"They don't seem to be tapping into our communications…" said Richard.
"Yes, I'm not sure whether to be impressed by their honor or shocked by their stupidity," said Wellington.
"Scout in range! One o'clock! One thousand meters!" a voice reported over the radio. Eton Boys Academy's main battle squadron was driving through the middle of an open field, with a bunch of loudspeakers playing "Rule, Britannia!" at full blast.
"Richard, stop!" ordered Wellington. The driver pulled the breaks. "You know the drill!" he cried before the tank even managed to stop completely. "This is Blue actual, we'll engage as planned. All blue units, move on. Out." The rest of the squadron passed them by. The Comet reached a complete stop. "Sharpe, put the smoke on it!"
"Already on it." The gunner locked onto the target with his sight. "Locked." The gun was already loaded with a smoke shell.
"Fire!"
"On the way." The Comet's cannon fired away. The shell flew through the air and exploded on top of the enemy BT-8.
"Reload! Castus!" Wellington hit the armor twice to get the loader's attention – not that he wasn't paying, he had already grabbed another shell, and the bumps could hardly be heard over the roar of the engine, but the commander was pumped up. They needed to blind the scout, fast.
"Smoke's up," said Castus.
"On the way." Even before the second smoke hit, the cloud had swallowed the enemy tank completely. The second shell only thickened the cloud. The BT was completely blind, at least until it moved up.
"Cease fire! Load AP!" Wellington was stating the obvious. Everyone knew what to do. Double smoke, AP to kill and another smoke. The crew was acting before even hearing the orders.
"Wilco," said Castus.
"Sharpe, the second you see the enemy pop out of the smoke, smack him! Don't wait for my order!"
"I know!" the boy growled.
"Again, why didn't we shoot him with an AP the first time?" asked Richard.
"I told you yesterday, because this way he's blind even if we don't get a direct hit!"
"Up!"
"On the way!" The deafening sound of the High Velocity 77mm firing followed a split second after.
"Load smoke!" Wellington shouted to Castus before the AP even hit. Castus hesitated. That wasn't the plan, he was supposed to wait for a kill confirmation before grabbing the next round: AP or smoke depending on whether the enemy was killed. But Wellington was the tank commander and orders were absolute. He reached for the smoke.
"He's out!" confirmed Sharpe.
"Smoke's up!"
"Fire!"
"On the way!" Another deafening shot. "Done." Sharpe relaxed. "I wonder what August would say now."
"Substiti, ieci, exterminavi? Maybe?" answered Richard. The two boys started laughing.
"Richard, move out!" ordered Wellington. "Punch it! We need to catch up with the squadron."
"Roger that! Pedal to the metal!" Richard said and sped off.
"Why did you ask for a smoke after the AP?" asked Castus. "I thought the plan was to confirm the hit before reloading."
"I trusted Sharpe's aim…" said Wellington. "That… and I realized that it's better to put another smoke on him in case we missed. Keep him blind longer. Didn't think of that yesterday."
August sat in the Black Prince's commander's seat, eyes wide open. Usually, he would be loading shells, but with Heinz away, a few changes had to be made. The position of loader was given to a quiet Literature Club member. For the moment, everyone silently kept an eye out for the enemy scout that was supposed to come through the area. A report came over the radio, breaking the silence. "First chick has been cooked." That meant that the main squadron had encountered and eliminated the first scout, thus attracting the enemy attention.
"Perfectus!" August exclaimed.
"First blood!" a voice cried from within the nearby Tortoise.
"Hush! You'll give us away, Ryuu…" scolded Monty, half asleep, from the Tortoise's command seat. All the ruckus had woken him up. Ryuu was a Gamer, and a proud one at that. He constantly reminded everyone about it with his references.
"My first real battle! This is just like in video games!"
"Si tacuisses, philosophus mansisses."
"It's nothing like a game, now hu… sh…" Monty mumbled.
"Don't try to convince me otherwise. You always fall asleep halfway through."
"Never do verbal battle with others. Even if you win an argument you can't change the other person's way of life," said Ryouma from the Black Prince's driver seat.
"Silentium! I hear an engine."
"A challenger appears!"
August spotted the enemy scout, a BT-8 fast tank. "Two o'clock!" He dropped back into the Black Prince.
"Head's down. Wake me up when it's dead," Monty yawned and went inside his tank too.
"Ita vero, Centurion! Tadatsune, aim!"
"Ha! Mochiron!" The Black Prince's turret turned slowly. "Arrows of fate…" Tadatsune took a deep breath and… "Hassha!" The QF 17 pounder roared over the silence. The AP shell whizzed through the air and hit the BT-8 directly in the turret. "Target destroyed!"
"Naisushotto!" said Ryouma.
"Argh," moaned Monty. "I forgot that tank guns are so loud." He rubbed his temples. "OK, let's get moving."
"Sensha zenshin!" said Ryouma and started the engine.
"Once more unto the breach!" said Ryuu.
August grabbed the radio as the tank accelerated and spoke into the transmitter, "KFC!" The enemy scout was dead, they were on the move.
The wind blew through the leaves as four hidden Shermans prowled the forest. The other two tanks that had been left behind radioed in. "Fried nugget" and "deep fried" were the codes used to confirm the success of the ambush. Not the most eloquent of coded communication, but it did the job. "Nachthexen down. Panzer vor," Heinz mumbled to himself. From on top the turret, he struggled to see through the thick forest. They were almost at its edge. It was almost time for the tiger to strike.
A flash of light hit Heinz's eyes. They were out of the forest. In front of them, the enemy kindly presented their flank. The Fireflies dropped right on top of them. "Engage!"
Four cannons shot. An ISU-122S was taken out. An IS-2 was hit in the left track and left it behind. Two shots missed. A good volley, given their skill. "Fire at will!" Before the enemy could reorganize, the immobile IS-2 was shot dead by Heinz's Sherman as it traversed its turret. The other three Fireflies shot at the remaining two heavy tanks but missed. Heinz knew that his team wouldn't target the damaged IS, thinking it harmless and immobile. A deadly mistake, as being immobile, it had the highest chance of shooting them with 122mm of death.
With one ISU-122 and one IS-2 taken out, four more tanks remained. They managed to hide behind a couple of large rocks, probably placed there before the battle to offer cover and spice things up. Four medium tanks against two heavies. The ISUs wouldn't have had time to turn and fire, but the IS-2s were still a threat. "It matters not," said Heinz under his breath. "The other Fireflies will be here momentarily and we'll surround them."
"Blue leader, this is Blue Five. I've joined up with Blue Six. We're almost there. Over."
Heinz went for the radio to respond but was interrupted by a shocking image. A small tank just flew out of the forest as if off a ramp. Out of the driver's hatch, a fiery redhead grinned deviously. Out of the turret hatch, an almost angelic beauty with long platinum hair blown by the wind had a terrifying frown that ruined her otherwise perfect face. Heinz saw the tank in slow motion as it hovered a couple of meters in the air, to the right of his rightmost Firefly. The only thing that he could think of was a familiar song. I believe I can fly, I believe I can touch the sky. Then, a split second later it hit the ground hard.
"Kurwa!" shouted the driver. "We lost a track again!"
"Shut up, Beka! You're not even polish!" screamed the commander, enraged.
"Hai, hai, Natalie!"
"Don't call me Natalie!"
"Err… Natashenka? The enemy…" a soft voice from inside the tank.
The platinum haired girl stood silent for a second. She turned her head left. Her eyes met Heinz's.
"Whoa, bijin!" said one of the Firefly commanders.
Then Natalia finally realized where they were. Her frown was renewed. "Suka, blyad! Ute! Ute! Ute!" she squalled in a combination of Russian and Japanese, pointing furiously at the Fireflies.
"Natashenka, you're the gunner."
"Derrmo! Kuso!" She dropped inside the turret. It started traversing to the left. Everyone was still in shock. What the hell just happened? The scouts were supposed to be dead. The BT-8 pointed at the side of the rightmost Firefly and fired. The shell penetrated the side armor. The white flag signaling that the tank was taken out popped up.
"Scheise! Take that BT out!" shouted Heinz. One of the Firefly turned its turret around. The BT fired another round, this time at the second rightmost Firefly, but the angle wasn't good enough and it bounced up. A loud bang. A 17 pounder fired a HE shell at the BT, knocking it over. "I thought you blew up the scouts!" Heinz shouted into the radio.
"Sorry, commander!" a freshman radioed. "We must have missed a vital spot, but I swear we hit something!"
"Double check next time! The damned thing took out a Firefly!"
"A hero should go his own way!" Ryouma's voice was heard from the radio.
"They're not a hero, they're the enemy!"
"The purpose of coming into the world is to accomplish one's duty. Can we truly blame them for trying?"
"I'm sick and tired of everyone's obsessive quoting," Monty joined the conversation. "Keep it down, I'm trying to sleep here."
"Don't sleep in the middle of the battle!"
"You only need me to calculate a firing solution. We're not in position yet. Do you even now how bloody slow this Tortoise is? Not that I mind… So hush!"
A girl inside the BT broke down crying. The sobbing was clearly audible from outside.
"Oi, oi! Don't cry Natalie!"
"There, there, Natashenka. We got one of them."
The enemy had very strange members, stranger than even Eton, thought Heinz. But it was not the time for meditation. "Focus fire on the enemy heavy tanks!" Heinz turned his attention to the remaining enemy forces.
"Commander, we're here!" The last two Fireflies arrived on the scene.
"Finally! Get moving! Surround them! Schnell!" The heavy enemy tanks were still hiding behind the rocks. Heinz could see their 122mm cannons.
Just as Heinz finished giving the orders a high pitched sound erupted from the radio. Like the wail of a banshee, it hurt everyone's ears. The entire crew pulled their headsets off. Heinz rubbed his temples. "What the hell?" Then he understood. "Mein Gott, they're jamming us!"
