#29: Construction

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Since he still had daylight to burn and all these husky young men and huge behemoths with little to do he set them to fortifying the neck of the promontory. He directed that they build a field expedient palisade. The First Sergeant put platoon Sergeant Hobbs in charge of that project. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, Sgt. Hobbs considered overkill to be a feature, not a bug. He got a little carried away on the fortifications. It turned into much more that mere field expedient.

Sgt. Hobbs had wanted poles. He wanted a LOT of poles, hundreds and hundreds of poles. He wanted wrist thick poles about fifteen foot long. He sent a contingent of wood choppers into the forest to get the poles. He sent a contingent of men along with a Troll driven, Rhino pulled, Demon chariot. In addition to the rail mounted swivel guns he sent several riflemen. There was no telling what might be in the forest. He told the men not to start any trouble but by God finish it if they had to.

Luckily the forest was full of young, tall, straight almost limbless trees. It was a young evergreen forest of some sort, just what he wanted.

Sgt. Hobbs then tried to make the Kindred wagonmasters understand his need for hides.

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Other men, Trolls, and Bears were set to do excavation. In places the land on the promontory was sandy. It so happened that a strip across the neck was almost pure sand...that's where the moat would be dug. The Army and the Civilians had shovels in their wagons. They rapidly dug a moat and built a rampart. As soon as he got the first batch of poles he had men us rawhide to lash them together.

The ramparted, palisaded, defensive field fortification grew quickly. In a remarkably short time it was completed, They continued to pile dirt behind it then at some point diverted the stream to flood the moat. They now had a relatively safe spot to spend the night.

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Jeb and the Kindred Buffalo were turned out to graze in the little meadow. The Orc Rhinos were there also. The Buffalo were almost as big as the Rhino. Individually a Buffalo wasn’t any smarter than a rhino but these buffalo worked as a team. A team of six buffalo were more than a match for any Rhino. If the Rhino started any trouble the Buffalo would finish it. The human horses and oxen were turned out to graze also. They looked like toys compared to the big beasts.

The grass was plush for now. It wouldn't last long with so many large hungry animals eating it. It'd last tonight though and perhaps a few days. That was the main concern.

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Sgt. Halsey looked out over the developing camp in satisfaction. It was, in truth, a camp. Latrines and fire pits had been dug. He set a guard on the wall and rotated everyone through the chow line. Everyone was fed and cleaned up and ready to hit their bedrolls when the sun went down. It seemed to have been an extremely long day.

He thought to himself as, he checked the guard one last time.

“Dammit Boy….you woke up this morning as usual, fell thru a hole to another world, fought a muthering great battle, and built a fort. No wonder you’re so damned tired...what a day”.

He found his bedroll. Throughout the night he'd sleep for an hour or two then check the guard. It seemed like an awfully long night.

Next Episode
#30:A Pleasant Morning…
Previous Episode
#28 - peninsula in the sky
First Episode
# 1 : In the beginning…

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