Seeking Title of Science Fiction Short Story (Part of an Anthology also of unknown name )

Cafe Society
1

Hello,

I am currently looking for a Science Fiction Anthology (I know, I know… Just pick one).

The specific one I am looking for includes a story that I have been wanting to re-read for a while now.

The Anthology:

  • They are short stories by different authors about the same general idea: The Human Spirit/Ingenuity versus Aliens
    The Specific Short Story in am looking for:

  • It happens in the office of an Alien General. They are planning to invade Earth.

  • They are giving him a report about the Humans and all that he is hearing is just confusing him about what type of race they are.

  • The Types of races that have been catalog are:

  1. Master/Conqueror
  2. Slave/Submissive
  3. Shielded - Race so mysterious and powerful that there is almost nothing known about them. They have managed to shield their entire planets for others and they do not meddle with Master and Slave races.
  • When finally the Aliens decide to invade earth they receive a message that bypasses all their communications securities with the word “NO” coming from the shielded worlds, therefore implying that humans could be such a race.
    and there ends the short story…

Does anyone have any ideas what is the name of the short story or the Sci-Fi Anthology?

2

I think the story is Gordon Dickson’s “The Human Edge” - stand by.

3

Correction - the story seems to be in the collection “The Human Edge” but I’m not sure which story it is (yet!)

4

I knew AndyL would be along to suss this out; he totally fucking rocks!

5

Thank you Snowboarder Bo. The story is “Three-Part Puzzle” by Gordon Dickson. It’s collected in a few places http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?55465

6

That is exactly the short story I was looking for! Thank you very much Andy L!

7

You’re very welcome. The ebook version of the anthology is available (DRM-free) at Baen for a very reasonable price.