eyed Steve expectantly. “At the moment, we’re effectively operating a system where people work and we take care of them,” he said. “Alarmingly like communism, really. But that is going to have to change.”
“Another headache,” Steve admitted. He rubbed the side of his forehead, then nodded. “Perhaps we should just pay everyone in American dollars. Or gold.”
He smiled. His father had always gone on and on about the value of gold, but Steve knew that gold’s value depended upon having someone willing and able to purchase it. Gold would work, he suspected, if it were sold down on Earth, but if the bottom dropped out of the market there would be a colossal economic disaster.
“I was thinking a kind of Lunar Credit,” Rochester said. “We could pin it to the dollar, for now, but we don’t want something that is pegged by forces outside our control. That almost fucked Greece.”
Steve nodded. If nothing else, the economic troubles in Greece meant that the country had plenty of young men and women willing to emigrate to find work. He was sure that, once the public announcement was made, hundreds of thousands of them would apply to join the growing colony. The only difficulty would be training programs and those were just a matter of time. As the colony expanded, experienced men could start training inexperienced men, who would then train newcomers in turn.
And, as they set up more homes below the lunar surface, there would be room for people who didn't want to live on Earth, but couldn't work on the moon.
“I’ll work on that, along with a constitution,” he said. “Have you had any major trouble just yet?”
Rochester scowled. “One idiot with more initiative than common sense built himself a still and nearly poisoned a couple of workers with bootleg alcohol,” he said. “I clobbered him, then put the idiot on punishment duty for a couple of weeks. But we will probably face something more serious later on, as we keep expanding. We need some kind of law, sir, rather than just my fists.”
He waved a cyborg arm under Steve’s nose. “That could be very dangerous in the future.”
“It will be done,” Steve said. “Somehow.”
He shook his head. He’d seen more than a few attempts to rewrite the constitution or devise a completely new one, but they were either simplistic or excessively detailed, full of ifs, buts and exceptions. There were people who wanted to restrict the franchise to those who had served a term in the military and people who thought that only those who paid tax should vote. Both ideas sounded reasonable, but they had flaws that would become disastrous if the system suffered a serious breakdown.
And most of the other ideas boiled down to I should get a vote. Here is the list of people who shouldn't get a vote.
“Good luck,” Rochester said. He paused. “For the moment, we’re largely operating under Queen’s Regulations, with some exceptions for off-duty hours. But that will have to be clarified soon.”
Steve nodded, tiredly.
“Markus Wilhelm was talking about moving his factories up here, as soon as we have cleared space for them,” Rochester continued. “I imagine that other corporations will want to follow suit, particularly if our regulations are nowhere near as tight as the States. But that will cause problems too. What happens if we don’t over-regulate and we have an industrial accident?”
“All right, all right,” Steve said. He held up his hands in mock surrender. “You’ve made your point. I’ll speak to the alien, then go back to the ship and start working on a constitution. And then Kevin and Mongo can read through it and decide what they think of it. How long did it take the Founding Fathers to draft the constitution?”
“Around one hundred days, but it depends on just what you use as the starting point,” Rochester said. “Just try and keep the lawyers out of it. We don’t want a monstrosity like the European Constitution.”
Steve nodded. The Constitutional Convention had included lawyers – or at least people trained in the law – but they’d also been statesmen. He wouldn't have trusted any modern-day lawyer to draw up a Constitution to govern a kids playground, let alone an actual country. Hell, perhaps they should have a law banning lawyers from government altogether ...
“We’ll make it happen,” he said. Had Washington and Franklin felt so tired, even as their work came to fruition? “Somehow, it will happen.”
***
Cn!lss had fallen in love with the human laptop as soon as it had been gifted to him by one of the humans charged with watching him. It was clunky, compared to some of the computers he’d seen when he’d been trying to study Galactic technology, but it was also remarkably simple. He’d read through countless files on humanity, researched aspects that puzzled him ... and discovered that humans seemed to like nude photographs of themselves. When he’d asked, his guards had muttered something about human sexuality and changed the subject.
The more he studied humanity, the more impressed he became. Humans were ... odd, both a technological race and yet a divided race. Almost every Galactic power had unified their homeworlds before reaching out into space or shortly afterwards, when they discovered that they weren't alone in the galaxy. Even the Hordes had an overarching structure, although it was more symbolic than real. No Horde would happily accept the domination of another Horde indefinitely.
But humanity ... they'd come so far, despite so many different attitudes and cultures. Human religion was a strange mixture, utterly beyond his comprehension, while human government perplexed him. There were societies that reminded him of the Hordes – and yet they were technological – while there were others he simply couldn't understand. What sort of ruling family ruled indefinitely? What sort of society operated by giving everyone, strong and weak, a vote? Half the time, he would read one website and then discover that the next website contradicted it. If he believed all he read, the human race was in a permanent state of civil war.
He looked up when the door opened, revealing the human commander. Cn!lss pulled himself to his feet, then slipped into the Posture of Respect. Maybe the humans didn't really expect him to prostrate himself, but there was no point in taking chances. He hadn't seen any of the humans beheaded by their superiors, yet even the most brutish Horde Commander tried to keep such discipline away from Galactic eyes. After all, they might disapprove and suggest trade sanctions on the Hordes.
“Greetings,” the human said. As always, it was hard to read emotion on the alien face. They simply didn't have anything like the Horde’s range of expressions. “Two more of your ships have been captured.”
Cn!lss wasn't sure how he felt about two more ships falling into human hands. On one claw, two more Horde Commanders had been humiliated – and he hated his superiors with a passion he couldn't have hoped to convey to his human captors. But on the other claw, it suggested that the humans were steadily growing more and more powerful ... and, combined with their technological inventiveness, would soon be in a position to leave their star system and wage war on the Hordes. Would his entire people be exterminated?
“Good,” he said, finally. At least it didn't seem as if the humans would commit genocide against the Hordes. “Did you take prisoners?”
“Most of the crews,” the human said. “Do you wish to speak with them?”
“No,” Cn!lss said, hastily. “They would reject me as a traitor.”
“I expected as much,” the human said. “Our sociologists will wish to discuss them with you later.”
“I have nothing to add,” Cn!lss warned.
“We will see,” the human said. “And there is a second issue we
would like to raise with you.”
Cn!lss waited, expectantly.
“We will be sending a trade mission to the nearest settled star,” the human said. “What do you think we could offer them?”
Cn!lss considered it. The nearest settled star to Earth, as far as he knew, was a multiracial colony on the end of a dangling chain of gravity points. There was almost no form of overall government, merely dozens of small settlements on the planet’s surface and asteroid belts. Indeed, it was commonly believed that, sooner or later, one of the larger galactic powers would eventually swallow it up. But, for the moment, its political insignificance was incredibly useful to the shadier sides of galactic society.
“Guns,” he said, finally. “And probably quite a few other things, if you give me some time to consider it. Or you could sell slaves.”
The human made a spluttering noise. “As nice as the idea of selling the” – he spoke a word the translator refused to handle – “into slavery is, I think it would be a very bad idea.”
“That may well be true,” Cn!lss agreed, reluctantly. Given the use some humans were put to by outside powers, they’d probably be reluctant to let more humans out of their control. “I think you could also offer mercenary groups. They are big business on the edge of galactic society.”
“We might have to do just that,” the human said. “I wonder what” – another untranslatable word – “would make of it.”
“Much of your technology is primitive, but so are many of the races along the edge of society,” Cn!lss offered. “It’s quite possible that they would be happy to buy technology from you, even though it isn't the best in the galaxy.”
“That would probably be a good idea,” the human said. “Anything else?”
“Rare metals would be useful,” Cn!lss offered. “But I don’t know what else.”
He paused. “And you would have to be careful. The other Hordes might realise you’re flying one of their starships.”
The human made the gesture he had come to realise meant agreement. “It’s a problem,” he agreed. “One final question, then. Would you be willing to accompany the mission as an advisor and native guide?”
Cn!lss hesitated. He was being trusted? The Subhorde Commander had never trusted him, not after he had studied the Galactics. Why, he might have been secretly intent on subverting the Horde and destroying its way of life! One word out of place and he would have been beheaded on the spot. But the humans were prepared to trust him?
“If you will have me, I will happily come,” he said. How could he refuse the chance to show his loyalty? “And I will be very useful.”
“Good,” the human said. “My people will speak to you soon.”
He turned and left the cell, closing the hatch behind him.
Chapter Seventeen
Washington DC, USA
The world had changed. Gunter Dawlish knew it, even though he could never have put the feeling into words. It was as if something was just lurking under the world’s collective awareness, something big enough to leave hints of its presence even as it remained unseen. He knew it was there. But what was it?
He’d spent long enough as an embedded reporter to know when he was being fed a line of bullshit. Hell, his report suggesting that some kind of new weapons system had been deployed against the Taliban-held town had earned him some more enemies in official Washington. But the next set of reports were even stranger. The Taliban leadership had started dying in large numbers.
There was always someone, he knew, who had pulled the trigger. It was a media age, after all, and few things remained secret indefinitely. If a weapon was fired, someone had to have fired it and that person would want his ten minutes of fame. Hell, several of the SEALs who had gone after Bin Laden and killed him had talked, within the year. But there was no one talking about the sudden drop in Taliban leadership.
It puzzled him. If drones had been deployed in such vast numbers, there would have been an outcry from the Pakistanis. Gunter knew better than to believe the Pakistani Government gave a damn about women and children killed in the northern parts of their deeply divided country, but they would have to make a public statement just to avoid more unrest. But they’d said nothing ... and nor had anyone flying the drones. Or had the SEALs been sent over the border to slaughter their way through the Taliban leadership? It was a heartening thought, a display of nerve he’d thought missing from the President’s administration, but as far as he could tell no one had been placed on alert.
He finally passed through the TSA checkpoint – they always paid close attention to anyone coming back from Afghanistan and the Middle East – and headed for the taxi rack. The driver chatted endlessly about the latest baseball statistics as Gunter opened his laptop and skimmed his emails. As always, there were a hundred pieces of junk for every tip he received from his sources. Being a reporter meant that everyone and their dog felt they could feed him a line, whenever they felt like it. But he still went through every email. Watergate had started as a minor break-in, after all. Who knew where the next story of the century would come from?
He’d made it his business to cultivate relationships with a number of military officers in various positions, providing advice on handling the press and keeping them calm. In exchange, they sometimes fed him tips, although nothing classified. Asking for classified information was a good way to lose a contact altogether; they might not report him to anyone, but they certainly wouldn't want to risk their careers any further. After Snowden, the White House and the Pentagon had become more than a little paranoid over unauthorised leakers in senior positions. It was ironic – most of the leaks in Washington came out of the bureaucracy, trying to sway political opinion one way or the other – but unsurprising.
Four of his contacts claimed – and, with collaboration, he believed them – that a covert military alert had been called a day ago. Military bases across the United States had rushed to full alert status, recalling troops, launching aircraft and generally preparing for war. It looked like some kind of exercise – God knew that the military had been caught on the hop before – but if so, his contacts noted, there hadn't been a single whisper that it was coming from higher up. And there was always a tip-off from higher authority ...
“Here you are, man,” the driver said. “Long flight?”
“Very long,” Gunter said, as he closed the laptop. He’d stopped telling people he was flying from Afghanistan after several of them had eyed him suspiciously for the rest of the drive. “Thank you for the ride.”
He paid, then climbed out of the cab and walked up to his house. It was in one of the better parts of Washington, a gated community with a very effective security service. Part of him disliked the idea of having to hide behind a wire fence and armed guards, but there was little choice. Crime in Washington had been on the rise for years, with the police seemingly helpless to do anything about it. And there was almost no crime within the community. The owners screened all their new residents, ensuring that children could play in the streets freely without fear. Shaking his head, he opened the door and stepped inside, looking longingly at his bed. It still felt like late night in his head.
Instead, he sat down at his desk and continued going through his emails. Several more had arrived while he'd been paying the driver, including one odd report of a series of high-energy bursts in outer space, alarmingly close to the planet. From what his source said, civilian astronomers were going berserk trying to understand what had happened. Was it a solar flare or something like it ... or was it unnatural as hell? Gunter looked down at the dates and shivered, suddenly, as realisation struck him. The event in outer space matched the date and time of the unscheduled military alert.
But was there something really there? Carefully, he started to look though the rest of his files, all the tips shared between independent reporters who couldn't call on the vast resources and influence of the Mainstream Media. Over the last week, stocks and shares in companies that produced space hardware ha
d risen, sharply. Someone was apparently buying enough of their produce to ensure their shares rose quite significantly. But who? NASA wasn't doing anything, as far as he could tell, and even the military space program had been cut back sharply. Or was there a program so secret that most government officials didn't know a thing about it?
There had been one odd whisper from a friend in Afghanistan. Apparently – and it could easily have been rumour – there had been a new black ops team inserted into the country from an unknown nation. And yet they’d had near-complete access to American intelligence and resources, something not offered to any nation. Maybe they’d been an American team, so secret that they’d been mistaken for foreigners, or maybe there was something else going on. Were they connected with the Taliban deaths?
Shaking his head, wondering if it was all the result of jet-lag and tiredness, he started to try to put the pieces together. But none of the results he got seemed to make sense.
***
The President looked haggard, Jürgen realised, as he stepped into the Oval Office. He had spent an uncomfortable night in the bunker underneath the White House while his wife and children were whisked away to an highly-classified location. Behind him, Craig Henderson looked concerned. He didn't think much of the President – Jürgen could read his body language, even if his voice was nothing but respectful – but he was still their Commander-in-Chief. And he’d spent the night wondering if Earth was on the verge of being destroyed.
A Learning Experience Page 17