Anti-Piracy Patrol
WIP
Chapter 1
The red bow of the Frigate cut across the waves like a spear. The slender body rode along the water, bobbing up and down, occasionally revealing its coppered bottom. Above the red-painted waterline, the crew are hurrying along the gun deck, opening the gun ports built into the ship’s beautiful navy blue hull and readying the guns to battery. On top of the deck, a brunette wearing a captain’s hat is shouting commands to the seamen, the mottled white feather on his hat bustles in the Sea wind. A smaller ship with the same paint sails a bit behind, to the starboard of the frigate.
Over the distance, three ships formed a line. Two teak hulls bearing the iconic junk-like rigging sandwich a traditional looking merchantman. A closer examination reveals it’s not just a simple trade ship. Its hull is full of axe marks and starches, with nails hastily applied all over. The depth and unusual number of the gun ports betrays its true identity.
“Captain! Those three sails are still heading this way! Should we engage?”
The captain took a deep breath. “What else are we to do? Treat them to a cup of afternoon coffee and cake? Drummer, beat to quarters.”
“General quarters! Men, to your battle stations!”
The bow flag flutter move violently as the vessel gains speed. Under the flag, the ship’s name is engraved on the stern: Minerva.
The two Pophagi ships maintained their heading, while the modified merchantman gained speed and turned West, breaking off from the line. With the wind blowing South East, the junks and the merchant gain on ROS Doru and Minerva. Only now did they start to raise their black colors. Still sporting the usual skull and the Pophagi dragons traditional to their flags, they seemed normal at first glance. But the borders and dragons are off. It is full of Cannibal raider’s runes, of course unintelligible to the crew of the Minerva and Doru. The dragons differ from the ones shown in the ethnographic books. Their gaping maws and eerie expression gives the impression of both extreme agony and pleasure. Though it might not be obvious to an ordinary seaman on board of a trader, the officers can tell from a glance they are different from the raiders sanctioned by the church, or whatever it is called in /meat/. And these Pophagis are the ones they are after.
“Let the Doru handle that merchantman, from what I’ve heard from those RID scoundrels, those junks are more dangerous, by far.” The Captain turned to the First lieutenant, “Lieutenant Langley, relay this to Mister Bartlett, tell him to ready the marines and to have all sharpshooters ready, and perched up top. I want them to start firing as soon as possible.”
“Mister de Vingy, tell the gunner to ready chain shot and priorities their masts, ideally we would want to keep them as far away from us as possible.” The surgeon nodded back to the captain and hurried down to the gun deck, towards the sick bay .
“Mister Green?”
“Aye, captain.” The piper answered.
“Play us something... more uplifting, will you?”
“Aye aye.” Green tipped his hat and started playing the Republican Volunteers. Standing beside the foremast, sailors are running past him to deliver powder charge, musketoons and water buckets. The topmen are busy aloft, maintaining the Minerva’s speed. Working to the drumbeat and tune, a couple of sailors preparing a carronade started to sing along.
*First to fight for right and liberty
And to honor the priestess; We are proud to claim the title.
Of the Republic’s Volunteers...*
The Minerva is a Victory class heavy frigate of second rate. Rated for 40 guns, she’s of the second literation of the first ever class of warship built by the Republic of Owl. Her 24-pounder guns and 32-pounder carronades reflect her home country’s naval doctrine: to pack as much firepower in a capable and nimble platform as possible. But the Minerva is also old, nearing her thirtieth year of service, and the Republic is already producing its third generation of frigates with planning of a fourth, even more cutting-edge generation already in the works. Both her and Doru’s armor is thick enough to withstand a cannonade from the merchantman, who most likely still carries 12 pounders or perhaps some 24 pounder carronades mixed in. It is true that the flotilla is slightly under leeward wind, heading the North East. But the Republic’s ships are faster than most, even if the enemy has the weather gage, they can just withstand the bombardment for now and decimate them with a close broadside later. What worries Captain Ashford are the Junks. More glorified troop ships than men-of-war, one shudders to think what would happen if they closed in and got a chance at boarding, not to mention the description of what this particular strain of Pophagis do to their prisoners...
Ashford reopened his eyes and spoke to the helmsman.
“Turn North by South East,” He then looked down from the short quarter deck: a classic sign of a Republican warship, and watched Langley poking his head up from the stairs.
“Captain, the guns are all loaded and ready to fire. Any further orders?”
“Fire as soon as the junks enter range. Don’t heed any fire from that merchant, as I said, Doru can deal with that. Also tell the crew to alternate between ball and chain, all elevated to around 5 degrees. Don’t change that until I give the order.”
“Aye Aye!” Langley answered after a brief sigh, disappearing back into the gun deck.
“Rotten luck today. I would’ve preferred chasing these bloody pirates down, not being run down by them.” The captain grabbed the railing with force and pretended to give it a few shakes. “But this old girl won’t disappoint us, isn’t it right, helmsman Jackery?”
“Aye sir. I’ve heard that those barbarians don’t even have guns... Well, they do have a few on the front, but I doubt they even know how to prim- “. A thunderous sound in a distance cut the helmsman’s words off. The merchant had already started firing.
“Heh. What’d I say these-“
A ball landed 3 feet away from Jackery, but it had lost so much energy, it only embedded itself on the quarterdeck. A gun crew immediately wrapped it with cloth and transported it to his ammunition box.
Wide eyed, the helmsman exclaimed, “T-that’s just sheer luck!”, and returned his focus on manning the wheel, decidedly to not distract himself small talking with his captain anymore.
Slowly turning South, the Minvera began firing on the leading junk. Her heavy cannons are multiplied by her crew's excellent gunnership, with most shots finding their mark, tearing holes in their target's rig and slowly chipping away their speed. Another barrage is launched from the frigate's gundeck. This time ball shot. The iron balls ripped through the air and penetrated the junk's hull easily. Aiming slightly high, some of the shots still landed in the enemy's second deck. Though the gun crews can't see it clearly, the seafoam around the leading junk is already tainted red. A loud cheer came from the sailors on the top deck. Though Ashford knows it's too early to celebrate: If he can't disable one of the junk before they get within 200-no, 300 yards, then the die is cast, and the result is the Republic would lose one of its valuable frigates, while the pirates gain the firepower of the Minerva and continue their reign of terror in this part of the Holo Sea.
To the starboard of the frigate, the Doru is engaged in a firefight with the ad hoc man-of-war. Although it's only armed with 18-pounders, her guns are still more than enough to tear through the merchantman's improvised armor. Although she's limited to using shot instead of shells, the Doru most definitely has the western flank covered.
3 more rounds of fire are presented by the heavy frigate. Each one wrecking the junk more. By now, the second junk had already caught up with the leading one, not a surprise given how many holes the Minerva punched through its sails.
The Republic's sailors are still green compared to many of its peers, not to mention the 3 pre-eminent naval powers of the Holo Continent. The country's close relationship with Hoshiyomia was indispensable to the initial formation of its Navy and the building of its first warships, to the point that the whole navy is modelled upon the Hoshiyomian system. But the Admiralty isn't completely stagnant and only follows other navy's example. Instead of pumping money into hiring foreign sailors to man its ships or worst, pressganging in the hopes to train as many able seamen as possible, the Admiralty invests in what the Republic already excels at, namely: gunnery, technology, and a large volunteer corps. Although its navy had not seen much action compared to say, the Deadbeat Veterans, it seems the Admiralty's investments are paying off.
But it seems time is against the flotilla, as the 2 raiders are already less than 300 yards to the stern of the Minerva's larboard. Ashford bit his lip and cried to a midship man, who was directing the gun crews in the gangway close to the quarter deck "Midshipman Cooper, relay this to the gundeck, switch to ball and shell, drop the elevation but continue to focus on the damaged ship."
He then switched to a gunner's mate manning a carronade "Same for all of you, don't give them any chance to breathe."
Ashford then rushed back to the quarterdeck and rejoined the helmsman.
"Mister Jackery, turn South by North East. Maintain it until I give the word."
As he said this, the Pophagi junks are already firing their chasers at the Minverva. Although the Minvera was able to rake the lead junk so far, she is exposing her stern to the second junk, which is rapidly gaining on the frigate. If the damaged junk isn't disabled now, the chance of a double boarding seems more and more likely.
CRACK
A shot ripped through the stern and flew into the gundeck, wrecking the cabin on its way and maiming a few crews with large splinters. Another one shot through the top deck's railing and ripped a large piece of flesh from a sailor, and continued into the sea. It's only a matter of time before the raiders start discharging an even more terrible munition.
While a few of the crew flew into a panic, most kept a calm head and started to either treat the wounded or pick off a few large splinters embedded in their coats and resumed their stations. Even though the crew is relatively inexperienced, just like the rest of the Republic's navy, the regular exercises kept the ship running smoothly even under fire.
Now the Second Junk is only a few dozen yards short of closing into the 200 yard mark. The once leading junk is so battered it's losing speed, and with a gaping hole in the upper bow, its firepower has been decimated with only one gun functioning. Ashford banked on the next volley to completely disable the ship. Looking through his spyglass, he can already tell it would just take another glancing hit to take down the main and mizzen mast. Before collapsing it, he took another survey around the top deck. Piles and piles of bodies are strewn along the gangway, with variable pink mess stuck on the walls of the mid and aft-castle. But there are still dozens active on board, with some wearing what looks to be leather armor emerging from the ruins of the aft-castle. Slightly puzzled by their excited look, which the Captain can vaguely tell, he stowed the glass away.
Not before another volley from the 24-pounders and the carronades rocked the ship once again, this time most of them landed atop the junk's deck.
As the masts fell, the crew didn't have long to celebrate as another pair of shots from the enemy's only functioning Pophagi junk forced them to duck. With one junk out of action and the merchantman being led away by Doru, the Minvera can focus all her attention on the remaining junk.
The only issue is the junk is now directly behind the frigate. Preparing for the inevitable, the Captain yelled down from the main deck "Armorers, bring up the grenades and hand mortars. If it is a bomb-throwing match they want, we shall give it to them. Idlers, start soaking rags in water and hand them to the crew."
"Captain, sir, are we to prepare for anti-boarding action?"
The captain paused from the question from the second lieutenant.
"I can't promise all of you would make it back alive to Eulhaven. But I can guarantee you that, we would give them hell. Focus on your duty, Lieutenant Anderson."
The junk fired three shots trailing with green smoke, all of them overshot the ship and landed in the sea. But Ashford cannot imagine how much disarray it's going to cause if one of them landed straight in the gun deck.
Luckily, none of the smoke emitting shells hit the ship. But now the two ships are only a quarter over 100 yards apart. Sharpshooters have already engaged the Pophagi warriors. Ducking from sling shots, the marines take cover at the stern and return shots with even more velocity, striking a warrior with an elaborate helmet fashioned from an Atosanpol skull, shattering the helmet and killing him instantly. Even with stern carronades and hand mortars raining death on the enemy, it would take hours and upon days to wipe out everyone on board that ship. As more and more warriors flow out from the castles of the ship, boarding seems like an inevitability now.
To be continued