Chapter 109: The Voice of the End
Chapter 109 The Voice of the End
While there was laughter on the Blackthorn, the deck of the Beagle was still busy.
While watching the trajectory of the Barbary pirate ship with binoculars, Colonel Fitzroy ordered the adjustment of the gun positions.
“Calibrate! Elevation 30, 15 degrees south by east, four shots, flush!”
Only the cannons could be heard roaring, the sea bitching up a splash, the Barbary Pirate hull was hit in two places, but the breaches were all above the waterline and did not affect their mobility.
But the round of shelling of Beagle ended, and the retaliation of Barbary pirates also came soon.
They showed six rows of guns, rushed to the Beagle ship and fired fiercely.
Only a rumbling sound was heard, and wood shavings flew and smoke rose from the deck.
Elder lay on the ground covering his head, and only after half a day did he get up and spit out the stubble in his mouth with a yuck, cursing, “These sons of bitches, have the guts to stick up and take over the gangway! Relying on superior firepower to bully people is nothing!”
Darwin also wiped the soot from his face and muttered, “Elder, that’s not what you said when we shelled Blackthorn just now! Didn’t you say that firepower is justice then?”
Elder glared, copied the musket in his hand and toppled it, he scolded, “Charles, where the hell are you from? Of course our firepower advantage is justice, others’ firepower advantage is bullying the weak, of course I have to protest!”
Perhaps it was because the Barbary Pirates saw the rolling white smoke rising from the Blackthorn, they finally couldn’t help but close the distance after a few rounds of shelling on the Beagle, intending to use their numerical advantage to come to the Blackthorn’s aid.
However, when the pirate ship had just shortened the distance with the Beagle, the sailors on the two ships couldn’t wait to raise their muskets to attack each other.
Under the orders of Barbary Pirate Captain Ahmed and Colonel Fitzroy, both ships stowed their sails and sailed parallel to each other at almost stationary speed.
The sailors on both sides slammed their guns to the ground after completing their rounds of counter fire.
Several diving boards were then set up between the two ships, and the Barbary pirates drew their cutlasses from their belts and rushed to the deck of the Beagle, shouting ‘Allah Akbar’ (Allahu Akbar).
The sailors of the Beagle drew their swords and shouted ‘God wills it’ to catch the onslaught.
Seeing this scene, Agares, who was pacing on the deck of the Blackthorn, couldn’t help but wrinkle his nose and shake his head, ”All believe in one God, why is this necessary? Besides, He can’t control you, you might as well shout my name, at the very least I can give you some response.”
However, the two parties obviously couldn’t hear the Red Devil’s sigh, and almost instantly, the deck of the Beagle was sprinkled with blood.
Almost everyone joined in the fight, even the little nine year old waiter, who brought up his sailor’s sword to fight as hard as he could with a couple of his buddies working back and forth to surround a Barbary pirate.
Elder was also fighting a pirate with a sword, but his arm strength was obviously not as strong as the other, and even his stance was not as steady as the other.
The pirate raised his foot and kicked Elder ankle, then he kicked a stagger, taking advantage of his unsteady center of gravity, the pirate instantly mounted on his body, lifting the knife is ready to take his life.
In the heat of the moment, young master Elder’s right leg knee forward, although failed to kick the pirate, but let the other party’s private parts were hit hard.
The pirate was momentarily in pain, and the scimitar in his hand fell to the ground.
Elder’s eyes and hands will be quick to shoot the machete away, and then lying on the ground with all his strength to choke the pirate’s neck.
And the pirate also grit his teeth to endure the pain pinched Elder neck.
Both sides so who do not put their hands in a stalemate, see the face of the two men are gradually green, Elder’s eyes, but the rest of the light saw the mast in front of him holding a person, that is, claiming to be a little bit of bloodsickness of the former surgeon Charles Darwin.
Elder hissed and cursed, “Charles, why don’t you come and help me? Look at you, you’ve got the fucking nerve to say you’re not related to a monkey in some way!”
Darwin’s head was spinning a bit, but as soon as he heard this, he took an angry leap and heaved himself off the mast onto the back of the Barbary pirate.
The pirate spurted out a mouthful of blood violently, muddying Elder’s face.
Just as Elder sighed in relief, intending to praise Darwin twice, he saw that Darwin was angrily giving him the middle finger.
“Elder, you can question my courage, but you can’t suspect me of having anything to do with monkeys without any evidence! You’re not only insulting me, you’re insulting Lamarckism!”
Elder covered his neck and shook his head, “Thank goodness for monkeys, and even more thank goodness for Lamarckism, the two of them kind of saved my life!”
Just as the sailors were caught in a bitter battle, only a burst of gunfire could be heard behind them, seven or eight Barbary pirates were instantly shot, and one by one, they fell to the ground covering their chests.
They turned around to look, it was the marines who were returning to help as well as Arthur who was standing on the diving board with his arms raised and his gun raised.
Arthur slightly squared his sailor’s cap as he raised the muzzle of his gun and blew the pale white smoke away.
“Whew ……”
The smoke faded away, and what emerged behind Arthur, besides the marines, were swarms of dark shadows, uncountable numbers of the liberated and angry indentured slaves of the Blackthorn, armed with various weapons.
The Barbary pirates saw this and knew that the tide had turned, and Captain Ahmed stuck two fingers in his mouth and blew the whistle for retreat.
He shouted in Arabic, “This order is a bust, let’s pull out!”
They wanted to withdraw, however, the sailors of the Beagle did not necessarily want to let them go.
Colonel Fitzroy kicked over the pirate in front of him, and immediately raised his arms and shouted, “All lines counterattack!”
Tom and Tony drew their muskets and fired one after another at the pirates retreating towards the diving board, “For justice and righteousness!”
At the same time, the voices of the sailors charging resounded from the Beagle, “For Nelson!”
And Dumas, who had followed Arthur to the Beagle, picked up the flintlock pistol Arthur had given him and fired fiercely, “The Irish represent the highest level of intellect in England!” The sailors, who were originally just a bunch of hotheads, only felt a wave of anger rise to the top of their heads when they heard this, and even Captain Fitzroy couldn’t help but growl, “Fuck! Which son of a bitch pirate shouted that? I think they don’t want to live! Kill them clean for me!”
Under wave after wave of onslaught from the sailors, the Barbary pirates were retreating.
Seeing that the angry sailors and indentured slaves were about to chase them down the diving board, the pirate leader Ahmed had to order, “We can’t wait any longer, remove the diving board and let’s retreat!”
Under his order, the pirate ship reopened its sails, and under the monsoon wind, it quickly pulled away from the Beagle at a distance.
The diving board lost its support, and those Barbary pirates who were still standing on it crashed into the sea, fluttering against the waves in fear and shouting for help.
And with a wave of his sword, Colonel Fitzroy roared his orders, “Fire me! Just don’t let them live!!!”
At the word of command, the Beagle’s bow guns roared.
Several shells instantly struck the pirate ship’s cabin positions, yet sadly did not break the sails that powered them.
Colonel Fitzroy looked at the ship full of Congreve rocket launchers and clenched his teeth in exasperation, “If I had known I would have kept some in reserve!”
He tried to order pursuit, but turned his head and saw the Beagle’s broken sails and a tipped mast again, and he sighed violently in resignation.
“Alas! It’s a pity, there was a chance to take both ships! These Barbary pirates, how dare they insult our intelligence level of only Irishmen!”
No sooner had he finished speaking than he saw Arthur rushing towards him with a bloody towel.
The battle was so intense that Arthur’s arms and arms were covered in blood, and his palms were so slippery that he couldn’t even grip anything.
Arthur looked at Colonel Fitzroy, who had a dissatisfied look on his face, and spoke, “Mr. Colonel, you don’t need to worry, those pirates are dead.”
“How do you know?”
Arthur wiped his hands clean, then fished out the binoculars from his pocket and handed it over, he pointed to the sea in front of him and said, “You look there.”
Colonel Fitzroy took the binoculars and glanced up, only to realize that several black dots had appeared on the sea ahead.
As the black dots got closer and closer, he got a good look at the bow flags hanging from the ships.
At the top, was the Navy Headquarters flag with three gold anchor symbols on a large red background.
And hanging below it was the white ship flag symbolizing the first-line troops of the Royal Navy with a red cross on a white background with the meter symbol in the upper left corner.
Immediately below is the detached flag symbolizing the Channel Fleet and the swallow-tailed, red-bordered detached command flag on a white background.
But these flags were not Colonel Fitzroy’s main concern; all his attention was focused on the particular flag flying in the wind with a small red sun on the St. George’s flag.
It was the flag that symbolized the rank of the supreme commander of the fleet to which it belonged.
And as the ships drew nearer, Colonel Fitzroy could see exactly what behemoths of the Royal Navy were coming.
The 74-gun third class battleship ‘Glasgow’, the 98-gun second class battleship ‘Reckless’, and the 114-gun first class battleship ‘Conqueror’, the flagship of the Channel Fleet. The ‘Conqueror’.
Colonel Fitzroy exhaled slightly, this information was enough for him to realize which of the Royal Navy’s bigwigs was aboard the ships across the sea from him.
Admiral Edward Codrington, Commander of the Channel Fleet directly under the Naval Headquarters of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and Vice Admiral of the Royal Navy under the White Flag.
By now, some of the sailors who knew what they were doing had grinned and begun to laugh, while Colonel Fitzroy couldn’t resist drawing a cross on his chest with his finger.
“And why do you think these pirates are doing this? General Codrington and the Ottoman Turkish Empire can have some complicated grudge relations, and it would be better to fall into his hands than to just surrender to me.”
At the far end of the sea, an admiral with a silvery-white curly wig, a boat-shaped cap, three shining round sun-star epaulettes on his shoulders, a red and black uniform and white pants, and a cold face was sitting in a crimson velvet seat in the bow of the ship with his hands interlocked and stacked on top of the hilt of a longsword that stood on the deck.
The salty sea breeze ruffled the side of his face, bringing up his silver-white wig.
Only the veteran admiral stood up and raised his right hand slightly.
The messenger behind him saw it and immediately pulled his voice into a deafening cry, “To Your Station!”
Soon, the sea resounded with hoots and hollers and the sound of uncovering artillery covers.
From top to bottom, various caliber guns were pushed out one by one, 12-pounders, 24-pounders, 32-pounders, and the largest caliber 68-pounders, the black holes of the gun ports were densely filled with 114 gun positions.
With a gust of sea breeze blowing through his cuffs, the raised right hand swung gently downward.
“Fire!!!!!!”
All that could be heard was a rumbling burst of lightning-like thunder.
A white fog so thick it couldn’t be melted rose from the distant sea in an instant, like the mysterious cloud curtain of the Bermuda Triangle, completely engulfing the pirate ship in the unknown.
With a gust of wind, the smoke gradually dispersed, the sea remained calm, there was nothing there, as if there was nothing there in the first place.
Only a few floating planks of wood will remind people that there may have been something here.
(End of chapter)