by Ralph Peters
It was impossible to judge the exact location of his vehicle now. If everything was still on track, his second vehicle would be tucked in behind him, with Senior Sergeant Malyarchuk to the rear in an over-watch position. Plinnikov laughed to himself. Overwatch. You couldn’t see ten meters. He glanced at his map, anxious to orient himself.
He could feel the trail dropping toward a valley or ravine. Artillery rounds struck immediately to the front.
“Keep going,” Plinnikov said. “Get down into the low ground. Stay on the trail as long as the smoke holds. Fast now, move.”
Plinnikov sensed that they were very close to the enemy. Clots of earth and stone flew into the air, hurtling across his narrowed horizon. Plinnikov guessed that, if he moved off the trail, there might be mines, but that the trail itself would only be covered by direct fires — which would be ineffective in the confusion of the Soviet artillery preparation.
“Lieutenant, we’re catching up with the barrage. We’re too close.”
“Keep going. We’re already in it. Go right through.”
“Comrade Lieutenant…” It was Junior Sergeant Belonov, his gunner and assistant. The boy’s face was milky.
“It’s all right,” Plinnikov told him through the intercom. “Just spot for targets. If we wait and try to sneak through, they’ll get us for sure.”
An unidentified object thumped against the vehicle so hard that the vehicle jolted, as though wincing in pain.
“Go faster,” Plinnikov shouted to the driver. “Just stay on the road and go as fast as you can.”
“I can’t see the road. I lose it.”
“Just go.” Plinnikov brushed his fingers at his nose. He felt fear rising in his belly and chest, unleashed by the impact of whatever had hit the vehicle.
Suddenly, the artillery blasts seemed to swamp them, shaking the vehicle like a boat on rough water. Plinnikov realized that if they threw a track now, they were dead.
“Go, damn you.”
In the thick smoke, the lights of the blasts seemed demonic, alive with deadly intentions.
“More to the left… to the left.”
The tracks seemed to buckle on the edge of a ditch or gully, threatening to peel away from the road wheels.
“Target,” Plinnikov screamed.
But the sudden black shape off to their right side was lifeless, its metal deformed by a direct hit. The driver swerved away, and the tracks came level, back on the trail again.
Plinnikov broke out in a sweat. He had not seen the shattered vehicle until they almost collided with it. He wondered, for the first time, if he had not done something irrevocably foolish.
Slop from a nearby impact smacked the external lens of Plinnikov’s periscope, cracking it diagonally, just as the vehicle reached a pocket where the wind had thinned the smoke to a transparent gauze. Several dark shapes moved out of the smoke on a converging axis.
“Targets. Gunner, right. Driver, pull left now.”
But the enemy vehicles moved quickly away, either uninterested in or unaware of Plinnikov’s presence. The huge armored vehicles disappeared back into the smoke, black metal monsters roaming over the floor of hell. None of the turrets turned to fight.
“Hold fire.”
The enemy were evidently pulling off of a forward position. The fire was too much for them. Plinnikov tried his radio, hoping the antenna had not been cut away.
“Javelin, this is Penknife. Do you hear me?”
Nothing.
The heaviest fire struck behind them now. But the smoke, mingled with the fog and rain, still forced them to drive without points of orientation. Plinnikov worried because he had once turned in a complete circle in a smokescreen on a training exercise, in the most embarrassing experience of his brief career. He could still hear the laughter and the timeworn jokes about lieutenants.
“Javelin, this is Penknife. I have a priority message.”
“Penknife, this is Javelin.” The control station barely came through the sea of static.
“Enemy forces in at least platoon strength withdrawing from forward positions under fire strike. I can’t give you an exact location.”
“Where are you? What’s your location?”
“I’m in my assigned sector. Visibility’s almost zero. We just drove under the artillery barrage. We’re in among the enemy.”
“You’re hard to read. I’m getting a garbled transmission. Did you say you’re behind the artillery barrage?”
“On the enemy side of it. Continuing to move.”
There was a long silence on the other end. Plinnikov sensed that he had surprised them all. He felt a bloom of pride. Then the faint voice returned.
“Penknife, your mission now is to push as far as you can. Ignore assigned boundaries. Just go as deep as you can and call targets. Do you understand?”
“Clear. Moving now.”
Plinnikov switched to the intercom. The smoke thinned slightly. His first instinct was to move for high ground so he could fix his location. But he quickly realized that any high ground would not only reveal his presence but was likely to be occupied by the enemy.
“Driver, follow the terrain, stay in the low ground. Just watch out for ditches and water.”
He switched again, this time to his platoon net, trying to raise his other two vehicles.
“Quiver, this is Penknife.”
He waited. No answer. He tried again and still received no response. He swung the turret around to get a better view, straining to see through his cracked and dirty optics.
There was nothing. Misty gray emptiness.
“Penknife, this is Stiletto.” Plinnikov heard Senior Sergeant Malyarchuk’s voice. “I can’t hear any response from Quiver. My situation as follows: moving slowly with the barrage. Can’t see a damned thing. I lost you twenty minutes ago.”
“This is Penknife. Clear transmission. Continue to move on primary route. Watch for Quiver, he may be stuck out there. End transmission.”
His other vehicle might be broken down or mired. But, he realized, it was more likely that they were dead. He was surprised to find that he felt little emotion, and ashamed to experience how swiftly his thoughts turned to the implications the loss of the vehicle and crew had for him.
“Driver, get on that trail to the right. That one.”
The vehicle moved sharply now, with the worst effects of the barrage well behind it. Plinnikov’s optics had deteriorated severely. The crack in the outer lens allowed water to seep in.
“Slow. See the trail into the trees? Slow. Take the trail.”
The vehicle eased onto a smooth forest trail that appeared very well-maintained. Plinnikov hoped to find a spot to tuck into for a few minutes so they could clean off all of their vision blocks and lenses and tighten the antenna. One barrage had already passed over the forest, and patches of trees had been splintered and blackened. The driver worked the tracks over a small fallen trunk. He drove the vehicle cautiously, with no desire to throw a track in such close proximity to the enemy.
“Comrade Lieutenant, I can barely see,” the driver said. “Can I pop open my hatch?”
“No,” Plinnikov said. “Stop right here. I’ll get out and clean the blocks.”
The vehicle rocked to a standstill. Plinnikov unlatched the safety bolt and pushed up his hatch. The sudden increase in the noise level was striking. The weight of the artillery preparation was incredible, and the fires sounded much closer now. It was difficult to imagine anything surviving such an effort.
In the wet green woods, fresh forest smells mingled with the stink of blown ordnance. Raindrops worked through the overhanging branches and struck Plinnikov’s nose and cheeks, touching cool at his lips. The hatch ring felt slimy with moisture and dirt.
Just ahead, another trail crossed the one along which they had moved. The other trail was deeply rutted and black with mud, evidence that several tracked vehicles had passed along it.
Plinnikov drew himself back down into the turret. “Belono
v,” he told the gunner, “make sure the auto-cannon’s ready to go. I don’t think we’re alone.”
“Comrade Lieutenant, let me check the exterior.”
“No. You stay on the gun. Just be ready.” Plinnikov stripped off his headset and snaked out of the turret. The deck seemed to slide away under his boots, and he grasped the long, thin barrel of the automatic cannon to steady himself, crouching.
The armament appeared to be all right, with no metal deformities. But there were numerous spots on the vehicle exterior where the paint had been stripped away and where the bolt-on armor had been gashed or even sheared away. One fender twisted toward the sky. An external stow-box was gone, and the spare track pads were missing. The shovel was gone. The main antenna for the high-powered radio set was nicked, but functionally intact.
Unidentifiable objects ripped through the foliage, their noises an occasional whisper. Big raindrops burst like shells on his skin. More rain coming. Plinnikov hurriedly cleaned all of the optics with a rag, trying not to smear them too badly.
He got back into the turret as soon as he reasonably could. “The trail looks clear enough up ahead, but you can’t see very far. The enemy has either passed through these woods or he’s still somewhere in here with us.”
“Perhaps we should wait here for a while, Comrade Lieutenant. See what the enemy does, you know?” Belonov was clearly frightened. Plinnikov hoped the gunner would be able to work his weapon when the time came.
Plinnikov twitched his nose, then rubbed at it with his dirty knuckles. “No. We have to get a fix on our location. And if we just sit, the artillery will roll back over us. We’re moving.”
The truth was, Plinnikov realized, that he was afraid to remain motionless, afraid he couldn’t handle the stress of inactivity.
“Driver, can you see all right now?”
“Better, Comrade Lieutenant.”
“Let’s go. Nice and easy.” Plinnikov wanted to make sure he spotted the enemy before they spotted his lone vehicle. He knew it would be impossible to detect moving vehicles until they were fatally close, due to the noise of the artillery preparation.
The vehicle dug itself into the peat of the trail, then gripped and lurched forward. Plinnikov unlashed his assault rifle. He expected to fight with the automatic cannon and the on-board machine gun, but he wanted to be prepared for anything. He stood up behind the shield of his opened turret, weapon at the ready, headset flaps left open so he could hear a bit of the world around him.
The vehicle pivoted into the rutted trail. The rain picked up, slapping Plinnikov, making him squint. Nervously, he ejected a cartridge from his weapon, insuring it was loaded and ready.
“Belonov?”
“Comrade Lieutenant?”
“How well can you see?”
“I can see the trail.”
“If I duck down and start turning the turret, be ready.”
“I’m ready.”
Plinnikov heard the nerves in both of their voices. He was furious about the lack of soldiers to fill out his crew. He wanted all of the fighting power he could get. He wished his lost vehicle was still with him.
The tracks slid and plumed mud high into the air behind the vehicle.
The immense roar of the artillery seemed part of another reality now, clearly divorced from anything that would happen in these woods.
Black vehicle shapes. Thirty meters through the trees.
Plinnikov dropped into the turret, not bothering to close the hatch behind himself. He took control of the turret, forehead pressed against his optics.
“See them? Fire, damn you. Fire.”
The automatic cannon began to recoil.
“There. To the right.”
“I have him.”
“Driver, don’t stop. Go.”
The vehicle pulled level with a small clearing in the forest where two enemy command tracks stood positioned with their drop ramps facing each other. Two light command cars were parked to one side.
A third track that had been hidden from view began to move for the trail.
“Hit the mover, hit the mover.”
The automatic cannon spit several bursts at the track, which stopped in a shower of sparks.
“Driver, front to the enemy.”
Plinnikov swung the turret again.
The enemy fired back with small arms, although one man stood still, helmetless, in amazement, as though he had never in his life expected such a thing to happen.
The automatic cannon and the machine gun raked the sides of the enemy tracks. All good, clean flank shots, punching through the armor. The track that had made a run for the trail burned now. The driver’s hatch popped up, and Plinnikov cut the man across the shoulders with the on-board machine gun.
The man who had stood so long in such amazement slowly raised his hands. Plinnikov turned the machine gun on him.
Plinnikov was afraid he would miss one of the dismounted soldiers, and he left the on-board weaponry to Belonov, standing behind the shield of his hatch with his assault rifle.
Just in time, he saw an enemy soldier kneeling with a small tube on his shoulder. He emptied his entire magazine into the man, just as Belonov brought the machine gun around to catch him as well.
Plinnikov pulled a grenade from his harness, then another. As quickly as his shaking fingers allowed, he primed one and tossed it toward the enemy vehicles, then followed it with the second grenade. He dropped back inside of his vehicle.
The explosions sounded flat, almost inconsequential, after the artillery barrage. Plinnikov realized that his hearing was probably going.
“Sweep the vehicles one more time with the machine gun. Driver. To the rear, ten meters.”
“I can’t see.”
“Just back up, damn it. Now.”
The gears crunched, and the vehicle’s tracks threw mud toward the dead and the dying.
“Driver, halt. Belonov, I’m going out. You cover me.”
He felt as though he would have given anything imaginable to have his authorized dismount scouts now. If there was a price to pay for the system’s failure, he’d have to pay it. The idea did not appeal to him. He felt as though he were going very, very fast, as though he had the energy to vault over trees, but his hand shook as he grasped the automatic rifle. He didn’t bother to unfold the stock. It was challenging enough to snap in a fresh magazine.
It felt as though it took an unusually long time to work his way out of the turret. He was conscious every second of how fully he was exposed. As soon as he could, he swung his legs high and to the side, sliding down over the side of the low turret, catching his rump sharply on the edge of the vehicle’s deck.
He hit the mud and crouched beside the vehicle. Great clots of earth hung from the track and road wheels.
He checked to his rear.
Nothing. Forest. The empty trail.
To his front, the little command cars blazed, one with a driver still behind the wheel, a shadow in the flames. Between his vehicle and the devastated enemy tracks, Plinnikov could see three enemy soldiers on the ground. One of them moved in little jerks and twists. None of them made any sounds. Another body lay sprawled face down on the ramp of one of the command tracks, while yet another — the antitank grenadier — had been kicked back against a tree by the machine gun. The grenadier hardly resembled a human being now.
The vehicle that had tried to escape burned with a searing glow on its metal. The type and markings made it Dutch. Plinnikov kept well away from it as he worked his way forward.
One of the command vehicles had its engine running. Both of the command tracks bore West German markings, and most of the uniforms were West German. Plinnikov skirted the front of the running vehicle, taking cover in the brush. As methodically as his nerves would permit, he maneuvered his way around to the enemy’s rear.
He halted along the wet metal sidewall of the running vehicle, feeling its vibrations. Above the idling engine, he could hear the razzle of a radio call in a strang
e language. He wondered if it was a call for the station that had just perished.
Someone moaned, almost as if he was snoring. Then it was quiet again.
Plinnikov breathed in deeply. He felt terribly afraid. He could not understand why he was doing this. It seemed as though he was meant to be anyplace but here. He looked at the grenadier’s contorted remains. Somehow, it had all seemed a game, a daring game of driving through the artillery. And if he had been caught, he would have been removed from the game. But the man slopped against the tree was out of the game forever. For a length of time he could not measure, Plinnikov simply stared at the tiny black, red, and gold flag on the rear fender of the far vehicle, as if it could provide answers.
He took a last deep breath, fighting his stomach. He pulled his weapon in tight against his side and threw himself around the corner of the vehicle onto the drop ramp.
He had forgotten the dead man on the ramp. He tripped over the corpse, flopping over the body and smashing his elbow. He landed with his mouth close to the dead man’s ear, and, in an instant of paralysis, he felt the lifelike warmth of the body through the battle dress and sogging rain. The dead man had fine white hairs mixed in with the close-cropped black on the rear of his skull, and Plinnikov saw the red pores on the back of the man’s neck with superhuman clarity.
As soon as he could, Plinnikov pushed off of the corpse and twisted so that he could fire his weapon into the interior of the vehicle. But he knew that if anyone still had been capable of shooting, he would be dead already.
The running vehicle bore a stew of bodies in its belly. The accidents of dying had thrown several men together as though they had been dancing and had fallen drunkenly. The inside of the cluttered compartment was streaked and splashed with wetness, and uniforms had torn open to spill filth and splinters of bone. Plinnikov realized that some of the rounds that had penetrated the near side of the vehicle had not had the force to punch out the other side and had expended themselves in rattling back and forth inside the vehicle, chopping the occupants.
