Chương 91: Day Ninety

Dear Diary, Today was calm compared to my last few weekends. Marie woke all three of us knocking on the door. Saffron settled Isnomi, who didn't appreciate being woken up and expressed her displeasure vocally until Saffron gave in and fed her while I got the door. We took our normal turns getting dressed, then dropped the crotch goblin off with Grandma before breakfast. The rest of the table actually complained about us arriving without her. I guess we know who they're there to see.

Still, what with us needing to bolt the moment the Barbie Brigade stood up, I thought we'd made the right choice. When we all got into formation, duBois called Bill up to demonstrate basic marching stuff. You know, left face, right face, about face, that kind of thing. We then spent at least an hour marching in circles around the Practice Yard. Well, rectangles, I guess, since we mostly marched centered on the 'inner track'.

After that he called us back together, sat everyone except Rider and Rosen in a circle, and had them demonstrate the foot movements for right face, left face, and about face. He didn't call anybody out for screwing them up, but given the difficulties we had on corners, I kinda got why he did it. Then we all marched for another hour, this time a lot more smoothly.

He had us narrow the formation down to a single paver wide, and the folks who'd been complaining about having to learn how to 'turn left' finally got a clue, since instead of tripping each other up we managed to keep moving more or less in unison. I mean, with Saffron and Rosen in the same formation, we had a bit of jank going on anyhow, but duBois has us focused on staying in formation, not taking exactly the same number of steps as everyone else, so we managed.

After our second hour of walking around in circles, Lancaster the Lesser called out, "what's this kind of thing good for, anyhow?" Okay, he more 'grumbled loudly' than 'called out', since apparently even he can learn, but duBois jumped on it anyhow.

"Excellent question, Cadet Lancaster. Rider! Rosen! Morson! MacConno! South shed, shields and spears for your squads!" While those four dashed off for the shed, duBois called us around, "I'm sure you all have wondered at some point why we don't issue swords to our levies. Anybody want to take a guess why?" I raised my hand. I didn't really know why, but I had a guess, as Lancasterlike as it seemed when the Marshall pointed to me and I said it out loud.

"Spears are cheaper, sir?" That got a half-grin out of him, and he asked, "so you think we're going to go cheap because they're levies, Cadet?"

"No, sir. But most people just don't have a reason to keep and maintain a formation fighting weapon, and since we've got... Uh... How many Heroes again?" Lancaster couldn't resist chiming in.

"Moron." DuBois being duBois, he didn't miss that.

"So, how many Heroes do we have, Cadet Lancaster?"

"By Law and Custom, Phileo City limits itself to five hundred Heroes, although there are usually around five hundred Cadets in training as well, and Cadets have been called on to lead units in emergencies." By the look on his face and tone of his voice, I thought he must be quoting something. Probably that damn Law book. I studied it when I got bored, but I'd already gone through all of the more-or-less sane portions, which meant anything new took me a while to plow through.

"Correct, Cadet Lancaster. Now Cadet Diaz, you were saying about spears?" By this point the four sent for equipment had returned, so I wrapped up my guess with, "even with small platoons, you're looking at twenty thousand troops who all need a weapon, some kind of armor, and I'm guessing a shield? If you issued swords, that's a shit ton of metal. Spears are mostly wood. Hell, you can make the entire thing out of wood. I think it's the same with shields, maybe?"

DuBois nodded, "there are other reasons, but logistics is one of the big ones. Anyone else have an idea?" This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. Lancaster's hand shot up, and when duBois nodded to him he said, "training someone to use a sword can take years, but a spear is simple enough even a peasant can use it." It always amazed me how even when he's right, Lancaster can still sound like an ignorant dick.

DuBois nodded, but said, "there's more to spear-handling than you might realize, but when it comes to getting someone trained enough to be an asset rather than a liability on a battlefield, it's easier to bring a levy up to speed on a spear than a sword. Now, each of you grab a spear and shield, then get back in formation." Once we'd all armed ourselves and made it back to formation, duBois moved around us, moving the four tallest into the middle before setting us to march around in circles for another hour or so.

Right away we could tell who'd paid attention during the first half of the morning. Oddly enough, while Lancaster had, Bill hadn't. He wound up nearly stabbing me and actually backhanding Saffron by accident on our second turn. After the third turn, I met Lancaster's gaze and saw his frustration mirroring my own. I called out, "Marshall, can we review the basics again, sir?"

DuBois called us to a halt and pulled Bill and three others out of formation, shuffling the rest of us around until we made a smaller three by four unit.

"You four, front and center. The rest of you, laps until I get these four straightened out." So we marched. DuBois worked with the four he'd pulled out until the sun stood high in the sky, almost directly behind the juncture of the ley lines above us. He called us to a halt, slotted the four back in their places, and had us do two more laps, the first at our normal march, the second double timing it around the Practice Yard perimeter.

Finally he had us each put our equipment back in the South Shed before dismissing us to lunch. Only one thing stood out during the afternoon. DuBois had us marching without spears this time, each of us carrying one of the crappy metal training swords instead. Before we'd finished two laps, I realized yet another advantage spears had. If you're just carrying a spear while marching, you can choke up and hold it at its center of mass. So long as you don't let it get horizontal, it's a lot easier to carry than a sword.

At least, it's a lot easier than the crappy poorly balanced hunks of metal from the training equipment sheds. At any rate, about halfway through the afternoon he showed us how to make a shield wall. I'd read about those, seen videos of them back at Eastside when goofing around trying to avoid doing real work, but I'd never been part of one.

On the one hand, it required us to bunch up closer than even a single paver width, and once the tall guys in the middle got their shields in place, the air inside got hot pretty quick, and stank even quicker. We practiced getting into a shield wall, getting back to marching formation, and how to turn the formation to change the shield wall's facing without killing ourselves.

Bruised ourselves a lot, but there's only so much damage you can do in a confined space with a hunk of dull metal with no real point on the end. Right as the bottom edge of the sun hit the walls around the Practice Field, duBois called out, "swords down, shields up!" and without thinking about it I'd dropped to a knee, dropping my sword and using that hand to brace the shield in front of me. The moment after Rider and Rosen's shields slid into place above me, something crashed into our wall.

I wound up sliding backward on my knee for about half a pace, and the shields bowed for a second as Rider and Rosen both stumbled back about the same distance, but... We held.

"Good wall, Cadets!" shouted duBois, then followed that with, "put the equipment away and get back in formation." Once he had us back in the middle of the field, duBois said, "so, do any of you think you lot could stop me on a battlefield?" That got a general round of muttered 'no's, to which duBois said, "I can't hear you!"

"Sir, no Sir!" we all shouted.

"And yet just now, with only an afternoon of training, you managed to stop my charge cold, more or less. Now do you begin to see why we train our Volunteers this way?"

"Sir, yes Sir!" we all shouted. Except Lancaster, of course, who called out, "but you weren't armed!" DuBois nodded and replied, "I wasn't, and that would make a difference on a battlefield. At the same time, none of you were armed either, and if you'd all had spears, I couldn't do that shoulder charge without pincushioning myself either, but I decided that today is not an Infirmary day for any of us." With that he looked us over; we all stood there, sweaty and tired from carting equipment around all day.

Eventually he finished his visual review of us and dismissed us to dinner. Steaks today, along with some ground beef that wasn't entirely unlike chili. Had some heat to it, at any rate. Saffron and I had picked up Isnomi on the way down to dinner, and the rug rat decided that chili wasn't her thing after the first handful squished out of her chubby little fist. She nommed the bread and some carrot slices out of a big tureen full of mixed vegetables.

Whatever she thought of the food, she got enough inside her that she fell asleep while I carried her back, and didn't wake up while I changed her. Saffron and I both fell asleep almost immediately after that. Almost.