Earth Unaware (First Formic War)

with the free miner, and Lem thought it best to keep it that way.
    When Lem finished erasing files, he checked and rechecked the servers and backups to make sure he hadn’t missed anything. Then he ran a program that deleted any record of the erasing. The last step was patching up holes. There were now gaps in the video surveillance records, so Lem filled those in with random footage of space already on file. When he was done, every scrap of potentially incriminating evidence was gone.
    Lem pocketed his holopad and made his way to the exit. He had hoped that by erasing the files he would also erase the sting of guilt that had been pecking at him ever since the bump, but as he left the archives room, he felt as anxious as he had before. He shouldn’t have watched the video, he realized. If he hadn’t watched the video he could have maintained the possibility in his mind that the man wasn’t seriously injured. He could have led himself to believe that no lasting damage had been done. That wasn’t an option now.
    Why had the free miners been outside? It had been sleep-shift. You don’t spacewalk during sleep-shift. That was reckless. In fact, now that Lem thought about it, if the free miner was in fact paralyzed or dead, the free miner deserved more of the blame than Lem did. Well, perhaps not more of the blame but certainly a good portion of it. Lem shouldn’t carry all the blame.
    Besides, it’s not like Lem had hurt anyone intentionally. He hadn’t even known the men were out there. The free miners had been working on the far side of El Cavador, obscured from Lem’s view, when the attack—no, maneuver—began. And by the time the ship did detect them, the Makarhu was already moving and the laser-firing sequence was already initiated. Lem couldn’t stop it. Not easily anyway. It was only dumb luck that the first target was the PK near where the three miners were standing.
    And if you looked at the facts that way, if you chopped up the blame into portions, then part of the blame went to the free miner, part went to the computer, part went to dumb luck, and only a small part went to Lem. And even that portion shouldn’t be entirely Lem’s. It had been a group effort, after all. The crew was following Lem’s orders, true, but they could have objected, they could have said no.
    Someone had, Lem reminded himself. Benyawe. She had filed a formal objection. Had he erased that as well? He must have.
    He left the archives room and made his way to the mining bay to give credence to the lie he had told. Lem didn’t expect Podolski to investigate the matter—Podolski had no reason to disbelieve him. But what if Podolski mentioned in casual conversation to someone that Lem had been in the mining bay? No, it was best to play it safe.
    The mining bay was a large garage where all the digging and mineral-extraction equipment was housed. Normally a ship this size would employ forty to fifty miners, with twenty to twenty-five WDs—or wearable dozers, the large exoskeleton diggers that most corporate miners wore for cleaning out mineshafts and pulling up lumps. Since this was a research vessel at the moment, the mining crew consisted of only ten men, whose only duties for the trip were to collect rock fragments from the field tests for analysis. The miners had intended to use the scoopers for this, which were long-armed diggers that could extend out from the ship and grab rocks in space. But since the engineers had only conducted a single field test and had not even bothered to collect the rock fragments from said test, the miners were insane with boredom. Lem had alleviated that a week ago when he had gone to them and told them of his intent to pull in as many minerals from the asteroid as the ship could hold. It would require modifications to the equipment, but the men were so hungry for an assignment that they had readily accepted the challenge. Lem could say his visit tonight was to check up on their progress.
    To Lem’s relief, five of the miners were working in the bay when he arrived, including their crew chief, who was anchored to one of the scoopers, welding on large metal plates.
    “This is a surprise, Mr. Jukes,” said the crew chief, lifting his welding visor and turning off his equipment. “Early for you, isn’t it, sir?”
    “Couldn’t sleep. How goes the equipment for the mineral extraction?”
    The crew chief smiled and gave the scooper an affectionate slap with his palm. “We’re making good