Firestorm d-6

by Taylor Anderson

  Musket balls voomed through the woods, thwacking into trees and causing a gentle rain of leaves.

  “Major!” Blas called. She was leaning over in her saddle, speaking to an Imperial lieutenant.

  Chack joined them, and the Imperial lieutenant saluted excitedly. The former wing runner had gained a reputation much larger than his stature, and sitting calmly on a horse with musket balls whizzing by only reinforced it in this man’s eyes.

  “Are you in command here?” Chack asked.

  “No, sir. Captain Morris commanding Company E of the Fifth, and Company C of your own Second, sent me. They’re in contact with the enemy!”

  “I can hear that. What does he face and how did he come to be engaged so closely?”

  “Their pickets fled and when we advanced, we ran into a blocking force on the Waterford road.”

  The musketry redoubled, and two thunderclaps stirred the brush and loosed more leaves.

  “Six-pounders,” Chack decided. “Ours. Your captain Morris must be fully engaged and at least partially deployed. What have we run into, and why were our pickets and scouts not between us?”

  “The scouts were… elsewhere,” the lieutenant admitted. “Captain Morris believes we face at least two companies, perhaps a regiment.”

  “Artillery?”

  “None yet, but it will doubtless arrive soon.”

  Chack nodded. “Then we must displace them. They must’ve been expecting us, but maybe not this fast. If we give them time to dig in, this will be a costly fight.” He looked west, toward the mountains he couldn’t see through the trees. “And we have no contact with Major Blair-but he must see this fight; the rising smoke…” He shook his head. “I didn’t want this yet. I wanted to draw troops from in front of Blair but leave them confused about our movements, spread them out. That’s over. The fight has begun. I won’t ask troops to attack ‘gently’ to buy time with their lives.” He looked at the lieutenant. “Tell Captain Morris that the rest of the regiment is coming up. I’ll be there directly myself. In the meantime, he’ll reinforce the companies now in contact and extend his left with an eye toward turning the enemy flank. If he sees an opportunity to do that before I arrive, he will, if he wishes to remain an officer. If the opportunity does not arise, the movement should at least weaken the forces in front of him-and that’s where we will strike with all our might as soon as I join him.”

  “What of Major Blair?” Blas-Ma-Ar asked.

  “He’ll coordinate his attack with ours, I’m sure of it. We must push the enemy into the open around Waterford to gain the full effect from our artillery and mortars!”

  The lieutenant saluted but stood there, waiting.

  “What?” Chack asked.

  “Uh… where will you be, sir?”

  “Right here,” Chack said. He turned to Blas. “Inform Major Jindal of this… change in plans, and return as quickly as you can. I don’t want a battle in this oppressive forest. We must force the enemy out of it where we can see him-and kill him properly.”

  The Doms and “rebels” were eventually pushed out of their rapidly improving position by a combined frontal and flank attack. They held determinedly until the fixed bayonets of Imperial and Lemurian Marines drove them from their hasty breastworks. The almost-fanatical courage of Dominion troops had been proven before, but they suffered a major technological disadvantage in a close-quarters fight: their bayonets were “stupid.” Their muskets were little different in function from those of the Imperials, but Imperial and “American” Marines used offset “socket” bayonets that slid on the outside of their weapons’ muzzles. Doms used “plug” bayonets shaped like short swords. They were better tools for everyday use and could hack brush and cut meat and serve as large knives. When “fixed,” however, they were inserted into the muzzles and held in place by friction. They usually had to be driven out. Firing a musket with one in place would rupture the barrel and likely injure or kill the shooter.

  Socket bayonets with their triangular blades were virtually useless tools, but wickedly lethal weapons, and a musket could still fire when they were affixed. When the entire regiment under Chack’s personal command rushed the enemy works, running, screaming through the dense trees and shot, bayonets fixed-then stopped and fired a volley into the terrified, waiting defenders-just enough broke and ran to crack the dam. Once that occurred, the remaining Doms had no choice but to run or die, and the crack gave way to a torrent. After that, the race was on.

  The bright yellow coats of Dom infantry made fine targets, and many were shot as they fled. Chack’s ’Cats and Imperials ran after them, shouting, shooting, stabbing at the fallen, and the woods grew dense with smoke even as the trees began to thin. The regiment had orders to halt at the clearing and regroup. Some, caught in the moment, continued chasing the enemy. Chack-still mounted and exhilarated by the experience of charging on horseback, despite having spent more time just holding on than slashing about with his Navy cutlass-shouted for the drummers to recall the overexuberant troops. The Doms were running away as fast as they could, oddly interspersed with monkeys of every size, blizzards of colorful parrots and other birds, and some other strange creatures Chack had never seen. The thundering drums were joined by Imperial horns, and slowly, most who’d continued their pursuit stopped, looked about, and realized how exposed they were. Quickly, they trotted back to the waiting raneven as a battery of six-pounders rattled down the road, drawn by gasping paalkas, and deployed in front of the infantry. Soon, exploding case shot pursued the fleeing enemy, reinforcing their terror.

  “Beautiful!” shouted Major Jindal, galloping up to join Chack. “Stunning! Yet another famous victory, Major Chack!” he gushed.

  “It was exciting,” Chack confessed, “but only the beginning. Look.”

  A wide plain, checkerboarded with ripening grain and other crops, lay between them and the New Ireland village of Waterford. It was a quaint, spread-out place, reminiscent of the economical architecture Chack associated with Imperials; but interspersed with the occasional classical planters or Company mansion Imperial aristocracy seemed to favor. Beyond the town, in the distance, the large amoebic shape of Lake Shannon sprawled around the settlement, and spread nearly to the water’s edge was a sea of canvas tents that probably outnumbered Chack’s and Jindal’s force. Figure at least two men to a tent…

  “Anything from Major Blair?”

  “Not yet. I’ve sent scouts farther upslope. Perhaps they’ve made contact by now. But the enemy stands between us.” He paused. “I’m not sure we drew much of his attention away from Major Blair.”

  “We will,” Chack promised. “Quickly, I want half your regiment and all your artillery up here. Leave two companies in the rear, guarding the approach from the north, and send the rest to the right and prepare to hit the enemy facing Blair on his right flank… Blair’s left.” Chack blinked, annoyed with himself for lecturing, but clarity was important. “Send a steady officer who will force his way to Blair if he must, and push hard when we advance!”

  “I should go myself,” Jindal said.

  “No, if something happens to me, you must be here. We’ll bombard the enemy before us, then advance across the entire front. That move should be unmistakable, and the enemy blocking Blair will have no choice but to defend his lines of communication and supply. I trust Major Blair to sense the proper moment and attack downhill, toward the town. Hopefully, your officer will have communicated this intent by then, but Blair should know what to do regardless. With luck, he may even catch them redeploying and add to the confusion. Ultimately, we should drive the enemy through the town and enclose him between us and the lake.”

  Jindal shook his head. “Marvelous,” he confessed. “The scope of your planning…” He chuckled nervously. “The scope of this war is beyond anything I ever trained for!”

  Chack blinked a sentiment Jindal hadn’t seen before-not that he remotely grasped any of the Lemurian blinking yet. “For all your naval power, your people have little
more experience at this kind of war than mine did not long ago,” he said. “You’ll learn, as I was forced to; as Major Blair has done. I was lucky to have good teachers, but the lessons have been… hard.” He blinked something else. “Pray you never face a lesson such as Major Blair first endured; his might have destroyed a lesser person.” He paused, then gestured around. “This fight is a skirmish compared to what this war has become in the west; compared to what it’ll likely become here before all is done. Learn it well-however it turns out-because the most important points are these: plan for the best, but prepare for the worst, and every battle is won or lost in the planning, in the mind, before the first sword is ever drawn.”

  Jindal gulped and felt a chill. A srmish? He was thoughtful a moment. “But this fight, your plan… will leave the enemy no avenue of escape. The rebels might surrender, but the Doms will fight ferociously if they can’t withdraw!”

  “Very good! You think ahead. What you say is more than likely true,” Chack said. “It is in fact a… consequence of the ‘best case’ part of the plan. As a certain large… strange… man once told me, ‘Any we don’t kill today, we’ll have to kill tomorrow.’ You have your orders.”

  The first battery to arrive had long since ceased firing, but within an hour, twenty-four guns had wheeled into place at the edge of the forest. Most were Allied six-pounders, but four were Imperial eight-pounders-their standard fieldpiece-and six were the new twelve-pounders. A hundred of the highly effective three-inch mortars came forward as well, each weapon with a crew of two, and each section with a squad of animal holders, ammunition bearers, crew replacements, and its own paalka, heavily laden with ammunition for the tubes. The enemy was throwing up a new defensive line on the outskirts of the town and emplacing a battery of their own guns there. That would be the first target.

  “The division artillery is ready in all respects, Major,” Blas reported. To punctuate her words, the first Dominion piece fired and a cannonball struck the damp ground short of the Allied line, spraying dark earth in the air and sending the shot bounding into the trees.

  “Commence firing,” Chack said, and Blas wheeled her horse and raced off. Moments later, amid shouted and repeated commands, the mortars erupted with a staccato pa-fwoomp! and twenty-four guns belched fire and smoke one after the other from the left, and recoiled backward as the case and roundshot soared downrange. The Imperials didn’t have case shot yet, and with their “nonstandard” bores, the allies couldn’t share. The eight-pound solid shot got there first, retaining its velocity better, and geysered earth and fragments of the breastworks around the enemy guns. The case shot was lighter for its diameter and bucked more wind for the weight, but there was only the slightest hesitation before white puffs detonated above the enemy line, spraying shards of iron and copper down on the defenders. Then the mortars fell.

  Some of the bombs landed short. The range had been only a good estimate before, and some of the late arrivals had little time to make the crude elevation adjustments on the simple tubes. Despite their simplicity, however, the mortars were amazingly reliable, largely due to careful weighing of propulsive charges back in Baalkpan and Maa-ni-la, and the steadily improving quality control on the projectiles themselves. Bigger mortars were in the works that would reach a mile or more, but even though nine hundred yards was stretching the limit of the current model, seventy or more of the bombs fell right among the enemy.

  The rippling detonation of the bursting charges sprayed dozens of prescored fragments from each bomb, decimating the Dominion defenders with the effect of a point-blank musket volley. None of the fragments were aimed, of course, so there were fewer real casualties, but the very… impersonal, utterly random nature of the projectiles unnerved the enemy like no volley could. And more were on the way. Section chiefs called range corrections, and the second barrage was more precise. The delayed, rippling blasts reached them long moments after the weapons blanketed the enemy position with white smoke once again. A third hail of mortars left their tubes even as the fieldpieces erupted with an earsplitting, rolling roar. So far, there’d been only that one cannon shot by the enemy.

  “It is practically murder,

  “There was a time when I would’ve agreed with you,” Chack said softly in the brief quiet imposed on the division artillery by the necessity of reloading. “My people long believed that to kill anyone was tantamount to murder, aside from the very rare duel. But Grik are not people; they’re brutal animals-and no one would call killing them murder. In self-defense, we killed some of the Jaaps that aided them, and I admit I felt… unhappy about that. But still, it wasn’t murder.” Another stream of mortars thumped into the sky, and he looked at the lieutenant. “And the Doms started this war with as clear a case of murder as I’ve ever seen one species commit against itself. Perhaps war distorts perceptions-I’m rather new at it myself, you know-but is it murder to kill a murderer? I think not. It has more the feel of justice to me.”

  The lieutenant watched the mortars erupt among the enemy again. “But those are only soldiers, men like me. They follow orders. Their leaders are the murderers.”

  “Do you really think so? Would you have obeyed orders to kill civilians? Innocent, noncombatant females and their younglings?”

  “Of course not!”

  “Then there you have the difference, Lieuten-aant. Those we kill are ‘only soldiers,’ but they protect and do the bidding of their murderous masters. While the masters may be chiefly to blame, their soldiers-their tools-must be destroyed.” Chack shook his head. “To kill them is not murder; it is war.” He cocked his head. “And it is a good war. I feel… a sense of righteous vengeance, a desire to punish them for what they’ve done-and for my troops they’ve killed today. Do you not feel it? To fight a war without that… sense.. . must be a terrible thing. Perhaps that is what makes a murderer?”

  “I feel it,” replied the lieutenant, “but I do pity them.”

  “As do I. As must anyone who desires to remain a person.” Chack paused. “Where is your captain?”

  “Killed, sir. In the charge against the breastworks in the forest.”

  “Then you must take his place,” Major Jindal said, rejoining the group. He turned to Chack. “The companies on the right have extended the line and made contact with Major Blair’s command at last. There is

  … confusion there, but I believe all will be well. The enemy already seems to be reacting to our presence here, and a courier from the major indicated he may move more quickly than expected to take advantage.”

  Chack had suddenly removed his battered old helmet to listen carefully for a moment, ears erect and alert. Jindal had no idea what he could possibly hear over the pounding guns and mortars nearby, but Blas-Ma-Ar was listening too.

  “Assemble your companies,” Chack instructed the lieutenant, “if you think they have another charge in them.”

  “They do, sir.”

  “Very well. It would seem Major Jindal is correct. Blair is stirring! The division will soon advance!”

  Blair unleashed his own mortars then, weapons no Dominion troops had faced until earlier that day. He’d been saving them sincehe arrived- unless he’d had no choice-until this very moment. White puff-balls appeared on the now-visible flanks of the mountains to the west, popping soundlessly, the smoke streaming back uphill toward Blair’s hidden force. The detonations became constant, creating a great, opaque cloud.

  “The artillery will cease firing and prepare to advance with the infantry,” Chack bellowed, his order repeated down the line. “The mortars will continue to target the enemy position to cover our advance. When the signal to ‘cease firing mortars’ is given, their crews will advance with their weapons to the next line and commence firing on the enemy camp, or anywhere the enemy gathers!”

  Jindal reached across, extending his hand to Chack. “God be with you, sir,” he said.

  “May the Maker be with you!” Chack replied, grasping the offered hand. He looked at the lieutenant. “W
ith you as well. Now see to your troops!”

  The lieutenant saluted and galloped away, quickly followed by Jindal, who peeled off to the right.

  “Now is an excellent time to dismount,” Blas said, grinning and hopping down from her horse. “Not only for the beast’s sake, but your own. Riding him in the open will make you both a target. Fear not,” she added. “They will be brought to us if we need them!”

  Chack clumsily stepped down from the saddle, his legs feeling strange. “Good advice, Lieuten-aant… and may the Maker be with you as well!”

  Most of the 2nd (largely Lemurian) and 5th Imperial Marine regiments-eight companies strong-crossed the wide fields of a grain Chack didn’t know amid a thunder of drums and behind a curtain of mortars. Some musket fire came from the enemy position, but it was ineffective across such a distance. There’d still been no more enemy artillery. Perhaps the guns were wrecked? The division advanced across a wide front with open files, four ranks deep. Furious firing erupted on the far right, where Jindal’s companies slashed unexpectedly into the enemy flank, just as Blair’s infantry struck the disorganized line head-on. The movement there was lost in the forest and beneath a growing fog of rising, swirling smoke. Ahead of Chack, there were still just the hasty breastworks.

  They’d learned at the Dueling Grounds that the shield wall afforded some protection from Dom musketry, and they’d close files and use it here if need be. In the meantime, tightly massed troops only gave the enemy a better target. Three hundred yards separated the forces when Chack ordered the mortars to cease firing. The dirty white plumes were more impressive the closer they got, and by now they could even hear the screams amid the explosions. At two hundred yards, the barrage gradually lifted and for a time, all that was visible of the Dom position was a dark, hazy cloud drifting from left to right across their front. The sporadic musket fire gradually increased, forcing Chack to call his Lemurian Marines to the front rank to shield those behind. Balls struck their angled shields, ricocheting away with low, whirring moans. A man screamed and fell, just a few paces from Chack. Another fell without a sound other than that caused by a ball striking flesh. At one hundred yards, the Dom fire reached a fever pitch. They’d probably killed or wounded half the defenders, but there were more than enough left to take a terrible toll, and, despite the shields, men and ’Cats began falling with a wrenching regularity. Chack noticed the men around him literally leaning into the fire, as one would struggle against a gale, and he realized with surprise that he was doing it too.