Mike Resnick - Birthright

“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 was presumptuous. “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.”

“Why?” asked Quince.

“Two reasons,” said Broder. “First, sooner or later they've got to realize what Grath knew all along: that the quickest way to conquer the Oligarchy is to conquer Deluros. And second, that the only other way to conquer the Oligarchy is to pick it to pieces, which means they'll be thirty generations removed from the warlords who finally land here.”

“Then you expect a strike on Deluros?”

Broder shrugged. “If it was me, yes, I'd buck the odds and attack. With them, who knows? Hell, they probably spend more time fighting among themselves than against the Navy. Still, they'll be coming one of these days.”

The conversation ambled on a little longer, and then Broder returned to his office. As second in command of the Navy's defense forces at Deluros, it was his job to keep troops and fleet in a state of preparedness ... and wait.

It had been a long wait. Grath had made it to within almost two thousand light-years before the Navy lowered the boom, and no warlord had had the temerity to come that close again. Sooner or later they'd try again, get a couple of light-years closer, and be repelled or destroyed again. And he, Admiral Ramos Broder, honor graduate from the Deluros Military Academy, author of two highly-praised volumes on the tactics of space war, former ambassador to Canphor VI, would grow old and die, awaiting the opportunity to prove his mettle in battle. On course, he thought with a tight grin, there was job security aplenty. But one of the problems with job security was that the men ahead of you also had it, and you weren't likely to advance until they died or retired. That was all right for men like Quince, but not for him: He wanted a position commensurate with his abilities, and he wouldn't be getting one unless and until those abilities were tested. At which time, he concluded, half the people above him would have been killed and he'd advance anyway. Neither the thoughts nor the frustrations were new to him. Far from it. He'd lived with them for years now, though the passage of time hadn't exactly mellowed him. Which was why he had agreed to see the man who was being ushered into his office. “Connough?” he asked, extending his hand. The man nodded. He was very tall, quite rangy, with large blue eyes that darted back and forth across the office, taking in windows, intercoms, and all the paraphernalia of bureaucracy. Broder turned to his aide. “No calls, no visitors, no communication of any sort and no monitoring. Understood?”