by Mike Resnick
“And what's wrong with having Deluros slumber on while we go for its throat?” asked one of his subcommanders.
“Because, ironic as it seems,” said Grath, “a slumbering Deluros is impregnable. The only way we can get within striking distance is to lure the Navy out from the core of the Oligarchy. If they fear us, if they mobilize the bulk of their forces, then we've got a chance. The trick is never to let them know our true size and strength, to make them nervous enough to seek us out but not smart enough to realize that we've got almost half a million ships.”
He paused, looking slowly about the table. “In order to accomplish this, we shall make a massive strike
upon Altair VII.”
“You certainly don't believe in easy objectives, do you?” said an aide. “There are a million easy objectives in this galaxy,” replied Grath, “and not one of them—or all of them put together, for that matter—would do us the slightest bit of good. The Oligarchy controls almost two million worlds; they control five-sixths of the galaxy's economy and they have a Navy of more than fifty million warships with an average crew of two hundred men per ship, not to mention billions of other soldiers and mercenaries on those planets that are under martial control. To make any kind of dent in the Oligarchy at all, we've got to hit something big, something vital. Do you think they really give a damn about what we do here on the Rim? We're so far away from the core of things that we don't even count as a minor irritant yet. We've wasted enough time seeking after loot; if we're ever to achieve empire, we're going to have to get on with it. Time is our greatest enemy. It's a big galaxy, big enough to take even our fastest ship more than a year to cross it unopposed. To cross it when we're outnumbered by more than a hundred to one, when we have precious little ability or opportunity to replace ships or men ... that, gentlemen, is the situation. We're going to have to do in a handful of years what is rightfully a task for generations. And we shall begin,” he concluded, “with Altair VII.” Altair VII was the political and economic center of an area almost 725 light-years across. It was the farthest from Deluros VIII of all the major Oligarchic worlds, and hence was the coordinating ruling body of tens of thousands of frontier worlds reaching out to the Rim. As such, it was considered to be of vital importance in the Oligarchy's scheme of things, and merited a fleet of almost 35,000 Navy ships for its protection (and its occasional forays against insubordinate frontier worlds). Altair VII held very little strategic value to any military force other than the Oligarchy itself. It was too far from Deluros VIII to make a useful base of operations, and it required three farming worlds to supply it with its needs. Its sole value lay in its complex and highly efficient bureaucracy. Almost six billion humans, practically all of them employed by the government in one form or another, worked in the huge, endless, glass-enclosed buildings, living out their lives amid file cabinets, computers, and fear of demotion or termination.
And yet power lay here too, the power to move unruly worlds into line, to expand Man's domination to a planet here or a system there; and, unstated but never forgotten, there was the greatest power of all—that of the Oligarchy.
The battle of the Altair system was brief, as space battles went in those days. Grath had made his plans well, feeding the coordinates of the star, its capital planet, and every ship of his own armada into scores of computers. Distances were established, times computed, the minute curvature of space accounted for, and eventually flight plans were programmed into every vessel. They did not all take off at once, nor at the same speed, nor even in the same direction. But each was programmed to reach the Altair system within seconds of all the others.
To the naked eye, the arrival of Grath's fleet would have seemed like magic: one instant the system was empty, the next it was alive with almost half a million ships braking to sub-light speeds. But the technology of spatial conflict had long since ceased to rely on the naked eye, and the Oligarchy's Navy was not totally unprepared.
A number of Garth's ships overshot the Altair system by light-years, some plunged into the sun, and a few crashed into the largest of the system's sixteen planets. But the bulk of the fleet arrived when and where they were supposed to, and after a brief flurry which saw relatively heavy casualties on both sides,
the battle settled down—as such battles usually do—to a series of manipulations, englobements,
three-dimensional phalanxes, and all the complex military formations that the most sophisticated computers and minds in the galaxy could conceive. It took almost three weeks, weeks of long and intricate maneuverings broken by short, unbelievably violent clashes. At the end of it, Altair VII, and indeed the entire Altair system, was Grath's. It had cost him twenty-one days and 46,000 ships. He spent the next few months regrouping his forces, reestablishing what meager supply lines he had created, and waiting for a reaction from the Oligarchy. There was none. “Our next target,” he announced one evening, “is Valleux II. It's a mining world specializing in platinum, and it's about a thousand light-years closer to the core than Altair. Also, I've decided to give up our Rim bases for good.”
“But why?” asked an aide. “We're almost impregnable here.” “Precisely,” said Grath. “It's possible they felt we had some grievance against Altair, but once we hit Valleux they'll know we mean business. Now, if I were commanding the Navy, my first thought would be to contain my enemy until I knew the size and strength of his forces and could mobilize against him; and the most obvious place to contain him would be on the farthest reaches of the Rim, where he feels least vulnerable. Also, if I knew his base, I could decimate him every time he returned from a strike. No, gentlemen, from this day forth, until we land on Deluros VIII itself, our only base will be our armada. And now,” he concluded, “I think it's about time to check with the computers and coordinate our attack on Valleux.”
The Navy forces protecting Valleux II were considerably smaller than those that had been in the Altair system, and the battle, though furious on both sides, didn't last as long. Counting the regrouping interim, Valleux II cost Grath 126 days and 12,450 ships. In rapid order his forces took Ballion X, Hesperite III, and Quantos IX. They cost him 152 days and 16,050 ships.
He made one last major strike, overrunning the entire Belore system, at the expense of 93 days and 22,430 ships.
And still there was no response from the Oligarchy. “And yet, why should there be?'’ he mused, half to himself, at a conference aboard his flagship. “What were their losses? Absolutely minimal, compared to what they possess. Even with Altair and Belore in our pocket, I'll bet we're still so unimportant that no one's even bothered to tell the seven Oligarchs about us yet. The galaxy's so damned big and we're so damned little...” He looked up.
“Gentlemen, none of us is getting any younger. We've proved ourselves in battle, and I now propose that we go after a target so important that they'llhave to react to it: the Spica mining worlds.” His subordinates were unhappy, as he knew they would be. Altair and Belore were one thing, but Spica
... It was protected by a fleet as large as their own, and was so deep into the Oligarchic empire that there
could be no clear, easy line of retreat in any direction. On the other hand, Spica VI was a ship-building world, and to continue the war (which, each acknowledged grimly, had not yet even been noticed, let alone joined, by the opposing side) they needed ships above all else. The Battle of Spica was the bloodiest ever fought in space, before or since. At long and weary last, Grath emerged with what the history books termed a victory. He knew better. It had cost him 495 days, and 360,450 ships. And it cost him more than that. He spent almost four years waiting while the huge plants on Spica VI rebuilt his fleet. In the meantime he returned to piracy, though his loot now consisted of weaponry and ships rather than credits and gemstones. His hair was streaked with gray now, the firm lines of his face more deeply emblazoned. Once again he held a conference of the various warlords, and once again found unity and the dream of Empire beyond them. His original master plan had called for
a feint toward Earth while the main body of his forces attacked Sirius, but there was no need to feint. Earth was unguarded, sleeping sublimely as the business of the race to which it had given birth went on unbothered half a galaxy away. It was a totally bloodless coup, but it cost him 200 more days ... 150 to change the feint into a conquest, and 50 to reunite his armada for the attack on Sirius.
And finally it happened. Sirius was too vital to the Oligarchy, too close to the heart of things, to be lost. As the maneuvering and battling reached their sixth indecisive week, his scout ships reported that Oligarchic reinforcements were on the way, to the tune of at least three million vessels. Withdrawing as quickly as he could, he returned to the Spica system, a quarter of a million ships weaker than when he had left it.
For three more years he darted in and out of the main body of the Oligarchy, picking off a Navy fleet here, destroying a world there, replenishing his arms and his men. The Oligarchy, cold, aloof, uncaring, merely tolerated him. He waged some battles that would live long in the annals of warfare. Outnumbered by more than eight to one, he fought the Navy to a standoff in the Delphini system; with one flank demolished and another crippled, he led his forces to safety from an abortive raid on Balok XIV; and always, when the odds were equal, or nearly so, he emerged the unquestioned victor. When outworlders spoke of the Warlord, it meant Grath and no one else; and yet the Oligarchy paid him scant attention, and his deeds were considered so trivial in the scheme of things that they went unreported in the Deluros media. “Gentlemen,” he announced one night when his subordinates were gathered in his quarters, “behind me is a Tri-D chart of the galaxy. This"—and he pointed to a tiny spot on the Rim—"is where we began. And this"—he pointed to another—"is where we are now. What can be gleaned from that?” There was a momentary silence. Then a voice spoke out: “Well, we've come almost half of the way.” “Wrong!” snapped Grath. “We've done nothing. Nothing! What do we actually possess? A handful of worlds, no more than eight thousand of them, in a direct line of our military conquest. We have no spheres of influence, no buffer zones, no economic power. If you stood in the complex at Caliban and eliminated every system we own from the map, it could take years before anyone noticed the difference.
“This is no way to destroy the Oligarchy. Sure, we've cost them almost three million ships, but they've
probably replaced them tenfold by now. We've been going about it all wrong. It can't be done in a military campaign. No one man, no one group of men, can hope to conquer, step by step, what it's taken Man six millennia to assimilate. No wonder the Oligarchy doesn't bother with us; they expect us to die of old age long before we can pose a real threat to their security.” “Then what do you propose?”
“I suggest that we make a swift, sudden, all-or-nothing strike at the very heart of the Oligarchy—at Deluros. If we control Deluros, we control the Oligarchic empire. If not, then we're just a bunch of pirates, a little stronger and more successful than the others, but pirates nonetheless.” “That's a pretty tall order,” offered an aide. “What would you have us do? Hit Sirius again? If they protected it once they'll do so again, and they'll protect every planet, habitable or otherwise, between Sirius and Deluros. That will mean about one hundred and fifty thousand pitched battles before we get within striking distance.” “There is an alternative,” said another aide. “What?” asked Grath.
“Create our own empire, beginning on the Rim and assimilating as many worlds as we can, while always spreading toward the outskirts of the Oligarchy. In time, we'd be able to challenge them on far more even footing.”
“No,” said Grath adamantly. “First of all, we're soldiers, not administrators. Any empire we tried to build and nurture would crumble before it had fairly begun, whereas Deluros is already capable of administering an existing empire. We won't destroy the billions of tentacles that reach out from Deluros to the rest of the Oligarchy; we'll simply take control of them—which is far easier than creating those tentacles on a world of our own choosing. And second, I'm not so sure that future generations would hunger for the Oligarchy as we do. They haven't fought as we have for what we possess, and there's a strong possibility that they'd become complacent. I seek after empire; my sons may seek only comfort. Finally, we don't have a stable society here. We have a military unit, a living, breathing entity that can remain cohesive only as long as it is given military goals. No, gentlemen, our target is Deluros.” He, perhaps more than any other, knew the problems involved, the microscopic chance of victory. For almost a decade the Spica factories turned out ships and arms, while he kept his men busy with minor skirmishes and conquests. When at last he felt he was ready he organized his armada, some six million ships strong, and began his drive for Deluros. His hair was now white and his once-erect posture was a little stooped, but the brilliant mind and magnetic personality that had conceived and structured this final thrust were unimpaired. Such inviting targets as Binder and the Canphor Twins were bypassed as his fleet plunged straight toward the empire's jugular. No move was made against him as he passed Rigel and Emra and Terrazane and Zeta Cancri. It was almost as if the Oligarchy was watching, bemused, to see just how close this upstart really dared to come. They passed a million stars, five million, twenty million, and the light from the galactic core became more brilliant. And then, suddenly, came the Navy. Millions upon millions of ships descended upon him, so many that they blotted out the stars. They came from his sides, from above and below, they rushed forward to greet him with a barrage of firepower so great that half his armada was demolished in the first minutes of battle.
Calmly, coolly, he began issuing orders. A feint here, a quick engagement there, a minor sacrifice here, a
major bloodbath over there. And always, when he moved, it was toward Deluros. Within a day his fleet had dwindled down to half a million; by the end of a week, there were less than sixty thousand ... and still he drove toward Deluros. Eight days into the battle the computers could find no alternative to complete surrender, and so he directed his remaining handful of ships himself. At last, brilliant as his resistance had been, he was surrounded and englobed. His eyes darted to the viewscreen, trying to pick out the huge, shining star that was Deluros, but it was still too far away, totally lost amid the light of a million of its neighbors.
He stared dully at the screen. It was just too big, too much for one man to take, to even dream of taking. The only word that occurred to him waspresumptuous. “And to think,” he mused wistfully, just before the firepower of the Navy tore his ship apart, “that Alexander wept because there was nothing left to conquer....” 16: THE CONSPIRATORS
...It was Admiral Ramos Broder (5966-6063 G.E.) who not only brought some measure of stability to the military after the fearful events of 5993, but also managed to ferret out Wain Connough, the prime mover in the death of the Oligarchic Era... —Man: Twelve Millennia of Achievement ...It is this author's opinion that neither Connough and Boron were so black, nor Broder so white, as history paints them. For while it is true that Connough was executed for treason within a month after the fall of the Oligarchy and Broder's conduct during that period and for the next seventy years was exemplary, it seems unlikely that the entire situation could have arisen without the mysterious death of Broder's superior, Admiral Esten Klare (5903-5993 G.E.). Be that as it may, it can safely be said that no other body of similar power ever fell as swiftly as the Oligarchy...
—Origin and History of the Sentient Races, Vol. 8 “Blame it on Grath,” said Broder, looking at a small, illuminated, three-dimensional map of the galaxy. “He's been dead for more than eighty years,” replied Quince. “I don't really see what he has to do with it.”
“He was the first,” said Broder. “He showed them how far one man could come. It was only a matter of time before the other warlords would figure out just how much farther they could get if they banded together.”
“But even Grath never managed to win them over to his side,'’ protested Quince. “He tried right up until his
final push toward Deluros.”
“First they had to see that it could be done,” said Broder. “They had to know that an outlaw force, properly marshaled, could attack the Navy and get away with it. Also, Grath didn't need them.”
“In the end he did.”
“They wouldn't have done him any good,” said Broder. “There couldn't have been a hundred million men
in the employ of all the warlords in Grath's heyday. Now things are different. They number between four
and five billion. Look at the map.” The two men turned their eyes to the illuminated spiral. “They've made huge inroads, absolutely huge. And since they haven't got anyone with Grath's talents, they're content to pick the Oligarchy to shreds, bit by bit, along the outskirts of the frontiers.” “Then why worry?” asked Quince. “It'll be eons before they turn their eyes toward Deluros.” “I doubt it.”
