British literature during the Revolutionary War mainly portrayed the American's as rebels using hit and run tactics and causing an overall nuisance of themselves. It's a small leap to classify the rebel's tactics as akin to terrorist tactics. Which led to the question, how would that be made manifest during an era such as this? As always you guys are great, and I really appreciate you taking the time to read my drivel.
-Hawkfrost
Present Day (Early Winter)
1778
It never stops, but what can you do. Life goes on. He pulled on his shirt and opened the door. Standing before him was lieutenant Thorn, he was holding a report in his hand and he was skimming it. Seeing his superior, he snapped briefly to attention before speaking.
"Major, we have reports of firefights breaking out in various sections- "
Henry interrupted the man severely, "Firefights? Here? What, how?"
The lieutenant shrugged, "I don't know sir, all I know is what we've been told. The battalion command reports they've taken casualties, gunshot casualties."
No, not here. Please God not here. Thoughts of chaos and bloodshed filled Henry's mind. The shouts of the damned again ran out in his ears. Not again, I won't let it happen again. He motioned for the soldier to lead him down to the command room. As they descended the stairs, Henry could hear the sounds of activity coming from the floor below.
"Has General Clinton been alerted to the status? And how are we responding?"
The lieutenant didn't pause while giving his answer.
"I'm not sure sir. As it stands you are the highest-ranking officer here. We wanted to wait before taking any aggressive action. We thought it prudent to try to avoid another…Boston incident."
"Yes, quite," Henry replied dryly.
The lieutenant opened the oak wood doors to see a flurry of commotion. Warrant officers and analysts were crossing back in forth like an anthill after its been kicked. Henry walked in and motioned to duty officer to brief him. The information they had was sparse, all they knew for sure was that redcoats had been attacked by armed hostiles. Four had been killed and 9 wounded.
"How did they get in?" Henry shook his head and paced back and forth. "It makes no sense. The harbor's cordoned off and we have patrols running 24/7."
He stopped to look at the blank faces before him. "Well, any bright ideas lieutenant?" Henry's irritation was seeping through.
"I don't know sir. We have received reports of spies operating within the city. Perhaps one of them aided them in their arrival?"
Henry's stomach churned at the suggestion. He knew it could be true, was most likely really, but he was repulsed by the notion. It was his job dammit, his job to make sure the people of this city stayed safe and to eliminate all of the King's enemies. You failed once before, you will not fail twice.
"Perhaps."
He sat at his desk and began rifling through reports. He raged at the fact that he had no way of monitoring the situation more closely. Everything they had was second-hand reports or that of delirious, half dead soldiers. Who was attacking? How many of them were there? How did they get here?
"I want the streets locked down. Curfew is now enforce; I want patrols on the street blockades set up. No one leaves the city, no one goes out, not until a thorough check is made."
"Yes, sir."
He placed both hands on his desk and took a deep breath. He knew intellectually that there was no benefit to be gained by panicking. You need to regain control. Take a deep breath and focus up. There's plenty of time to feel bad once the job is over. He pulled out the boots beside his desk and tugged them on, along with his shirt, vest, and belt. He looked in the mirror, and despite the circumstances, smiled a little. Looking damn good soldier.
It took him a moment to process what he saw in the reflection. There was this weird orange glow that was suddenly basking everything. It's too early for a sunri-. Then the noise hit him. The sound was overwhelming, everywhere at once, and then gone at the same time. It was if the very air had been ripped apart and sucked out. Henry couldn't hear anything, nothing other than this dull ringing in his ears. He yawned a few times to see if that would work but nothing happened. Then he felt the room vibrate, the candles in the room flickered and some blew out. The back of his neck stung and when he touched it, it was slick with blood. That's odd. Is that, glass? With a snap, his hearing came back, and he could hear the screaming in the street. He turned around to see that the windows from his balcony had been shattered from the force of the explosion. The word popped into his brain suddenly and his stomach turned into a ball of lead. He didn't remember instructing his feet to carry him to the window, but after a few seconds, the sounds of crunching glass signified that he was, in fact, on the balcony.
He looked out at the massive billow of black smoke that hung over the city like a hungry predatory bird. The flames of the fire were licking at everything in its path, devouring it in an inferno of heat and rage. It was such an odd contrast with the snow that blanketed the whole area. He stayed locked like that, ignoring the hectic cries of his subordinates, ignoring the blood running from his neck, ignoring everything. All he could do was focus on the flames and the smoke. I failed, again.
"Major. Major!"
Henry turned around to see lieutenant Thorn standing there, bleeding from a cut on his cheek, he was pressing a rag to it.
"What now sir?" It's time to come back, boy.
"Get yourself all decked out, then round up as many able-bodied people you can, we're going down to the source of that fire."
Thorn nodded and ran off. Henry turned back around to see flickers of lights in the darkness. His eyebrows drew together as he tried to puzzle it out. At first, he just assumed it was pieces of debris floating around, perhaps embers of the fire. It took him a minute to figure out it wasn't debris but musket shots. Bloody hell, bloody fucking hell!
The thought came to him like a flash of lightning. Astrid! He tore off out of the room and up the stairs. Please, please don't let her be hurt. He bursted through the door and look around the room wildly. The smoke was stinging his eyes and making him cough. He placed his arm around his mouth to keep the worst of it out.
"Astrid!"
"In here!"
He followed the sound of her voice to find her standing in the kitchen calmly dressing her wound. He stared at her a few moments, mouth open, just gaping.
"What?" she looked at him with mild concern. "Are you all right?" now it was full concern.
"Yeah…are you, are you okay?" He stammered it out.
She smiled and nodded. "Yeah, its nothing major. I caught some glass from the explosion is all, I was standing near the balcony when it went off."
He watched her pluck a two-inch shard out of her arm without even wincing while carrying on a conversation. He was quite simply impressed.
"You're far too modest, miss Hofferson." She chuckled and nodded to the activity down below.
"You have to go, don't you?"
He came closer to her and gently brushed a strand of hair behind her ear; she smiled up at him.
"Yeah."
She leaned against him with a resigned smile, so he wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her close and placing his cheek on the top of her hair. They stayed like that, for a few moments that felt like a few years.
"Just…just come back to me." The words were softly spoken, so softly spoken he didn't think they were for him. He kissed the crown of her head.
"Always."
They enjoyed each other's embrace for a few seconds more.
"Major!" It was Thorn. "Major, are you ready sir?"
With a groan of his own, Henry reluctantly disengaged from the embrace and headed downstairs. Lieutenant Thorn had rounded up 7 other soldiers, all of them loaded up for bear. With a solemn nod, they headed out into the street. It was chaos, as soon as they opened the door, they were almost overwhelmed with it all. The streets were thronging with civilians running, horses were neighing panic, shop owners were boarding up their stores. Any and all semblance of order and procedure was lost. Worry about that later, for now, you need to eliminate the hostiles. They moved off into the street.
The further away they got from the manor the more dangerous it got. The sounds of musket shots were louder and more frequent. They made their way through back alleys and narrow walkways. He was tense, so much so he could hear his own ragged breathing. The sounds of glass breaking, footsteps treading, and shouts of the wounded and the dying filled his senses. His eyes were burning from the smoke, it was thick, almost corporeal. Already exhausted from the combat jog, the smoke wasn't helping his oxygen strained lungs. Something sliding off the rooftop to his top right caused him to bring his musket up on reflex, as did all members of his squad. It was nothing, just shingles falling loose from a blown-out house. He let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding and motioned for them to carry on.
The deeper into the blast zone they went, the more the carnage became apparent. Entire houses were reduced to rubble or smoldering flames. The heat so intense that the very air seemed to be on fire, rippling with energy. The bright orange glow blinding them and making it hard to blink, hard to breathe. They could seem people weeping and screaming the names of loved ones that were no doubt already consumed by the ravenous appetite of the fire. They took it all in, the destruction, the death, and they all saw clearly that this was the true face of the rebellion. This was what these rebels did to everything they touched. They brought it all to ruin, there was nothing righteous about the cause. They were the ones that had shirked the natural order of things, they were the ones who refused to repay the Crown for all it had expended protecting them from French and Indian aggression, and they were the ones who had started the bloody conflict. The anger they all felt could not be easily put into words, all each of them knew was that they would have their pound of flesh before the night was up. They would take a life for each lost in this most cowardly of acts.
Henry looked at the faces around him, all twisted with rage and revulsion.
"Take a good look. This is the true face of the rebellion! This is all they are and all they accomplish! They bring to ruin all that is holy and just under the poorly veiled excuse of oppression. The next time someone tries to tell you that you're in the wrong, that Britain's occupation is misguided, just remember this. This is what it looks like when order is removed. This is what you'll be condemning all of his Majesty's subjects to should you give up in the fight."
They drank his words in, they drank the whole situation in. Henry could see it bothered them in a way nothing had before. None of them was idealist by any means, but this nightmare of a scene filled them all with a rage that needed a release. They kept going, they had no choice, these people couldn't be helped, at least not by them.
Along the way, they came across five more soldiers caught on the edges of the blast. They were doing patrols when the sound of muskets drew their attention. Henry puzzled over that, the shooting started before the blast? He cataloged that for later. Their superior officer had been killed so they requested permission to join up with him. He agreed, the more the merrier.
The force of the explosion and the destruction it caused herded them into corridors with apartments on both sides. Most of them were blast scoured, black with smoke and residue. The windows were shot out and some of the drapes were burning still. One of the explosions had knocked a building down and effectively blocked their path, the only way through was by forcing entry into an adjacent apartment. The hole would be tight, and it only permitted one soldier to go at a time. Not just that, the opening was so tight, they would have to toss the weapon in first and then squeeze themselves in after. Private Adams went first, he sent his musket through, and then forced himself in afterward. The process took about thirty seconds. The whole time Henry was nervous, he didn't like this, he didn't like this at all. It was taking too long, and they were too exposed. This is one hell of a kill-box. He kept glancing nervously around, his head on a swivel taking in anything and everything. He wasn't the only one feeling it, he saw a lot of nervous faces in the fire lit night. It was hard to listen, the whole city was noisy, on fire literally and emotionally. He checked ahead to see that only the third man had gotten through. Damn! This is taking too long. If you asked Henry what made him turn around that last time, he still couldn't give you a satisfying answer. Call it luck, fortune, or divine intervention, but Henry did turn around. He turned around in time to see the shadow move in the window, he turned around in time to see the dark object flung out the window.
The object fell in slow motion, its deadly arc curving through the dark night. Henry shouted a warning and flung himself and the soldier closest to him to the ground. The only cover they had was behind a half-broken wagon. Time continued to slow, so much so that Henry saw the grenade land, it was the size of a grapefruit almost. Black, impossibly black, with a spout at the top with a wick sticking out. He watched as the wick, already lit, reached the end of its rope, the flame sizzling briefly. For a moment nothing happened, and it seemed as if the whole world held its breath. The explosion was loud, not as loud as the ones that lit the city on fire, but loud nonetheless. The ground shook with the force of its violent exhalation. The fragments of the explosive hurled itself in every direction, slamming into the wagon, the brick of the wall, and with a sickening reality, the flesh of the soldiers unfortunate enough not to get out of the way.
Following on the heels of the blast was the distinct staccato of several muskets being fired. Henry and the corporal next to him hugged the ground, hoping the dark and smoke would make them smaller targets for the enemy shooters. The shooting only lasted no more than thirty seconds, but it might as well have been thirty years for what it sounded like, wet thwacking of the rounds slamming into flesh, the pained grunts of the soldiers shot. It was a textbook trap executed to perfection. The bomb had maimed and disoriented them, the smoke had blinded them, and now they were getting slaughtered by shooters who had the advantage of higher ground. They couldn't do anything, getting up meant getting shot, moving meant getting shot. The only course of action was to hunker down, pray, and wait for them to reload.
The opportunity came after the initial rounds had hit. It was only five or six of them on one side of the street. They had staggered their shots, but they hadn't spaced them out enough, the excitement of the explosion or the adrenaline from the bomb had made them sloppy. Now they were all reloading instead of having a continuous field of fire. Henry dragged the corporal up and motioned for four of the soldiers to get on their feet. Henry ordered three soldiers to fire once every fifteen seconds. Once forty-five seconds had passed, the soldiers would swap out with three other soldiers who would continue the onslaught until the original three had reloaded. The pattern of staggered fire would continue until all had retreated back the way they came.
What do you think? Does the desire to escape the victimization of British colonization merit such drastic action, or are there simply certain lines that shouldn't be crossed? Also, I do have a poll up on my account that pertains to this story, I'd love to see what you guys think.