Disclaimer: The Rat Patrol is not my property. They come out to play sometimes, then I send them home.
Author's note: This is my 100th Rat Patrol story.
The Game's Afoot
By Suzie2b
Captain Carl Smith—aka Corporal Karl Schmidt—had been working undercover at a German garrison and sending out coded radio messages from his private quarters. After his last transmission was abruptly cut off, the Rat Patrol was sent to see if the captain could be rescued.
However, the garrison's commander, Lt. Col. Schwarz, after becoming suspicious of Corporal Schmidt and having caught him as he sent out a coded message, expected a rescue attempt. The lieutenant colonel questioned the prisoner without success and had him sent to the Gestapo in less than twenty-four hours.
Troy, Moffitt, Hitch, and Tully had gone in just before the changing of the guards at midnight, when the Germans on duty were tired and less likely to notice the commandos coming over the back wall. But instead of catching the Germans off guard, they were captured before they could get to the main building. When brought before Lt. Col. Schwarz, he took great pleasure in telling them that their operative had been sent to the Gestapo for further questioning.
After refusing to talk to the lieutenant colonel, he ordered that the prisoners be locked up. Troy and Moffitt were put in one cell while Hitch and Tully went into another. As the night wore on, the four finally took to cots for a few hours rest.
Troy and Moffitt were awakened a short time later by a commotion in the other cell as two guards wrestled with Tully and two others held Hitch back. When one of the guards held a gun to Hitch's head, Tully stopped struggling. One guard tied his hands behind him, then he was led out of the cell.
As the cell door was locked again, Troy demanded, "Where are you taking him?"
In broken English a guard sneered, "It is time for the game to start."
"Game? What game?"
A second guard put a burlap sack over Tully's head and tied it around his neck. Tully's voice was muffled as he spoke through the rough cloth, "I'll be okay, sarge."
Troy looked worried. "Yeah, you'll be fine."
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The air was cool, so Tully figured it was still dark when he was put into a halftrack and pushed down into a corner. He listened as they headed out into the desert and could hear three distinct engines.
Tully didn't know how long they'd been traveling, but he could feel the air gradually heat up as the sun rose. Then he heard the engines shift into a lower gears as the terrain got rougher and they began to climb.
When the halftrack finally jerked to a halt, hands hauled Tully to his feet and guided him out only to push him down to his knees. For a brief moment Tully thought he was about to be executed, but then a knife was put in his hands as a German accented voice said, "The game begins when you free yourself. If you survive the next three days, you and your friends will be set free. If you do not survive, they will be executed. Do you understand?"
Tully nodded. Seconds later he heard the engines start again and listened as the three vehicles drove away. As quickly as he could, Tully cut through the heavy ropes holding his hands behind him. Then he untied the rope around his neck and pulled the sack off his head. He blinked in the sudden light and got to his feet. Tully was alone.
He listened for the sound of the engines, but he could no longer hear them. He looked at the knife he'd been given and discovered that it was his. Tully slid the weapon into its sheath as he said to himself, "What kind of game are we playing?"
Tully took stock of what was around him. Obviously the Germans had dropped him somewhere in the mountains. They'd left him with the knife and a canteen of water. With a sigh, Tully picked up the canteen and dropped it into the burlap sack along with the length of rope that had been around his neck.
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Lt. Col. Schwarz had Troy, Moffitt, and Hitch brought to his office later that morning. "I know you must be curious about your private, sergeant."
Troy frowned. "A guard mentioned a 'game.' What's going on?"
Schwarz smiled. "Your private has been dropped off on Mt. Cameroon. He is being given a chance to fight for your lives as well as his own. If he is still alive after three days of being hunted, the four of you will go free. If his lifeless body is brought back here, the three of you will be executed."
"Hunted? By what?"
"Why, by my men of course. It is a game they have become quite proficient at. So far no one has survived longer than a day and a half against them."
Hitch said, "You don't know Tully. If anyone can survive, it'll be him."
Lt. Col. Schwarz laughed. "We shall see. We shall see." He turned to the guards. "Nehmen Sie zurück in ihre Zellen."
After the cell doors were closed and locked, Moffitt watched the guards leave as he said, "Tully will be all right, Troy."
The sergeant sat down on a cot. "Are you trying to convince me or yourself?"
"Both of us I hope. Like Hitch said, if anyone can do it, Tully can. He's a survivor. I'd lay my bet on him any day."
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To get his bearings Tully watched the sky, following the sun's path. He decided to head down hill and west. He'd been told he had to survive three days to free himself, Troy, Moffitt, and Hitch. Tully told himself he could live off the land as well as anyone. First he needed a water source…
Tully's thoughts were interrupted by a rifle shot that ricocheted off a rock near his right leg. He dove for cover behind a tree as several more shots rang out. Tully peeked out and saw several German soldiers moving through the undergrowth and thought, "That's what's going on. I'm being hunted … and I'm supposed to survive three days." He decided on a change of tactics and headed uphill.
Tully hurried up the hill, staying out of sight as much as possible. He stopped to take a breather and scanned his surroundings. He definitely wasn't in the Ahaggar Mountains. He looked at the lush vegetation and up at the dark, bare, looming peak above and whispered, "This must be Mt. Cameroon. If I go east, I'll be heading for the sea side of the mountain. Better chance of finding fresh water and maybe something that I can eat." Tully checked for any movement before he continued on. "All I have to do is stay ahead of them and out of sight."
He hadn't seen any signs of the Germans in hours. Tully knew he might have lost them, but that didn't mean they wouldn't catch up to him. It would be getting dark soon. He needed to find someplace to hold up for the night. A fallen tree up ahead got his attention. On inspection, Tully found that the base of the trunk was rotted. With his knife he was able to dig out a shallow hole in the tree's trunk big enough for him to crawl into.
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After a cold and fitful night, Tully was awakened from a doze by movement and quiet voices speaking in German. He carefully peeked up over the log and saw four Germans moving around as if searching for something … most likely searching for him. They were slowly making their way in his direction, so Tully abandoned his hiding place and, staying low next to the fallen tree trunk, he moved down and away from the Germans.
However, that led him straight into another group. Tully was spotted as he threw himself behind a tree and crouched down. He heard a voice shout just before bullets started flying by and ricocheting off the tree. Then a grenade exploded and Tully was propelled out into the open by the blast. There was no time to check for injury, he picked himself up and ran.
Tully ran until he didn't hear the Germans following anymore. He stopped next to a stream where he would be hidden by some large rocks. He refilled the canteen and sat down to check himself over. Shrapnel from the grenade had peppered his left side from shoulder to knee. Nothing life threatening, but they were painful. Tully removed what he could with his fingers and rinsed the wounds with water as he thought, "I'm not going to make it this way. There's too many of them to just stay out of their way and they know the lay of the land. It's time to go on the attack."
Tully backtracked until he came across the group of Germans that had chased him. They had met up with the first group and it appeared that they were taking a break. Tully counted eight in all and wondered if there were any more. Either way he was outnumbered.
He went high and wide around the group of soldiers and made his way back to the old tree where he'd spent the night. Then he went to where he'd run into the second group. Tully looked around. It had been early morning when he'd been rousted from his hiding place. In fact, though it had been light, the sun hadn't yet penetrated through the trees. So, it made sense that the Germans camp wasn't too far away. But in which direction? He knew they had vehicles with them. Tully looked up the hill. There wasn't a way to get even a jeep up that way and there was no sign that a vehicle had been through. "There must be a flat area down there where they've made their camp."
Tully's wounds were beginning to make him ache with every step when he finally came to the German encampment. He got as close as he dared. There were two halftracks and a staff car. Tully counted five more soldiers and a captain. He could smell their breakfast and coffee, which made his stomach rumble. Tully picked a few dandelions to munch on as he watched the camp for the next half hour or so. They appeared quite confident in themselves because there were no guards stationed on the perimeter. One of the other groups returned and from his gestures was obviously telling the story of how they nearly killed him with a grenade. That got Tully thinking.
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Tully set about looking for what he needed. He thought, "Okay, Pettigrew, you're on Mt. Cameroon. It's a damned volcano. There must be some around here somewhere." He climbed higher until the forest started to give way to volcanic rock. Finally he found what he was searching for. Tully picked up several of the yellow tinged rocks and dropped them into the sack.
Tully made his way back to where the grenade had exploded and picked up all the bits and pieces he could find. Now, all he needed to was saltpeter. He went back to the fallen tree and searched through the rotting wood until he uncovered the white crystals he was looking for clinging to some rocks. He added these to the sack and headed back to the stream.
Tully smiled as he dug a match out of his shirt pocket and built a small, but hot fire. While that burned, he found two good sized rocks—one was somewhat flat—and began to separate his ingredients from the stones he had gathered with his knife. He then started the process of grinding the pyrite and saltpeter between the rocks. When the fire finally died, Tully let the burned bits of wood cool before he scraped the charcoal into the other ingredients. After a little more grinding and mixing, he took one last swig from the canteen before pouring the last of the water out. He put all the shrapnel bits into the canteen, then searched the stream for small, sharp stones to add to it. Tully then finished it off by packing in the mixture of sulfur, saltpeter, and charcoal. He recapped it and set it aside.
At this point one of the groups that were searching for him could be heard coming in his direction. Tully couldn't let them find him or discover what he was doing. He quickly hid his handiwork and headed off to lead the Germans away, which was a fairly easy task until they started shooting at him again. He felt a bullet find his already sore left leg, but he didn't stop until he'd lost his pursuers and circled back to the stream.
Tully sat down where he'd been before and looked at the two wounds where the bullet had gone through his thigh. He took his kerchief out of his back pocket and wrapped it around the wounds and tied it tight. After giving himself a few minutes to let the worst of the pain pass, Tully got back to work.
He still needed a fuse. Tully thought about using a strip of material from his shirt, but then got a better idea. He got the rope he'd saved from the sack and pulled five of the rough strands out of the end. Then he limped to a tree and cut into it with his knife until sap started to run onto the piece of bark he held. Tully was then able to coat the rope fibers with the sap. He left his fuse to harden a bit while he sat back to rest.
After a while, Tully roused himself and checked his fuse. Satisfied that it was ready, he uncapped the canteen and inserted half of the fuse. He then used some of the left over sap to plug the canteen and hold the fuse in place. Tully was quite pleased with his little bomb and grinned as he gathered up his things. He would wait outside the encampment for dark.
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As it got later in the day, Tully munched on more dandelions and some grass as he watched the search parties return to camp. There seemed to be some dissention in the ranks and he assumed it was because they hadn't yet been able to catch him.
When the sun went down, Tully watched them light a fire. He saw them make and eat their supper, could smell it, and sighed. Then they passed around a couple bottles of wine. He worked out where he wanted to set off his bomb, changing the plan several times, and waited for them to finally bed down, leaving a single guard on duty. Taking a deep breath, Tully started down into the camp.
He got down behind one of the halftracks and looked around. The guard was sitting by the fire, apparently not too worried about anyone sneaking up on the camp. Tully opened the small door in the back of the halftrack and carefully retrieved one of the gas filled jerry cans.
The two halftracks were parked side-by-side and close together. Tully crawled under one and placed the jerry can on its side, then made a shallow trench from it to under the second vehicle with a small depression at the end before removing the can's lid. He then crawled to the other halftrack and placed his bomb under the gas tank. Tully made sure the gas was pooling in the depression, then lit the fuse and quickly scrambled out.
Tully was quickly limping away when the guard appeared to investigate the gas odor. He heard the guard call out, "Halt!" And that's when his bomb went off, igniting the gas and blowing both halftracks up.
Shrapnel from the vehicles killed the German guard as Tully ducked behind a tree. Probably half of the sleeping soldiers were killed by flying debris. Tully grabbed the guard's rifle and made his way into the trees before he could be spotted. Then he started taking out the rest of the Germans one-by-one as he moved to different locations around the burning halftracks. He stopped shooting when the only one left was the captain, who thought it was an all-out assault and put his hands in the air.
Tully limped into camp with the rifle pointed at the captain. As he approached, the captain looked around nervously, expecting more Americans to appear from cover. Then he recognized that it was the man he and his men had been tasked to kill. The captain realized ruefully that there would be no other American soldiers.
Tully relieved the captain of his sidearm, tied him up, and checked to see if anyone else was left alive. After a head count, he was satisfied that he and the captain were the only ones left, Tully said, "Do you speak English?" The captain nodded. "Good. At first light you're going to drive that staff car back to that stronghold and get my friends released."
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By noon the following day the staff car, driven by the captain, pulled up just outside the gate and stopped. Tully stood up on the seat and brought the captain up by the collar with the pistol to his head. "Tell them to go see about letting my friends go."
The captain said, "Go Tell Oberstleutnant Schwarz an, dass die amerikanischen gewonnen hat seine Freiheit zusammen mit seinen Kameraden." The two guards at the gate stared at the captain in disbelief. "Jetzt gehen!"
One of the guards finally nodded and ran off to tell Lt. Col. Schwarz what was happening while his partner stayed behind with his rifle trained on Tully.
It was a long time before Schwarz arrived at the gate. He didn't look too happy. "Well, you have finally been bested, captain. I am disappointed, but not totally surprised. It was bound to happen sooner or later." He shifted his gaze to the disheveled and bloodied American. "Your comrades will be out in a minute. Will you allow the captain to get out of the car?"
Tully shook his head slowly. "No, sir. He's staying right here until my friends are in this car with me."
Several tense minutes passed before Troy, Moffitt, and Hitch appeared at the gate under heavy guard. They were all relieved to see each other.
Lt. Col. Schwarz looked at Troy. "You and your men are free to go as per the agreement, sergeant. Your man is either a very good soldier or a very lucky one."
Troy said, "I'd say he's both, sir."
Troy, Moffitt, and Hitch walked quickly out to the staff car and got in. Hitch got in behind the wheel as Tully released the captain so he could get out, Troy got in the passenger side next to Tully's legs, and Moffitt climbed in back. Tully stood there, holding the gun on the captain with one shaky hand and the top of the windshield with the other as they drove away.
As soon as they were out of firing range for both sides, Tully collapsed. Troy took the gun from his hand as he caught the private and got him over the seat to Moffitt. When they got to where they'd left the jeeps, they got Tully into the back of one and headed out. There was a waterhole about ten miles away where they would be relatively safe to take care of Tully.
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At the waterhole, Troy and Moffitt helped Tully out of the jeep and into the shade on a blanket. Hitch got a med kit and canteens.
Troy looked up at the worried look on Hitch's face. "Go keep your eyes open."
Reluctantly, the private nodded. "Right, sarge."
Troy and Moffitt got Tully out of his shirt. Moffitt worked to clean the shrapnel wounds the best he could while Troy slit open Tully's pant leg. He removed the kerchief and examined the bullet wounds.
Tully said quietly, "They almost got me twice, sarge."
Troy nodded. "I can see that."
Moffitt asked, "Do you want me to give you a shot of morphine, Tully?"
He sighed. "I won't say no to it. I hurt all over."
Troy said, "We'll get you cleaned up some and then you can rest before we head out again."
After they did what they could for Tully's wounds and made him as comfortable as possible, Troy and Moffitt went to let Hitch know what was going on.
Without taking his eyes off the desert, Hitch asked, "How is he?"
Moffitt replied, "There's still shrapnel in some of the wounds. He took a bullet through the leg. He's exhausted, there's infection setting in, and he has a fever."
"When are we getting him to a doctor?"
Troy said, "We'll let him rest for a while. The closest field hospital a couple of hours from here."
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Four hours of surgery and twelve hours of sleep later, Tully opened his eyes. He started to sit up, but a hand on his chest pushed him back down and a familiar voice said, "Just lay still."
Tully let himself relax back onto the pillow. His voice was hoarse as he said, "Where are we?"
Hitch poured a glass of water and helped Tully take a drink as he said, "We're at a field hospital." He set the glass aside and looked at his watch. "It's been about sixteen hours now."
Tully sighed. "So we got away okay?"
"Yeah, thanks to you."
Tully looked at his bandaged arm and side. He could feel the bandages on his leg when he tried to move it. "That was one heck of a game."
Hitch nodded. "You'll have to tell us all about it when you're feeling better."
"My head feels sorta … fuzzy. Things are a little outta focus."
"Some of the shrapnel wounds were infected and you still have a fever. The doctor has you on a steady diet of antibiotics, pain killers, and sedatives. You need to rest. Once your fever's gone we'll take you home. Probably in two or three days." Tully took a deep breath and let his eyes close as Hitch said, "When Troy and Moffitt get back tomorrow they're going to be glad to see you looking better."
Tully didn't open his eyes as he asked quietly, "Where are they?"
"Captain Boggs wanted the report immediately. So they left to go to base as soon as you came out of surgery."
"Think they'll talk to Charley?"
Hitch smiled. "I'm sure they will. Why don't you go back to sleep now?"
Tully was fading fast and Hitch barely caught his whispered words. "You don't have to stay. Just gonna sleep a while."
"I'll just stick around a little while longer."
Midmorning the next day Tully opened his eyes and expected to see Troy, Moffitt, or Hitch sitting next to him. He frowned slightly and blinked, thinking he needed to clear his vision. "Charley?"
She looked up from her book and grinned. "Good morning, love. How are you feeling?"
Tully reached out for Charley's arm and pulled her down for a kiss, then said with a smile, "A lot better now."