“Karl and I to start with, although I suspect others will be approached soon. As keen as Karl is on rockets, he’s no scientist. He will handle the business aspects of the program, and they want me to lead the technical side.”

“And the ultimate goal is to send a man into space?” I clarified, because this still seemed so unlikely I could barely believe my ears. The rockets Jürgen’s group experimented with weren’t just unreliable—they were toy sized.

“There’s a possibility that they have an ulterior motive.”

“What else could they possibly want them for?”

“Sofie. Think about the launches you’ve been to. Half the time, the rockets explode, don’t they?” I stared at him blankly, and he prompted, “They explode…just like a bomb. That’s an unfortunate side effect of the fuel’s volatility. But just imagine what they could do if we were to intentionally use them as explosive devices.”

To me they always seemed like dangerous toys, foolish toys. But in an instant, I understood that in the wrong hands, those “toys” could have a distinctly dark purpose. Jürgen’s friends were very careful when handling the rockets, but even so, from time to time someone suffered an injury. The best launch they had ever achieved stayed in the air for a full five minutes before it exploded, but it exploded nonetheless.

“You think they want to…weaponize them?”

“An attempt at reaching space makes some sense in terms of rebuilding our international reputation. Simply getting a device to the edge of the atmosphere would attract worldwide praise.”

“It would be incredible,” I whispered. “But is that possible?”

“With the right team and the right budget, I’m confident we could produce rockets capable of traveling many miles.”

“How many miles?”

I could almost see the cogs turning in his mind as he considered this. After a moment, he said, “The moon is 200,000 miles away, and although I still believe it can be done, I’m not convinced I’ll see it in my lifetime. The edge of space is around sixty miles… With enough money and a few decades of development, that’s likely possible. The problem is that even in designing a rocket that can travel sixty miles vertically, we’d have inadvertently designed an explosive device that could land far from its launch point.” At my blank look, he explained patiently, “Gravity is an immensely powerful force. They’d only need to develop ways to manage the angle of the fall so they could target the impact point. It’s a hideous thought, but a well-designed rocket could bomb countries some distance away, without requiring a pilot.”

“But we are prohibited from rearmament. Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. And exploding rockets…bombs…”