Luke’s HAARP Time Warp: Part 7

Marion defeats Cecilia; but at what cost?

Based on a post by somethin fishy,
in 15 parts. Listen to the Podcast at Explicit Novels.

<figure class="tmblr-full"></figure>

As Cecilia’s army got underway the next morning, Marion had her scouts
constantly watching. They watched every step that Cecilia’s army took and
gently encouraging them to go in the way that they wanted them to go. Finally,
all the scouts broke away and rode hard ahead of Cecilia’s army. They
disappeared around a corner in the road with elements of Cecilia’s army hard on
their heels. As Cecilia’s army rounded the corner, there was the entirety of
Marion’s army blocking the road only three hundred paces ahead

Kleist was actually a bit impressed that Marion would bring her army out to
play. He was further impressed once he studied the enemy lines. Everyone was in
uniform and they were in very good order. What was confusing him is why they
were still there with his army coming onto the field and coming into order.

As the enemy army came onto the field, Marion couldn’t help but fell a bit
nervous. She had faced thousands of men before but since they had fought from
ambush, nobody in Marion’s group could see all the enemy at one time. Now they
could and Marion found it nerve-racking. Furthermore, she could see that many
of her troops were nervous too. She knew that she had to act fast or her army
might start to break before the battle had even begun. It was time for Marion
to do what only Marion could do.

She spurred her horse into motion as she, her personal flag bearer, and a
bugler rode out alone to a spot in front of the army. She had ordered her
bodyguard to stay behind and actually had to threaten Gabriel with
insubordination charges to get her to stay. As Marion rode out a great cheer
went up through the army. Marion then pulled her sword out and drove it into
the ground in front of her army. To them the message was clear. Win or die.
Retreat wasn’t an option. Behind her Cecilia’s army was forming up but Marion
ignored them for a minute. Speaking to her army:

“Men! Woman! Citizens! You all come from different backgrounds and from
different villages. You all have been brought together by one thing; Cecilia’s
tyrannical rule. This is not about the ruler of these lands, your homes. This
is about protecting everything that you hold dear to you. Your children, your
wives, your husbands, your elders. While I am not sure of who will win today, I
am sure of what will happen to your families and your lives if we lose and
every one of you know too. You have the training, you have the weapons, you
have the courage to win a glorious victory here today. The rest is easy!”
Marion reached down and grabbed her sword from the ground and holding it up
high above her head yelled “Victory Or Death!”

Her army erupted in cheer. Within seconds they were chanting “Marion!
Marion! Marion!” Marion rode from one end of her lines to the other. Soldiers
took their helmets off and put them on top of their bayonets as Marion passed.
The noise was like none that had been heard sense the Romans.

Cecilia sitting on her horse on the other side of the field was dumbfounded.
Three horsemen had ridden out in front of Marion’s army. Shortly later that
army erupted in cheer. One of the figures drove their sword into the ground.
Shortly later the army erupted again. This time Cecilia could make out the
words. They were chanting “Marion.” The three figures they rode from one end to
the other. Cecilia was getting the feeling that the figure that had drove their
sword into the ground was none other than her little sister. General Kleist was
next to her and she heard him give a snort of derision. He turned to his
orderlies.

“Order all units to advance.” Then turning to Cecilia,

“You have nothing to worry about. We will kill them all in an hour or so.”

“I hope you are...” That was as far as she got before smoke and thunder
erupted from the enemy lines.

Chapter 31.

As Marion reached the far end, she turned to her bugler.

“Send the order to the artillery. Commence firing.” The bugler blew the
order and her artillery opened up with a mighty roar. She had ten guns on the
field with her today. They were all 12 pound cannons that Luke had been working
at frantically for the last month to get done. He had got the bronze for them
from old church bells. Now they were in battle for the first time and they were
under Luke’s direct command. Marion rode back to where her guards were still
at. By the time she had got back, Luke’s guns had reloaded and were firing
again. Luke was using solid shot with bagged powder. As Marion looked back
toward the now approaching enemy, she saw the second volley hit just behind the
enemy ranks. Seeing the look on Marion’s face, Gabriel told her:

“The first rounds went way over their heads.” Marion nodded and turned to
one of her messengers.

“Tell the fucking idiots that if they miss again, they will all be hung.”

“Yes ma’am” and she rode off.

“You’re being a bit harsh with your husband aren’t you dearie? After all
those are smooth bore guns and this is a new experience for everyone here.
Nobody other than Luke has ever heard of technology like this before.” asked
Gabriel of Marion. Marion just gave her a hard look. Gabriel might be her
girlfriend and her husband, Luke, in command of the artillery but Marion had
resigned from the human race and found that she was rapidly becoming a
commander and started developing a commander’s point of view of things. Her
worries were now for her front-line troops and what would happen to them if the
artillery didn’t bleed the enemy bad enough before they got within range.

The third volley was on target and hit just in front of the enemy ranks.
Since the ground was still solid, this is just what Luke was looking for.
Grazing shots, he had called them in the pre-battle briefing. He had explained
that with solid shot; you want to hit just in front of the enemy ranks while
getting the round to bounce off the ground. This way the round would go through
the enemy ranks and kill or wound a dozen or more men at a time. Marion watched
as the approaching army had great holes put in it, but they kept coming. When
they were within 150 meters Marion ordered the artillery to switch to caster
shot. It was time to get serious. When the enemy was only 75 meters away,
Marion ordered the infantry to open fire.

The noise was horrendous; the sound of almost one thousand rifles firing at
once. Furthermore, the infantry was firing as fast as they could work the bolts
and shove another round in. Luke had designed a single shot rifle for the
infantry that was based on the French Chassepot rifle from the Franco-Prussian
war. The only person to have a repeating rifle on the field that day was
Gabriel. Luke had decided not to make anymore of her rifle because the
ammunition was very hard to make without the machinery and he had enough other stuff
to make first.

Eventually he would reequip the entire army with repeating rifles, but he
had other things to make first. In the glimpses that Marion could get, she
could see that the enemy lines were getting very ragged. The amount of smoke
that was produced was by all the rifles firing was so bad that Marion was
having a very hard time seeing. A couple of times Gabriel had to grab her
horse’s reins to keep Marion from wondering off to find out what was happening.
By the time that the enemy had got to within 20 meters of her front lines only
a hundred or so remained.

Marion ordered a general advance across the whole line and within minutes it
was all over. The remaining men surrendered as soon as they saw Marion’s troops
charging them. The whole battle had only lasted about fifteen minutes from
first shot to last. Marion had given strict orders to not kill prisoners and
anyone caught killing a prisoner would get executed by firing squad so the men
surrendering were not harmed.

Chapter 32.

What followed was one of the worst things that Marion had ever seen. The
rifles had done their jobs well. Luke had designed to be chambered in .58
caliber and they certainly packed a punch. Marion saw some men who didn’t even
have heads left. Others had holes the size of her fist in their backs, were the
rounds had went through them. One of the things that Marion had set up before
hand was a system to get the wounded off the field and into the hospital
quickly. Alice would be busy today and probably for the next week. Marion
ordered most of her troops to help the wounded and pile the dead up for burial.
She detected fifty of her men to guard the prisoners while they dug a mass
grave for the dead. Marion sent most of her cavalry and Pollyanna’s engineers
to head toward York and rebuild all the bridges that they had destroyed to slow
down Cecilia’s army. By the time that Marion’s army got to them, the bridges
would be rebuilt.

Now that Marion had the immediate concerns done; she had some personal
business to take care of; she just had to find Cecilia. Marion walked through
where the enemy lines had been and had to do her best to not vomit. There was
more blood and guts on the ground then Marion had ever seen and that included
in a butcher. It took Marion a while but she eventually foun