Steel World by B. V. Larson Read Free Book Online Page B

leaving our star system. They knew we’d already sent out probes, but that was forbidden in the future. From now on, we could only leave the Solar System by paying for the privilege with Galactic credits.
    Their second requirement was harder to meet. We had to have something of value to trade with the rest of the member worlds in order to pay the Galactic government. In other words, we had to demonstrate we could pull our weight and pay our taxes.
    At first, the requirement to provide a trade good had been problematic. Our technology was pathetic by Galactic standards. Our foodstuffs and raw resources were, at best, mundane. An alien counselor was appointed to see if something could be worked out before our scheduled demise. This snail-looking official was aloof, but she’d done her job thoroughly. She determined that humanity had been discovered early in our developmental cycle as a species. We didn’t even have a world government yet, which made us a throwback amongst the membership. We frequently engaged in bloody wars against one another, and had a long history of conflict, something most worlds had left behind in their histories. She recommended we hire out as mercenaries to other, more civilized planets that lacked professional armies.
    Earthers latched onto the idea immediately. Within a month, there were literally millions of volunteers. Joining the legions was the only way to earn Galactic credit or to see the stars.
    Many years after our membership in the Empire had been established, I now found myself onboard Corvus . She was a dreadnaught, a huge capital ship that was capable of transporting an entire legion from one world to the next. The ship wasn’t outfitted for battle in space—that too, was against Galactic Law. But it could provide bombardment to support a landing if a contract called for it.
    Despite being a warship, Corvus was surprisingly comfortable. Whatever types of missions Legion Varus specialized in, I could tell they’d gathered enough loot to keep their vessel in good condition. Corvus was about three miles long, with forward prongs and a spinning central cylinder. The ship displaced something like a billion tons of mass. Most of that tonnage was in the engines and fuel, of course, but our quarters included enough space to make up a small town. There were practice fields that encompassed cubic acres of space. There were centrifugal swimming pools, null-grav rooms—even entertainments, such as a movie house and a small park full of trees.
    The ship itself was run by an alien race, the Skrull, who looked like spindly spiders with hard shells and wizened monkey-faces. They didn’t interact with the legionnaires much. They kept to their quarters and their strange duties, and we kept to our generous portions of the ship.
    The Skrull were another member of the Galactic Empire. Like us, they’d been required to trade something to maintain membership—and thereby continue breathing. They were good at building ships and running them, so that’s what they did. Being a peaceful race, they didn’t do any fighting—that was our job.
    As I understood it, every legion fielded by Earth had a ship like this. Corvus was independently operated by the tribune of the Varus Legion under the loose supervision of the Hegemony people back on our Earth. For the most part, we did whatever we wanted. Like every legion, our task was to scrounge up every credit we could to enrich ourselves and our home planet.
    Varus Legion, however, did this in their own distinctive way. I hadn’t figured out yet what kind of missions we specialized in, but I was sure it was dangerous and well-paid.
    I’d met many of my fellow recruits, including some fine-looking female specimens. I noticed that whatever special criteria Varus had for recruiting, it included making sure we were all physically fit. Most of us were young and well-built. There were a few overweight recruits, but the veterans were already picking on them. I had a