Free Mask by C.C. Kelly Page B

exactly should they be, ah – shooting at?” Vincent asked again using that special tone.
    “The terrorists, of course, the enemy combatants.”
    “And which ones, and please be specific, would those be?”
    Congressman Needly glared back and then leaned forward placing his palms on the table.  “The un-American ones.”
    Director Vincent smiled a rueful smile.  “And what makes a person un-American?”
    “Un-American, you know.  Anyone who isn’t a Christian, anyone who doesn’t believe in the Democracy of the Corporate Union and anyone who doesn’t believe in the Moral Sanctity of Washington and the Government of the United States of America — un-American!”   Needly caught his breath and leaned back in his chair and licked the spittle off of his fat lips.
    “What about un-American Americans?”   Director Vincent asked.
    “We have the camps up and running and the Behavior Modification Implant program is about to launch.  That’s another one of my projects.  Soon we won’t have any un-American Americans,” the congressman responded with a trifle too much enthusiasm, “That behavior modification implant has worked wonders on immigrant populations in the testing phase, turns them into red-blooded American Christians, in Jesus’ name it surely does!”
    The others stared at him, unimpressed and slightly sickened.
    “Yes, we know, we make them, remember?” Doctor Sorenson reminded.
    “Oh yes, right, you are a bunch of tricky bastards, I’ll give you that.”
    “Those implants were for accelerated education and environmental conditioning and adaptation for the Aquarius Project colonists.  We are not the bastards here!” Doctor Sorenson seethed.
    Director Vincent interrupted, “The scourge of questionable parentage aside, we’ll stick with the science here at Luna-Dyne and let our good friends in Washington concern themselves with the morality of the technology, fair enough?  So, detention camps and, ah – re-education notwithstanding – how do you propose we explain this notion of what an American is exactly, to a robot I mean?”
    “Aren’t they A.I.?  You just tell them.”
    “Artificial intelligence is an illusion, Mr. Needly, clever programming, nothing more.  The robots do not actually think for themselves like we do.  They are not sentient.  We have no way of programming a difference engine to allow a Gamma series robot to decide which humans to kill and exactly when to stop killing them.  We have no methodology under battlefield condition to program a robot to recognize a Christian or a non-combatant.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because, Mr. Needly, the notion is not possible.  I am afraid you will just have to take my word for it.”
    The congressman was not pleased, not because his idea was meeting with resistance, although that was enough to infuriate him, but more so because he was painfully aware that he was the only one in the room that didn’t understand what Director Vincent was trying to explain.
    “And I would like to go on record here and say that a robot with a thousand-year plus life span, a nearly indestructible chassis, ultra-advanced weapons technology and an order to kill humans is most assuredly an unpleasant idea of Biblical proportions.”
    “Ditto,” Doctor Sorenson agreed.
    The congressman looked at General Donahue who glanced away from his vid pad and nodded his assent.  The general knew his business all right, Needly thought and let the idea go.  And then his brow knit with another thought.
    “But what about Aquarius?” Needly asked.
    “You mean Project Ghost,” Doctor Sorenson corrected.
    “We’ll get to Ghost in a moment,” Vincent responded, “General, I would like to include a Beta Series as a command and control unit, a fail-safe for each Deca-Squad of Gammas.  The Betas, while not as effective and creative as the Gammas, are rock solid in the silo testing and are necessary, I feel, for the rather unpleasant business we are about to