What Exactly Is Reality?

by D.P. Allen

  The column came to a stop when they turned the edge of the hill and spotted the entrance to the serpentine. One of the Spaniards rode forward and stopped at the first turn looking from the first to the second turn of the serpentine. Mike could have picked him off with his .308 from his vantage point above the man, but decided to try a little diplomacy.

  He stood looking down on the Spaniard, rifle ready and called out to him with his little bit of Spanish, Algien que habla Ingles? The Spaniard ducked in his saddle startled by the voice and turning his mount galloped back to the others. They conversed for a minute and then another came forward with one of the locals running along side. The local looked up and yelled that he would translate for the deus.

  Mike told him to tell his masters that Tif’n was not their property anymore. If they left now, they could leave in peace, but if they attempted to continue towards Tif’n, they would all die. He reminded them of what had happened to their boats that tried to enter without an invitation and told them that the people of Tif’n were ready to defend their city.

  The man answered that the deus would give a demonstration of their power and then give the city the chance to surrender. If it didn’t they would attack and those in the city who were killed would be the lucky ones. The horseman then turned and galloped away leaving the translator standing alone under Mike’s gun. The translator realized that he had been abandoned and ran as fast as he could after the horseman.

  The column fell back a short distance from the wall of the serpentine entrance and a cannon was unloaded from its cart. The cannon crew moved the cannon into position to fire at the first barrier and began loading it. Mike resisted the temptation to shoot the barrel of gunpowder that was brought out for the loading. It would have done some severe damage to the crew and possibly damaged the cannon, but Mike wanted to see how the wall’s material would handle a cannonball at close range.

  The command was given and the cannon fired. What happened next was hilarious to watch. The cannonball hit the sheeting on the wall and bounced almost straight back at the gun crew. It tore through the cart that had held the cannon and after bouncing on the road in front of the “draftees”, continued into the marsh where it plopped out of sight into the water.

  As the cannonball whizzed by the gun crew, they all went flat on the ground and as it passed near the “draftees”, many dropped their crossbows and started to run back down the road, only to stop short when they realized they would have to run through the Spaniard troops to get away. The wall was unhurt, but the cart was kindling. The gun crew were all shaken and stared at the wall from the ground in disbelief.

  The “draftees” slowly made their way back into formation and retrieved their dropped weaponry and the rest of the Spaniards stared with surprised looks on their faces.

  Mike couldn’t resist yelling, Quieres a hacerlo otra vez?, which meant, Do you want to try again? If they tried a few more times, they might defeat themselves and save the city a battle. Marcel and the other Protectors who had been standing behind Mike through the entire episode were laughing so hard that their laughter was echoing through the marshes.

  The leader of the Spanish column looked angrily at Mike, but obviously wasn’t sure what to do now that his demonstration had gone so awry. While they stood pondering their next move, Mike decided to help their decision making. He knelt and took aim at the gunpowder keg sitting a dozen feet from the cannon and fired.

  The black powder exploded quite nicely, knocking the cannon sideways a few feet and breaking off one of its wheels. The crew had moved a short distance to the other side of the cannon while they discussed what had happened and other than being pelted by the dirt and debris as it fell back to earth and once again trying to bury their faces in the pavement, didn’t appear to have suffered any serious casualties.

  Mike shouted for the translator to tell his master that they could leave or advance, but if they stayed where they were, he would start shooting them one by one, beginning with their leader. He told them that if they left, they could drag their cannon with them and go in peace, but if they advanced, Mike’s soldiers would start shooting too.

  The commander showed that he didn’t lack for courage as he rode up to the point under Mike and shouted something that Mike didn’t understand in Spanish. After he repeated it a few times with Mike’s response being, No entiendo.” I don’t understand, the translator came close enough to shout that he was saying they would leave. Mike answered, bueno. The gun crew by now were on their feet and trying to repair the broken wheel. They finally attached a team to the cannon with ropes and dragged it off a short distance to what they probably assumed was out of Mike’s rifle’s range.

  The Spanish leader now demonstrated a very non-gentlemanly trait and ordered his “draftees” to advance. As they reached the first serpentine wall, Mike had Marcel fire a warning shot to show that Mike’s was not the only firearm they faced. Marcel’s “warning shot” dropped the first person in the column, like a sack of bricks.

  Mike was impressed by the shot as the 150 yard range was far beyond where Mike could hit anything effectively with a .22. The deceased man was obviously a leader as his arm was raised in a forward motion to the other troops when he died. The following troops froze in place staring first at their fallen leader and then up at the bluffs where Marcel made a show of chambering another round for the next leader.

  The effect was not lost on the Spaniards either. They now knew that they faced more rifles, but didn’t know how many or even exactly where they were. The Spaniards had never faced smokeless gunpowder or rifles with the accuracy of these. Mike shouted, That was your last warning.

  The Spaniard shouted for them to advance and they did at a dead run, more a stampeding herd than an organized fighting force. They were obviously more frightened of the Spaniards than the enemy on the hill for now anyway. They were about to find out that the enemy on the hill was much more frightening.

  Mike turned to the ballistas that covered that area of the serpentine and said to commence firing. Four fire bolts and two standard bolts immediately arched down into the packed running “draftees” and a dozen plus continued running until they were burned to the point that they collapsed while at least 20 lay dead or injured after being skewered and burned by the bolts. As the leaders of the stampede turned the first turn into the serpentine, the next battery of ballistas fired and a wall of fire met them and turned 30+ more into twitching, burning corpses that met the others as they made the turn.

  First one then the whole attacking force turned and ran back to the Spaniards, as the front tried to retreat, the back that hadn’t made the turn yet advanced and the reloaded ballistas fired into the tightly packed group jammed together and not able to move.

  Close to 100 died in that volley as the flames engulfed both soldiers caught in the spray of burning pitch and the dead and wounded that the bolts mowed paths through. At that point all of the survivors who could retreated. Many wounded and dead were trampled as well as any who fell in the panicked rout.

  The Spaniard commander saw his decimated troops returning and had his Spaniards form a line to stop them from passing his position. This was the moment that would decide matters thought Mike. He leveled his rifle and shot the Spaniard leader in the chest.

  The clang of the bullet hitting and penetrating through his iron breastplate was followed by a loud thud as he flipped from his horse and landed dead on the road. Mike cranked another round into the chamber and repeated the action with a leather clad horseman and was working the bolt for another shot when the other two horsemen wheeled and galloped through the foot soldiers on their way to safety.

  The foot soldiers dodged the horses and then followed them leaving the wagons, cannons and provisions behind. Several of the cart drivers stayed with their teams, but the majority joined with the surviving “draftees” running after the soldiers. Marcel convinced the few drivers loyal to their teams to follow the others on foot. He shot the first cart driver from
his perch on the front of the cart and before that unfortunate had hit the ground, the other drivers had abandoned their carts.

  Very quickly all that could be seen was a mass of running or riding people heading north. All that was left on the road by the city’s defenses were wagons, animals and the dead or dying. Round Three and luck was still holding. It seems the few minutes of slaughter had destroyed the Spaniard commander’s battle plan and his troops’ will to fight for now.

  After the lookouts reported that the column had stopped a ways down the road and after reorganizing, continued north, Mike and his Protectors followed the trails back towards the city, down through the gates and out to the scene of the battle. They were cheered as they passed each strong point and saluted the Defenders. As they passed the battleground, they encountered a platoon of the Watchers. Some were throwing the charred bodies over the low wall into the marsh where the creatures there would dispose of the remains. Several were guarding injured “draftees”.

  It looked like there were three who were only slightly injured and a couple of more who probably wouldn’t survive. Hue and some of the Watchers were standing guard over the captured equipment and animals though none would go near the two horses. Mike told them to get everything to the city.

  No one made a move towards the horses, which they had never seen before. Mike walked up to the horses slowly and gently took one by the reins. It followed him with no trouble, so Marcel copied the action with the other. Mike then mounted the horse and it remained well behaved to his relief. He had ridden some in his younger days, but wasn’t an expert by any means. Marcel looked at Mike, looked at the horse he led, looked back at Mike and continued leading the horse by its reins.

  Some of the Watchers were trying to move the dead Spaniards to the wall when Mike told them not to. He explained what the procedure for burial was among the Spaniards and said to put them on a cart and send the cart with the three slightly wounded soldiers and the bodies after the retreating column.

  He wanted the Spaniards to get the message that alive or dead they would be treated with respect, but that Tif’n was to be left alone. The bullet hole punched through the Spanish armor would show then that they were very vulnerable to the weapons of Tif’n and the “deus” ploy no longer worked here.

  He gave the wounded prisoners a message to deliver to the Spaniards. Stay away from Tif’n and Tif’n would stay away from ‘Acon. Attack Tif’n again and ‘Acon would be destroyed along with every Spaniard.

  He said to tell the Spaniards that they hadn’t seen anything near the power that could be brought against them. He added that if the Spaniards decided on peace, Tif’n would invite trade with them. A peace envoy would be welcomed, but they must arrive unarmed in an unarmed boat.

  Chapter 29

  After the thrill has passed.

  As he passed the edge of the city enroute to the battle site, Mike checked on the enemy fleet. They still sat at anchor obviously not knowing that they’d already lost the ground battle. They’d have a long night or two if they waited for a boat to bring them word. That assumed that they didn’t decide on their own after a period of time that something was wrong and leave. They might sit there assuming there was a siege on the ground side, but Tif’n was self-sufficient and could continue with or without a fleet outside the harbor while the fleet would have to resupply.

  As he debriefed and praised the leaders of the various defensive forces for their and their troops’ actions at the end of the day of the battle, Mike thought of an odd thing that hadn’t registered at the time. He asked why the Spaniards were surprised that their cannon hadn’t destroyed the defenses and how was it that they had been able to destroy buildings in ‘Acon with their cannon when they first arrived. What was different now compared to then?

  The Elder, Samu chuckled as he answered. Mike, he said, we are the only manufacturers of the sheeting, so all must trade with us for it. We have different qualities that we can produce and our grade for sales outside of our city are missing certain ingredients that produce the special qualities of which you speak.

  Mike said, In other words no one else has nor can produce the super strength materials that we have here?

  Exactly, was the answer. Of course the other cities have their own specialties which we can’t duplicate. ‘Acon for instance is the boat producing center, producing the parts and assembling the boats used by all of the coastal cities, Alb'ny is famous for their fish products and Colu grows the best rice, while Corde’ controls the forests from which they harvest the woods used by many guilds in the different cities.

  You may have noticed that the people of Tif’n have been eating a rather simple diet of those items grown and produced here. That is because the trading with the other cities stopped except for whatever the deus wanted for themselves.

  We have also been saving any meat producing animals for breeding stock and milk production. The deus destroyed much of our breeding stock to have meat on their table every night, most of which went to waste because they wouldn’t share with inferiors as they called us. They said that only real men deserved meat, not peons.

  Hmm, we need to do what we can to increase the food production here then. said Mike Perhaps a study can be done to see if it might be possible to expand the walls further into the marshes to give more pasture and crop lands? Oh and a question on a different subject. If ‘Acon builds the boats, where did our four harbor defense boats come from? asked Mike.

  We can repair boats, so we know how to take parts off and replace them. We simply stripped some of our other boats to produce those,” said Samu. The guildsmen in ‘Acon will not like it, but if we had asked them to build them for us, the deus would probably have taken exception!

  Well here is something for our ingenious guildsmen to think about, said Mike. Is it possible to cover the hulls of the boats with layers of the sheeting with some sort of spacing to let the sheeting deflect cannonballs without crushing the hull underneath?

  A voice belonging to a guildsman responsible for crafting the sheeting, identified to Mike as Ronnal answered, It might be possible, but the boat repairs fall under the boat craftsman guild rather than my own building materials guild. A meeting will have to be arranged so that the guilds can determine who can do what portions of the work without infringing on another guild’s domain.

  Oh no thought Mike, sounds like a 20th century union answer. Aloud, he said I hope you can join forces on this project as it may well be very important to the well being of the city and all of its citizens. And he said to himself as he saw the nod and barely stifled smile on Erman, Now working together becomes an issue of patriotism.

  Five days after the battle, a boat arrived at the fleet’s location. Within an hour the now six boat fleet sailed north.

  The city went back to watching and waiting, but the tension of not knowing what to expect had given way to the self confidence of knowing that they could defend themselves successfully against an enemy. The attitude was confident, but not jubilant.

  Those who had seen the carnage of war, even if it was the enemy’s burned and mangled corpses rather than those of friends, had seen that warfare was neither noble nor glamorous and had passed the knowledge on to those who had been spared the sickening sight.

  Chapter 30

  The miracle of creativity.

  The fleet hadn’t been gone for a day when Mike was startled by the sound of a cannon from the direction of the north road. He hurried in that direction watching Watchers and Defenders rushing for their posts. As he reached the first gate, he ran into a crowd of guildsmen clapping each other on the backs and laughing.

  As he plowed through the crowd, he found one of the captured cannons with a supply of powder and ball and a crew of Defenders as well as several guildsmen looking carefully at a sheet of the bullet proof building material. They all seemed embarrassed when Hue started yelling at them to warn people that they are doing an experiment before they create any future city wide mobilizations. The chewi
ng out however didn’t dampen their enthusiasm about what they had accomplished.

  They held up a composite panel made with a sheet of the building material on one side and a simple clamp assembly that clamped to a section of boat hull on the other. The two materials held apart by a spacer of what looked like a piece of concrete pipe about 4” in diameter split in half to resemble the tiles used on the roofs of houses in the 20th century American southwest.

  The “pipes” were glued (That was the best word Mike could think of to describe the way they were joined to the building materials.) like upright stripes to the back of the building sheet and “C” clamps attached the pipes to the hull material. Mike figured there were at least three guilds represented and possibly a fourth if there was another guild to produce and use clamps.

  Mike asked if the shot had been a test, which had gone well and was answered with a chorus of perfect, perfect andset it up again to show him”. Not needing another panic to start in the city, Mike suggested that if the guildsmen were satisfied, that was good enough for him.

  With more back slapping and hand shaking the guildsmen picked up their respective materials and challenging each other with quicker production times for the modification of every marine asset, returned to the city. Mike and Hue approached the Defender gun crew and asked how they had determined how to operate the device.

  An older Defender seemed amused by the question as he answered, I was in one of the ballista batteries above the deus crew and just watched what they did. These are very simple to operate as long as you are careful not to drop anything and to make sure no heat is present before it is needed.

  Mike couldn’t argue with that logic. Where are you positioning them? he asked

  We wanted your suggestion as to that. We couldn’t decide whether to put them to either side of the final gate or to put one at each of the outer gates.

  Mike said, My recommendation would be to put them at the city gate as they have a longer range than the ballistas and can cover the edge of the serpentine and the space between the outer gates quite effectively. The city gate has a very large open area in front of it. Any enemy that should penetrate this far could be engaged at the cannons’ maximum range with a clear shot. It would also make it difficult for an enemy to set up their cannon to fire at the gate if identical cannon with the same range are firing at them.