Now fatigue bore me down till I had to stop and lean against a wall to rest. I began to wonder if I'd come on a fool's errand.
Then, close to the globeship's exit hatch, I glimpsed a narrow storage niche—a niche stacked high with neat oblong cases.
Fibrox transit boxes.
Involuntarily, my breathing quickened. Dragging down the nearest box, I ripped it open.
A folded paper fell to the floor: a cargo manifest.
I clawed it up ... fumbled it open with fingers numb and stiff as sticks.
And there was the stamp, the familiar scarlet label:
CLASSIFIED FEDGOV SECURITY SUPPLIES!
PORT INSPECTION FORBIDDEN
—The label that would permit these boxes to pass customs checks at any port on any planet, throughout FedGov Security's whole far-flung field of operations.