The races which ruled the Galactic Federation knew they
were vastly superior to the inferior species restricted to
the narrow confines of their own star systems by the
crudity of their technology . . . and they had every
intention of keeping things that way.
It was a neat little scam, a rigged game in which only the
House could win, which the Federation had played for over
a hundred thousand years, and no one had ever managed to
challenge it.
Yet all good things come to an end, and the Galactics made
one mistake. It didn't seem all that terrible at first,
only a single merchant guild which bought itself a Roman
legion to use as enslaved sepoys on the primitive worlds
where they weren't permitted to use their own weapons to
force trading concessions. But the Romans were too good at
what they did, and a desperate competing guild decided
that the only way it could continue to compete was if it
had Romans of its own.
Unfortunately, Roman legions were no longer available, so
the competing guild had to settle for something else:
English longbowmen on their way to the Battle of Crecy.
Roman legions make dangerous pets . . . but English
longbowmen are even worse.
It may take a century or so, but the Galactics are about
to discover what happens when the sword finally comes out
of the stone.
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