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be the unlucky soul who had told Mark that time heals all wounds one time too often.
 Do you want to prove you are on my side? Mark asked belligerently.
 Not if it means humoring this delusion you have developed.
 I don t want you to humor me. I want you to help.
 How?
 Let me use your yacht.
 Sure, I ll loan youGossamer Gnat after I have sunk a quarter-million credits in her.
 I don t want you to loan her to me. I want you to take me somewhere.
 Where?
 PoleStar.
 Why?
 Because that is whereMagellan is.
 And I suppose they are going to allow us to light-surf right up to their midships airlock and let you out?
 They might, Mark agreed.  However, if they do, it means that you are right and I am imagining things.
Now, if I am right, they will warn us off and not let us near the ship.
 So what good will it do you?
 It will give me confirmation that they are hiding something. Don t worry, I will not ask you to violate any
restricted space, but if you can get me close enough, I will be able to get there on my own.
 How?
 Long range vacuum suit.
 You re drunk, Mark! Only a fool would try to navigate a suit across a hundred kilometers of empty
space, and he would need to be a skilled fool to have any chance of making it.
Mark shrugged.  If I get into trouble, I will switch on my emergency beacon and they will send the station
taxi to pick me up. Either way, I ll get where I want to go.
 And I will end up in jail for violating restricted cubic.
 No you won t. You will keep well clear. You can claim that I am a stowaway, that you did not even
know I was aboard.
 Pretty difficult claim to make on a solar yacht, my friend.
 Whether they believe you or not isn t important. I will back up your story. That way they will only throw
me in jail.
 You are forgetting one thing. How are we going to get theGnat into polar orbit?
 Tug. I will pay the change-of-plane charges both ways.
Perlman considered for a moment, and then shook his head.  I won t do it. If you want to kill yourself,
do it without my help.
 Please, Gunter, I am begging you.
There was a long pause while Perlman thought it over. Finally, he turned to Mark and said,  All right, I ll
do it. I was going to take theGnat out and exercise her anyway. I still think it s a damned foolhardy thing
to try.
 I have to try, Gunter. I hope you see that.
 All I see is someone who has lost his family and seems determined to join them. Talk to Sam Wheeling
about a vacuum suit. He knows about such things and will get you a good one. Do not scrimp on the
price. You may be out there a long time before they can rescue you.
#
Lisa Arden watched Sar-Say as he moved effortlessly in the microgravity of PoleStar and wondered how
long it had been since his people had invented space travel. The pseudo-simian (as the scientists had
taken to calling him) seemed too well adapted to microgravity for it to be an accident. She felt clumsy by
comparison. Next to the Taff s fluid movements, she seemed all elbows and knees.
 Wait up, Sar-Say! Nothing s going to happen for at least fifteen minutes.
The supple neck twisted to reveal two yellow eyes and comical ears pointed in her direction.  Hurry,
Lisa. We don wish to be late.
 Don t, with a  t ending, she corrected automatically.  It is one of those pesky contractions.
The alien blinked, a sign that he was filing another fact away in his prodigious memory, and said,  We
don t wish to be late.
 Better, she replied approvingly as she finally caught up with him. Sar-Say s speech was improving daily
with practice. Just that morning, they had engaged in a conversation that would have been impossible
only a week before. The subject of what name applied to the Broan Empire had arisen.
 The Broa do not rule empire. There is no single Broa in charge, no emperor.
 Then what would you call it?
 I do not know, Sar-Say had replied seriously.  I have not yet learned a Standard word that fits.
 What do you call it in your own language?
The alien had uttered a long series of syllables that consisted mostly of sibilants.
 What does it mean?
 It means  Civilization. It means that the Broa rule all.
 The Broan Tyranny, perhaps?
 No. The word is too negative.
 You have described them as pretty negative people.
 They are not malicious, Sar-Say had replied seriously.  So long as things are done as they wish, they
allow most to live with a minimum of ... of interference.
 Big of them, Lisa had said sarcastically.  What is the mechanism of their power over other species?
How do they maintain control?
 They have no need to control the worlds directly. They control the stargates. The Broa are not a &
prolific & yes, a prolific people. They breed slowly. There are not enough of them to colonize every
world in their & whatever you humans call it.
 Then there are some worlds that are free of Broa?
 Yes. Many worlds have only a few Broa on them, and others are visited infrequently by the masters.
 These worlds are sovereign?
 What does that mean?
 It means that they have control over their own affairs and answer to no one else for what they do.
 No, the Broa are ... sovereign. Those who rule do so in the masters name.
 The Broa are the kings?
 No, that word too denotes a single individual who rules. The Broa practice rule by kinship, not
kingship.
Lisa had looked sharply at her star pupil.  Was that an attempt at humor, Sar-Say?
 It was.
 Not bad for a beginner. But you were saying-- [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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