by David Weber
“When you start reusing them in the field, you also have to take into account how old your cases are. If a case is new or nearly new, you can put more powder into it than into an older case. Older ones are more brittle from the heat generated by repeated firing, which can cause them to split or tear apart inside the chamber if you load them as heavily as you would a new case.
“You also have to consider how high the metal quality is to start with. The metal in the gun, itself, is a factor. An old gun that’s been fired thousands of times is more likely to crack or split during use than a new gun. If the metal quality’s lousy to start with, you can create problems from the very outset. I’ve seen guns with parts that sheared off, from cheap metallurgy and shoddy manufacturing and poor maintenance, and a couple of those broken guns caused serious injury to the men shooting them. So you see, there isn’t an easy or definitive answer to your question.”
“Well,” she responded reasonably enough, “what about this gun?” She pointed at the rifle Jasak had tried to fire. “With this ammunition?”
“That combination would yield about forty thousand pounds per square inch of pressure inside the cartridge case and the rifle’s chamber. That kind of pressure would propel a bullet of this size, shape, and weight at a bit over two thousand feet per second at the muzzle. The speed drops, of course, once it leaves the gun, but it’s still moving fast enough to kill a man a mile or more away.”
Sogbourne stared at him, his horror at the weapon’s power once again clearly evident. “No wonder those accursed things blow flesh apart!”
“Yes,” Gadrial said, but she was frowning thoughtfully. “But if this is merely a physical process, a simple burning of natural compounds that works in your universe, but not in ours, we need to find out why it doesn’t work here. It may be that some step in the manufacturing process used to make these cartridges renders them inoperable here, although I can’t imagine what that might be.”
“Neither can I,” Jathmar agreed.
“I find it interesting that your Talents don’t work as well here and your weapons apparently don’t work at all. It’s odd…very odd.…”
Her voice trailed off, and then a sudden flare of inspiration lit her eyes. She met Sogbourne’s gaze. “I want Jathmar to try shooting the rifle.”
“What use would that be?” Sogbourne asked sharply. “And I still don’t want a prisoner to handle a weapon.”
“If it doesn’t function in our universe,” Gadrial said in a patient, reasonable tone, “there’s no risk in letting him hold it. It wouldn’t be anything more dangerous than a simple wooden stick. Speaking as a scientist, Twenty Thousand Sogbourne, I want as complete a dataset as possible. Right now we have only one set of data to work with: the priming compound doesn’t ignite the powder, or it doesn’t ignite the powder because Jasak Olderhan is operating the rifle.”
Sogbourne stared at her as though she’d taken leave of her senses. So did Jathmar. Even Shaylar was astonished. He could feel it even through their malfunctioning marriage bond.
“Frankly, Sir,” Gadrial went on, raking one hand through her hair, which promptly rearranged itself into the sleek coif she’d laid a spell to create this morning, “that’s seriously insufficient data. Scientific research demands that we find a way to prove that something will work. We already know this weapon works under some conditions. What we need to know is how to make it work under our conditions. That’s the basis of good magisterial science.”
Jathmar blinked in surprise. “Your science is based proving something can work, instead of looking for conditions that prove it doesn’t?”
Gadrial blinked in turn. “Your scientists look for ways to prove a theory doesn’t work? How in the world do you ever manage to invent anything?”
“I don’t mean inventing technology,” Jathmar tried to explain. “I mean coming up with ways to explain how the universes work. You start with a hypothesis, an idea. You test it every conceivable way to see if any of those conditions cause the idea to fail. If it fails, your hypothesis was wrong. Only after multiple people have tested it in many different ways, over a long period of time, does everyone assume it’s true, that it’s an accurate description of how the universes work.
“But it’s still considered only a theory. If any new data come to light that causes the idea or even part of the idea to fail, then the theory has to be revised or eliminated and replaced with a new theory that includes the new discovery. Then that new idea is tested again and again before it’s assumed to be valid.”
Gadrial looked stunned. “That’s…my God, Jathmar, that’s backwards, totally opposite of the way magisters approach scientific research—”
“I fail to see the need to discuss this nonsense,” Sogbourne growled. “We’re here to demonstrate Sharonian battlefield equipment, not develop new explanations of science! We don’t have time to waste on folderol and curiosities of the magisterial mind!”
Gadrial’s eyes glinted. “Oh, really? Then you’d better resign yourself to losing this war.”
“Why?” Sogbourne demanded.
“Because this,” she pointed at the malfunctioning rifle, “is the greatest scientific mystery to come along in two centuries. Their Talents don’t work properly in our core universes. Their military technology doesn’t work properly here, either. If their technology doesn’t work in our universes, it’s logical to assume our technology won’t work in theirs.”
Sogbourne swallowed hard. “Oh, dear gods…”
“Yes. This isn’t some mere ‘curiosity of the magisterial mind.’ It’s a matter of Arcana’s survival if we can’t find some way out of this shooting war with Sharona. This,” she touched the rifle, “is simply an object. It either works or it doesn’t work. It worked in the battle of Toppled Timber, in a pristine universe. It worked on the way back to Arcana, when Jasak and Otwal Threbuch and I fired them at targets made of paper. But it doesn’t work now. To find out why it doesn’t, we have to start testing it under as wide a variety of variables as possible, to see if we can find a condition under which it does work. The most obvious variable is also the easiest and fastest to test. Jathmar’s people built this object. Jathmar’s used it many times, and so has Shaylar. Let one of them operate it and see what does—or doesn’t—happen.”
Sogbourne frowned. “I don’t like it,” he muttered. “You don’t hand a prisoner a weapon.”
“There are enough armed soldiers here to turn Jathmar into a crisped pincushion if he tries to attack one of us. Are you planning to stand there quoting regulations or do you intend to try winning this war?”
“Magister Gadrial—” Sogbourne glowered at her. “You’re obviously going to be as great a pain in the arse as Magister Halathyn ever was. Maybe greater. Oh, all right, I withdraw my veto. Conduct your research. I just hope to hell you know what you’re doing.”
“I haven’t a clue,” she said brightly, “But I mean well. And I guarantee I’ll know more in just a few moments.” She rested a hand on Sogbourne’s arm and said more seriously, “You have your duty to Arcana, Sir, and I have mine. You may trust that I’ll take that duty very seriously, indeed.”
He sighed and nodded. “Very well, let him proceed.”
“Thank you, Commander.” She turned to Jathmar. “All right, Jathmar. Let’s find out what happens.”
Jathmar turned to Jasak. “Will you go with me to the firing line, please? I’d like someone from Arcana to observe closely what I do. I don’t want anyone to doubt my actions—or my intentions.”
The request caught even Jasak by surprise, but the hundred’s eyes glinted with amusement. “Of course, Jathmar. That’s a very accommodating request. In fact, I’d like to ask an officer of the court to accompany us to the firing line, if you don’t mind?”
“That’s a good suggestion,” Jathmar nodded.
Sogbourne stepped forward briskly. “Let’s go,” he said, eyeing Jathmar with curious speculation.
Jathmar pulled ammunition from several box
es, as he’d asked Jasak to do, then loaded carefully. “Very well, gentlemen, shall we see what happens when I try to fire it?”
Sogbourne nodded.
Jathmar lifted the rifle with care, moving slowly enough to keep the suspicious guards satisfied that he wasn’t going to shoot any of the officers or ministers of Parliament. He sighted carefully, acquired the x-ring on the paper target, and squeezed gently on the trigger. He wasn’t entirely certain what to expect, having witnessed that inexplicable series of misfires.
So he squeezed gently down on the trigger, taking up the slight amount of slack, waiting for the crisp snap as carefully machined inner parts sent the firing pin forward through the breechface, into the primer.
A sharp c-r-a-c-k! tore the crisp morning air. The rifle had fired. But the buttplate had barely nudged Jathmar’s shoulder. He stared down the barrel past the front sight at the target, which was pristine. It was only fifty yards away. There was no wind. His sight alignment had been perfect, he knew it had been, but the bullet hadn’t struck the target. He hadn’t missed a shot that simple since childhood.
He peered at the rifle in consternation. It had fired, which was comforting to his violated sense of normalcy, but the recoil had been so puny as to be almost nonexistent and the bullet had failed to punch a target only fifty yards away. Even the sound of the rifle had been off. That sharp crack wasn’t anything like the deep-throated bellow the Ternathian Model 9511 was famous for producing when fired. That characteristic roar had earned the rifle its most common nickname: Thundergun. Only this Thundergun had barely wheezed.
Jasak’s voice punched through his shock.
“It fired!” Jasak was saying again and again. “It fired. But why? I don’t understand. It fired.”
“Ye-e-s-s,” Jathmar said slowly, “but it didn’t fire properly.”
Sogbourne frowned. “What do you mean by that? Explain.”
Jathmar scratched the side of his head, trying to figure out where to begin. He was still scratching when Gadrial called out a request to join them at the firing line. A moment later, she and Shaylar were standing beside the shooting bench, staring down at the rifle in Jathmar’s puzzled hands.
“Well,” Jathmar said, “for one thing, the sound was wrong. Much too quiet.”
“Quiet?” Sogbourne gaped. “That hellish crack was quiet?”
“You know,” Jasak frowned, “now you mention it, the noise was louder the last time we shot this gun.”
“Yes,” Jathmar said, although his voice was distracted by the thoughts colliding uselessly in his head. “For another thing, the recoil was all wrong. It was much too soft.”
“Recoil?” Sogbourne asked.
“Yes, the recoil that occurs when the gun is fired. The release of all that gas pressure moving forward shoves the butt of the rifle, this part,” he carefully moved the rifle into a new position, muzzle-up, to show them which part of the rifle was the butt-plate, “back against my shoulder.”
“Why?” Jasak asked, looking mystified.
“Because of physics. For every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction. When the gas propels the bullet forward at such a high speed, with all that tremendous gas pressure, the energy released propels the rifle backwards, in an equal and opposite direction. The bullet goes one way and the rifle goes the other way, so it punches your shoulder. The faster the bullet moves out of the gun barrel, the more energy there is to slam backwards. If you have a big, heavy gun, some of the weight will tend to compensate, but there’s still an opposite reaction. The gun will travel backwards while the bullet travels forwards, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
The Arcanans, he discovered, were staring at him as though he’d lost his mind.
“Ah, Jathmar,” Gadrial said carefully, “that’s a very interesting theory. But it doesn’t work that way here.”
Others were shaking their heads.
“But that’s impossible,” Shaylar said. “There’s always a reaction.”
“Oh, well we’re familiar with the idea of recoil,” Gadrial reassured her. “We just don’t let it get in the way.”
“‘Get in the way’?” Jathmar repeated. “That’s one of the basic laws of physics. It underlies everything. It has to ‘get in the way,’ Gadrial!”
Gadrial’s brow furrowed. “Not here. Half of what we do on a daily basis wouldn’t work if that was a physical law underlying everything. Heavens above, dragons couldn’t fly if we had to worry about silly things like recoil all the time!”
Jasak Olderhan exchanged a long and worried look with Commander of Twenty Thousand Sogbourne.
“I want to shoot this,” Gadrial said abruptly. “I shot it before. I want to shoot it again. Jathmar, I’ve forgotten how to operate it. Could you show me again, please?”
“Well, certainly, if you really want to.” He loaded it for her, slipping half-a-dozen rounds into the tube-fed magazine, worked the action to chamber a round, then showed her again how to hold it, how to aim it, and how to fire it. She had trouble holding it steady and on target, because the weapon was much too heavy for her, but she did a creditable job of aligning everything, and then she squeezed the trigger…
It clicked.
Just clicked. Not even a crack, let alone a roar.
Jathmar stared in utter consternation.
“That’s impossible!” he blurted. “Why didn’t it fire? It should have. It just did!” He did something he shouldn’t have done. It wasn’t safe. It certainly wasn’t smart. He took the gun from Gadrial, thumbed back the exposed hammer to cock it without working the action, tucked it against his shoulder, and squeezed.
C-r-a-c-k!
The buttplate jostled his shoulder. The target remained pristine, but the cartridge that had failed to fire for Gadrial had fired on the first try for him. He nearly dropped the rifle. In fact, he had to fumble for it as the gun started to slide out of his numb hands and a film of sweat broke out across his whole body. His hands actually shook as he lowered the rifle gingerly to the shooting bench.
Jathmar stared at Gadrial.
She stared back.
“That’s impossible,” he said, voice flat with shock.
“Why?” Jasak asked, brow furrowed.
“It just is,” Jathmar insisted. “The primer should have worked for Gadrial, too.”
“Does this kind of thing ever happen in Sharona?” Gadrial asked.
Jathmar started to answer, then halted. “Sometimes,” he said slowly, “there are misfires or hang fires. A misfire is a cartridge that doesn’t function at all. A hang-fire is one that for some reason doesn’t ignite properly. It goes off more slowly, usually due to the powder not burning at the proper rate, which is one reason we always point a gun’s muzzle downrange, away from anything we don’t want to shoot. A hang-fire can go off a second or two later.”
“Maybe,” Jasak suggested, “we should experiment with more shooters?”
Jathmar nodded, feeling dazed.
Ten minutes later, he was so confused, he could barely think straight. It was flatly impossible, but they’d given it a thorough, rigorous testing. When Jasak Olderhan, Gadrial Kelbryan, or Twenty Thousand Sogbourne tried to fire a Sharonian gun, nothing happened. When Jathmar or Shaylar pulled the trigger, the gun fired—but with only a fraction of its original power. A bullet that should have nailed a target a thousand yards away wouldn’t travel fifty. They had to move the target back to the twenty-five yard line before Jathmar’s bullet would even reach it.
Even Twenty Thousand Sogbourne was puzzled by the admittedly weird performance of Jathmar’s hunting rifle. “What’s going on, Magister Gadrial?” he demanded in exasperation.
“I don’t know. Jathmar, tell me again how the guns work. What makes the bullet leave the gun?”
Jathmar drew a deep breath and launched into another explanation of powders and primers and gas expansion. He told her what gunpowder was, how and why it burned, what priming compounds were and why and how they exploded
when struck with a sharp blow. He didn’t do a very good job of it, in part because he was thoroughly rattled and in part because he wasn’t an expert in arms manufacture or the chemistry of weapons development. But he told her what he could.
Gadrial listened intently.
“In essence,” she said with a frown that only seemed abstracted, since Jathmar was perfectly well aware of how agile her mind was, “what you’re describing is the incarnation of motive energies, which are harnessed through a distillation process that transfers their latent arcane energy from the etheric plane to the physical, and the action of this device, this ‘fire-making pin,’ is a physically expressed incantation that causes the latent motive energies distilled in these various compounds to combine in a sudden, complex spell of release. Ye gods, Jathmar, it’s mind boggling!”
