Earth Awakens (The First Formic War 3)

"That's what an applicant does. She applies. She gets interviewed. Hopefully she gets a job."

"You want the job?"

"This isn't a difficult concept to grasp, Vico. You're offering a job. I need a job."

"Yes, but ... you want to come?"

"I wouldn't be here if I didn't want to come, Vico."

"But I'm going to the Belt, Imala. That's far out there."

"I know how far it is. We went once before, remember?"

"I'll be going much farther than that, Imala. And once we get out there, it won't be easy to get back. This isn't auditing. This isn't a desk job. It's mining."

"You think I can only handle desk jobs?"

"No, of course not. You can do anything. That's my point. This is grunt work. You've got a college degree, real-world experience. A reference from Lem, and you could work wherever you wanted. Luna, Earth. The International Fleet would take you in a hot second. The Hegemony would as well if anyone other than Ukko Jukes was running the show."

"So you don't want me to come?"

"Of course I want you to come. But ... I can't ask that of you. You have a future, Imala. The Belt is the last place in the system to find opportunities."

"Maybe I don't want opportunities, Vico. Maybe I want something else."

He was quiet a moment. "What do you want, Imala?"

"To be happy, Vico. I want to be happy."

*

They left three days later on a cargo ship. Victor didn't end up hiring anyone other than Imala. He'd wait until they reached the Belt, where he might find better applicants. Or perhaps Imala was right. Maybe he didn't need to hire anyone else. Maybe he and Imala and the women of El Cavador could do it all.

"Arjuna has crewmen as well," Imala told him. "This is a partnership, remember? He'll want to invest laborers, too."

Victor frowned. "I still can't get used to that idea. These people aren't my family."

"No, but they took your family in. That counts for something."

One week into the trip, the captain came to call on them. "Mr. Delgado, Ms. Bootstamp, would you please follow me to the cargo hold?"

Victor and Imala exchanged glances and flew with the captain to the hold. "I'm instructed to give you this holo," said the captain, handing Victor a holopad.

"From who?" asked Victor.

The captain smiled and flew off, leaving them alone. The hold was brimming with equipment. All of the bays were packed tight with parts and supplies. Victor turned on the holofield, and Lem Jukes's head appeared. "Hello, Victor. By the time you get this message, you'll be a week into your voyage. I'm not one for longwinded apologies, or any type of apology for that matter, but I owe you one. You and Imala both. I wasn't always as honest or forthcoming as I should have been. I know you still harbor some deep resentment toward me, and I can't say I blame you. Some of my decisions have been inexcusable. I can't make up for those mistakes, but what I can do I will. You will find on this ship everything you and your family needs to retrofit your mother's salvage ship. The captain has a full inventory. I made it as comprehensive as I could. Giving you a completely new mining ship would have been less expensive, but knowing you, I worried you might not take it. So don't salvage crappy parts from derelict ships. That's a recipe for disaster. Take these new ones and save yourself a lot of heartache. You can still have the pleasure of installing them all yourself. And since they're already loaded and you can't turn back, you have no choice but to take them. You'll find quickships, two A-class lasers, suits, helmets, wearable diggers, smelters, hand tools, nav equipment. You're pretty much set for life. If you're going to do this, you might as well do it right. Best of luck."

The message ended. Lem's head winked out. Victor stared at the empty holofield for a long moment. Then he looked up at Imala and began to laugh.

Epilogue

Edimar sat at the bay window of the Gagak and went over the data a final time. She checked and rechecked, calculated and recalculated. Then, when she was certain there were no errors, she went to the helm to find Rena.

The past several weeks had been hectic. Now that the war was over, pirates that had gone dormant were now out in full force. Or maybe they never had gone dormant. Maybe they had continued to raid ships all this time, and it was only because of the interference that nothing had been reported. Either way, a day didn't go by without another report or two coming in. Families killed, ships stripped and gutted. The most notorious of these was a vulture named Khalid. He was a Somali, like Arjuna, and the two of them had some history, though Edimar had never been brave enough to ask what.

Rena had implored Arjuna to increase the ship's shielding, and the two of them had had a rather heated discussion on the subject in the corridor. Rena had suggested adding more metal plates to the hull.

"And where am I to find these