Earth Unaware (First Formic War)

time. We’ve got two scoopers prepped. Two more will be ready by the time we fire the glaser.”
    Lem had decided to wait a full week after arriving at the asteroid to fire the glaser. He wanted to give El Cavador enough time to get far enough away that they wouldn’t be able to see the field test take place. Lem could blow up a pebble and not arouse any curiosity, but if anyone saw him annihilate an asteroid this big, they’d know Juke had developed a revolutionary technology—a fact Father would rather keep secret.
    “We’ve turned the scoopers into giant magnets, sir,” explained the crew chief. “If what the engineers tell us is true, that glaser will blow the rock to dust. So to separate the detritus from the minerals, all we’ve got to do is wave a magnet through the dust cloud and let the magnet attract the metal fragments. Then we bring the scooper load into the smelter, switch off the magnets, dump the metal, then go back out and do it again. Pretty soon you’ll have metal cylinders all stacked up neat as you please, sir.”
    “How long will it take to bring in the metal?”
    The crew chief shrugged. “Depends on the size of the dust cloud and the amount of metal we find. Could be as quick as a week. Could be as long as eight. That’s really your decision, sir, we’ll keep making cylinders for as long as you want.”
    Lem thanked the man then went back to his room and zipped himself up in his hammock. He had two hours before sleep-shift ended, though he knew he wouldn’t fall asleep; the image of the free miner’s bent neck was too fresh in his mind. He might have erased the files and covered his tracks, but he couldn’t erase the memory of it. Lem lay there in silence. He knew he was deluding himself to think that anyone else bore the responsibility of what had happened. It was his crime, his doing. And no sneaking around in the dark could ever delete that fact.
    *   *   *
    A week after the bump, Lem was up in the observation room with Benyawe and Dublin, ready to fire the glaser. Lem was looking out the window at the asteroid, now a considerable distance from the ship.
    “You’re sure we’re far enough away?” asked Lem.
    “No question, Mr. Jukes,” said Dublin. “We’ve been working on the math all week. I went over it myself. The gravity field won’t reach us this far out. We’re already several kilometers farther out than we need to be. I’ve taken every precaution.”
    Lem nodded, though he couldn’t help but feel a bit uneasy. When the glaser hit the asteroid, it would create a field of centrifugal gravity inside of which gravity would cease to hold mass together. And the larger the object hit, the larger the field of gravity.
    “We can’t be too far away in my opinion,” said Lem. “Can we still hit the asteroid with accuracy if we back up, say, another five kilometers?”
    “We should be able to,” said Dublin. “But it’s overkill.”
    “I would rather commit overkill than be killed,” said Lem. He touched his holopad, and a holo of Chubs’s head appeared. “Back us up five more kilometers, Chubs.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “And give me the latest on our area scans. I want to be certain there aren’t any ships close enough to see what we’re about to do here.”
    “Rest easy, Lem,” said Chubs. “We’re all by our lonesome. El Cavador was closest, but they’re long gone now. We’re not even picking them up on our scans anymore.”
    “Good,” said Lem. “Then let’s get started. Send out the sensors.”
    “Sensors away,” said Chubs.
    Lem watched out the window as the sensors flew away from the ship in a burst of propulsion, heading toward the asteroid, a long anchor line unspooling behind each one. The sensors, once in position, would record every aspect of the explosion for later analysis.
    “Sensors are in place,” said Chubs.
    “Fire the glaser,” said Lem.
    “Yes, sir.”
    Lem clicked off his holopad and waited in silence with Benyawe and Dublin. After a moment it began. The asteroid exploded outward into large chunks, which quickly exploded again into smaller chunks, racing outward in a growing sphere of destruction. The large fragments continued to burst again and again, getting smaller and smaller, the cloud getting thicker, wider, more massive, moving outward with incredible speed. Now four times bigger than the original size of the asteroid. Five times. Six.
    “Hmm,” said Dublin.
    Eight times.
    Benyawe looked confused. “I