Deborah has staying in a village in the Galilee, in northern Israel, dispensing judgements and giving advice on topics she knew little about. To supplement her knowledge, she had bribed a poor family with copper to take her in. The mother of the family agreed to teach her all sorts of useful skills, such as how to bake, clean, take care of children, and other things that women do, without asking questions about why a woman Deborah’s age would not already know such things. It was a mixed experience: one of the things Deborah had to learn was how to kill and prepare a chicken - something totally alien for a 21st century north american woman. Cleaning out a pen filled with animals defecating was another experience. She slaughtered a goat, and failed in her first attempt so badly that her mentor laughed at her, technically, a breach of contract, but Deborah was determined to fit in, so she tried again until she got it right. She helped deliver a baby, by holding a candle for the midwife. She splinted the arm of a boy who had fallen off a ladder.
She talked with the people about religion, urging them to put away their idols and follow the one God. At first, the men were a skeptical about a woman engaged in a serious discussion of philosophy, but eventually they agreed to make an exception and include her. It helped that she could drink them under the table, thanks to a small anti-oxidant pill that detoxified the wine before the alcohol could leave the digestive tract.
She also spent time learning the trades, such as working metal, farming the soil, driving a team of horses. She cheated a little bit, by analyzing the soil spectrographically and fertilizing it appropriately. During a drought, she arranged for the local farms to get water from the transporter, surreptitiously, of course. She distributed copper generously, so the village prospered.
She also organized a school, and taught reading, writing, and simple mathematics to the children of the village. The village elders looked askance at the thought of teaching females to read, until Deborah convinced them that the literate women could be part of the process of preserving the traditions of the past.
Once a year, Deborah would make a pilgrimage to Ramah to check on Lapidot. It was getting harder and harder to check on Lapidot without raising suspicions about what she was doing, and she had finally taken to tranquilizing him in his sleep, beaming up to the timeship, getting a checkup, and beaming back down before the tranquilizer wore off.
Life was idyllic.
One day, while Deborah and the men were arguing over the law for the vows of women (Which would be the book of Numbers chapter 30 in about 500 years), 9 men rode into town, 6 on horseback, 2 in a chariot, and 1 on a cart. The men wore brass armor and carried swords and spears. They dismounted and yelled “All the people, gather here”
A crowd of people gathered in the square.
“Who are the elders of this village?”
The men Deborah was arguing with stepped forward.
“We are the elders”, one of them said. “What is it you want?”
“We are soldiers of King Jabin of Hazor”, said one of the men in the chariot. “We are here to collect tribute for the King. You will fill the cart with the choicest grain from the field. Also, you will give us 12 goats. Two of your young men will drive the goats back to Hazor. You will also give us 4 jugs of wine. Your elders will arrange to deliver the tribute here, now”
The people muttered among themselves.
“Go now, and fetch the tribute”, the soldier said.
The elders gathered and began discussions. Deborah tried to hear the gist of the discussion, but she couldn’t. She decided to take matters into her own hands so she slipped away and snuck behind a building. She pulled out her medallion and pressed the button.
“Yes”, Adelle said.
“Let me talk to Walter”
There was a pause. “Walter here. What can I do for you?”
“I need some tactical advice. 9 men have entered the village, 6 on horseback, 2 in a chariot, and 1 in a cart. They are wearing bronze armor. Each one of them has a sword. Some of them are carrying spears. They are demanding tribute. What should I do?”
“Do you have a laser pistol?”
“Yes”
“Then kill them.”
“What’s the best way to do that?”
“The laser pistol probably isn’t powerful enough to penetrate bronze armor. So shoot them in the neck or face. I realize that will be hard to shoot that accurately from a safe distance”
“What is the effective combat radius of a spear?”
“It depends on the skill of the soldier. It could be as much as 20 meters. The spear itself could be thrown on the order of 100 meters, but you lose accuracy at such distances. You could use a low power laser for targeting and we could kill them from orbit using the spot you indicate as the targeting point”
“How much collateral damage would there be?”
“Everything within 20 meters of the center would be destroyed or seriously damaged”
“That’s no good - they will have hostages”
“Then I think you have to kill them with your laser pistol. Hey - are the horses armored?”
“No. They have saddles but no stirrups”
“If you kill the horses, then you immobilize the chariot and reduce the cavalry to a heavy infantry. Because the soldiers are wearing armor, they won’t be able to move very fast. You should be able to pick them off at a range of 30 to 50 meters. I have another idea. I could beam down a laser rifle which would have an effective combat radius of 2000 meters.”
“Could I ambush them with the rifle?”
“Yes. Let me check the map. Here is the road to the coast. Okay, the road goes through a pass about 4 kilometers west northwest of you. The hills on either side of the road rise 300-400 meters above the road. How does that sound?”
“I like it”
“You want to be on the hill on the south side of the road”
“Why the south side?”
“So that the sun will be at your back. Your fire will appear to come out of the sun. That makes it hard for them to see you”
“I didn’t think of that”
“That’s how a guerrilla thinks.”
“I’m a guerrilla?”
“One man against a larger number of trained warriors? Yes, you are a guerrilla. Your strategy is stealth and surprise”
“I’m a woman”
“Even more so. I can beam you up now and beam you down there when they get there”
“I want to stay here and see how events here play out”
“Okay. I’m going out of transporter range in about 10 minutes and I will be back in range in about an hour”
“These people don’t move that fast”
“Anything else?”
“No, I think we’ve got a plan”
“I agree”
“Deborah out”
Deborah snuck back to the square. Apparently, nobody had missed her. The cart had been filled with baskets of grain, jugs (presumably of wine), and a collection of goats had been gathered.
“I want a woman”, one of the soldiers yelled.
Do I volunteer? No! I have to rescue the party, and I can’t do that if I’m a captive.
“You”
Crap. I guess that’s a disadvantage of being 30 centimeters taller than everybody else.
The soldier walked forward and grabbed her by the arm. She delivered a swift kick to the groin, and the soldier let go of her. Then another soldier approached her. She grabbed the soldier by the wrist, pulled him backwards and he fell to the ground. Two soldiers grabbed Deborah by the arms. She fought them, but they were too much for her: they tackled her and then dragged her to the cart.
“Uncircumcised bastards!”
One of the soldiers hit her in the side of the jaw, and she fell to the ground. She tasted blood in her mouth.
“Quiet, woman, or I will hit you again”, the soldier told her.
Deborah picked herself up. She touched her cheek. That hurts”. She tasted blood. Then she realized that there was a loose tooth in her mouth. She spit it out.
“If you try that again, I will kill you, and then go back to the village and get another woman”, the soldier said.
“Let’s go”, the soldier on the chariot said.
So the men mounted their horses (without stirrups this was hard to do). They moved out of town at a slow walk. Between the rubbing sound from the cart, the bleating of the goats, the squeal of the chariot, and the sounds of the horses feet, it was a remarkably noisy procession. Deborah decided to risk talking to Walter. Deborah carefully pulled her medallion and pressed the button.
“Yes”, Adelle answered.
“Let me speak to Walter”, Deborah whispered.
“Walter here”
“Quietly. I’ve been taken captive.”
“That’s clever.”
“Why?”
“Now you can fire at close range.”
“The men have spears”
“You have a laser pistol. You can target and fire faster than they can. With a 1 megajoule pulse, you can fire once every 5 seconds. What is the arrangement of your procession?”
“Two mounted soldiers in front, then the cart with the spoils, then me, then the goats with 2 boys driving them, then two men in the chariot, and 4 more mounted men in the rear.”
“Let me think about this a moment.” Deborah walked on. “Okay, is the commander in the chariot?”
“He is”
“Take him out first. If you shoot him the face, that will probably kill him because he has to be able to see, so his face is uncovered”
“Why do I take him out first?”
“Because if you attack anybody else first, he will give orders to kill you. If you take him out, then the rest of the men are going to need time to reorganize and establish a new hierarchy of command. That will take time, and you won’t give them time”
“I see”
“Once you take out the commander, kill the horses behind you. Then kill the soldiers on those horses. Once everybody behind you is dead, then kill the soldiers in front of you”
“Why kill them last?”
“Because their backs are turned to you. They can’t see what you are doing. The laser pistol doesn’t make any noise. Any other questions?”
Deborah thought.
“Walter, I’ve never killed a man before. It’s murder. I have a clear superiority of weaponry. It’s not a fair fight”
“They are soldiers. You are a prisoner. The ethics of war are different than what you are used to. It is moral for a prisoner to attack his or her captors. You’ve been kidnapped. That makes you a victim. You are morally entitled to fight back. Finally, you are outnumbered. When Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, it never occurred to them that the United States would drop an atomic bomb on two of their cities”
“I understand that as an abstraction. However, these are real men, not an abstraction”
“Have you given any thought to what they are going to do to a captive woman?”
“They will probably gang rape me”
“Is that an abstraction to you?”
“No”
“Alright. Do you understand what to do?”
“Yes”
“Whenever you are ready”
Deborah reached to her ankle and pulled the laser pistol. She set the laser at 10 Megawatts and 1 tenth second impulse. She turned around, held the pistol at arms length, aimed (the laser pistol had a low power sight to make aiming easy), and trembling, she shot the commander in the face. He fell backwards. The driver turned to his right to see what was happening to his commander. Deborah ran to the north about two meters, 5, then ran to the east, 4, then ran to the north again 3, then ran west, 2, then pivoted and aimed, 1 and she shot the driver. Walter was right - the laser pistol made no noise and the men died too quickly to shout.
One of the soldiers grabbed a spear. Deborah ran to the east, 5, then stopped, The soldier tried to turn his spear to track her, 4, but a spear is very long: it has a high polar moment so it is hard to turn and hard to stop it turning. Deborah continued to run to the east, 3, past the point where the soldier could pivot his waist, so now he had to turn his horse, 2, 1. Deborah aimed and fired. The soldier fell back and off of his horse.
Deborah now ran south behind the last two horses, 5, 4, and turned west. The soldiers had been trying to turn to the right, and now were trying to turn to the left 3, 2. Deborah ran to the southwest, into the sun, and also trying to keep changing the angle between the soldiers and her. 1. She turned, aimed and fired. Another soldier fell backwards.
One of the soldiers threw a spear at her. 5. However, she could see it coming and easily dodged it. 4, 3, She ran to the east again, 2, 1. She watched to see which soldier was facing her most directly, made up her mind, aimed, and fired.
The one soldier left looked around at his fallen comrades. 5. How did three of them fall off their horses at roughly the same time? 4. He looked at the woman, standing alone in the field. 3. He knew that he could easily kill her with his sword, there was no cause for panic. 2. He was wearing a state-of-the-art armor. Except that three of his comrades were laying on the ground, with tremendous bleeding from their faces. 1. He looked at the woman, saw a bright flash, and died.
Deborah ran forward, 5, towards the west, 4, towards the cart. As she ran past the goats, 3, one of the young men yelled, “Deborah, what are you doing?”
“Quiet!”
She kept running forward, 2. When she was alongside the cart driver, 1, she tapped him on the shoulder. He turned towards her and she shot him in the face at point blank range. He fell to the right side of the cart.
Then she ran forward 5 and to the south 4, 3, turned, aimed (Amazing - he hasn’t a clue that they are under attack!), 2, 1, and shot the horseman on the left. He fell towards the right, on to the horseman on the right. That soldier crouched down, and reached for his sword. Deborah ran behind the horses. 5, The soldier apparently didn’t see Deborah. She ran to the north side 4, 3, 2, turned and aimed 1. The last soldier died.
Not too bad - 9 men dead in less than a minute.
Deborah then ran back to the cart, climbed aboard, and stopped it. She returned her laser pistol to its holster.
“Are you alright?”, she asked the young men.
“What did you do?”, one of the men demanded.
“I didn’t do anything. The Lord was incensed that the soldiers treated me badly, so he killed them.”
“No, you did something. You ran back and forth. You had something in your hand”
“Am I a mighty man? Do I have a sword? Do I have a spear? Do I have armor? I am just a woman, but God cares about me. God cares about you, too”
“If God cares about us, then why does Jabin oppress us?”
“Who can know the will of God? It is sufficient to put away idols, and serve the Lord. Now, help me get this cart turned around. We are going back to the village. Friends, I don’t want anybody to hear a word about what happened here. You can tell them that a miracle occurred, that there was a bright light, and all the soldiers died. Understand?”
The men all agreed. They got the cart turned around, went around the bodies, and started back to the village. The goats walked in front. Deborah drove the cart, and the horses were tied to the back of the cart and followed docily.
Deborah touched her medallion.
“What happened?”. It was Walter.
“I killed all the soldiers and none of the horses. You know, it takes 5 seconds for the laser pistol to recharge after a Megajoule shot. That’s a long time.”
“I know”
“I’m not very happy. It feels wrong somehow. It was an easy victory. Too easy.”
“A true warrior likes easy victories”
“I’m a scholar, not a warrior”
“I admire your moral sensibilities. Since I am your prisoner, I want you to behave ethically towards me.”
“I want to make an appointment with the autodoc tonight”
“Are you okay?”
“I lost a tooth and I want to get it replaced”
“I’ll get it on the calendar for you”
When they got back to the village, everybody gathered around. “What happened?”, everybody wanted to know.
“Deborah is a prophetess! The Lord came in a bright light, and all of the soldiers died. But none of us were hurt!”
Deborah just stood there and smiled. Everybody reached out to touch her.
“FRIENDS!”, She called out. “IT’S BEEN A HARD DAY. WE SHOULD UNLOAD THE CART, PEN THE GOATS, AND THEN GO HOME AND RELAX”
So they did.
However, that night she left a couple of dozen disks of copper on the table, and walked out of the house. She touched her medallion.
“Yes”, Adelle said.
“Beam me up, please”
“I can’t. You are out of range”
“When will I be in range?”
“About 20 minutes”
“Very well. Let me know when I am range. I’m going for a walk”
In the moonlight, she could see reasonably well. So she walked around the village one last time. The animals were in their pens. There were a million, zillion stars in a cloudless sky.
The Medallion beeped.
“This is Deborah”
“You are in transporter range now”
“Thank you. Beam me up”
And she was gone.
Deborah crawled into bed. Real sheets! Real mattress! A soft pillow! She had missed her creature comforts. Instantly, she was asleep.
The next morning, after a wonderful breakfast of waffles with real (well...) maple syrup, Deborah went to the autodoc.
“How may I help you?”
“I lost a tooth in a fight, and I need a new one to replace it”
“Fine, fine. Sit down in the chair please”
She sat in the chair. A monitor came down from the ceiling, positioned where Deborah could see it. A robotic hand forced its way into her mouth. Another robotic arm with what looked like a tiny camera and a bright light swooped down and into her mouth.
“You haven’t been brushing your teeth or flossing, have you?”
“uh uh”
“You need a good cleaning, you have a cavity that needs filling, and of course you have a missing tooth.”
“Huh”
“Good, good”
Yet another robotic arm appeared. How many robotic arms does this thing have? And how many robotic arms can fit in my mouth at once?”
“OW!”
“You may experience some discomfort. I have injected your jaw with a local anesthetic to kill the pain while I do the cleaning”, the autodoc explained.
“OW!”
“Just a couple more and your jaw will be completely numb”
“Ah wan ouda here!”
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t understand that. I’m going to start on your lower left rear quadrant.”
“Ah aid, Ah wan ouda here!”
“Good, Good, I agree with you 100% - dental health is the secret to a long and pleasant life. Now just relax”
“AHHHHH”
“That’s right, just breath deeply, relax, and leave everything to me. That’s a good patient”