Chapter 17

The following new characters appear in the story in the next few chapters:

Allistair O'Flannagain

Supply Sergeant, 5'-8" tall, 155 pounds, 42 years old, brown hair going bald, gray eyes, married

Egan O'Callaghan

Private, 5'-9" tall, 145 pounds, 21 years old, dark blond hair, blue eyes, second level talent

"And how was this remarkable feat achieved?" President Jefferson asked in a calm voice.

"We created Defensive Shells around all of the front-line militia units," Gwyn answered to all of the men's shocked surprise.

"Who was the 'we', and what are Defensive Shells?" Mr. Jefferson asked in a still calm voice.

"The 'We' was the O'Connell women. Four pairs of twin Sisters did the work," Sererena told him.

"As to what Defensive Shells are, we'll show you," both Gwyn and Sererena told him just before we all vanished from the conference room in the President's house. We instantly reappeared at the site of the Johns Creek battle.

"This is where the battle took place," Gwyn told those with us, who were all in shock at the sudden relocation.

"And this is the exact spot where my Sister, Glanda, and I had our Defensive Shell," she continued with a smile before she and Sererena sat on the ground and cast the spell for a Prolate Defensive Shell. Once created, they tinted it a nice light pink.

"There were four shells this size that protected the front line of the militia. We had a hard time making their Officers understand that we were here to protect them until a six pound cannon ball bounced off of our shell," Gwyn told the still shocked men. They were still staring around them in disbelief at what they were seeing.

The valley floor still stretched away to the creek that ran across the valley, and then continued on to the forest on the other side. The grass had regrown from where the cremation fires had burned down to the bare soil, but there was nothing visible to indicate that a battle had taken place here recently.

"How do we know that this is where the battle took place?" a doubtful dour Henry Dearborn asked, as others nodded in agreement.

"Do you think that we can't... !?" Gwyn started, upset by his accusation.

"I think that he has a legitimate question," I told her and him. "There is little here to indicate that a battle took place here."

"You may be correct, Mark," Sererena admitted after the Cousins had canceled the Defensive Shell, and they had looked around the area themselves. "There is little evidence to show that a battle took place here. There are no broken cannons or stacks of bones. Your Magic Fire consumed all of that, and the grass has re-covered everything."

"There has to be something left," Gwyn insisted. "There were too many shots fired, and too many died outside of our shells for there to be nothing left."

"The Continentals collected all of the useable weapons and other things," I reminded her.

"Still there must be some souvenirs left. They can't have collected everything. There are bound to be things that they missed," she insisted.

"Or threw away!" General Greene said in a triumphant voice. He had been searching the ground near where the edge of the original shell had been and now bent to retrieve something. He soon held up a tube of metal some four and a-half inches long with a slot cut in it in the shape of an 'L'. It had a short curved stub of steel projecting up from one edge.

"What is that?" President Jefferson asked looking at the unfamiliar object.

"It is the locking ring for a bayonet, sir," the General replied and turned the object to one side for the President to inspect after rubbing the dirt and grime off of it. "And it is marked with the Broad Arrow that shows it to be British property," he told the President happily, as he handed the item to him. General Clark had been encouraged by this find and soon located another plus several pewter buttons with a crown and the letters GR cast in them.

"These would seem to indicate that the British were here," he said, handing his finds to the President also. Mr. Randolph had also been looking on the ground and had picked up several items.

"What are these?" he inquired, holding up several irregular gray disks. General Dearborn reached out and took two of them to examine. His eyes grew large as he looked closely at them.

"Why these are flattened out musket balls. This only happens when they strike something very hard that they can't penetrate, and they are totally stopped. The soft lead flattens out against the hard target," he told Randolph before turning the disks over. "Look you can still see the spherical shape on the back of the pieces," he pointed out.

"I take it that the very hard something that those musket balls struck was the pink ... structures like the one that you created when we first arrived here," Mr. Jefferson said examining one of the disks. The others had picked up quite a few more of them during the discussion.

"Yes sir," General Clark assured him. "I rapped my knuckles against one of their ... creations when they first arrived at Fort Henry. It was very substantial, and General Sullivan personally assured me that not a single musket ball had penetrated their ... creations during the battle."

"Also sir, when they first arrived at Fort Jefferson, they moved General Clark and myself to where they had camped on the previous night on their way to Washington City. There, we met one of the security units that patrol the area along the Cumberland on a regular basis. They created one of these ... structures there and had the entire patrol fire their rifles at it from forty yards, with them inside of it. Afterward, the men collected their fired rifle balls to reuse the lead, and they were very similar to those found here just being smaller because of the smaller bores of their rifles," General Greene told President Jefferson.

"From all of this, I believe that we can concede that the ... structures that they create are proof against rifle or musket fire and quite possibly cannon fire," Mr. Jefferson told us. "May we return to the conference room now to continue our meeting in more comfort," he requested.

"Certainly, Mr. President!" Gwyn told him in that honey smooth voice that she used when someone excited her sexually.

"If you will all move closer together, we will be back in the conference room in a second," I told them as the four of us joined hands and Gwyn cast the transfer spell and its glyph with a flourish before adding all of our Magic to it. The valley of the battle snapped out of existence, and we reappeared in the conference room an instant later.

"Very impressive!" President Jefferson commented before asking, "Where were we previously?"

"Mr. Dearborn had just finished the presentation of the current situation, sir," General Greene answered before continuing. "The reason that we are here today is to seek funding for the unit that the O'Connells wish to form, and to see if it is possible for them to use Hickory Hill as their supply site," he finished.

"Hickory Hill?" Mr. Jefferson asked, puzzled.

"A part of the property seized from that traitor Wilkinson. We still maintain control of it," Mr. Madison reminded him. Mr. Jefferson just nodded.

"What kind of unit will this be and how large will it be," the President asked, returning to the business at hand.

I gave him a briefing on how the unit would be organized and where we would be setting it up, at least initially. I didn't have any fancy charts, just used the wrinkled papers that we had written our ideas out on, and that I had carried in the pocket of my uniform coat.

"This is written in Gaelic!" Mr. Jefferson observed on seeing the sheets of paper. "I can read some of it, as I have studied the language because so many of our citizens speak Gaelic. I am unsure, however, how many of our citizens can read or write it," Mr. Jefferson continued with a smile.

"Gaelic is one of the Master Languages of Magic, sir, and we can all speak many of the dialects and of course read and write it in its various forms," I told him.

"You are obviously very fluent in English also to be able to read from these papers in Gaelic and speak in English at the same time," the President told us.

"Yes, sir. We have no trouble speaking your English which we term 'Old English' to differentiate it from the English spoken in our home Reality and time," I told him.

"Obviously you are all quite well educated for being so young. What other languages do you speak," Mr. Jefferson inquired in an interested voice.

"We also speak several dialects of Celtic which is used in Another Reality as well as the ancient dialects of German and French spoken by our relatives in that Reality," Seamus told him.

"How did you learn all of that and your Magic also at such young ages?" he wanted to know.

"We have a system of sleep learning that taught us much of it. In addition we heard the languages spoken and the Magic discussed by our Parents, several of whom are the heads of the Department of Magic at the university where they teach. Several of our other Mothers are also the heads of the Agriculture Department there," Gwyn told him.

"Really!" Mr. Jefferson answered in surprise. "No wonder you are all so informed. At what college or university do they teach?" he asked next. "Is it William and Mary in Virginia or perhaps Harvard or Yale in New England?"

"Actually, it is the University of Georgia in Athens Georgia in our Reality where they teach, and where it is two hundred and seventy years ahead of the time here," Sererena told Mr. Jefferson to a look of shocked dismay.

"Are you from that far ahead in the future? Are all people as well educated and knowledgeable as you are in that time?" he asked.

"No sir. Unfortunately the uneducated of the world are still very much with us. There are still many who neither want nor care to learn or improve themselves," I told him to a sad look from him.

"You mean that you won't require any Continentals?" Henry Dearborn, he of the one track mind, broke in when we had finished.

"No sir. I don't believe that they are trained for the type of movement and fighting that we will be engaged in most of the time," I told him, but hedged my bet by adding, "for anything less than a full scale invasion anyway."

"The British have never been inclined to try something like that because of the vast distances involved and the clear lack of good roads, or any roads at times, for their supply trains through the mountains and the forest on either side of them," Mr. Madison told us.

"This doesn't seem like an overly large or expensive organization for what they intend to do," President Jefferson noted. "And they would be using facilities that already exist. Hickory Hill is certainly not in use presently. When would you be able to begin operations, Captain O'Connell?" he asked.

"We were looking at the first of August if the proposed locations are acceptable, and we can have at least a part of the required Rangers available, Mr. President," I told him.

"That is rather quick. Usually these military units require six months to a year or more to achieve active status. Are you sure of that date?" he asked.

"Yes sir. I believe that we will be able to start at least limited patrols by that date," I assured him.

"Very well. I will have Mr. Hamilton, from the Treasury Department, make the necessary funds available to General Greene and his people. However, it seems to be a rather large organization to have just a Captain as the Commander. For an organization of this size and complexity, the Commander should be at least a Major, if not a Lieutenant Colonel," the President stated before turning to General Greene.

"Nathanael, I authorize you to promote Captain O'Connell to the rank of Major for now. When we see how his organization works out, there will be time to consider promoting him to Lieutenant Colonel. You may also authorize him to promote his senior people as he sees fit," the President instructed General Greene.

"Certainly, sir," General Greene agreed.

"If that covers everything, we can all return to our other pursuits," President Jefferson said rising. We all rose with him.

"Yes sir, I believe that covers everything," General Greene told the President who led his people out of the room.

"Be at my office at 9:00 in the morning, Major," General Greene instructed me. "I'll have your commission there then as well as your authorization to promote your other people and the orders authorizing you to take possession of the various sites that we discussed earlier. When will you be returning to Fort Henry?" he finished.