Immediately behind Melville, Petreckski was performing his usual, splendid dance, emptying his pistols and then turning to precision sword work. Many times throughout the battle Melville saw a sword blade dart under his arm or beside his head to strike home into the enemy. Once it even darted out from between his legs and into the groin of the enemy in front of him. A macabre phallus of death. It never occurred to Melville to worry that the blade might harm him. He knew that this blade was guided with superb skill and speed, and it was dedicated to keeping the path in front of him clear.
Also behind him were the midshipmen, each with a double-barreled pistol in each fist. One of them was wounded even before crossing to the Guldur ship, and another fell with a musket ball in the head as soon as he crossed. But the remaining four were still behind him, including all three of those who had landed on Broadax’s world. Periodically they took shots with their pistols. Shots carefully chosen to aid and protect him. Having the young middies shoot from behind him was something that concerned Melville and he reminded himself to have Petreckski take charge of their pistol marksmanship training in the future. Assuming there was a future.
As Melville and Petreckski fought with their swords, their left hands were usually back behind them in a fencer’s stance. As the middies’ pistols ran dry their job was to reload, and then place the loaded, cocked pistols into Petreckski and Melville’s outstretched left hands. Periodically during the battle, Melville and Petreckski gained added momentum when a double-barreled pistol was suddenly slapped into their hand.
Quoth he, “The she-wolf’s litter
Stand savagely at bay:
But will ye dare to follow,
If Astur clears the way?”
Well, he was no “Astur,” or any other hero of ancient legend, but Melville’s sense of duty did put him at the forefront of the battle, in the most dangerous position, so that he could “clear the way.” That didn’t mean that he had to do it stupidly. His best fighters, Gunny Von Rito, Corporal Kobbsven, and Josiah, were to his left and right. Petreckski was immediately behind him, and the middies were also lending their assistance. The net effect was like the vanguard of a military attack, supported by artillery and the covering fire of all the units behind him. Even his monkey seemed to be adding its two bits, as it gibbered madly and flailed its belaying pin around with amazing speed and agility.
Archer and Crater had a special task in this attack. These two senior midshipmen had each been issued a powerful flashbang concussion grenade, to be used if the attack stalled. These terribly expensive devices were one of the Kingdom of Westerness’ most closely guarded secrets. They were powered by a little piece of Keel contained in a special lining. The concussion and flash contributed by these devices wasn’t much of a “secret weapon” but it was the best that Westerness could do, and it could make a critical difference if used correctly.
The momentum of the attack bogged down as the enemy forces mustered and met the warriors of Westerness in a solid line to the left and right of the mainmast. These curs and ticks were fresh, and organized two deep. The Westerness boarders were beginning to tire, and they weren’t able to get their superior numbers into play along this straight line.
Melville was hard pressed. He was dodging blows from his enemy’s sword and from the short sword of the tick on the cur’s shoulders, although his monkey seemed to be helping a lot with this latter threat. Immediately behind this foe was another cur with a long boarding pike, thrusting and stabbing at Melville in a very proficient manner.
He considered calling for a flashbang . . . if he could just get a free second! Then one sailed over his head. Behind him the four middies began to chant, “ONE-thousand!, TWO-thousand!, THREE-thousand!, FOUR-THOUSAND!” On the last count there was a sudden flash and a loud “BLAAMM!” behind the enemy’s line. There was a heartening chorus of yelps, and for one split second the enemy was surprised, stunned, and distracted. Even after that effect passed, the enemy remained slightly cowed and dismayed.
In the early twenty-first century, some obscure pioneer in the field of warrior science introduced the concept of the Bigger Bang Theory. “In combat, all other things being equal, whoever makes the bigger bang will win.”
Napoleon said that, in war, “The moral is to the physical as three is to one.” That is, the psychological factors are three times more important than the physical factors. One of the most important of these “moral” or psychological factors is noise.
In nature, whoever makes the biggest bark or the biggest roar is most likely to win the battle. Bagpipes, bugles, and rebel yells have been used throughout history to daunt an enemy with noise. Gunpowder was the ultimate “roar.” It had both a “bark” and a “bite.” First used as fireworks by the ancient Chinese, later in cannon and muskets, gunpowder was a noisemaker that provided sound and concussion. Concussion is felt and heard, and gunpowder also provides the visual effects of flash and smoke. Often a gunpowder explosion, or its drifting smoke, can be tasted and smelled. Thus gunpowder provides a powerful sensory stimulus that can potentially assault all five senses.
This is one of the primary reasons why the early, clumsy, smoothbore, muzzle-loading muskets replaced the longbow and the crossbow. The longbow and the crossbow had many times the rate of fire, much more accuracy, and far greater accurate range when compared to the early smoothbore muskets. Yet these superior military weapons were replaced, almost overnight (historically speaking) by vastly inferior muskets. Inferior at killing, that is, not inferior at psychologically stunning and daunting an opponent.
Back on Old Earth, in the incredibly violent world of the early twenty-first century, the police forces often encountered criminals who would surround their houses with dozens of vicious dogs. The police tactical teams found that the best way to counter this problem was with a flashbang concussion grenade. One of these, tossed into the yard, seemed to “take the fight right out of them.” It was like the dogs were saying, “Whoa! That’s some bark you got there, fellow. I give up.” The men of Westerness had hoped that, if they ever went to battle against the Guldur, the effect of a concussion grenade might be the same.
In two-space it was very difficult to get a true concussive explosion. The Keel charge of a 12-pounder did make a significant noise, especially when the cannonball slammed into your Ship’s hull. But it was nothing like the concussion, flash, and smoke that a gunpowder weapon of similar size can create. Rifles and pistols in two-space provided significantly less noise than an equivalent gunpowder weapon. So the wise men of Westerness, steeped in the lore of warrior science, were determined to find something that would provide a true concussion effect in two-space. The result was the flashbang.
On the deck of the Guldur Ship the curs were surprised by the flashbang, but every Westerness warrior was cocked and primed to strike on the middies’ count of “FOUR THOUSAND!” Every warrior within reach of the enemy thrust home a blow at the instant immediately after the explosion. Melville cut down and left to deflect the pike, using the recoil from that blow to deliver a powerful backhand slash that decapitated the cur in front of him.
And out the red blood spouted,
In a wide arch and tall,
As spouts a fountain in the court
Of some rich Capuan’s hall.
As the cur’s blood fountained upward into the face of its tick, Melville continued the sweep of his sword, bringing it around and to the right. He stepped in and to the right of his headless foe, before the body could even fall. The Guldur with the boarding pike still held his weapon on the other side of the corpse, which was now crumpling to its knees. Melville was completely free to thrust his sword up and to the left, into the torso of the cur with the pike.
Melville was vaguely aware of the fact that Kobbsven and Von Rito, to his left, and Josiah, to his right, were having similar success. Kobbsven’s mighty sword was threshing Guldur like wheat. His huge size, his terrifying strength, the awful pallor of his face, and his way of foaming at the mouth, all made him a dreadful incarnation of berserker rage.
Von Rito still fought with only his ancient fighting knife. Gunny Von Rito had been the Westerness Marines’ primary trainer in hand-to-hand combat, and he had demonstrated that, one-on-one, a man with a knife would defeat a man with a bayonet more than nine-out-of-ten times. The gunny practiced what he preached, and his fighting knife combined with Kobbsven’s huge claymore to form a long-range, close-range team that was a joy to behold. All along the battle line the curs’ defense was giving way and the boarding party again began to move forward.