Earth Unaware (First Formic War)

Victor’s legs gave out completely. He buckled and crumpled to the ground. He tried pushing himself up with his arms but couldn’t. He lay there not moving while the officer attached an audio cable to his suit.
    “I need to see some identification,” said the officer.
    “I don’t have any. I’m a free miner.”
    “Space born, eh? Let me guess, you don’t have any docking authorization, either.”
    “I came here from the Kuiper Belt.”
    The officer looked amused. “On a quickship? Sure you did.”
    “You don’t believe me? Check the flight computer.”
    The officer ignored this, typing notes onto his pad. “So no permits, no papers, no entry codes, nothing.”
    “I need to speak with someone in charge.”
    “You need to speak with a lawyer, space born.”
    They carried him out to the rover and lifted him into the cargo trunk. Victor felt completely helpless—and to think this was only one-sixth of Earth gravity.
    The officer drove him to a medical facility, where nurses put him on a stretcher and gave him IV fluids and ten different vaccinations. When they finished, an officer in a different colored uniform entered and wire-strapped Victor’s wrists to the stretcher. It wasn’t until the man started reciting a litany of legal rights that Victor realized he had been arrested.

 
    CHAPTER 21
    Imala
    Imala Bootstamp wasn’t trying to get anyone fired at the Lunar Trade Department, but it sure felt good when she did. The culprit was one of the big uppity-ups, a senior auditor on the fifth floor who had been with the LTD for over thirty years. Imala, a mere junior assistant auditor with the agency, was so far down the totem pole that it took her a month to get anyone with authority to actually look at what she had found.
    She had tried going to her immediate boss, a perverted idiot named Pendergrass, whose eyes dropped to her chest whenever she was forced to bring anything to his attention. Pendergrass had only told her, “Get off the warpath, Imala. Put down your little tomahawk and focus on your job. Stop following tracks you shouldn’t be following.”
    Oh Pendergrass. You’re so, so clever. How witty of you to make reference to my Apache heritage.
    She had thought the world had outgrown racial insults—she certainly had never heard any growing up in Arizona. But then she had never known anyone like Pendergrass, either, who called her cubicle her “wigwam” and who would always make a circle with his mouth and tap it with his fingers whenever she passed him in the break room. She could have gone to HR and filed a complaint a long time ago, but the HR bimbo assigned to their floor was actually sleeping with Pendergrass—a fact Imala found both repulsive and sadly pathetic. Besides, Imala didn’t want anyone fighting her battles for her. When she felt the need to “go on the warpath,” she’d be swinging her own tomahawk, thank you very much.
    She couldn’t go to Pendergrass’s boss either. He was a pushover yes-man whose head was so far up his boss’s ass that he wore a kidney for a cap. All she’d get from him was a nice condescending lecture on the importance of following the chain of command. Then Kidney Cap would go to Pendergrass and give him an earful for not keeping his Apache on a short leash. And if that happened, Imala would have hell to pay with Pendergrass.
    So she did the slightly unethical yet wholly necessary next best thing: She lied her way into the director’s office.
    “Do you have an appointment to see Director Gardona?” asked the secretary, not looking up from her terminal.
    “Yes,” said Imala. “Karen O’Hara, Space Finance magazine. Here for the feature interview.”
    Imala felt ridiculous with her hair in a bun and dressed in such a fashionable jacket and slacks—which she had rented for the occasion—but she knew she needed to look the part. She wasn’t concerned about the secretary recognizing her. The agency employed hundreds of people, and all the grunts on the second floor where Imala worked never hobnobbed with anyone up here on the fifth. They didn’t even use the same entrances. It was like two neighboring countries whose borders were never crossed.
    Imala had tried a week ago to set an appointment with the director as herself, but as soon as the secretary had learned that she was a junior assistant auditor, the secretary referred her to her superiors and hung up on her. Nor could Imala get an e-mail or a call through. All of the