The Guns of Two-Space

by Dave Grossman

  Damn, Fielder thought as he watched Asquith's guns blaze and Crabs drop like flies, that psycho, Ulrich, has really trained Bert to perform under pressure. I wonder what our little earthling could do with a decent pistol, like those .45s we had down on the planet. Going to have to introduce him to those soon. Real soon!

  On the upperside quarterdeck Grenoble, the two rangers and the dogs—along with their monkeys—served the same purpose, hammering the invaders with such gleeful efficiency that Melville and the quartermaster never even had to participate.

  The quarterdeck personnel, above and below, only had to defend themselves for a few brief minutes before the Fang's marines hit the Crabs. The lunging line of bayonets moved across the enemy's lowerside bow with Broadax at the center. Fielder watched her pounce forward and sink her ax into the thorax of one of the enemy's big fighter Crabs, while her monkey deflected the alien creature's scorpion-like stinger. Her blow sounded like an ax biting into a log, smashing the big Crab down into the deck and cracking its shell like a coconut. A splash of green ichor fountained out in all directions from the creature as its innards came out, under compression, from the mashed body. Then she tore her ax out as you would from a chopping block, pulling a ropey string of green slime back with the axhead.

  Working together as one, Dwakins and Rawl fought beside her, and they fought well.

  Above and below, the marines moved forward like a butchering machine run amok, slicing and dicing the Crabs, pausing for a single volley of massed fire on command, and then pushing forward into the mass.

  "Daniel," said Asquith quietly as they watched the marine machine at work aboard the enemy Ship. "Am I mistaken, or did I just hear Dwakins and Rawl shouting, 'Wreckdum! Wreckdum!' over there? What in the hell is that all about?"

  "I really don't want to know, Bert."

  "Execute!" ordered the admiral, and the line of battle, all the seaworthy Ships (or as close to seaworthy as they could make them and still get underway in time) turned nimbly to their greenside, forming a line of battle, like a string of ducklings following their mother, the flagship Asimov.

  Middlemuss pumped a fist in the air in excitement, then quickly placed his hands together behind his back. He tried to maintain a calm stately demeanor, but the huge smile on his face gave him away as he observed the Fang draw closer to his beam at about five hundred yards distance. His gunners and officers watched him like a pack of dogs eager to be unleashed, waiting impatiently for the chance to fall upon these scum who had caught them by surprise. The time for retribution was approaching—quickly.

  Melville strode the upper quarterdeck, stepping over a groaning sailor. Much as it hurt to leave the man, the captain's job was to keep the entire crew alive, not just one wounded crewman. So Melville simply called "Corpsman! Over here!" and kept going.

  He glanced over the stern and verified that the marines had their battle in hand. Fighting was still fierce but it seemed to be concentrated at the stern of the Crab Ship.

  He looked around the quarterdeck and noted with sorrow that the quartermasters had both been killed or wounded, and that a seaman named Simpson was manning the wheel. Tiny Aquinar was still standing his watch, hobbling around on his wounded leg and breathing deeply as he awaited orders. Melville nodded to him, "Mr. Aquinar, have the signalman make the signal for 'Reporting for duty.'"

  "I'll do it sir," said Aquinar quietly. "Signalman's dead."

  Melville felt ashamed that he hadn't even noticed. "Mr. Barlet," he called over the quarterdeck rail, "the redside batteries will cease fire on my command."

  "Aye, sir!" the master gunner replied.

  Melville watched as the Westerness Ships came closer to his beam... closer... closer.

  "Signal from flagship, sir," said Asquith. "Return to port!"

  "Thank you. Mr. Barlet... redside batteries only, cease fire!"

  Midshipman Hayl felt the deck heave beneath him and the air was suddenly filled with a shower of deadly wooden shards and falling rigging as yet another cannonball smashed into Fang's mainmast. Other balls screamed overhead like tortured souls escaping from hell.

  All around him the mast, decks, and railing were splashed with blood, as though the Ship were being painted by a lunatic. Men were being pulped into purple and scarlet masses by the enemy fire and falling spars that burst through the protective netting. He felt the tug of small splinters and debris on his clothing and wet splatters on his face. Looking down, he saw flecks of gristle and blood on his white pants.

  Initially, Hayl was the upper redside battery commander. His guns hadn't gotten much play at first, and he and his gun crews had quietly watched as Midshipman Palmer, Mr. Barlet, and Captain Melville worked the stern chasers and the upper greenside battery. Then the enemy had begun to pull around the Fang's redside, and suddenly his guns were very busy.

  When Midshipman Palmer was called to replace the injured Aquinar on the upper quarterdeck, Hayl had to fill in and command both the greenside and the redside batteries. He allocated targets whenever the captain or the master gunner didn't, he saw to a steady supply of shot for the guns and water for the crews, and he redistributed manpower as men were injured and killed.

  Then Palmer had died while commanding the quarterdeck, and Hayl's duties and responsibilities became even greater! He still could not yet fully grasp the fact that the deep voiced, giant of a boy was dead.

  Fortunately, Aquinar had limped back from the hospital to resume his duties on the quarterdeck. Hayl deeply respected the courage that it took to come back to the fight. The hospital wasn't really all that much safer, but it would have been tempting to just hunker down there and make the most of your wound. But not little Aquinar.

  Young Hayl had been pushed to the limits of his endurance. He tried to be everywhere, encouraging, exhorting, assisting, directing, and allocating resources for his guns. His new arm sent a constant message of support and reassurance from the Fang, and his monkey's belaying pin had blocked a dozen deadly splinters.

  One of his 12-pounders, Bad Ju-Ju, had been upended by a direct hit, killing or wounding half the gun crew. He had reassigned the survivors and kept the guns firing. It became an obsession with him. The guns must be fed. They must keep firing! They could not stop. They must not stop.

  The air shook with each crash of Fang's guns as she gave far more than she received, and her guns, her vicious, feral guns screamed out their hate and wrath. "Cha-DOOM!!" And a cannon sprang back inboard where it was caught by its tackle. The sweat-soaked crew reached for fresh fodder to feed their guns, rammed two balls down its throat, and then ran the heavy cannon back out with a squeal like dying hogs.

  "Cha-DOOM!!" "Cha-DOOM!!" The guns pounded like a great, thundering heartbeat, and Hayl knew that if that heart stopped beating, the Ship, and everyone aboard her, would stop living.

  The young, one-armed middie felt shocked, stunned, and amazed when the captain gave the command command and the redside guns finally stopped. It was almost as if his own heart had ceased beating.

  But they still had the greenside battery to feed and fire. He redirected dazed crewmen, pushing and shoving them to assist the exhausted greenside gunners. And the beat went on...

  HewhocommandstheFleet pulled his mangled foreclaw out of his mouth and watched with satisfaction as one whole side of the hated enemy Ship finally fell silent. It was working! The Royalslayer's sluggish Hivemind was finally turned toward repelling the boarders! He gathered himself to order a mass attack on that side when he felt the sudden confusion of theFleet's Hivemind.

  He whipped his head around, trying to pinpoint the source... and finally saw them! "Ships!" he cried. "The fleet from the Pier is here! How? How?"

  The attendants around him groveled and the whole Fleet's Hivemind came to a halt as he snatched up an eager attendant, bit its head off, and sucked its brains out. The little Crab's final conscious act was a cry of blissful joy.

  Under stress, and in the absence of Royalty, the neural matter from his attenda
nts would go to the admiral's brain and he could be transformed to Royal status, with true Royal command abilities.

  But, damn, he was quickly running out of attendants!

  And the soldiers' skulls were too damned thick to suck their brains out...

  He started to give orders to save his fleet, then stopped, wondering why his voice was muffled. Blast! He had his foreclaw in his mouth again. The urge to devour another attendant was overwhelming, and there were several juicy specimens gathered round, eagerly bobbing their heads up to have their brains consumed. But he had to give orders first!

  "Retreat!Runaway!Run!Run!" he cried aloud, throwing his claws out frantically and flinging an attendant into two-space with a last wail of confused despair. HewhocommandstheFleet was also sending the same signal, to the best of his limited ability, at all empathic, telepathic and gestalt levels.

  "Quick, signal the retreat!" he called out to Hewhosendsthesignals. HewhocommandstheFleet ripped an arm off of the signal officer and began to beat him with it as the hapless Crab raised the signal flags up the halyard.

  Then the enemy fleet opened fire.

  "Commence firing as the targets come to bear!" ordered the admiral.

  He watched with intense satisfaction as the Asimov's broadside rang out from bow to stern, ripping out close-range blasts from their double-shotted cannon, smashing the Crab boats in crushing volleys of 12-pound balls. The gun crews reloaded with a will, returning the guns to battery to deliver their message of vengeance to the next lucky Crabs in line. As each Ship cleared the Fang, they commenced to fire in turn, smashing swathes of the Crab's Ships from two-space.

  "Damn, I love it when a plan comes together," said Middlemuss to his chief of staff. "Especially one thrown together on a wing and a prayer like this one."

  Captain Stockard replied thoughtfully, "I'd have to say that this plan relied a lot on Captain Melville giving us time to get out here. Seems like a lot of responsibility to heap on one young man's head at the last minute."

  Middlemuss sighed. "Yes, it is. But he's the one who did the heaping. And I could tell from his poker that he plays one hell of a bluff. Damned glad I am that he played this bluff, too. Without him getting underway and taking out the attackers at the Pier and then distracting this fleet... Well, without him there wouldn't be a fleet."

  "Aye, sir," Stockard replied. "Aye."

  The Crab fleet began to dissolve like sugar in hot water. Between the pounding guns of the fleet and the broadsides of the Fang, their will to fight had been thoroughly shattered. They still outnumbered the Westerness Fleet, but with their courage—and their royalty!—gone, the remains of the Crab fleet started to run for the northern horizon.

  Their guns were all mounted at the bow, which meant that they were turning their unarmed sterns to the bow chasers of their very irate pursuers. And while the Crab Ships were very fast, they weren't fast enough to escape unscathed—nowhere near fast enough.

  For a stern chase is a long chase, and a faster Ship being pursued by a slower Ship can be in range for quite a long time. As the enemy fleet learned to their sorrow.

  "Jarvis," said Broadax, "load up one o' them swivels and train it on the prisoners. If they try ta retake the Ship, ye know what ta do!"

  He nodded and moved to a swivel gun mounted on the rail of the captured Crab Ship. Lance Corporal Jarvis was a right smart young lad, and Broadax was confident he could figure out how to make the thing work.

  "Uh, sir," Broadax called over to Melville, "they's given up. Or at least they's stopped fightin'. An' yer right, Cap'n, they been studyin' us. Damnme if'n they don't talk our lingo! Sort o'. But they say they can only surrender ta royalty!"

  Melville had come to the lower side to assess the damage on this half of his Ship. He and Fielder stood on the lower quarterdeck, watching the rout of the Crab fleet with subdued humor. The Fang was still intact, so to speak. She had taken damage. Terrible damage. And it hurt to even consider the butcher's bill, but she could still fight.

  "Royalty?" said Melville. "Huh... Well... um, Lt. Fielder is a baronet. Mr. Fielder, the Crabs say they can only surrender to royalty. Go across and sort the matter out, please. There's a good fellow."

  Not knowing what else to do, Melville then went back to the business of clearing the Ship's damage and making her ready for further action. It looked like the battle was over, but you never knew.

  One thing warrior science had learned (and paid the price in blood to do so) was that if you relaxed after a battle, the price your body demanded was complete and utter exhaustion. That is why Napoleon had said, "The moment of greatest vulnerability is the instant immediately after victory." The best time to counterattack is after the enemy has won: when they let down their guard and were all suffering from the physiological backlash that came after battle.

  Men were being carried below, to meet the tender mercies of Lady Elphinstone and her mates, sawing, cutting and stitching endlessly. Others were being dragged to the side, limp and emotionless, to await the sailmaker and his mates, who would sew them into their hammocks for the final journey.

  Some of the wounded were moved to the other side, away from the dead, chatting quietly and watching the remaining hands at work with professional interest. Great masses of fallen cordage, shredded canvas, shattered wood, and a dismounted gun were strewn about. Men picked their way amongst it like stunned survivors of a Shipwreck.

  To counter this post-combat letdown, Melville knew to keep the men busy. Keep them occupied doing the urgent tasks necessary to fight again if need be. Resupplying the ammunition for the guns, caring for the wounded, clearing away the damage, making repairs to the Ship's rigging—anything and everything that must be done if the Ship was to survive.

  Melville stood on the upper quarterdeck and watched his crew scramble to repair the damage. Men and Sylvan were clambering aloft to splice severed lines, while the sound of pounding coming up through the deck told him that the carpenter and his mates were repairing damage to the hull.

  The captain jerked in surprise as Thad Brun, one of the Fang's corpsmen, put a hand on his shoulder.

  "Cap'n, you're gonna have ta go ta th' sick bay fer some o' these, but I'm gonna take out a couple o' t' worst fer now!"

  Melville looked at him in surprise. "What are you talking about?"

  "T' splinters, Cap'n. Ya didn't catch any bigguns, but 't looks like ya walked tru a cactus."

  Melville stared at him, then looked down at his coat. His right side had a veritable forest of toothpick-sized splinters from his hips to mid chest. At first he thought none had penetrated until he realized the sodden feeling on his side was not sweat... and the damned things burned!

  "Oh, hell," he said wearily, "not another session in the body shop."

  "Naw," replied Doc Brun as he carefully worked his hand between the coat and his side and then suddenly lifted it clear of the skin to the accompaniment of what felt like a host of fire ants suddenly taking bites of his skin—and in unison, at that!

  "Urrrk!" was about all Melville could manage as he rose to tiptoe.

  "Eep!" said his monkey cheerfully. It joined Boye and the dog's monkey in craning their necks to observe the process with clinical interest.

  "And why didn't you block those?" Melville asked his monkey accusingly.

  The little creature held up a tattered, scarred and bullet-pocked belaying pin, shrugging innocently and expressively, as if to say, And just how in the hell was I supposed to have blocked them all?

  "Yep," continued Doc Brun, oblivious to the captain's discomfort. "Nuttin' too serious here, jes' need a bit o' cleanin' out. But I think I'd take that coat off, 'twere I you. It's gots ta feel like a pincushion in there!"

  "Thanks, I hadn't noticed!" retorted Melville. "And, Doc, have I mentioned lately that your bedside manner really sucks?"

  "Yup, been tole that a'fore. Be glad ol' Doc Etzen didn't treatja, Cap'n. He's not near as gentle as me. Gots ta get back ta work. Yer okay fer now, skipper." And Bru
n picked up his equipment bag and headed for the next victim.

  McAndrews and his monkey prepared the captain a mug of tea and then took his jacket, tut-tuting quietly as he and his monkey sadly examined the ruined garment. "That was yer best dress coat, too. Straight from the party to the battle," muttered the steward. "You coulda taken time to change first..."

  Fielder was wide-eyed with amazement, an amazement that was tinged with considerable disgust and fear. But he hopped down from Fang's lowerside stern to the Crab Ship's bow and strode to their lower quarterdeck.

  "What the hell is going on here," he asked the befuddled Broadax.

  "areyouRoyalty?" chittered a little alien, as it waved its eye stalks, feelers, and front pinchers in his direction. "areyouNobleblood?" It sounded like a hyperglycemic child with a mouthful of marbles.

  "Yes!" said Fielder arrogantly.

  Through the Moss of their Ship the Crabs sensed the truth of Fielder's statement. "Royalty!Nobility!Royalty!" they cried, scuttling around him, tugging at his cuffs.

  "Get back, you scum! Get back, I say!" spat Fielder as he sent them flying with kicks of his feet. But still they gathered around in ecstasy at the very idea of meeting true royalty. In horrified panic Fielder kicked one small Crab and stomped another of the groveling creatures, crunching them both into ichorous globs.

  "Oh mah gawd we're dead now," said Broadax as she looked at the sudden swarm of Crabs all around them. "Git ready to sing yer death songs boys, Mr. Congeniality here 'as killed us all!" Then, with true dismay in her voice she added, "By the Lady, I can't believe I'm goin' to quaff ale in the hall of my ancestors, an' the only honor guard I can take down with me is a bunch of stinkin' overgrown piss ants!"