Slowly, towing our thirty-nine suns with us, we headed away through space toward the dim light-patch of our own galaxy. Looking back, we saw that the galaxy of the machines was lit in many places by the flaring fire of collided suns. We stared back for a long time at the stupendous damage which we had done to that universe. "It'll be a long time before _they_ will come buccaneering again for our suns!" predicted Jhul Din. "And if they ever do come again we can defeat them now that we have powers equal to their own," I added. "We'd rather not war with the machines nor with any one else. But we have fought for our suns, and as long as the Patrol lasts we are going to keep them!"