by Simon Hawke
"But we’re almost at the Malakand fort," said Churchill. "It would seem to me that our strength has intimidated him, otherwise he would have attacked before we could have an opportunity to join forces with the troops at the garrison. "
"Or ‘e’s waitin’ to knock off two birds with one stone, sir," said Mulvaney.
"I’m afraid Mulvaney’s got a point, sir," said Learoyd. "Put yourself in the Mad Mullah’s place. You’ve got some of your men pressing the Chakdarra garrison, others harryin’ the fort at Malakand. Here comes a large relief force on its way, and in order to attack them, you’ve got to split your own troops further to take them on. The Malakand is situated in a large depression, sort of a valley ringed by cliffs. If you can command the heights, why not wait until the relief has arrived and then ring them ‘round, cuttin’ them and the garrison off from Chakdarra""
"Rubbish, man," said Churchill. "I’ve seen the map of the area. In order to command the heights around the Malakand, it would require a very large force indeed. Thousands, I should say."
"Now you’re catchin’ on, sir," said Mulvaney. "You can be sure you’ll ‘ave yourself a bloody entertainin’ dispatch to write before too long."
The terrain they were covering was rough, extremely difficult for a large detachment with pack animals and guns. They had made good time, but making good time in the Hindu Kush range still meant going slow. Nevertheless they were within sight of the garrison at Malakand before too long, and throughout the entire journey they had encountered no resistance whatsoever, not even so much as one stray shot, which was unusual in the extreme.
Lucas and Andre travelled at the middle of the column, slightly behind Churchill. They rode on horseback, moving along at a slow walk since they were travelling with mostly infantry. Din, their Hindustani attendant, was just behind them, proudly leading their pack mule and keeping so ramrod straight a posture in his brand new khakis that it looked as though his back would break. He had managed to obtain a battered bugle somewhere, which he carried proudly and clutched to himself protectively whenever anyone came near.
"Something’s wrong," said Lucas in a low voice, so that only Andre could hear him.
"I know," she said. "You’ve been preoccupied throughout the entire journey. It’s this Churchill fellow, isn’t it" You keep staring at him."
"This Churchill fellow"" Lucas said.
"Yes. What’s so special about him""
"Good Christ, you really don’t know."
"Should l""
"Well, actually, you’d be about the only one I could think of in the service who’d have a good excuse. He’s not a part of your history. You went straight from the 12th century to the 27th. That leaves one hell of a big gap, though you still ought to know about him. I find that puzzling."
She frowned. "So do 1. I thought my implant education was complete. If he was-is-an important historical figure, even if I didn’t remember anything about him consciously, the subknowledge of the programming should have triggered my awareness of him the moment I heard his name. And there was nothing in the mission programming about him either."
"I know. That’s what’s wrong. There’s simply no way for that to be possible. Or at least there shouldn’t be. That young subaltern riding up ahead grew up to be one of the most important men of the 20th century. One of the greatest political figures of his time. He became prime minister of Great Britain and led that nation through the Second World War."
"My God," said Andre. "And the programmers missed that" How could they""
Lucas shook his head. "They couldn’t. I just can’t see it. Even if someone was somehow negligent, the data banks have built in failsafe for vital information. It’s been driving me crazy. And you put your finger on it. The subknowledge. I knew something was missing, but I couldn’t figure out what it was until you said that. I knew about Churchill, but I couldn’t figure out why there was a gap. Why did I know about Churchill, but didn’t know about him being on this campaign" Because I didn’t know it through the subknowledge of my implant education either! I remembered. I just plain remembered about him on my own, because I like to read history. But it’s been a while since I’ve read any British history, or any 20th century history for that matter. I didn’t remember completely. It just goes to show you how dependent we are on our subknowledge. And that’s the common denominator. There was nothing about Churchill in our mission programming, and neither of us could extract anything about him from our programmed subknowledge because it simply wasn’t there. And that’s impossible."
— You’re right," she said. "It doesn’t make sense. It should have been there."
— You still don’t understand," he said. "It can’t not have been there! I can only think of one possible explanation. A temporal disruption. There isn’t any record of Churchill in our subknowledge or in our supplementary mission programming because there was no record of a Winston Churchill as a pivotal figure in history."
"But that doesn’t make sense either," Andre said. "If that’s the case and a disruption occurred that has prevented-or will prevent-Churchill from following his historical template as we know … as you know it, then how could you know about it in the first place""
Lucas stared at her. "You want to run that by me again"
"I’m not even sure what I just said." She shook her head. "What1 mean is, if there isn’t any historical record of Churchill, then how could you remember reading about him in your history books""
"I see what you mean," he, said. "It has to be an anomaly of Zen physics. Whatever happened that caused Churchill to be wiped from history must have happened after I read about him."
"I’m confused," said Andre. "How could something have happened during his lifetime and yet have taken place after you read about him in the 27th century""
— You’re confused because you never studied Zen physics," Lucas said. "I only have a well-versed layman’s knowledge of it. Delaney’s the only one I know who’s taken the full course, and he said it almost gave him a nervous breakdown. I take that back. Our friend Dr. Darkness understands it. Hell, he could probably teach the course in his sleep. I wish to hell there was some way of getting in touch with him so we could ask him about this. Let me try to follow it through with you. Assume that some action originating in our time, in the 27th century, kicked off a chain of events that led to the disruption. For the sake of argument, let’s set up a simple hypothesis. Say somebody clocked out to Minus Time, to this scenario, on the day before we went in for our mission programming. And let’s say that someone killed Churchill."
"You’d have a paradoxical situation which would have to be resolved by a disruption," Andre said.
"Right. Up until that someone clocked out to the past in order to cause the disruption, that is, killing Churchill, there was no disruption and Churchill was part of our history. If we assume that the disruption wasn’t massive enough to overcome temporal inertia — and frankly, I don’t see how Churchill’s death wouldn’t qualify as a disruption massive enough to cause a timestream split-then temporal inertia wouldn’t be overcome. It would simply be affected significantly. You remember the analogy Delaney used, the timestream seen as a river" The river has a current, and that current is temporal inertia. An act that’s insignificant, that is, not historically disruptive enough to affect the timeflow, is like tossing a small pebble into the river. The current or the inertia overcomes any possible effect. You wouldn’t see any ripples from where you tossed the pebble in. Next, take a large rock and toss it in. The rock has mass sufficient enough to affect the current, if only temporarily. You’ll see the splash, perhaps a very brief rippling effect, and then the force of the current eliminates it or compensates for it. Now take a huge, behemoth boulder-something the size of one of these damn mountains-and toss it in the river. The effect of the current is overcome. It either dams up the river somehow, or more likely, splits the flow-creating a timestream split. The river comes back together again on the other side and you have both effects working
one against the other. A historical timeline in which Churchill died and one in which he didn’t. Nobody knows how the hell that would resolve itself. It would either create a parallel universe or screw up the future six ways from Sunday. Trying to work out the possibilities has driven more than one scientist right off the deep end. Whatever it is that’s happened back here-or, from where we stand now, is about to happen-has. affected the timestream to the point that we have no historical knowledge of Churchill. It wasn’t in the mission programming because the programming session took place after whatever event it was that originated in our time affected history in this time."
Andre shook her head. "That doesn’t work," she said.
Lucas frowned. "Why not""
"Granted," Andre said, "the information could be missing from my subknowledge because my implant education took place fairly recently, relatively speaking. But when did you get your implant education""
"Why … when I enlisted, of course. But I still don’t see what that has … " His voice trailed off.
"Uh-huh," said Andre. "When did you take up reading history as a hobby""
"Not until well after I enlisted," Lucas said. "Damn! I shouldn’t remember anything about Churchill either.
"I’d say we’ve got ourselves a real problem," Andre said.
"To which no solution can possibly exist," said Lucas, "because the problem can’t exist. Only it does."
"Maybe Finn will have an answer," she said hopefully.
"Which brings up another question," Lucas said. "Will Finn remember anything about Winston Churchill" "
"What are you getting at"" said Andre.
"Suppose he doesn’t"" Lucas said.
"Okay, so suppose that. What of it""
"If Finn doesn’t have any subknowledge of Churchill, then the whole explanation works, except in that case, I’ll be the anomaly."
"I still don’t see your point."
"Remember our hypothesis. What if something I’m about to do-or something I’ve already done-is the cause of the disruption"" He bit his lower lip. "Jesus, what if I" m the guy who’s going to kill Churchill""
Chapter 5
Their arrival at the Malakand was like an entrance through the doors of Hell. The troops of the garrison were worn out from fighting. Many were wounded. Many had been killed. The broken ground was littered everywhere with bodies, far too numerous for the burial details to dispose of, even if they’d had the time. The lizards and the carrion birds were feasting.
The fort itself was situated on a hill overlooking the depression known as The Crater. The position of the garrison had been spread out when the attack commenced on the twenty-sixth of July. Malakand Post, the fort itself, was in a virtually impregnable spot, but its surroundings were its weak point. To the north-north-east of the fort was The Crater, where the largest concentration of buildings stood. There was the bazaar, which now stood ruined and blackened from flames; the commissariat; the brigade offices and the mess, on a rise overlooking the depression; and an area known as Gretna Green, site of the quarters of the 45th Sikhs. To the north of the depression was a giant rock formation known as Gibraltar Tower, which was in the hands of the enemy tribesmen, who possessed superior firing position from its heights. West of the depression was a water-filled nullah. Across the nullah, through the rocks and to the north-north west, was North Camp. The camel and transport lines were there, as well as Camp Malakand, the site of Number 8 Mountain Battery, the 31st Punjab Infantry, and a large detachment of the 11th Bengal Lancers. Back across the nullah, to the southwest of the fort, was the 24th Punjab infantry. Communications between North Camp and the Malakand Post were by telegraph. Two roads, separated by rock formations, ran parallel cast of the fort to Dargai — the graded road, and the older Buddhist Road.
The officers of the fort had just returned from their game of polo when the garrison at Chakdarra telegraphed that they were under attack by a large force of Pathans. A moment later the wire was cut. The officers were still in their polo kit when the attack came.
A handful of men under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel McRae of the 45th Sikhs immediately ran to hold off the enemy’s advance down the Buddhist Road until the camp could mobilise and reinforce them. They held a position at a point where the road took a sharp curve through a narrow pass. There they re-enacted the stand of the Three Hundred Spartans. McRae’s men kept up a steady stream of fire at an even more steady and seemingly unceasing stream of Ghazis, buying the garrison valuable time in which to organise. McRae was wounded, but he held on until nightfall. The enemy pulled back.
At the fort General Meiklejohn could see the glow of star shells from North Camp, which told him that an at-tack was under way there as well. More tribesmen were pressing in along the graded road, and the 24th was hotly engaged. Tribesmen commanded the heights of the Gibraltar Tower and kept up a constant sniping at the troops below while the infantry attempted to beat back the rushing advance of hundreds of fanatical swordsmen. Meiklejohn rushed from the fort, and at great peril to his life, kept moving from point to point to direct the defensive actions.
Wild fighting took place in the bazaar, a struggle of sword against bayonet as the tribesmen poured through, driving the soldiers back and capturing a large part of the ammunition reserves. Attacks continued along the high ground of the Buddhist Road and from the rocks all around. Regular fire from the rim of the depression resulted in heavy losses.
North Camp was evacuated at the first opportunity and a cavalry detachment sent to reinforce Chakdarra. Miraculously, they got through by criss-crossing the nullah while under heavy fire. Lack of proper transport caused the officers and men of North Camp to leave almost all of their possessions behind. That night the glow of flames from the north gave testimony to the
looting and destruction that commenced as soon as they had left.
Continued massed attacks made it impossible for the pickets to hold their lines. They were forced to pull back to the fort, there to strengthen their defences as much as possible by levelling the bazaar and many of the outlying buildings to cut down on the enemy’s opportunities for concealment. Open lines of fire were exposed and bon-fires built to illuminate the enemy’s approach at night.
There was little respite. By the time the detachment of lancers Delaney rode with had arrived, the Malakand garrison had sustained heavy casualties. Three British officers were killed, ten severely wounded. Seven native officers had died, amounting to a total of twenty senior officers killed. The total losses of officers, both British and native, as well as non-commissioned officers and enlisted men, stood at 153 killed and wounded.
All around upon the hills, Delaney could see the white dots that were the white-robed Ghazis moving about. There were dozens upon dozens of tribal banners, as well as the black flags of the jehad. As night came, the cliffs all around them glowed with the light of several hundred campfires.
"Hell of a sight, eh""
Finn turned toward the voice.
:‘Surgeon — Lieutenant Hugo," said the doctor.
‘ Lieutenant Delaney," said Finn. He held out his hand. Hugo took it in an awkward grip with his left hand. His right arm hung straight at his side, looking stiff. "You were hit"" said Finn.
Hugo gave a slight snort. "No, fortunately. Bit of temporary paralysis. Cramped, you know."
"From what""
"Oh, Lieutenant Ford was wounded in the shoulder. Bullet cut the artery. We were under heavy fire and he was lying out in the open, so there was no opportunity to give the poor chap proper aid, don’t you know. He had fainted from loss of blood. I had no other choice but to pinch the vessel shut between my thumb and forefinger. Crouched there that way for three hours until I could move him to safety. Hell of a thing. Haven’t been able to move my arm hardly at all since. Hand’s gone numb. Nothing to worry about, it’s only a temporary cramp, but it’s rather an inconvenience."
Finn thought that only an Englishman could speak in such an offhand manner about holding a man�
��s life between his thumb and forefinger for three hours while under heavy fire.
"Anyway, it’s nice to have you chaps," said Hugo, putting a cigarette in his mouth and awkwardly trying to strike a light with his left hand. Finn lit it for him. "Thank’s, old boy. Didn’t quite think you were riding into such a damned mess, did you""
"Oh, I knew it would be bad," said Finn, "but it’s another thing to see it. There must be thousands of them up there. It looks like the whole mountain range is on fire."
Hugo nodded. "More arriving every day. Word has it the Utman Khels have joined the fray. The Mahsuds, as well. The Mad Fakir’s pulling them in. Final bloody conflict and all that. There’re lathered up right and proper."
"They let us ride right in," said Finn.
Hugo nodded again. "Why not" Why take you in the open where you can make an effort at deploying" Better position here. Nothing short of a mass suicidal assault would break into this fort-not that I think they’re not up it, mind you-but they have us trapped in here. It’s like sitting atop a sugar cube in a great big empty cup. And they’re all around the rim. I believe they’re building up to final push. Meanwhile they continue sniping at us from the cliffs. They’re damned proficient at it too. Bloody good marksmanship, at this range."
"Has there been any communication with Chakdarra" " Finn said.
"We managed to re-establish heliograph signalling with them briefly on the morning of the twenty-ninth," said Hugo. "They’re hanging on, but they’ve sustained heavy losses. It seems they’ve had a rougher go of it than we. Food and ammunition are running short. Lieutenant-Colonel Adams took the Guides to make a try for the Amandara Pass, but they were forced to retire. He lost sixteen men and twenty-six horses. Now that you lot have arrived, we might stand a better chance. I was forced to miss the officer’s conference. Had to tend to the wounded. Couldn’t do much with this arm, you know. Stiff as bloody blazes. That new doctor was a godsend." He chuckled. "Godsend. Missionary, godsend, that’s good, what""