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“Everyone recovered from the shock?” he asked.

“As much as we could have, I suppose,” Laura Dresser said before sipping from a drinking bulb full of black coffee. When she finished, she carefully returned the drinking bulb to its recess and reached for the magnetized fork beside her tray. “I still think we should go home through the stargate. The captain is correct that getting our news home the safest way possible is the only thing to do now. Still, I think we should worry about the impression we leave with the Voldar’ik. If they detect that we have not gone through the stargate, they are going to be very curious and word may get back to their masters. What do you suppose the Broa will do if they receive a report of a ship that left the system without transiting the stargate?”

“Besides,” Mikhail Vasloff said, “it will give you a chance to play with your toys.”

“There is that,” Laura agreed, nodding.

Buried in the
Ruptured Whale
’s hull was just about every sensing device ever invented by human beings.

They watched surrounding space continuously and fed the data to the three oversize computers in the cargo compartment. Traversing a stargate would be a bonanza for the scientific community back on Earth.

“It seems to me that the stargate is the linchpin to this entire problem,” Lisa said around a piece of toast with butter and strawberry topping. The others regarded her while she chewed the mouthful and swallowed. Mark noted that she had a thin line of yellow butter on her upper lip, thought about telling her, and then decided that it looked good on her.

“What?” Lisa asked as she noted the four sets of eyes on her.

“You are going to put out that statement and say no more?” Laura Dresser asked.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it? The Broa depend on their stargates for everything. They are the doorways to the stars, and he who has the keys to the doors has control of the house. In addition, the stargate makes it possible for the Sovereignty to be as large as it is. We could never build a million-star empire with our technology.”

“Why not?” Vasloff asked.

“Because it takes us time to go from Point A to Point B,” Lisa replied. “Look at the trip out here. It took us a year to get from Sol to the Crab Nebula. The Broa can do the same jump in no time at all. Sar-Say is right. Had we let him contact the Voldar’ik, it would have been over, even if we had escaped. By the time we rushed back to Earth, the Broan occupation force would have been in place for six months.”

“Which is why our only defense is to make sure they never have a hint as to our existence,” Vasloff said, nodding sagely. “As soon as they know we exist, it will be over too quickly for us to do anything about it.”

“Please, Mikhail,” Laura Dresser said. “We all know your opinion on the subject. Let us try to get through one breakfast without hearing it again.”

“Are you saying that I am wrong?”

“No. In fact, I cannot think of an alternative, but that conclusion depresses me and I do not want to spend the day holding back tears. Let us just sit here and drink our coffee in peace.”

“Too bad,” Lisa said.

“What’s too bad?” Bendagar asked.

“It's too bad we can't defend the solar system against star gates,” Lisa mused. “What we need is a fortress that blocks access to our system, like Gibraltar once guarded the entrance to the Mediterranean."

Suddenly, Mark knew what it was that he had been trying to remember for nearly a full day now. He was so surprised that he slammed his open palm down on the steel table. Everyone jumped at the explosion of noise. Even some of the crewmembers at other tables looked up.

“You scared me,” Lisa accused. “What was that for?”

Mark smiled. He avoided laughing. It would sound too much like that hysterical cackling he had emitted in the wardroom after Raoul Bendagar had called Sar-Say a “cheeky little bastard.”

“We don’t need a fortress to guard our system,” Mark said, in awe of the idea that had struck him like a punch to the stomach. “We already have one!”

“I beg your pardon,” Vasloff said.

“Your own words, Mikhail,” Mark replied. “To prevent the Broa from exterminating us, we need to make sure they never learn of our existence. Failing that, we must
keep them from finding out where we
live!
”

“What has this to do with a fortress?”

“Everything,” Mark said, warming to his subject. “So long as the Broa don’t know where to find Sol, they can’t attack us. Our anonymity is our best defense. It makes Earth as impregnable as The Rock ever was. Our armor lies not in millions of tons of hard stone overhead, or in tunnels drilled kilometers deep into mountains. Our armor lies in the fact that the Broa have no idea that we exist. Moreover, even if they become aware of humanity, they still will not know where in the galaxy to look for us. There are literally millions of stars that might be our home and they can’t very well search all of them.”

“Wasn’t that Mikhail’s point, namely that if we keep a low profile, there is a good chance they will overlook us?” Laura Dresser asked.

“Oh, I agree that we should hide from the Broa,” Mark said as a wild surge of hope jolted through his veins like a powerful drug. “But I don’t advocate keeping a low profile. I propose that we use our anonymity as a weapon. We work secretly to destabilize and destroy the Sovereignty. By the time they figure out that we exist, it will be too late. They will have too many problems at home to come looking for us.”

“Now I know you have gone insane,” Vasloff exclaimed. “We can no more fight a million stars than we can fight a supernova!”

“You can fight a supernova by being somewhere else when it goes off,” Mark retorted. “And we don’t have to fight a million stars. At best, we only have to fight a single planet, and at worst, a dozen planets.”

“I am sorry, but I missed something there,” Raoul Bendagar said.

“Look,” Mark said, “the Broa have problems already. Otherwise, their factions would not be sneaking around, ambushing each other in stargates. We all know that they are not the most prolific species in the universe. If they bred like rabbits, or even human beings, it would not be a decade or more between Broan visits to Klys’kra’t. They must have a home world, or at most a few worlds, where the bulk of them live. We seek out those worlds and target them.”

“You mean we attack the Broan home world?”

“Sure, why not? Cut off the head of the snake and the tail won’t bother you again.”

“Won’t that just infuriate them and ensure they exterminate us? After all, there will be a lot of Broa who survive any attack we make on their home planet.”

“Then we give them something to keep their minds busy. We destroy their hold over the subservient species. In fact, if we do that well enough, we won’t have to attack their home world. What is their power base?

“Their monopoly over the stargates, of course. What if a large number of stargates were simultaneously put out of action? With our own starships able to move at will among the Broan stars, we could destroy their economy and social system over large parts of their domain before they could figure out who was responsible. Better yet, think of the confusion if several key species suddenly started building ships with our kind of stardrives!”

“The Broa would go ape,” Lisa said with a smile, obviously unaware of the unintentional pun.

“You are suggesting that we start a revolution in the Sovereignty?” Vasloff asked.

“Why not? They are ripe for it. The Sovereignty is a pyramid with trillions of workers at the bottom and a few masters at the top. It is the sort of oligarchy that even Hitler and Stalin could not have thought up in their wildest dreams. Destroy enough stargates, disrupt their economy, hand out the secret of the stardrive wholesale, and the whole top-heavy structure will collapse of its own weight. I would bet my life on it.”

“That is precisely what you would be doing,” Vasloff replied. “Your life and the lives of every other human being in the galaxy.”

“An interesting idea,” Bendagar replied. “It will need a great deal of fleshing out before it becomes a plan, however.”

“Of course it needs fleshing out,” Mark said with a laugh. “I just thought it up over breakfast. It is not even an idea. It is a feeling. But unlike what Mikhail is advocating, it
feels
right.”

“That’s all you have? A feeling?” Vasloff screamed.

If Mark’s outburst had angered Vasloff, it had clearly intrigued the rest of his companions.

“Just how would we go about this plan of yours? What is our first step?” Laura Dresser asked.

“You will like it. Our first step is to leave this system via the stargate. We are going to need both stardrive and stargate if we are to pull this off. What better time to begin learning the technology than now?”

“What do we need stargates for?” Bendagar asked.

“If we are going to take on the Broa, we can’t spend a year in transit between their domain and our own.

We’ll need to set ourselves up in bases along the periphery of the Sovereignty, bases like we have on Brinks.”

Ever since Mark had begun explaining his idea, Lisa’s mind had been awhirl with the possibilities. Like most good ideas, this one was breathtakingly simple in concept, but would be maddeningly complex to execute. His excitement was contagious. “Mark is right,” she said. “We will need stargates of our own if we are to challenge the Broa, and not only to establish forward bases. We will need them to set up an insurance policy, in case we lose.”

“Insurance policy?”

Lisa nodded. “Despite our cleverness, the Broa may somehow find Earth. On that day, we will face a cruel choice. We can either surrender -- and likely be exterminated when they figure out who and what we are -- or we can fight, and likely be exterminated when they overwhelm us.”

“Not much of a choice,” an obviously disgusted Vasloff muttered. What had begun as a quiet breakfast had turned into a nightmare. Mark Rykand had sucked the others into his fantasy and the Russian could see no way to pull them back.

“There is always a choice, Mikhail. I admit that it would be a shame to lose dear, old Earth; but the possibility is real whether we oppose the Broa or knuckle under to them. Obviously, if we are to follow Mark’s plan, we need to take steps to ensure the survival of the species. To do that, we need stargates.”

“How so?”

“Far from pulling back and giving up our interstellar colonies, we need to search for Earthlike worlds far from the Sovereignty. Once we find such worlds, we have to keep their location a carefully guarded secret while we colonize them. We will be able to move millions of people through the gates with all of their equipment in the same time we could only move thousands via starship. It will not be cheap and it will not be efficient, but we need to make these ‘lifeboat’ colonies self-sufficient as quickly as possible.

That way, if the Broa destroy Earth, they won’t wipe out our entire species.”

“You speak rather blithely of the destruction of the Earth,” Laura Dresser said.

Lisa shrugged. “I am with Mark on this one. If we give in to our fears, we have no hope for the future. As it is, we toss the dice and take our chances. However, even if we lose, so long as a single unmolested human colony survives, we win. That is true whether we fight or whether we hide.”

Mark nodded. “I hadn’t thought of that, but you are right. My idea of using Brinks Base is also too limited. We are going to need at least a planet, and possibly several. That way we will not have to mount our operations directly from Earth. We can build shipyards and factories on our bases on the fringes of the Sovereignty. That way, even if they track us back to base, the home world will be protected.”

“A breathtaking plan,” Laura Dresser said. “But is it truly practical? Think of the cost.”

“Think of the cost if we do nothing,” he retorted. “No, it won’t be easy. It will require every erg of energy the human race has, but what other choice have we? We have the armor of our anonymity for defense. For offense, we have something far better than coastal batteries. We have the stardrive. Once we establish our bases on the Sovereignty’s perimeter, we will be able to move at will through their space. Our ships can drop sublight at the edges of their systems and spy on the Broa with impunity.

While our war fleet is building, we can search out their points of weakness. We can secretly gain allies and spread sedition in the form of stardrive technology. Once we find their home worlds, we attack with overwhelming force and surprise on our side, and with as many allies as we can muster. We’ll keep them too busy defending their own home worlds to have time to look for ours.”

Mark was out of breath as he finished detailing his plan for turning Earth into the galaxy's Rock of Gibraltar. He could tell by the others' looks that they are intrigued. Only Mikhail Vasloff looked unhappy.

However, Captain Landon had been correct the previous day when he said that there was no way for a few specialists aboard the
Ruptured Whale
could make such a weighty decision. Whether humanity would choose to hide or fight was something for the First Coordinator and Parliament to decide, and ultimately, for the ten billion people of Earth. It was their task to alert the public to the danger and to give them alternatives. No doubt, Mikhail Vasloff and the other members of
Terra Nostra
would see to it that their own view was well publicized. It would be interesting to see which course of action the public would choose; or indeed, if they would choose either.

“Well, it has the virtue of being audacious,” Laura Dresser said. “Let’s go find the captain and see what he thinks of it, especially the part about leaving this system through the stargate.”

#

Mark Rykand and Lisa Arden sat side by side in the darkened Astronomy cubicle and watched the approach to the Klys’kra’t stargate while they listened to the interplay on the bridge. They were currently in freefall, although the ship had undergone short bursts of acceleration for most of the past hour. The stargate, which had been invisible for most of the approach, had just come into view on the long-range scanners. The gate, which was half-lit by Orpheus’s rays, stood out in stark relief against the blackness of the void. It was a simple toroid, a thin featureless ring that looked as though it had slipped off some giant’s finger. The Ruptured Whale had shed most of its hyperbolic velocity during the approach. It was now moving slower than an aircar in the lower traffic lanes. In a few minutes, it would enter the gate and don seven-league boots. The next step they took would be to another star.