Steel World

by Larson, B. V.

  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 feeling everyone was going to be in shape before we reached our mission world six months from now.

  At 0500 every day I got up and showered. I didn’t have much choice in the matter, as the ship’s klaxons blew me right out of my bunk. By 0600, we were on the practice fields. Our day was divided up into eating, sleeping and training. Of the three, the training part took the greatest portion of time. Most of it involved physical exercise and basic combat training. I did okay with guns, but like most of the troops I needed a lot of practice with hand-to-hand.

  The one of few times we got to socialize was in the mess hall. I’d somehow grown a rep among the recruits, probably due to my early recognition by Centurion Graves. My table was always full, and new people often asked to sit with us. Carlos, who’d never left my side, had appointed himself as bouncer in these situations.

  On a Thursday morning in what was the month of May back home, a new person wandered into the mess hall. Everyone stared, but we didn’t stop chewing. You didn’t have enough time to fill your body with calories if you did that.

  The unfamiliar person was a recruit with curly brown hair. She was attractive, tall and muscular. She veered toward my table and approached with her tray in hand.

  “Hold on,” Carlos said importantly. “State your business, Recruit.”

  “I’m a transfer from 3rd Cohort,” she said.

  Carlos frowned. The cohorts rarely interacted and maintained separate quarters. The only time we met up was when we were on the parade grounds under the big star-speckled dome on top of Corvus, or when we passed one another as one group left the training grounds and another moved in.

  “A transfer?” he asked. “What did you do, piss off an adjunct?”

  She smiled quietly. “Something like that. Now, am I sitting here or what?”

  I saw Carlos ruffle up. He didn’t like anyone who didn’t respect his authority, imaginary or not.

  I lifted my hand. “Please, take a seat.”

  Carlos shot me a look of annoyance. I’d stepped on his toes, but that happened all the time, so I didn’t worry about it.

  “I want to hear what it takes to be transferred out of a cohort.”

  The recruit sat across from me and introduced herself. Her name was Natasha, and she had a soft-spoken manner, but she seemed very self-confident. Her cheeks were perfectly shaped, and she had eyes that disappeared when she smiled. I found her interesting.

  Several other female recruits around me looked disdainful. If anything, they were more annoyed than Carlos was. Sexual activity was pretty common among recruits and wasn’t frowned upon by the officers. I’d hooked up with one or two of the women in the unit, and they clearly did not appreciate any new competition.

  “I can see this unit isn’t much different than the one I left behind,” Natasha said.

  “How’s that?” I asked.

  “Full of petty cliques and jealousy. You’d think with more men around than women, the women would feel they had the upper hand.”

  I smiled. “Maybe they do. But you haven’t answered my question.”

  She addressed her food and didn’t meet my eyes as she answered. “I was just like anyone else. I met new people and did what I felt like. Unfortunately, there are some rules involved.”

  Carlos was suddenly delighted. He leaned forward, face split into a grin. “You screwed your veteran, didn’t you?”

  She shook her head, smiling demurely. She lifted a thumb and aimed it upward. It took us a second to catch on.

  “An officer?” asked Carlos excitedly. “What, not Centurion Graves himself, was it?”

  Natasha frowned at him. “No. Don’t be gross. There was this fine little adjunct. He looked like a kid in his uniform.”

  Carlos scoffed. “He’s probably fifty. If he dies a lot and keeps getting copied, he might have the body of a twenty-five year old. It takes you back to the last time they backed up your data, you know.”

  “I know that, but he wasn’t old,” Natasha said in irritation.

  I marveled at how quickly Carlos could piss people off. It was a gift he had. I’d come to ignore his quirks, but it was always instructive to watch as his personality impacted someone new. Before she took a fork and stabbed him, I decided to intervene.

  “All right,” I said, “now I know how you got yourself transferred. Thanks for answering me honestly. If you want to, you can become a regular at our table.”

  “I’d be happy to,” Natasha said, reaching across the table and touching the back of my hand lightly.

  At that, another recruit named Kivi got up and huffed away. She was a small, olive-skinned girl who moved quickly. She dumped her platter, which was only half-eaten. I avoided her eye.

  The warning buzzer sounded. We stopped talking and scrambled to shove food into our mouths. The buzzer indicated there was only three minutes left. I glanced at the tapper imprinted on my forearm. It looked like a tattoo, and the ink changed as the seconds ticked away. The timing seemed off, we should have had another ten minutes or more.

  Not knowing what was up, we chewed furiously. Only Carlos attempted to talk and eat at the same time.

  “Something’s up. Must be a special drill. They never open up the rooms before 0600. This will be big—I know it.”

  “Shut up and eat,” I told him.

  For once, he did as I asked. Just as we were finishing up, the second buzzer sounded. This one was longer and louder. We scrambled to our fe
et as we’d been trained to do over the last several months and rushed out of the mess hall. As we passed the recycling center, we shoved our trays into waiting slots. The automated kitchens behind the walls began the lengthy process of turning whatever we didn’t eat from breakfast into lunch.

  We charged out in a line, two abreast, and headed down the hallways double-time. Veteran Harris appeared out of nowhere and roared at us, trotting along beside the column. We stared ahead and prepared ourselves mentally for another grueling day on the training fields.

  Usually, we began with calisthenics and a long run. Today, however, was very different.

  As we marched out onto the fields under the big dome we passed a weapons rack. The veteran screamed at us to grab and check our weapons. Frowning, I grasped a snap-rifle and pulled it off the rack with the rest of my squad.

  Snap-rifles fired metal slivers at high velocity. They used magnetics to accelerate the projectiles to amazing speeds with little recoil. For the most part, they operated like old-fashioned chemical gunpowder weapons, but were much quieter. Instead of a bang, they made a relatively soft, snapping sound.

  As members of the light infantry, these weapons were preferred. A heavy trooper wore armor shielding and carried an energy weapon. But all those took power and weight. New recruits weren’t issued such valuable equipment. We got thin smart cloth uniforms and snap-rifles.

  I cracked open my weapon, checked the magazine, and saw it was full. Another advantage of the snap-rifle was the large capacity for ammo. With no cartridge, each slender bullet took less space and weight.

  I heard a distinctive snapping sound a moment later. It was faint and distant—but my head was up and swiveling, seeking the source of fire.

  “Incoming!” choked Carlos. “I’m hit!”

  He went down beside me. A spot of blood bubbled over his lung, where he’d been shot. I didn’t bend down to help him. I dashed away instead.

  “Sniper!” I shouted.

  Everyone was running now in every direction. Kivi, the girl who’d run out of the mess hall pissed off not fifteen minutes earlier, went down next. Her legs were hit, and she was rolling around and screeching, grabbing her shins. She wasn’t dead, but she was in a lot of pain.

  This changed my response from fear to anger. I liked Kivi, and, somehow, seeing her shot made things personal for me. I took cover behind one of the practice rocks and aimed my weapon in the direction I thought the fire was coming from. I released what I hoped would be a suppressing spray of fire in that direction. A copse of palms stood in that quadrant. The leaves shivered and made sounds as if they were being hit by hailstones.

  The fire kept coming in. I looked around, expecting the veteran who’d led us into this trap to be somewhere, calling out orders. He was nowhere to be found. He had vanished just as fast as he’d appeared.

  Often during our training sessions our trainers had surprised us with attacks. Occasionally they’d been deadly. But I hadn’t run into a drill that seemed so intentionally cruel since they’d tried to suffocate us all. Sure, we might come out of this situation as better soldiers, but there were already seven recruits down in this ambush. They were bleeding out, with all the pain of death on their faces. I knew they could be revived later, but I didn’t think it was a fair test of our skills. What were we supposed to do to avoid this situation? Shoot our veteran instead of following him? That wouldn’t have made them happy, I’m certain.

  The rest of the team was crouching behind any cover they could find and firing randomly at the trees. I scanned the scene, desperate for any indication as to where the fire was coming from.

  On a hunch, I looked back toward the hallway from which we’d entered. There was a shadow there, inside the entrance. The lights in the hall behind the figure had been shut off.

  I jumped up and sprinted toward the wall. I threw myself against it and ran along it toward the entrance. I saw two more of my squaddies go down. They were shot in the back. They’d all assumed, as had I, that the fire had been coming from the trees ahead. Instead, the sniper was right behind us.

  I came around the corner with my weapon upraised. There was Veteran Harris, crouching and aiming at my squad, half of whom were down and crawling in their own blood.

  The veteran glanced up at me in surprise. He chuckled.

  “Good work, Recruit. Now—”

  I fired six fast rounds into his chest. Several pierced his heart. He slumped forward onto his face in shock. His final moments were spent shivering and pissing himself on the floor, and I didn’t feel an ounce of sympathy for him.

  -5-

  I stood at attention. No less than three veterans and three officers surrounded me. The seventh man, Centurion Graves, was the only one present who wasn’t shouting at me. The rest were barking like a pack of dogs.

  “You knew you were involved in a drill, is that correct, Recruit?”

  “Yes, Adjunct. I suspected that was the case.”

  A tough-eyed woman pressed forward. She was Adjunct Toro, one of Centurion Graves’ two supporting officers. Most importantly, she was the officer closest to me in the chain of command. Among all of them, she was possibly the angriest. She was red-faced, and her lips curled away from her teeth as she spoke, as if I’d shot her instead of Harris.

  “What you did was unacceptable, McGill. Drill or not, killing a superior on the practice field without cause isn’t permitted. I’m formally requesting that you be kicked out of my unit, and preferably the entire legion.”

  I glanced at her, and then directed my eyes straight ahead again. “May I be permitted to speak, sirs?”

  “No!” shouted the adjunct.

  “Yes,” said Centurion Graves.

  Everyone stopped talking. They continued glaring at me but tossed surprised looks at Graves. It was the first time he’d spoken during the grilling.

  “Thank you, sir,” I said. “Veteran Harris was engaged in sniping at my squad mates when I located him. The drill had not ended when I fired my weapon. I believe I took appropriate action.”

  “That’s it?” squawked the adjunct. “That’s your answer? He was no longer a threat. He acknowledged you’d located him and therefore had successfully terminated the exercise.”

  “Excuse me, sirs,” I said. “He did not drop his weapon. He did not surrender. He did not announce the exercise was over.”

  “That’s because you shot him before he could speak!”

  “That’s enough,” said Graves, sighing. “Anyone else want to say anything before I announce my disciplinary decision?”

  Someone cleared his throat at the back of the room. Everyone turned to look. It was Veteran Harris. He was having difficulty walking, as he’d only just returned from the revival center. I felt my throat constrict at the sight of him.

  “I’d like to say something, sir,” he said.

  “Please do.”

  “I know Legion Varus is a harsh unit. We train our troops to think for themselves. We kill them now and then to keep them sharp and to make sure they take their training seriously. All that said, I would suggest that this young man has done me a favor.”

  Centurion Graves’ eyebrows raised high in surprise. “And what favor is that?”

  “He taught me a lesson today. One I’ll not soon forget.”

  The centurion nodded thoughtfully. “I take it then, that you wish to drop the charges?” he asked.

  Veteran Harris coughed and nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  “Very well. The charges are dropped. Dismissed.”

  “That’s it?” the adjunct asked rudely.

  “Do you have something to add?”

  “Yes. I don’t want a man like this in my group. He’ll shoot me in the back one day if he doesn’t like how I run things.”

  “All right. Transfer him to Adjunct Leeson’s group.”

  I couldn’t believe the ordeal was over. It had been a grueling day. Before noon, I’d been placed in detention. After hours, the officers and veterans had formed a pack
and I’d spent an hour being debriefed, grilled, and just plain yelled at.

  A few minutes after Graves had announced his decision I was out in the hallway, breathing a sigh of relief. Harris followed me down the long, echoing tubes toward our quarters.

  “Why’d you shoot me, son?” he asked.

  “I was pissed off,” I said.

  He nodded. “That’s what I figured. Do you know that I haven’t died in three campaigns?”

  I looked at him. He did look old. Almost as old as Graves himself. I shook my head. “No, I didn’t know that.”

  “That’s why they call me the old man. Do you know how I kept from dying all that time, through three campaigns on three worlds?”

  “No, Veteran.”

  “Because I always killed the other guy first. But this time, you surprised me. No warning, no shouting. You just fired your weapon. You won’t surprise me again, Recruit.”

  “I’m sure you’re right, Veteran.”

  He left me then, moving painfully off toward the non-com sleeping quarters on Deck Eight. I heaved another sigh. I could understand his anger.

  A grim thought occurred to me. What if he’d spoken up on my behalf in order to keep me in this unit? Not because he understood my actions, but because he wanted the opportunity to get even—personally.

  I’d expected that my actions would make an enemy out of Harris. But now I thought I might have made something far worse: a committed enemy.

  I crashed on my bunk on Deck Nine, stretching my arms over my head. Lights were already out, and everyone was asleep.

  The moment my head hit the pillow, I heard stealthy footsteps. I lurched awake, lifting my hands, reaching for the throat of my attacker—I barely stopped myself in time.