Atta (1953) by Francis Rufus Bellamy

by Atta (pdf)

  beyond those trees Atta and I had had our last intimate

  conversation—six months ago. Now the same trees held

  for me only the road to the city of the Natissians, the objective of our first campaign. Like Hannibal, I was crossing the Alps to Italy. Like Alexander, I was leading my men toward the distant Indus. For me, too, the die was

  cast and I had to conquer or perish.

  Such, I think, was the final effect on me of Nuru’s

  disquisitions: that I did not care in the least what happened to anyone else. As I stared at the green trees that morning I did not care if ten thousand Fusans lost their

  lives and ten thousand more took their places. I wanted

  victory at any cost, and I meant to have it. If mass murder was to be the price of safety, I would show the Fusans that Man was the most savage and destructive

  creature of all. Then let Nuru or Draca touch me at

  his peril!

  Such was my grim resolve that spring morning, and,

  viewed from the removed standpoint of a just Heaven, I

  suppose I was on the way to becoming little better than

  a savage myself. Indeed, even as I looked out upon my

  new troops I shuddered a little to perceive how brutal

  they were, and wondered if in time I might not be indistinguishable from them.

  But again I am getting ahead of myself.

  At the moment there lay before me the first test of my

  military promises to the leaders, and this was all that

  concerned me as I dug my heels into Trotta and galloped

  beside my regiments on the way to the frontier, as im­

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  placable and savage a commander as ever Genghis Khan

  or Attila appeared to past'ages of men. To my mind the

  only important consideration was the tactics and strategy

  of a first campaign that must not fail. Beyond these I did

  not try to think.

  I rode with my Fire Feeders about me and left no precaution unattended to. I inspected their burdens at every stop and allowed no stragglers among the workers that

  I had impressed into military service to carry the necessary dry, tinderlike wood. They were Napoleon’s Old Guard to me, these Fire Feeders, and I had drilled them

  until they responded to my voice and were attached to

  my person like any Palace Guard. Ahead were the regiments that I had trained to fight in military formations, and in the rear came the headquarters staff, with Halket

  receiving the reports as was his custom.

  We were ten thousand in all, I suppose, and we

  marched not in single file or down one Formican roadway as I had noticed that the Rubicundians did, but in fifty parallel lines separated only by a few yards. This

  space was filled with scouts; so that we moved through

  the rough woods much as a living carpet would have

  moved. Nothing escaped us, and the first few scouting

  parties of the enemy that we encountered neither held us

  up nor got away. Our lines simply opened up and engulfed them, after which small special squads finished them off at leisure. In this manner the element of surprise

  was retained. And surprise was the essence of my

  strategy.

  For our goal was a high wooden city set in a dark

  forest where it rose above the familiar green tangle of

  our own jungle like the huge serried towers of Ilium.

  There was almost no open ground around its walls, Halket had told me. Fighting in the dark forest could be a very long-drawn-out and costly business; a frontal assault might be even more costly. Moreover, such tactics would allow of a slow abandonment by the enemy of his

  stronghold, and this would defeat the object of our

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  campaign: to capture their young and carry them back

  to Fusa as slaves. Therefore I had drawn up a strategy

  of encirclement that depended on surprise and discipline, and I meant to see that it was followed to the letter.

  To this end I kept continually on the move, leading

  first one column and then another and even pushing forward alone at times, to rein up and wave the advance squads forward. This scouting ahead involved no particular bravery on my part, for Trotta could outdistance any Formican enemy, and furthermore I was now clad at

  last in what amounted to armor. It consisted of my tin-

  foil discovery cut into a cape that fell from my shoulders,

  leaving my arms free, and further fashioned into greaves

  for my knees and elbow protectors and forearm guards for

  my arms. Made from the heavy metal foil, these were

  clumsy and had to be tied on; but they protected my tender skin against poison wounds and left my arms free at the shoulder for wielding my hatchet if necessary. Thus

  I was a swift and dangerous antagonist.

  We had left Fusa at an early hour, but it was some

  time before we came in sight of the woods that surrounded our objective. During this time there had been only the briefest of halts for rest, and I could not but

  admire the stamina of my strange command. However,

  the real test of their discipline and of my ability still lay

  ahead, and on this score, remembering Atta and his

  weakness for combat of any kind, I had legitimate doubts.

  Only one circumstance reassured me: the manner in

  which my columns had marched past the entrapped

  scouts while my trained squad of fours set upon them.

  Such discipline was the essence of victory.

  There must be absolutely no deviation from orders, I

  had impressed upon Halket, and to this principle every

  regimental commander had acceded. Now we were to

  have the proof.

  Ahead of us, meanwhile, in the wet spring day, the

  dark woods dripped with dampness—the one real ob­

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  stacle to be feared. For, as yon will have guessed, fire

  was to be the first of my new and unsuspected weapons,

  and for it I had had my Fire Feeders bring along huge

  supplies of dry, tinderlike wood. I intended to ignite the

  enemy’s citadel, holding back my troops from the assault

  until flame had produced utter demoralization. The

  crucial question was whether their citadel, saturated with

  winter damp, might refuse to burn. A dozen times I

  debated this question when pool after pool and here and

  there a deep, rushing rivulet slowed up our progress and

  the encircling regiments struggled through the tangled

  trees on each side of our objective.

  I had set a thousand yards as the extreme limit of any

  possible tunnel exits such as Atta and I had dug for our

  miniature stronghold, and beyond this distance I meant

  the circle of our investing lines to hold, completely shutting off any retreat. Not until these lines were fully in place did I intend to order forward my assault troops, behind whose expendable platoons my own Fire Feeders could bring up the necessary tinder and I could start the

  deadly work. At least twenty times I had rehearsed the

  entire maneuver in the Oval. But in actual combat would

  it work out so neatly?

  Strangely enough, it did. Despite the hundreds of wild

  creatures my encircling infantry flushed from their hiding places on the flanks of their advance, no premature notice reached the roughly towered city while we gradually and silently surrounded it. No field worker or scout escaped our squads to sound the alarm to the defenders.

  The flanking parties met, and I sent forward my assault

  t
roops to cover the activities of the Fire Feeders at the

  foot of the battlements. As soon as the Fire Feeders were

  in position I gave the signal to the assault troops to rush

  the gateways and hold them until I had set the fires.

  The battle was on.

  Fierce conflicts instantly developed in the gateways as

  soldiers rushed to their defense from inside the city. In

  back of them other thousands pressed forward to their

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  assistance. But none got through, and meanwhile the

  Fire Feeders were already in action at the foot of the

  wooden walls, bringing the dry wood and piling it ever

  higher and higher as I set fire after fire. The flames

  swiftly rose to a prodigious height as the workers poured

  load after load of the dry tinder on them. Even without

  the assault troops both a holocaust and a riot would have

  gripped the city, for the dampness increased the density

  of the smoke, and it rolled upward like a cloud toward

  the gateways and into the hidden streets of the citadel

  itself. At its appearance all the community took alarm,

  unaccustomed to such a menace, but well aware of what

  it portended.

  At the gateways my assault troops followed orders and

  fell back; and from every conceivable aperture enemy

  soldiers, nurses, and workers poured forth in inextricable

  confusion, the workers carrying loads of food, the nurses

  with young children in their arms, the soldiers rushing

  hither and yon to do battle with somebody, but nobody

  seeking the cause of the smoke or making any effort to

  quench the now formidable fires.

  I gave the signal for the Fire Feeders to retreat with

  all speed, and as the undisciplined mob from the city

  poured out of the gateways our own front lines let the

  Fire Feeders and the assault troops through and then

  closed ranks and advanced against the enemy like a belt

  of ruddy armor. No one could penetrate that wall of

  iron. The mob recoiled from it and turned to flee back

  to the city, only to face the now blazing fires and struggle

  against other refugees.

  It was a ghastly spectacle. For our lines held like steel

  and pushed forward tightly and implacably, and the

  seething mob grew ever larger. Enemy soldiers shrieked

  as they were pushed back toward their own battlements,

  and the fires bit their bodies. Behind them the flames

  rose higher and higher toward the topmost battlements.

  The city itself began to burn, and from every conceivable place the inhabitants tried to reach the ground with

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  the incredible madness of a crazed crowd. Every newcomer but added to the confusion before the roaring fires. The heat reached even to my own face where I sat

  on Trotta, urging calmness on my men in the midst of

  the horrible and unheard-of yells.

  Even in the face of the hitherto inexperienced, our

  own discipline held steady, and nowhere did our lines

  break or the struggle degenerate into single combats.

  Time and again I ordered the lines opened to allow

  nurses and foreign children to struggle through—children

  who were promptly carried off to our own slave attendants while their nurses were being tom to pieces by the Execution Squads. Each time the lines were reformed

  strongly; each time they pressed forward again upon the

  enemy soldiers and the raging fires behind them; and

  the outcome was never in doubt. Those who were not

  killed were burned to death, and the stench of hot acid

  was almost unbearable. In the rear more thousands tried

  to escape by emerging from tunnel exits in the wet

  woods, only to be wiped out in their turn by our disciplined waiting infantry. Nowhere did any of the Natissians escape except when the signal was given to take

  them alive.

  In a matter of two hours the whole city had gone up

  in smoke and a flame so intense that we ourselves could

  no longer bear it and withdrew to a prudent distance. In

  our hands were six thousand young Natissians, at a cost

  of nineteen Fusans killed and perhaps fifty wounded or

  burned. Every order I bad given had been obeyed,

  every prediction verified, every promise kept.

  Victory was complete. I was a conqueror.

  Chapter 12

  L ooking back now, I can see that that moment at Natis-

  sia, followed as it was by my triumphal return to Fusa,

  constituted both my zenith as a conquering Stranger

  among the Formicans and my nadir as a decent human

  being. For, let me say at once, I knew precisely what I

  had done and why I had done it. Not for patriotism nor

  in self-defense had I slaughtered thousands of innocent strangers, but for one reason only: to secure personal power and security. Worse, my amazing success made it inevitable that I should continue on the path I

  had begun; that victory should follow upon victory and

  slaughter upon slaughter—an illimitable future stretching ahead for all the rest of my days, until Fusa was become the Rome of what the Formicans called the

  world. For obviously I could now conquer the entire

  group of enemy states that surrounded Fusa and in so

  doing become Fusa’s Caesar, an imperial ruler of a state

  that would remain forever alien to me.

  Such was my perception as I stood and stared at the

  burning city. And it is obvious to me now that the

  sharp revulsion I felt against such a future went far to

  blind me to the hidden reaction to my triumph that must

  instantly have occurred among my Fusan masters.

  It is an axiom among Formicans as among men that

  the mysterious, the unknown, produces unreasoning fear;

  and to the Formican of any caste fire is the most terrible

  mystery of all of Nature’s devices. What more natural,

  therefore, than that my sudden and unheralded produc-

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  tion of fire, with its accompanying revelation of the actual purposes for which I had been drilling my Fire Feeders, should have struck an unreasoning fear of me

  into the minds of all of Fusa’s leaders? Yes, I was a

  conquering hero. But had I not done the unpardonable:

  conquered by means of a new idea?

  Such was the inevitable reaction of my masters to the

  mysterious weapon that my victory had revealed to them;

  and I think it not too much to say that even as they stood

  in the Great Oval and honored me for my conquests they

  had already determined to destroy me. Yes, the disciplines that I had introduced into the regiments could be accepted. But fire, even if obviously a potent and successful weapon, was too far outside Fusan experience to be put in any category.

  It was this abhorrence, this deep suspicion of something new, I am convinced, rather than any personal jealousy of my popularity or any fear that I might be a

  new Napoleon come to upset the Directory, that actuated

  all the leaders after Natissia. All that my popularity

  meant to them was that any attack upon me must be as

  oblique and underhand as possible; because, after all, I

  had obviously served the community by securing it six

  thousand slaves. Just the same,
I was marked for destruction.

  All this was hidden from me, however, during my first

  few hours back in Fusa. In my new gallery Nuru was

  once more my constant companion—he came to my quarters evenings because (so he said) he was engaged in memorizing the victory and the first use of fire in Fusa—

  and I must say that he gave no hint of any dissatisfaction

  whatever, either with me or with the scope of my victory. Rather, he more than insinuated that none of it would have been possible without the assistance of his

  factotums in training the Fire Feeders; and since I was

  more than inclined to agree with him he appeared to

  look on me with considerable favor.

  As a matter of fact it was the old Memorizer himself

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  who first suggested that Atta be my aid-de-camp in the

  next campaign against die Rubicundians, along with

  Subser as a mess sergeant for us both, and here I must

  contend that I had some reason for my gullibility. For

  it was true that no one knew more about the Rubicundians and their country than my old friend, and who could better serve as my adviser and adjutant. I admitted as much to Nuru without hesitation when he brought up the subject, and perhaps my very eagerness

  raised an unexpected suspicion in his mind. At any rate

  he sent for Atta, after informing me that my friend was

  a Guard at a Maternity Center not far off.

  Summoned by messenger, Atta himself arrived within

  the hour; and at sight of him after so many months I had

  hard work to dissemble my deep emotion. Indeed, surrounded as I had been by ordinary Fusans, I had almost forgotten the gentle nobility of Atta’s high forehead and

  pale eyes. Reinforced now by a kind of somber sadness,

  his appearance went straight to my heart. How different

  he was! How inconceivable that anyone could ever consider him like the others!

  Such was my instant response on seeing him again. But

  I gave no outward sign of my feelings, and Atta himself

  betrayed not the faintest indication that he had ever

  known me at all, so our meeting passed off without any

  untoward incident. Not until Nuru and Subser had gone

  and we two sat alone over two gourds of nectar did my