One Size Does Not Fit All

“Who’s the genius that made our cannons a non-standard size?” Cannoneer Ely said. “Now we have ta make special cannonballs ta shoot out o’ the infernal contraptions!”

He spaced his hands apart, showing me just how large the ammunition was.

“I would look kindly on ye if ye would go out and find the balls we’ve already shot. No doubt with the way these louts shoot they be all o’er the place ta the south and east. That would be faster than us making ’em from scratch fer a certainty.”

So someone, somewhere, designed custom cannons for Westguard Keep without considering that custom cannons require custom ammunition. And now, in the middle of a war against the Scourge, the vrykul, and whatever else Northrend wants to throw at us, I was wandering the fields looking for spent ordnance.

The cannonballs were everywhere. Lodged in hillsides, half-buried in frozen mud, scattered across the landscape, a reminder of our forces’ horrible aim. Ten of them, each one heavy enough to make the trip back interesting.

“Oh, bless ya, bless ya!” Ely said. “Just set ’em down right where yer standin’. I’ll have one o’ the boys come load ’em up soon enough and we can stop worryin’ ’bout runnin’ out o’ balls ta shoot at Skorn.”

The same cannons that helped destroy Skorn’s towers, reduced to recycling their own missed shots. Somewhere, a quartermaster was probably writing a very strongly worded requisition form.

The pirates sitting across the straits were the next thing in the way, so somebody had to Break the Blockade.