by R. W. Peake
“How did he lose his head?” Pullus wondered aloud then dismissed it as unimportant.
What was of most immediate concern was evidenced by how, within a matter of a couple of heartbeats after the new handler settled into his spot astride the elephant’s neck, the sound of a horn that, less than a third of a watch earlier, Titus Pullus had never heard before, rang out above the roaring noise of battle. Within a heartbeat of hearing the sound, Pullus understood what it meant, when the animals that had seemed not only content to move at a walk but seemed reluctant to move any faster, suddenly broke into a ponderous gait that he supposed was their version of the trot. Like many others, including the Macedonian king Alexander, Pullus underestimated the speed with which the huge animals moved, so he could only watch helplessly while the leading animal, with the nearest elephant to it now slightly behind and to the leader’s right, increased their pace. Whereas they had seemed careful to avoid the possible entanglement of the Bargosan tents up to this moment, it now seemed to Pullus as if these obstacles no longer existed as the elephants, all of them adding to the din with the high-pitched, trumpeting call that he recalled hearing at Thapsus, plowed through the tents and flattened them, along with anything contained inside.
“Oh, Sextus,” he murmured under his breath, “what have I done?”
Even as he said this, the first elephant seemed to aim itself directly for the spot where Scribonius and his Signifer were standing, waiting for the charge.
Turning to the scorpions to his left, he thundered, “What are you cunni doing? Aim for those fucking animals!”
It helped that the Immune in command of every scorpion along this part of the rampart had independently arrived at the same conclusion and were already in varying stages of reloading their pieces with normal ammunition, so that within a heartbeat of Pullus’ command, the first scorpion launched its bolt. Now that they were no longer using naphtha-soaked rags, it was impossible to track the missile with the eye, but it nonetheless streaked across the two hundred fifty paces to strike one of the beasts a glancing blow, the iron point gouging a bloody furrow just above one of its ears. This elicited something that sounded eerily close to human, a screeching cry of pain, and more dangerously, rage. The stricken animal, which was the third to Pullus’ left from the leading elephant, gave a burst of speed that took it ahead of its companions, where it went smashing into the line of Legionaries, men belonging to the Third Century of the Second Cohort. Even as this was taking place, another scorpion to Pullus’ left loosed a bolt, and this one flew straight and true, striking the elephant to the immediate right of the leader’s animal directly in the center of its bronze headdress. Because of the noise, Pullus couldn’t hear it strike, although he imagined that it had made some sort of ringing sound, but while the bolt embedded itself, he could see that while it had penetrated deeply enough to remain, sticking out straight from the center of the animal’s head, it didn’t seem to have much of an effect. The animal did come to a stumbling stop, and the new handler pitched forward violently enough that Pullus thought he might lose his seat, especially when the beast shook his head much like a dog, clearly trying to dislodge whatever it was embedded in its forehead, flinging the handler back and forth so violently that, despite himself, Pullus was impressed that he managed to remain in place. The men in the box must have had a sense of warning, because they all grabbed at the sides and hung on, although the movement wasn’t nearly as violent on the beast’s back compared to just behind its head. Then the momentary pause was over, the elephant raising its trunk, and even over the other noise, Pullus could hear the animal making a noise that, to his untrained ear, sounded like a bellow of defiance as it resumed moving, quickly picking its speed back up. Before the animal went more than a couple steps, another scorpion bolt slashed across the space, and this time, it struck flesh, the bolt striking the animal, but not before piercing the leg of the handler, effectively pinning the Bargosan to his elephant. His shriek of pain was drowned out by the screeching cry of the elephant, but it didn’t seem to hamper the animal, only enrage it further as, after another pause, this one lasting perhaps a normal heartbeat, it resumed its headlong charge. Pullus only saw the result because the bolt had struck the animal on the opposite side, but his attention was jerked away to a more immediate concern, as he helplessly watched the animal carrying the handler Pullus assumed was the commander bearing down on where his best friend and nephew were standing, waiting for the onslaught.
Chapter Eight
Porcinus had never been so frightened in his life, and for the first time, he thanked the gods for at least not being in the leading rank. Because of his height, he had a slightly better view, although he wished he hadn’t since, even with the tents obscuring the lower part of the elephant’s body, he could see enough of the animal as it came at them at a lumbering trot to be terrified.
“Remember, boys, don’t try to stand in its path! When I give the order, jump out of the way, then use your spears on it as it goes by!”
Scribonius’ voice sounded eerily calm to Porcinus, as if they were standing on the training ground, but he didn’t give more than a passing thought to how that was possible. The elephant had just crashed into the last tent separating itself from the front rank; what happened next occurred so quickly that, even later, Porcinus couldn’t seem to unscramble the events, although the beginning was clear enough. When the animal, whose handler had a gray beard and was shouting something Porcinus assumed was a command, struck the tent, while it collapsed immediately, somehow its left tusk penetrated the material, thereby scooping up several folds of the fabric. Despite this, the elephant didn’t slow, so when it continued on, it was dragging the tent with it, although it certainly didn’t seem to hamper the animal.
It did, however, cause havoc with the leading rank of the First Century, through no real fault of Scribonius, who, when the animal was a bit more than a stride away, bellowed, “MOVE!”
When the men directly in the path instantly obeyed and leapt to one side, those who chose to move to their left managed to get out of the animal’s path, although Porcinus saw one of his comrades struck a glancing blow by a massive knee, sending the ranker flying, knocking his shield and long siege spear from his grasp. It was the men of the first, second, and third ranks who moved to their right who were in the most peril, the fabric of the tent obscuring their vision as it fluttered outward in response to the motion of the elephant’s head, reminding Porcinus of shaking a blanket out and it flapped in the air. Suddenly blinded by the yards of fabric pinned to the animal’s tusk, the man of the First Section, Publius Secundus never saw the blow from the left knee of the animal that knocked him flat a fraction of an eyeblink before a massive foot crushed his chest, while the shield of the comrade directly behind him was knocked aside by the stiff material so that the arrow loosed by the lone survivor somehow standing erect in the large box on the animal’s back punched through the fabric to bury itself in the man’s chest. The Third Section ranker was hit in the face by a flailing guy rope, striking the man with the same kind of cracking noise made by a whip when a man was being flogged, rendering him temporarily blind and making him forget the situation he was in as he dropped both shield and spear to reach for his eyes as he dropped to his knees, whereupon he was struck by the bronze chest plate of the elephant, which was still plowing through the middle of the Century. Porcinus was several men over; being the tallest man in his section placed him on the outermost file, behind Scribonius, the Cornicen and Signifer, so he was able to see all this occur, and it was his last clear memory, everything after this coming in images, just glimpses of moments as the elephant smashed through his Century as if it wasn’t even there. Although Porcinus clearly heard Scribonius’ first order, he never heard anything after that, simply because it was so noisy he doubted that even if the Cornicen had blown his horn standing just a few paces away he would have heard it. Somehow, though, he was moving by pivoting to his left to face the flank of the elephant, although h
e felt slightly ridiculous holding his shield, thinking how useless it was against this beast; that feeling lasted all of a heartbeat when, as the elephant plunged more deeply into the Century lines, Porcinus saw the archer, already with another arrow nocked, pulling his arm back and clearly aiming directly at him. Without thought, his shield came up just as it was struck a terrific blow that came close to yanking it from his grasp, the iron point punching through the wood to protrude at least four inches. Peeking over the top of his shield, his eyes met those of the archer, and some part of Porcinus noticed that, even with a beard, the man was about his own age, but the smile he gave held not a hint of anything other than malice. While he would never know with any certainty, afterward, Porcinus believed that this momentary distraction was what caused the archer’s death, as one of Porcinus’ comrades—he never learned who it was—had snatched up one of their javelins from the ground where they had lain them to handle the heavier siege spears, and hurled it to strike the archer in the chest. Porcinus saw it happen, the smile suddenly vanishing, replaced by what he thought was a puzzled expression…then the archer was gone, toppling backward over the edge of the box to land somewhere on the opposite side of the animal. Since he had never faced elephants before, Porcinus had assumed that once the beast punched into their lines, its handler would just drive its animal onward to plunge into the rear, which was what this handler did. What he was completely unprepared for was how quickly the handler, who was now all alone, managed to not just stop the forward motion of his elephant, but turn it about to come plunging back into the midst of his Century, the ruined tent still streaming from one tusk as it swung around. And, to his horror, he saw that he wasn’t the only one caught by surprise.
“Vulso! Move!”
Above the roaring noise, Porcinus heard someone shout this, never realizing that it was himself, because at that instant, he was doing as he had beseeched his close comrade to do, except that he was moving towards the elephant instead of away from it, although Porcinus didn’t think of it this way; he was simply running towards his close comrade. Vulso seemed paralyzed, standing flat-footed, his mouth agape, although he had his shield up in front of him, and if Porcinus didn’t know better, he would have thought that his older veteran friend was challenging the animal to combat, but he was certain that Vulso was simply too frightened to respond. Dashing forward with his spear out in front of him, Porcinus was only dimly aware that there was at least one of his comrades, he thought it might be Licinius, moving alongside him, as the beast presented its armored side to them. Porcinus’ long legs helped him move quickly, but he was a step too late to save Vulso, when with a seemingly casual toss of its head, the right tusk of the elephant punched through his shield as if it wasn’t there before transfixing Porcinus’ close comrade, the tip bursting through Vulso’s back in a shower of blood.
“Nooooooooo!”
Porcinus’ cry transformed into a snarl of rage and he didn’t slow at all when he rammed the point of his siege spear into the side of the animal, just ahead of the scale-armored blanket and just behind the shoulder. Vulso’s shriek of mortal pain was instantly drowned out by an eerily similar sound from the elephant, while the spear was jerked from Porcinus’ grasp before he could drive it home by the animal rearing up on its hind legs, whereupon he was struck a glancing blow by the animal’s right front leg in the process, one that sent him stumbling backward. This was when he saw that it was indeed Licinius, who had been a step behind Porcinus, except that his aim was off, the point of his spear striking the bronze scales at too flat an angle, which caused it to skid along the surface of the blanket, the only damage being the gouge it created in the armor. Worse for Licinius was the fact that he had been expecting to exert a tremendous amount of force to penetrate the animal’s armor, so he had done as Porcinus, running at full speed towards the beast, but without that resistance, it meant that when the point of his weapon skipped across the armor, he ran directly into the elephant’s side of the animal, slamming into it with a tremendous impact. Because he had his shield to his side, the only way a Legionary could run at full speed, he smashed face first into the armored blanket, and Porcinus was close enough to see the sudden spatter of blood from the impact in the eyeblink before Licinius caromed backward to land flat on his back, apparently out cold. Reacting quickly, Porcinus’ intention was to grab his unconscious comrade, but then out of the corner of his eye, he sensed movement, reflexively ducking as the shaft of the spear that was embedded in the side of the animal came whipping towards him, preceding the head and front part of the elephant which, with its eyes placed as they were, had seen and recognized Porcinus as the human who had just hurt it and had turned towards him. Porcinus managed to avoid the spear shaft, but the dangling legs of his close comrade still pinned to the animal’s tusk struck him bodily, sending him reeling several steps sideways. Somehow, he not only managed to keep his feet, he also managed to avoid tripping over Licinius, who was now beginning to move his head back and forth, his face a mask of blood, but because he had been driven in that direction, the elephant could now see both Porcinus and the prone figure of Licinius, so that before Porcinus could get his feet under him, Licinius’ fate was sealed. Raising its right back leg, the elephant brought its foot down, placing its massive foot on Licinius’ chest, yet not with any real speed; in fact, to Porcinus, it seemed as if it was with a malicious slowness, done deliberately to torture his comrade. This seemed to bring Licinius back to some sort of consciousness as he began flailing wildly about, but before he could issue a scream, the air, and the life was crushed from him, leaving Porcinus and his comrades only able to shout with helpless rage. That no more than three or four normal heartbeats had elapsed from the instant the handler turned his animal about to renew its assault on the Century would have been deemed impossible by Porcinus, or any of the other men, but this was the case. It was also why it seemed inconceivable to Porcinus that Vulso was still alive, but just as the elephant crushed Licinius as it continued back into the midst the Century, Porcinus saw his close comrade turn his head to look directly at him.