Breath
frosted in the frozen morning as students grunted and groaned as they pushed
the onager into position. The onager had taken a month to construct by the
physics students, who would operate it.
Alex’s class
had been divided equally to help the physics students with historical accuracy,
right down to the correct rope to provide torsional power to the catapult. The
other half of his students lay up ahead behind the snow wall that took up half
the campus quad. The goal was to replicate part of Julius Caesar’s siege of
Alesia. The Roman fortifications were made of snow instead of wood, but it
would help the architecture students understand load bearing and exceptional
stresses on structures.
On his stick
horse, Alex lifted his spear, crying “Attack!”
The
students aimed and fired the catapult as quickly as possible while the
defenders attempted to hurl hand-made snowballs the right distance.
The physics
students overshot at first, then undershot before getting the hang of the
reality of their calculations to begin hitting the wall. At first they would
hit the top of the wall, where it was thinnest, knocking pieces down, only for
the architecture students to begin repacking snow to repair as they shouted
jeers back at them.
Professor
Tremont corrected his students, telling them to aim for the base of the wall,
or at least lower down where the weight of the wall above would work to help
bring the wall down. Likewise, Professor Dixon yelled at her students to not
just lump the snow on, but to construct it in specific block shapes for better
structural support.
“Surrender,
Caesar!” Alex Yelled
Cynthia
Johnson, Alex’s TA, decked out in Roman armor, yelled back. “Never, Gaulish
scum. Rome does not yield!”
His
students inside the wall all shouted agreement as they raised fake spears and
shields.
Now if we can just keep Dean Weirmont from
catching wind of this. . . .