Gibraltar Sun (6 page)

“The unpleasant facts are facts nonetheless. The Broa
are
the masters of the galaxy. They receive tribute from hundreds of thousands of species. No matter how brave and skilled our warriors, the day will come when the Broa occupy this world, or destroy it. This point is crystal clear in the Klys’kra’t data. Mr. Rykand obtained a number of scenes that show the fate of rebel worlds. They are now cinders orbiting their respective stars.”

He waited a few seconds for the mental image to sink in, then continued.

“It is not glamorous, I grant you. But the only safety the human race will ever know lies in making ourselves as invisible as possible. Earth has coexisted with the Broa for thousands of years. We just didn’t know it. If we keep to our part of space and they keep to theirs, I submit that we can keep coexisting with them indefinitely.

“To this end, I say that we must do everything in our power to keep from coming to their attention. To do this requires some unpleasant actions on our part.

“We must return to Earth and the Solar System. We must reduce the radio noise we broadcast skyward. The earliest TV and radio signals are far away and getting farther, yet they are relatively weak compared to our modern broadcast power. We can do nothing about past sins, but we should not continue them. By shielding our power sources and reducing electromagnetic emissions, we can prevent Earth from becoming a radio beacon in the Broan sky.”

“Is that it?” the chairman asked.

“Far from it, sir,” Vasloff responded. “Reducing emissions is only the first step. We must also abandon our interstellar colonies. They give us too large a footprint to remain inconspicuous. Even though space is vast, it is exponentially easier to find a civilization spread across a dozen star system than it is to pinpoint a single star.”

“What if the colonists refuse to abandon their colonies?”

“Then we must force them. We cannot let a few selfish individuals endanger the human race.”

“Anything else?”

Vasloff lifted his hands, palms upward, in a gesture of resignation. “The list is endless. Once the colonies are abandoned, we must erase all traces from those planets’ surfaces of our presence. Luckily, our toeholds are so tenuous on most colonies that this will not be difficult. And after the colonists return here and all traces are obliterated, we will have to give up our starships. Not mothball them, mind you; but destroy them completely.”

“Why?”

“To prevent what happened in the New Eden System from happening again. If we allow starships to roam this part of space, there is a much higher chance of our encountering a Broan ship than if we do not.”

“What you are suggesting,” Chairman Hulsey said, “sounds like a totalitarian state of the sort we thought we had outgrown.”

“It is no more totalitarian than the militarism that Mr. Rykand is advocating, but it is no less either. I don’t like it any better than you do, but the safety of humanity is more important than my personal opinions.”

Vasloff continued speaking for another hour, then each of the scientists summoned got their say. Many supported Mark Rykand’s Gibraltar Earth plan, but not all. The sun had long since set and stomachs were beginning to growl when the talking finally ran down.

Finally, The Honorable Tony Hulsey gaveled the hearing to a close. It was a confused group of legislators who filed out of the hearing room by one door, and a gloomy group of witnesses who left by another.

Mark commented to Lisa as they strode out of the black tower and onto the street, “No one said this was going to be easy.”

#

Chapter Six

Nadine Halstrom stood in front of the glass wall of her office on the 100
th
floor of the World Secretariat building and stared out across the Toronto skyline. The sun was setting as it often did when she stood here and pondered a problem. She seemed to be doing that more than ever since that damned Sar-Say had come into her life.

“Well,” she asked her visitor. “What do you think?”

Anthony Hulsey, Member from New South Wales, and Nadine Halstrom’s unofficial troubleshooter in parliament, stretched out in the powered chair and balanced a bourbon-and-branch-water on his oversize paunch. His position of ease belied the inner tension that the coordinator’s question had triggered. Finally, after a long minute of silence, he replied, “I don’t know what to think, Madame Coordinator.”

“That’s a hell of an answer, Tony.”

“It’s the truth, Nadine. The problem would seem to have no good solution.”

“How so?”

“Well, let’s just state the obvious. The more emotionally satisfying course is the one young Rykand is advocating. We fight as smart and hard as we can. Maybe we win in the end, although that seems farfetched, but maybe we lose. If we lose, the Broa will likely exterminate us.

“Then there is Mikhail Vasloff’s plan. We dig a hole, climb in, and pull it in after us. Cowardice is never attractive, but in this case it may be the smart thing to do. After all, we haven’t been visited by the Broa in the thousands of years we were blissfully ignorant of their existence. Who is to say that we can’t live in peace for several more millennia. All we need do is stop advertising our presence to the universe at large.”

“I don’t like Vasloff’s plan,” the coordinator replied. “I’ve never liked defeatism. We would be trading the last century of human progress for an uncertain safety. ”

“I don’t care for defeatism either,” Hulsey replied. “However, that doesn’t mean it isn’t the smart play under these circumstances.”

“Then how do we choose? Put it to a vote?”

Hulsey made a rude noise. “The people will vote for whichever side lulls them to sleep best. The last thing we need is to turn this into one of our recurring propaganda battles. Vasloff will do that well enough by himself.”

“Can’t be helped, Tony. This is a secret too big to conceal.”

“I had no intention of concealing it,” Hulsey said. “However, since we are going to be hammered no matter what we do, we might as well do our jobs.”

“Which brings us back to the original question.”

After a long pause, Hulsey responded, “I think, Madame Coordinator, that for the moment, we should straddle the divide as best we can.”

“Meaning what?”

“We adopt both sides for the time being. We begin planning and preparations for Mark Rykand’s Gibraltar Earth program, while at the same time, making preparations to abandon our interstellar colonies. We put whatever resources we need into becoming smarter while keeping both sides working toward their goals. Perhaps in the ongoing process, we will discover a middle way.”

“Sounds expensive.”

Hulsey shrugged. “You can’t take it with you and you can’t spend it if you are dead. The advantage of this plan is that we can postpone the crisis until we are much smarter about its dimensions. Take, for instance, the need to build new ships. We will need them whether we attack the Broa or defend the Solar System, so we get started building before we know what they are to be used for.

“No, Madam Coordinator, I see no reason to lock ourselves to a course of action until we have to. Kicking the can down the road has its detractors, but I find it is often the smart play.”

“Very well, that is what we will do. I will set up a full net address to announce the bad news.”

Hulsey’s whistle was barely audible. “I don’t envy you at all, Madam Coordinator. But then, I guess this is why we pay you the big credits.”

This time it was the Coordinator’s turn to make the rude noise.

#

“… and so, my people, that is where we stand. Our intrepid explorers have identified an alien civilization that could be the greatest threat humanity has ever known. This is very bad news, but far from the worst news. No, the worst news would have been that they found us first.

“We are currently evaluating two competing proposals for dealing with this threat. One recommends that we prepare carefully, and in secret, and when we are ready, we confront these Broa directly by destroying the stargates in their home systems. This will isolate them and give their subject races the chance to revolt. We will do everything we can to foment and support these revolutions. If we create sufficient chaos in their realm, we will be able to topple them from power and end the threat they pose forever.

“The second proposal is that we use our anonymity to keep ourselves safe; that we do nothing to bring ourselves to the attention of the Broa, and everything to minimize the chance we will be discovered. This will require that we abandon our interstellar colonies and pull back to the Solar System.

“Each of these proposals has much to offer, as well as many potential drawbacks. I have concluded that we do not yet know enough of the situation to choose between them. I am, therefore, proposing that we initiate a program to study the problem and to determine our best course of action.

“Tomorrow, the Honorable Anthony Hulsey will introduce into parliament a bill to establish three research institutes – one devoted to fleshing out the Rykand Plan, another to do the same for the Vasloff Plan, and an independent institute dedicated to the study of the Broa. Since a certain amount of supporting infrastructure will be required regardless of our eventual decision, this bill will also request a major appropriation to begin the design and construction of a fleet. This fleet will be used during offensive operations against the Broa should the Rykand Plan be adopted; or for defensive operations here in the Solar System should we choose the Vasloff Plan. I expect our elected leaders to approve this bill quickly so that we can get about the important business of protecting this planet.

“Nor is this a matter only for government. For the risk belongs to each of us equally. In the coming months, we will sponsor town meetings across the globe to obtain your advice. Talk to your neighbors. Dialogue with one another to see if you can come to a consensus. If you think you have a better idea for dealing with the Broa, we want to hear it. Two separate hypernet sites will go up in the morning to give you a place to express yourselves.

“Finally, I would like to end on an optimistic note. That the Broa are a major threat to our lives and freedom cannot be denied. However, they are not the first such threat. In the Middle Ages, the Black Death nearly exterminated the population of Europe. In the Cold War of the Twentieth Century, children were put to bed each night not knowing whether they would be alive the following morning. Yet, our species got through both of these crises. We have been threatened thousands of times… nay, millions of times…in our history and we have always come through.

“It will be no different this time. Whatever we do, we will be successful. If we choose to confront the Broa, then it will be the best prepared battle ever fought. If we choose to hide from them, then we will hide so well that they will never find us.

“I urge all of you to contemplate what I have told you this evening. Think about the crisis. Think about what you
think
about the crisis. Consider the pros and cons of both recommended plans, and consider whether there is be a better way. Then, when enough of us have thought this through, we will make a decision via your elected representatives.

“This cannot be the usual political battle that we might have over an appropriations bill, with one party vying for advantage over all of the others. This is something that affects every human being alive, whether here on Earth or in our newest colony out among the stars. Whatever decision we make must be in the service of all humanity.

“As you consider the problem over the coming days, keep this thought always: Consider not what benefits you and yours, but what is good for all of us.

“That is all I have this evening, my fellow citizens. Please remember that we have come through crises before and we will come through this one in the Lord’s good time.”

#

“Not what I had hoped for,” Mikhail Vasloff said as the Coordinator’s image slowly dissolved in the holocube, “but not as bad as it could have been.”

He was seated in his office in
Terra Nostra
Headquarters in the Old Quarter of Amsterdam. He had watched the Coordinator’s address in front of a bay window overlooking the Keisersgracht Canal.

“Agreed,” Claris Beaufort, his administrative assistant, said. “Although, I think I detected a bit of bias toward the end. The Coordinator described Rykand’s plan as ‘confronting the Broa’ and your plan as ‘hiding from them.’”

“Yes,” Vasloff replied. “While technically accurate, we will have to find some better way to characterize our position. It will be hard to attract support by telling them we want to ‘hide.’ No one likes to be thought a coward, not even me. However, sometimes discretion is truly the best part of valor.”

“Agreed,” Claris responded with a vigorous nod.

“What sort of shape is
Terra Nostra
in?” he asked.

“We are in surprisingly good shape, Mikhail. We had a surge in membership after the riots three years ago. Tonight’s speech should lead to another. Where do we start our campaign?”

“I presume I will be asked to join this peace institute that they are setting up,” he replied. “Which gives us our public relations angle. The ‘Vasloff Plan,’ as the Coordinator called it, isn’t about hiding. It’s about peace. We are the ‘Peace Movement’ and our adversaries are the ‘War Movement.’”

“Do you suppose that will work?”

Vasloff smiled. “It has worked more times throughout history than I can count.”

“How do we begin?”

“Call the bookers of the major news outlets and get me on their morning and evening netcasts. Tell them that I want to share my observations of our expedition.”

“Right,” Claris responded, penning the order into her datacom. “What else?”

This was far from the first propaganda blitz that Vasloff had organized. In addition to the initial public appearances, he suggested half a dozen things they could do to flood the public with Broa horror stories. Lord knows, there were enough in the Voldar’ik data.