Authors Note: For any readers from before, there have been some changes made to the previous chapter with Maho and Moller's brief talk, I like it a lot better now.
Between the pungent smell of sweat of oil, the deafening sound the vehicles abused engine, and the not so infrequent violent jerks that came with every pile of rubble that they had to cross over, the fighting compartment of the Panzer III was nearly unbearable to work in.
Having heard of the high casualty rates among unwary tank commanders Maho peered out through the protective viewports of the copula.
It has only been a few hours since the arrival of their column into the besieged city, and already they were being pushed forward against the supposedly nearly broken enemy defense. So far however, much like in the case of the several hundred miles of open plains and villages that they have been through before, with the exception of the occasional laid out body, or discarded piece of equipment damaged beyond repair, there was not one sign of their elusive foe… much to her crews' disappointment.
"Man at this rate we'll be more likely to die of old age before we even see a live Ivan!" Karl blurted out in in frustration with a pout.
"Don't worry, you'll see action soon enough." Maho informed him. "From what I heard we'll be seeing more than enough for you all… Stalin wouldn't let the city that bears his name fall without a fight." A lace of disgust not going unnoticed at the last part.
'What I can't understand is why we're on the move so soon. We've been on the move for several weeks straight, and we were barely given a bite or rest before being sent to the thick of it.'
"Ah, Lieutenant. Captain Glaas is reporting we're approaching yesterday's front line. We have no reported contacts yet… but he says he can feel them close by, whatever that means."
And less than a few moments later, a loud 'Bang!' was could be heard as an enemy shell slammed into the lead tank as it drove around the corner right ahead, followed in rapid succession by two more and several machine guns that fired onto any of the accompanying infantry in the open.
"Muller! Report to the other commanders that we made contact. Karl: HEAT shell on the ready. Hayden angle the hull, move between us and the crew in front of us to give them cover. Markus, get ready to fire on my command."
With a sudden jerk from the suspension the tank cranked forward with much added speed as it barreled in between the brick masonry building and the immobilized Panzer III L right into the three Soviet 45mm guns that were positioned right around the corner.
Without hesitation the gunners open fired onto the enemy vehicle before taking time to aim against their commander's orders; the first two failed to penetrate the tank's angled hull, and the third failing to fire from a malfunction in the shell primer. On unconscious instinct Hayden fired as well before he could properly aim, causing his own shell to shoot through the wall behind his target. The gun crews on both sides immediately scrambled to load in the next round as fast as they could while an additional Panzer III and a Marder II rounded the corner to face them.
Most of the gun crew members were younger than even Miho, some of them were completely frozen with fear despite the commanders harassing for them to keep working. One even turned and made a break for it before he was shot down after only a few steps.
"Target in sights!"
"Shell loaded!"
"Lieutenant!?"
Maho made one last glance at the young crews of the enemy guns with pity. Some were still too scared to even move, but others were still going as best as they could to get ready to fire again, forcing her to give the order.
"Fire."
Still dripping wet from before, Nonna moved along the burnt out walls and buildings around her.
Clutching her rifle in a firm grip while continued to move from one stable foothold to another and ever more westward along with all of the others that completed the passage across the River.
While all of the ferries landed on the same small stretch on the river bank, upon landing, she could not find even a single sine of Alex or the others from her village. As far as she knew, they were all already…
'Where are you guys?'
The broken streets came to an abrupt end as it came to the edge of a large open square. Several men fell over with the distinct crack of a high powered rifle round, and everyone else followed suit to hit the ground behind any bit of cover that they could use.
Laying behind her own small pile of rubble along with several others, Nonna scanned the far side of the square. Everything seemed perfectly still, almost as if not even the simplest form of life could be found there; then several enemy tanks came into view from the streets on the other side, and their escorts as they took up positions along their side of the large clearing.
'I got a bad feeling about this.' She thought to herself as the whizzing sound of gun fire went overhead.
"Comrades!" yelled a commissar from behind the cover of a wall. 'Oh great, here we go now'
"Move forward for your motherland, for Comrade Stalin! And remember, NOT one step back!"
"URA!"
'Ura'
Several more men fell as a machinegun crew opened up onto the exposed men in the open below, their maxim machine gun let out the sound of hundreds of rounds of ammunition being expended. It lasted for several seconds before it was cut short with the sound of a single loud blast.
"Target Destroyed!" Markus announced as Karl loaded in another shell into the breach. Maho's Panzer III continued to advance at the head of the column, gradually moving along with its accompanying escort and leaving behind the smoldering wrecks of the two machineguns and the one 45mm Anti-tank gun that fell victim to their own 5cm main gun.
"Hayden halt our advance, we don't want to continue forward without support."
"Yes sir."
The tank came to a halt, allowing the suspension to steady out once again. "Target at 11 o'clock, enemy barricade… Fire!" She ordered as the whole cabin shook upon the vehicle's main gun reduced yet another enemy position to rubble.
"No wonder we've been winning the war like this. The moment the great German army show up anywhere, they simply give up, or run away." Karl calls out.
"At least we were able to get a little action in for the first time. Who knows, maybe we'll get our fair share while driving up towards Moscow after this." Markus hollered out.
As usual, Maho didn't enter into the gun crew's little discussions about always looking for action and becoming heroes when they return home. Simply looking over the battle that unfolded before her as the soviets were steadily pushed back closer towards the banks of the Volga; and very briefly letting the thought of wanting to get out of this godforsaken place, and being able to return home with both her family honor intact, and the possibility of enjoying life thereafter with at least a partially clear consciousness.
"URA!"
'Thud!'
"What the hell was that!?" Karl asked as he rubbed the lump that was forming on his head.
'Well there goes the possibility of keeping a clear consciousness.'
"It's the action you were so looking forward to seeing Private."
Shouting as one, everyone rose to their feet from behind cover, and charging into the clearing at once.
After a few yards into the open, the first to fall were the NCOs and Officers that were brave enough, or foolish enough to lead their men from the front as the sharpshooters on the far side picked them off one by one.
And while there was a good hundred yards from one side to the other, the steel helmets of their adversaries could be easily seen from behind their makeshift defensive positions. By fifty they were literally looking into the bores of their rifles aimed right at them; their handlers just as intent on holding every inch of ground that they took as the Soviets desperation of pushing them back.
The other side grew still once again, but the helmeted grey figures where still holding where they were, rifles at the ready, along with the just as still but deadly panzer that loomed ahead.
"FEUER!"
A single shout called out on the far side, then at once all hell was set forth upon the advancing Russian infantrymen in the form of flying hot lead that cut through whatever they came in contact.
With a quick leap and sidestep Nonna passed over the first few casualties as enemy rounds continued to fly by.
'Just keep moving. No use standing still, only gives them an easier target to shoot at.'
Several more men fell around her as she continued to run forward, a few stopped to fire their rifles, but they were almost always gunned down, and running forward wasn't much of a better option either.
She kept moving until a solid smash sent her tumbling into a crater with a loud 'Thud'.
At first expecting to find a gruesome wound in her side. Nonna quickly patted herself down but found nothing worse than a few scraped and bruises.
All around now the flow of men moving forward slowed down to enemy fire, and random calls for retreat could be heard. But it was the faint sound of a whimper from behind her that caught Nonna's attention to the cause of her fall.
Turning around she came to find a young boy in uniform cuddled up and silently sobbing at the other side of the large depression in the ground. Ever so gently she crawled over to where the boy sat and lightly shook his shoulder to get his attention. "Hey…Are you hurt?"
The boy only responded with a slight shake of his head as he whipped his eyes.
"Good. It looks like the rest are retreating, we should probably get out of here ourselves." She said before she slowly pulled herself to the edge of the crater to get ready to launch herself up. There were only a few others still standing in the square now, meaning there was little chance of them getting smashed into again, but also that there was a much more likely chance of them being targeted upon standing back up, and the increased chance of tripping something, or someone if they didn't watch their step. She turned back to the child next to her.
"I need you to start moving when I tell you. Watch where you step, and don't stop in the open no matter what. Can you do that?"
A slight nod reassured her, and she turned her attention back towards their line to make a break for it when they were both ready.
"Open Fire! No Retreat!"
'What!?'
Nonna quickly ducked her head back into cover as round of hot lead started flying from both sides of the square now. The scene turned into absolute panic and confusion as men started to now run wherever they could to escape from the deadly fire that came at them.
'Can't go forward… won't be able to go back either...' She thought to herself as she glanced to either of the two sides of the square that the fire came in from. '…How about sideways?'
She then turned back to the boy next to her who was still attempting to get his nerves back in order. "We can't stay here any longer. Follow my lead, and just keep moving no matter what."
She calmly grabbed a hold of the boy's sleeve and waited for the right moment to move. While she noticed that they were fairly close the near side of the closest side, it did only take only one well-placed round from either side to make all the difference. They could always wait it out till night, but as she noted earlier, the small crater gave little protection from small arms fire, and the Germans where already concentrating their heavy gun on the area. If only there was something that could cover them for the ten or so seconds to get into cover.
A heavy shell launched dust and debris into the air in a great explosion right next to them. 'Perfect.'
"Now!"
The smoke cleared after several minutes, and the whole crew could only gape at the scene of gore that came into view before them. It took what seemed like an eternity before Markus broke the silence in the vehicle. "What on earth?"
"I-I-I-I…" Muller shuddered while looking at his hands that just recently handled the still smoking machinegun in front of him. "…Oh my God… Wha… what have I done?"
"You done what you were ordered to… what we were all ordered to do." Maho simply replied in an attempt to reassure her clearly demoralized crew.
"I always thought of them like wild beasts, blood thirsty killers. But they weren't. They were… they seemed just like us. Just dressed differently, nothing else."
"I can't believe I said what I did before. I feel like an absolute fool." Karl said.
"I got to say the same about what I said before." Markus replied with his head hung low.
"Don't be." Said Maho sternly. "Like I said before we have no choice on what we do on the battlefield, it was you or them, and I'm going to be selfish in saying that I'll much rather prefer it being them than us." She finished before deciding to change the subject. "Now I assume that that was what remained of their defenses. Prepare to advance forward and…"
"URA!"
"Are you kidding me?" Glaas blurted out as he loaded another drum off a dead Russian soldier for his PPSH. "Erich, call in HQ and find out where the hell they're getting all of this new cannon fodder from, I highly doubt they were holding them back for this long in the city like this!"
"Ah sir…" The radio operator said to him. "… I don't think you're going to like this."
"Spit it out already!" The captain yelled out impatiently.
"Major Moller just reported that a whole division is crossing the Volga as we speak."
"A whole ficken divi…" Manfred started than stopped himself. "This wasn't in the briefing, not by a long shot… Order all units to pull back, I'm not in the mood of getting overrun here."
"Yes captain!"
"Lieutenant, the general retreat order has been given. The Captain also ordered for all remaining armored units to cover the infantry pulling back."
"Hayden slow reverse. Markus continue giving suppressive fire."
With a load creak, and an uncomfortable shift of the suspension, the tank began to slowly move steadily back. The smell of propellant mixed with that of spilt fuel as the main gun were fired, and the two MG-34s continued to fire whenever a few soviet soldiers got a little too bold and came into view.
Since Hayden was unable to see where he was moving without exposing the tank's weakly armored rear, Maho gave the order to fire at will, and view through the back to help maneuver the tank through the piles of rubble and bodies that stood behind them.
By now the unit was almost completely pulled back, and as being the lead tank in the attack following the destruction of the first one in line, Maho's panzer took the very rear of the column as it pulled back. Knowing that the designated defense point was drawing near brought a little comfort to her, she clearly noted the shocked and traumatic state of her crew following their first bloody action, and to be honest much batter herself, but that'll have to wait for a later time to work out.
The sound of two loud bangs, followed by the unexpected turn of the chassis before the opening put a halt to their last stretch into cover.
"Hayden, why are we turning, we're need to be moving strait back." Maho called out as she noticed the tank make the unexpected maneuver off their desired path.
The driver wrestled with the controls in front of him but found it unresponsive. "I'm trying commander. But it's unable to turn to the right, and putting it on full reverse is only making it worse. I think we lost a track."
Maho let out a frustrated groan as she could clearly make out the sound of multiple enemy infantry just outside.
"Ah s-sir, wh-what are we going to do now? None of the other panzer are in a position to assist us." Muller stuttered from his post.
Taking in a deep breath she analyzed her situation. 'Of all the times that we could have lost a track it had to be now… Well no use grumbling about it now. Now what are we going to do now.'
Reaching behind her, she immediately clung onto the tank's MP-40.
"We can't stay in here any longer, we'll only get ourselves killed in here if we do. We're going to have to bail out to the line of buildings to the right of us, at least we'll have a fighting chance using cover to get back to our unit. Alright everyone?" She asked before clocking the chamber for the SMG.
Her proposition of leaving the protection of the tank in the open sit too well with the crew. Particularly Muller as a look of fear overtook his features.
"You-you mean going out there? With them!?"
"We'll die in here if we stay. It's nothing more than a very cramped tomb for us right now, not our safe haven." Maho said as she slipped down to unlatch the tank's bottom escape hatch.
"Lieutenant!"
Unnoticed in the crews' state of panic, two soldiers with RPG-40s in hand were running strait for the tank. Markus nearly cut the first one in half with the coaxial machinegun but the other one just kept coming.
"Dlya Rossiya-Matushka!"
Knowing that at this point there was nothing they could do to stop the other anti-tank grenadier, Maho ordered the only thing she could think of before the high explosive device made contact with the hull.
"Everybody brace yourselves!"
Northern Caucasus 1932:
Moving along the open planes of the steppes with the sun directly overhead; Vlad, Alex, David, Dennis, Kimek, Noona, and Katyusha walked along the small dusty trail with several others for their weekend off from the rigorous work and schooling in the village.
"Where are we going Vlad, we've been walking the whole day." David complained slightly behind with several others. "If we don't get there soon we'll have to turn back for church tomorrow!"
"Ahh… that's so sad!" Nonna replied in a mocking tone to her friend right next to her. She always enjoyed hanging out with the boys of the village from a very early age, though it did give her some awkward looks from other girls, especially whenever she would return from playing with a large bruise on her face… and an even larger smile to go with it.
"Oh sorry, not all of us have Sunday off as you do Nonna." David said to her before mumbling something under his breath.
"WHAT WAS THAT!?" Katyusha barked from atop Nonna's shoulders.
"Now, now you two. We came out here to have fun… not to kill each other." Sergey, another boy in the group said to the two of them before cowering under a murderous sent by Katuysha as she slipped off her older sister.
"You shouldn't get in between everything Sergey, remember last time." Alex chimed in as the other boy placed his hand to the still visible scratch marks on his face.
"Katyusha." Nonna warned her little sister. "I only allowed you to come if you promised to be nice."
"Ah, here we are." Vlad said to himself as he looked over their destination.
"Hey everyone we're here now." He called over his shoulder, only then noticing that half the group was paying no attention to him, seeing Katyusha starting up trouble again. "Hey everyone!" He called again more firmly which got their attention. "We're here now."
It took them several moments to catchup with the leader of the group to overlook the field before them.
"Vlad is this what I think it is?" Nonna asked as she saw the familiar sight.
"Yes it is. It's the battle site our dads first met on." He answered as he walked over to the still battle scared plane with everyone else following close behind.
"They were from two different units in the red army during the Civil war, but in the last days of the war they were converged to take the white Russian fortification here." He told the others while motioning towards the long weathered trench on the far side.
"In the charge across the field, both of our fathers were wounded by shrapnel from one of the white heavy guns, and eventually found their way to a certain village several miles down the road and meet two young girls who cared for their wounds."
"My father was a commissar at the time, and yours was a simple partisan. But their difference in rank never got in the way of the friendship that they formed all the way back then." She added while looking at Vlad.
"Well… that was all nice and all. But I thought we came out here to have some fun, not listen to some old stories that we can hear any other day at the village." Another boy named Oleg cut right in before they wasted any more time simply talking.
"Now last one to the enemy trench is a rotten egg!" He yelled out before taking an early lead.
"Hey, no fair!" David and Dennis said in unison before chasing after him with the others.
Oleg had the early lead for a bit, but was quickly chased down and passed by Alex and Nonna. Vlad eventually followed suit but was unable to pass him, David and Dennis was placed after him fighting for the lead over the other, Kimek was just behind them with Sergey shortly following, and last but not least Katyusha chased after the bunch as fast as her short legs could carry her.
Now around half way to the finish line… err trench that is, and with everyone basically now without anyone coming up from behind her, Nonna decided that now was the time to take the lead over Alex who was also fighting to take first place. Picking up her pace a little more, she easily overtook her winded companion as he gave her a very confused and exhausted expression as she looked over her shoulder. Nonna couldn't help but break into laughter from looking at the look on Alexe's face as she passed him, causing her to trip in the small depression from an old bomb crater and fell over onto her back. Alex was to close behind her to avoid her, and tripped in the same small crater as he tried to catch her from hitting the ground.
He landed right on top of her: his hands placed on either side of Nonna's shoulders, and their faces just inches apart. They were so taken by surprise of their close contact that it caused both of their faces to turn beet red, and didn't even notice as the rest of the group send a few awkward glances of their own as they passed on.
"Hey lovebirds! You let Oleg take the lead!" Sergey yelled at them as he ran past them.
With their faces turning several shades darker, Alex removed himself from on top of Nonna and offered her his hand to help her up. Starting back up into a brick pace to finish the race with the others, they unsurprisingly came in the last two places just as the arguments over the race started between the others.
"Cheater." David muttered aloud after catching his breath.
"Hey! You call it cheating, I call it strategy." Oleg defended.
"Yeah-yeah. Whatever 'strategist'." Kimek mocked in between pants.
Everyone stopped talking after that to simply catch their breaths, everyone giving dirty looks in Oleg's direction, which he immediately sent right back; or a mischievous smirk towards Alex and Nonna, causing their faces to regain their dark red tint. It was like this for several minutes until impatience got the best of Oleg yet again.
"Well that was fun, but I was thinking we do something a little more fun to make up for the long walk over here." He said to the others as he looked around them, before walking over to an old shovel planted in the ground. "Well, would you look at that? Whoa…"
"What is it Olag, walked in on a pair of cattle breeding again." Dennis joked, referencing to another one of the groups little excursions into the pastures, which to their parents dismay forced them to all have 'the talk' a few years sooner than they planned to.
He followed Oleg with the others over the small hill beyond the weathered fortification to see what he found.
"What on earth?" Was all he could mutter over what laid just ahead, looking over the row after row of makeshift crosses, and rusting swords and planted rifle barrels sticking out of the ground.
"Well, it looks like this is what they did with all of the bodies afterwards." Stated Vlad while casually pacing towards the marked plots with everyone else on tow.
Everyone looked out over the neatly laid out graveyard. "Wow, there's so many of them."
Vlad looked back over towards the graves after hearing the remark before speaking up. "This one was just a skirmish at the time. My father told me about his time in the Imperial army against the Germans and Austrians, there was so much death, they had no choice but to let them rot where they fell. He still gets the creeps whenever he sees a rat near him." The last part resulted in a few chuckles from the others despite its dark implication, though once again, except David who was thinking up one of his own ideas now.
"I got to agree with Oleg, we could have done that back at the village any day. How about we finally find something else to do until we have to go back home?"
Alex pondered over what David asked. Everyone always considered him the leader of their group, though there were a few occasional scuffles for among them for dominance. "Well…ok. But not here, this place gives me the creeps."
No one seemed to agree with Alex on that last part. And the day was still high in the sky.
"We did pass a clearing not too far back with some trees we could go under for some shade." Nonna chimed in as a suggestion.
"That's sound nice. I can't stand this heat."
Authors Note:
Well, it has been five long grueling months since I had the chance to update this. I started on the basic outline for this chapter several months back, got one of the largest writer's blocks ever, had a few crashed of my computer that lost whatever progress I made up till then, and had a few other issues that needed my attention that got in the way as well, but I think I like the end result. It's been pretty nice to see some of the older GuP fanfics starting to be updated as well. I hope to get started on the next chapter started soon, I thought long and hard on how I could get these two people to meet without killing each other, but I think I got it figured out.
I also hope you like the second part of this chapter that goes back to Nonna and Katyusha's lives around 10 years prior. I know it's really OOC from Nonna's rather calm and serious personality, everyone had different personalities when they were younger and I highly ought that she would be the exception if she was given any coverage in her childhood like Maho in the flashbacks within Little Army.
Other than that I think everything's in order. If any one of you see anything out of place here, please be kind enough to point it out, I can use any bit of constructive criticisms you can throw at me.
Translations/Important Terms
Dlya Rossiya-Matushka – For Mother Russia [Russian] (I think, I saw a few different lines for this one).
Feuer – Fire [German]
Fick – F*ck [German]
Writer's recommendation of the day:
Well, seeing the multiple other Girls und Panzer Fanfics that have come up over the last few months since my last update I'll do two today, which will be convenient since they are both by the same author, and are basically two parts of the same story. CaptainDavidBlake's Heimatfront Episodes one, two, and three looks over the events of the very last days of Hitler's Third Reich, following the path taken by a small group of the BDM tasked with the repair and delivery of some of the very last tanks of Germany's once unstoppable army, but as further complications arise in their country's war effort, they find themselves in the very heart of the war itself.
When I first heard about Girls und Panzer, all I could largely think was 'Oh great, another one of those now.' However, between the rather enjoyable combat scenes, and the many great characters that I probably would have never taken the time to know had it been any other show, I became I massive fan of the series. When I first started reading Fanfics, I was really interested in the possibilities of Girls und Panzer set in the same times and places that many of their tanks have battled in real life; when I didn't find one however, I made one of my own.
Thanks to the default search settings to exclude M rated fics, It took me quite some time to stumble across episode one. I have loved the series ever since, and I hope you all enjoy it as well if you ever have or will take the time to read them.
Have a nice day everybody.
