Gotterdammerung
Disclaimer/Author's Note: The literal translation of the verse that Martin and his companions sang in the previous chapter is this: "Not To Us O Lord Not To Us But To Your Name Give Glory" Gotterdammerung means Twilight of the Gods.
February 2142: Six days have passed since I received news of my loved ones' deaths. I have gone out on another patrol. I have been volunteering for this duty with increasing frequency since that day. Me and six companions agree upon a plan and slip out past the wire to spy on enemy positions at El Alamein. They look formidable indeed, but for the first time since this war I fear them not.
We creep back to our lines and as we do so the fear that we will encounter a marauding band of ogres or Gollums, creatures a lot more intelligent than zombies and thus more keen and harder to deceive of our presence, is no longer in me. Let them come and I will take as many of them as possible to the grave with me.
A patrolling band of Gollums is creeping back to their lines from a similar patrol against our own lines. Sergeant McCron halts the patrol and orders us to take ambush positions. He fires the first shot which takes a Gollum down with one shot. I start shooting with cold precision at first and then violent intensity with both weapons. Sergeant McCron orders a cease fire as I throw a grenade into the midst of three Gollums. We search them for weapons, documents, anything that battalion intelligence might find useful.
As we do I see a single Gollum, a sucking wound in its throat, the first creature hit by our impromptu ambush. It is moving feebly, barely conscious but still alive. Six days before, had I encountered such a sight I would have been moved to pity at the destitution of war and how this creature was once a human being like myself. Now I only feel a cold and savage contempt, for these creatures were responsible for two deaths of people that I cared for and hundreds more who couldn't defend themselves. I raise my pistol and I see the look of alarm and dread in the creature's face as it gives me gasping pleas, its lamp like eyes fill with dread and it puts its shaking hands out in a vain request for mercy. I give none as I fire the last six rounds in the clip into its face. The first round killed the creature but I empty six rounds, watching as the creature's skull fragment apart like a split watermelon. I care little as gore splashes into my face. I see Wiersbowski standing over a living Gollum, cowering and wounded by my grenade fragments.
Savagely I kick it in the ribs with a running start. It gasps feebly; one or two ribs are broken. "Sarge, do we take prisoners?" Wiersbowski asks.
"Of course not, kill them all." Sergeant McCron replies.
Wiersbowski forces the creature to its knees as I reload a magazine into my pistol. Placing it next to the creature's temple I squeeze the trigger and watch it buck wildly for a few moments as its nervous system reacts to being shot in the head. We shoot all the wounded survivors of our ambush. For the first time I feel no remorse for doing this sort of thing, I almost relish it because of what these creatures have taken from me. Like an avenging angel I slay these demons whenever and wherever I find them.
We return to our lines with vital intelligence. I am so drained I nearly forget to salute a new lieutenant that has replaced the valiant platoon leader I saw die at Mersa Matruh. He is a medium built man with close- cropped graying hair from Boblingen, Germany. He was a sergeant with the 127th Infantry Division at Dyson City, wounded in the midst of the battle, sent to Officer's Candidate School and now shipped of to the North African theater in time for one of the largest battles of the campaign, El Alamein. Fortunately he is the patient type and does not choose to give me the scathing dressing down our old platoon leader used to give to soldiers who failed to salute him. That was his one and only major flaw that I noticed. 2nd Lieutenant Franz Wachter is different in that regard. I have not seen him in combat however, so I have no idea as to how good he is as a combat leader.
That changes a few days later, towards the end of the month when he leads the platoon out on a patrol towards enemy lines. For days on end our gunships, artillery, and fighter bombers have been pummeling opposing positions without letup. The vast majority of Army Corps Africa's offensive power is being concentrated on this assault. It is unnerving to hear the loud whoosh of rockets from the gunships, with the artillery acting as a sort of non-stop refrain, lobbing shells at El Alamein with blazing intensity.
Now we are sending platoon and company strength probing attacks after squad sized patrols ferret out major opposing positions. Our bombardment hasn't been merely one sided. We too have been the recipient of several attacks. Once on grave detail I find what appears to be a discarded uniform of a soldier from the 117th Flak Division that probably didn't know how to take cover during a bombardment. We find fragments of his naked body some feet away.
"No question, energy orb shock wave blew this poor bastard out of his clothing." Fressan remarks in a manner that would make any civilian grow pale.
Why should a civilian grow pale? The dead man wasn't in our unit; it was his misfortune, and not ours. The next thing I know is the corpse starts twitching and starts rising to its feet. I am closest to it and open fire.
Suddenly more of the loathsome creatures come burrowing out of the sand. This is a new tactic they have learned. The ogres and Gollums bury crimson heads and zombies in the no man's land and await patrols to step over them or wait until the patrol is behind them. Now there are zombies in our midst and one of them is fighting Wiersbowski, grabbing a hold of his Wraith cannon. I put my pistol to its head and squeeze the trigger. We dare not use any grenades because of our close proximity and the fight denigrates into a hand to hand contest with fighting knives, bayonets, pistols and rifle butts.
I see Kat bury his entrenching tool into the neck of a zombie that must have been quite a large man in life but his girth is hard to determine, the breadth of his shoulders shrunken by necrotic decay and death. I see two zombies drag an unfortunate soldier over a dune and I can hear screams as they begin to consume him alive. I throw a grenade over that dune and am struck full force by blood and fragments of skin and bone.
I can see our platoon in full retreat, several badly injured and shooting wildly. We leave a number of our dead in the midst of the living dead roaming about the dunes. I see Kat and Wiersbowski laying down suppressive fire, Kat no longer firing in short and controlled bursts, but using the machinegun as a fire hose spraying lead as opposed to water. Belt after belt of ammunition beats back this inhuman tide of the undead, keeping them at a distance as we reach our own lines. Over the dunes, an SH-6 observation skimmer rises up and sprays the attacking horde with rockets and mini-gun fire.
It is early in the morning as the dawn creeps over the horizon, the disc of the sun a fiery copper red over the horizon as the tank motors begin firing up, revving up many times to confuse the enemy as to the exact time of our assault. The Egyptians have been doing this for days while we launched several probing attacks on the enemy lines, determining numbers and positions. After another barrage of missiles, rockets, and shells the Egyptian tanks advance with our units on their heels to deter enemy tank fighting squads.
What follows is a savage battle, the like of which I have not yet seen before. As soon as we cross the no man's land, we are hit by savage attacks with zombies and ogres attacking our infantry, allowing several Gollum tank fighting squads past. The tankers are no slouches themselves; very frequently they grind to the edge of foxholes and spray machinegun fire in, obliterating anything inside there. The Gollums throw energy grenades, fire orbs, and drop explosives into the hatches of the tanks. The tank beside me suddenly belches smoke and I see two blinded and coughing Egyptian tankers push their way out. Suddenly two ogres grab them and throw them into the midst of a mob of zombies which tears them apart.
I see a tank fire a 75 mm tank round into a cluster of zombies coming down from the other side of the dune. The shell explodes, throwing several of them airborne. I see an energy orb from a portable orb projector carried by a single Gollum who is assisted by three of his fellows explode into the side of a Sicilian half-track.
The survivors keep fighting the tank fighting units in savage firefights as they drag their injured comrades from the burning wreckage of their vehicle. Scores of energy orbs and crude explosives hammer our armored vehicles while the giant scorpions also spray their corrosive venom into our ranks and puncture the vehicle's hulls with their stingers and claws.
We fight them with our Pak 3.7 cm anti-tank guns as well as our 90 mm dual purpose cannons as well as with Javelin anti-tank rocket launchers. I pick one up from the corpse of a dead replacement from Crete, shoulder the weapon and fire it into the brain casing area of a scorpion with two Gollums carrying an energy orb projector atop it. The explosion throws the two Gollums into our ranks and I see soldiers beat them to death with rifle butts. I see the Sicilians on our flank take a savage counter attack by a phalanx of ogres with a swarm of zombies coming after them. I watch as Wiersbowski blows apart a swarm of zombies with a burst of 20 mm cannon shells from his Wraith cannon. A nearby blast knocks me off my feet, displacing my helmet. Before I throw it back on I see Andi's picture.
Barely a few days ago I would have said I was fighting to keep these things from harming her, but now I do not think such thoughts, I only think to destroy and kill in these intense moments of combat. I throw two grenades into a spider hole that may contain a few creatures. My hunch was correct because I see ogres madly scrambling out before the grenades explode, killing everything inside the hole.
Savage firefights erupt all around me as I pull my pistol, shooting several zombies down as they close with our unit. A barrage of .50 caliber fire blasts the swarm apart as a tank opens up with it's machineguns only to explode as an energy orb crashes against it, throwing it's turret into the air and sending it crashing down atop our ranks.
The retreat begins first as the Libyans begin to falter and then break as they absorb another savage counterattack going through their ranks. Then the Sicilians begin to falter as the Libyans begin a full out retreat on our flanks. The Egyptians provide cover as our own division begins its retreat.
As the pursuit dies down, with the Egyptians providing their tanks as an armored spearhead through enemy lines, we march as battered, broken units, our numbers reduced across the desert sands. All through the night we march, harried by wasps all the way back to our lines at Mersa Matruh. The Libyans have taken too many casualties to fight as a cohesive unit. Thus the 115th Libyan Infantry Division fights on as an ad hoc battle group strung together by a few surviving officers and NCOs from that unit protecting our right flank as we continue our retreat, past the burning remains of several tanks and other vehicles destroyed in months of savage desert fighting.
I am an automaton once again; my spirits are dampened by our current defeat and the deaths of my loved ones. I see battered and destroyed units attempting to regroup at Mersa Matruh. Fortunately General DeRutyer has planned for this disaster at El Alamein, he has had the engineers build lines of trenches, bunkers and pill boxes across the desert along our lines of retreat should we be forced from Mersa Matruh.
Kat, Wiersbowski, Fressan and I take up positions in a pillbox just outside the approach to Mersa Matruh. The concrete pillbox overlooks a large sand dune and has enough room for the four of us and our machinegun. I sit and wait behind the machinegun, awaiting the inevitable counterattack that I know is imminent.
This is the Mersa Matruh Line that we man, and must defend against an inevitable and major counteroffensive our implacable and ruthless foe is sure to launch. As I sit behind the machinegun, Kat, Wiersbowski and Fressan grab a few moments of sleep. I begin to doze off myself at my post. My sleep is light, barely enough to accommodate a fluttery dream of someone now dead.
In my dream I feel Andi's gentle hand across my face as I crouch behind my machinegun. Her touch is gentle, soothing, taking me back to what used to be. Taking me back to when she was alive and well. It is a soothing sight to see her face, radiant and pristine, her smile warm and her arms open, an angel waiting to receive a soul of a sinner forever damned to the dark depths of Hell. I reach for her smiling as my hope rises, a soul exonerated from the Inferno, the Inner Circle of Hell.
Then I hear an aircraft plummeting uncontrollably to the ground and Andi's final words, laced with terror. I feel myself plummeting deeper into Hell after having tasted a bit of Paradise. I am now dragged into the innermost circle of the damned.
All I hear now is the crescendo of explosions and the ringing of my ears that follows after a savage firefight and repeated concussions that herald the approach of the Gotterdammerung, the aptly named Twilight of the Gods.
Disclaimer/Author's Note: The literal translation of the verse that Martin and his companions sang in the previous chapter is this: "Not To Us O Lord Not To Us But To Your Name Give Glory" Gotterdammerung means Twilight of the Gods.
February 2142: Six days have passed since I received news of my loved ones' deaths. I have gone out on another patrol. I have been volunteering for this duty with increasing frequency since that day. Me and six companions agree upon a plan and slip out past the wire to spy on enemy positions at El Alamein. They look formidable indeed, but for the first time since this war I fear them not.
We creep back to our lines and as we do so the fear that we will encounter a marauding band of ogres or Gollums, creatures a lot more intelligent than zombies and thus more keen and harder to deceive of our presence, is no longer in me. Let them come and I will take as many of them as possible to the grave with me.
A patrolling band of Gollums is creeping back to their lines from a similar patrol against our own lines. Sergeant McCron halts the patrol and orders us to take ambush positions. He fires the first shot which takes a Gollum down with one shot. I start shooting with cold precision at first and then violent intensity with both weapons. Sergeant McCron orders a cease fire as I throw a grenade into the midst of three Gollums. We search them for weapons, documents, anything that battalion intelligence might find useful.
As we do I see a single Gollum, a sucking wound in its throat, the first creature hit by our impromptu ambush. It is moving feebly, barely conscious but still alive. Six days before, had I encountered such a sight I would have been moved to pity at the destitution of war and how this creature was once a human being like myself. Now I only feel a cold and savage contempt, for these creatures were responsible for two deaths of people that I cared for and hundreds more who couldn't defend themselves. I raise my pistol and I see the look of alarm and dread in the creature's face as it gives me gasping pleas, its lamp like eyes fill with dread and it puts its shaking hands out in a vain request for mercy. I give none as I fire the last six rounds in the clip into its face. The first round killed the creature but I empty six rounds, watching as the creature's skull fragment apart like a split watermelon. I care little as gore splashes into my face. I see Wiersbowski standing over a living Gollum, cowering and wounded by my grenade fragments.
Savagely I kick it in the ribs with a running start. It gasps feebly; one or two ribs are broken. "Sarge, do we take prisoners?" Wiersbowski asks.
"Of course not, kill them all." Sergeant McCron replies.
Wiersbowski forces the creature to its knees as I reload a magazine into my pistol. Placing it next to the creature's temple I squeeze the trigger and watch it buck wildly for a few moments as its nervous system reacts to being shot in the head. We shoot all the wounded survivors of our ambush. For the first time I feel no remorse for doing this sort of thing, I almost relish it because of what these creatures have taken from me. Like an avenging angel I slay these demons whenever and wherever I find them.
We return to our lines with vital intelligence. I am so drained I nearly forget to salute a new lieutenant that has replaced the valiant platoon leader I saw die at Mersa Matruh. He is a medium built man with close- cropped graying hair from Boblingen, Germany. He was a sergeant with the 127th Infantry Division at Dyson City, wounded in the midst of the battle, sent to Officer's Candidate School and now shipped of to the North African theater in time for one of the largest battles of the campaign, El Alamein. Fortunately he is the patient type and does not choose to give me the scathing dressing down our old platoon leader used to give to soldiers who failed to salute him. That was his one and only major flaw that I noticed. 2nd Lieutenant Franz Wachter is different in that regard. I have not seen him in combat however, so I have no idea as to how good he is as a combat leader.
That changes a few days later, towards the end of the month when he leads the platoon out on a patrol towards enemy lines. For days on end our gunships, artillery, and fighter bombers have been pummeling opposing positions without letup. The vast majority of Army Corps Africa's offensive power is being concentrated on this assault. It is unnerving to hear the loud whoosh of rockets from the gunships, with the artillery acting as a sort of non-stop refrain, lobbing shells at El Alamein with blazing intensity.
Now we are sending platoon and company strength probing attacks after squad sized patrols ferret out major opposing positions. Our bombardment hasn't been merely one sided. We too have been the recipient of several attacks. Once on grave detail I find what appears to be a discarded uniform of a soldier from the 117th Flak Division that probably didn't know how to take cover during a bombardment. We find fragments of his naked body some feet away.
"No question, energy orb shock wave blew this poor bastard out of his clothing." Fressan remarks in a manner that would make any civilian grow pale.
Why should a civilian grow pale? The dead man wasn't in our unit; it was his misfortune, and not ours. The next thing I know is the corpse starts twitching and starts rising to its feet. I am closest to it and open fire.
Suddenly more of the loathsome creatures come burrowing out of the sand. This is a new tactic they have learned. The ogres and Gollums bury crimson heads and zombies in the no man's land and await patrols to step over them or wait until the patrol is behind them. Now there are zombies in our midst and one of them is fighting Wiersbowski, grabbing a hold of his Wraith cannon. I put my pistol to its head and squeeze the trigger. We dare not use any grenades because of our close proximity and the fight denigrates into a hand to hand contest with fighting knives, bayonets, pistols and rifle butts.
I see Kat bury his entrenching tool into the neck of a zombie that must have been quite a large man in life but his girth is hard to determine, the breadth of his shoulders shrunken by necrotic decay and death. I see two zombies drag an unfortunate soldier over a dune and I can hear screams as they begin to consume him alive. I throw a grenade over that dune and am struck full force by blood and fragments of skin and bone.
I can see our platoon in full retreat, several badly injured and shooting wildly. We leave a number of our dead in the midst of the living dead roaming about the dunes. I see Kat and Wiersbowski laying down suppressive fire, Kat no longer firing in short and controlled bursts, but using the machinegun as a fire hose spraying lead as opposed to water. Belt after belt of ammunition beats back this inhuman tide of the undead, keeping them at a distance as we reach our own lines. Over the dunes, an SH-6 observation skimmer rises up and sprays the attacking horde with rockets and mini-gun fire.
It is early in the morning as the dawn creeps over the horizon, the disc of the sun a fiery copper red over the horizon as the tank motors begin firing up, revving up many times to confuse the enemy as to the exact time of our assault. The Egyptians have been doing this for days while we launched several probing attacks on the enemy lines, determining numbers and positions. After another barrage of missiles, rockets, and shells the Egyptian tanks advance with our units on their heels to deter enemy tank fighting squads.
What follows is a savage battle, the like of which I have not yet seen before. As soon as we cross the no man's land, we are hit by savage attacks with zombies and ogres attacking our infantry, allowing several Gollum tank fighting squads past. The tankers are no slouches themselves; very frequently they grind to the edge of foxholes and spray machinegun fire in, obliterating anything inside there. The Gollums throw energy grenades, fire orbs, and drop explosives into the hatches of the tanks. The tank beside me suddenly belches smoke and I see two blinded and coughing Egyptian tankers push their way out. Suddenly two ogres grab them and throw them into the midst of a mob of zombies which tears them apart.
I see a tank fire a 75 mm tank round into a cluster of zombies coming down from the other side of the dune. The shell explodes, throwing several of them airborne. I see an energy orb from a portable orb projector carried by a single Gollum who is assisted by three of his fellows explode into the side of a Sicilian half-track.
The survivors keep fighting the tank fighting units in savage firefights as they drag their injured comrades from the burning wreckage of their vehicle. Scores of energy orbs and crude explosives hammer our armored vehicles while the giant scorpions also spray their corrosive venom into our ranks and puncture the vehicle's hulls with their stingers and claws.
We fight them with our Pak 3.7 cm anti-tank guns as well as our 90 mm dual purpose cannons as well as with Javelin anti-tank rocket launchers. I pick one up from the corpse of a dead replacement from Crete, shoulder the weapon and fire it into the brain casing area of a scorpion with two Gollums carrying an energy orb projector atop it. The explosion throws the two Gollums into our ranks and I see soldiers beat them to death with rifle butts. I see the Sicilians on our flank take a savage counter attack by a phalanx of ogres with a swarm of zombies coming after them. I watch as Wiersbowski blows apart a swarm of zombies with a burst of 20 mm cannon shells from his Wraith cannon. A nearby blast knocks me off my feet, displacing my helmet. Before I throw it back on I see Andi's picture.
Barely a few days ago I would have said I was fighting to keep these things from harming her, but now I do not think such thoughts, I only think to destroy and kill in these intense moments of combat. I throw two grenades into a spider hole that may contain a few creatures. My hunch was correct because I see ogres madly scrambling out before the grenades explode, killing everything inside the hole.
Savage firefights erupt all around me as I pull my pistol, shooting several zombies down as they close with our unit. A barrage of .50 caliber fire blasts the swarm apart as a tank opens up with it's machineguns only to explode as an energy orb crashes against it, throwing it's turret into the air and sending it crashing down atop our ranks.
The retreat begins first as the Libyans begin to falter and then break as they absorb another savage counterattack going through their ranks. Then the Sicilians begin to falter as the Libyans begin a full out retreat on our flanks. The Egyptians provide cover as our own division begins its retreat.
As the pursuit dies down, with the Egyptians providing their tanks as an armored spearhead through enemy lines, we march as battered, broken units, our numbers reduced across the desert sands. All through the night we march, harried by wasps all the way back to our lines at Mersa Matruh. The Libyans have taken too many casualties to fight as a cohesive unit. Thus the 115th Libyan Infantry Division fights on as an ad hoc battle group strung together by a few surviving officers and NCOs from that unit protecting our right flank as we continue our retreat, past the burning remains of several tanks and other vehicles destroyed in months of savage desert fighting.
I am an automaton once again; my spirits are dampened by our current defeat and the deaths of my loved ones. I see battered and destroyed units attempting to regroup at Mersa Matruh. Fortunately General DeRutyer has planned for this disaster at El Alamein, he has had the engineers build lines of trenches, bunkers and pill boxes across the desert along our lines of retreat should we be forced from Mersa Matruh.
Kat, Wiersbowski, Fressan and I take up positions in a pillbox just outside the approach to Mersa Matruh. The concrete pillbox overlooks a large sand dune and has enough room for the four of us and our machinegun. I sit and wait behind the machinegun, awaiting the inevitable counterattack that I know is imminent.
This is the Mersa Matruh Line that we man, and must defend against an inevitable and major counteroffensive our implacable and ruthless foe is sure to launch. As I sit behind the machinegun, Kat, Wiersbowski and Fressan grab a few moments of sleep. I begin to doze off myself at my post. My sleep is light, barely enough to accommodate a fluttery dream of someone now dead.
In my dream I feel Andi's gentle hand across my face as I crouch behind my machinegun. Her touch is gentle, soothing, taking me back to what used to be. Taking me back to when she was alive and well. It is a soothing sight to see her face, radiant and pristine, her smile warm and her arms open, an angel waiting to receive a soul of a sinner forever damned to the dark depths of Hell. I reach for her smiling as my hope rises, a soul exonerated from the Inferno, the Inner Circle of Hell.
Then I hear an aircraft plummeting uncontrollably to the ground and Andi's final words, laced with terror. I feel myself plummeting deeper into Hell after having tasted a bit of Paradise. I am now dragged into the innermost circle of the damned.
All I hear now is the crescendo of explosions and the ringing of my ears that follows after a savage firefight and repeated concussions that herald the approach of the Gotterdammerung, the aptly named Twilight of the Gods.