Nath furrowed his brows, tracing over a couple of the lines, adding a vein down the oar. Unsatisfied, he leaned back and glanced down at the grainy reference picture. "Not quite…" he murmured, shaking his head.
Looking over Nath's shoulder, Marc hummed. "It looks fine to me."
"His nose is a little more defined," Nath objected. "And look at the detailing on his vest – I can't just leave it out."
Marc raised an eyebrow. "You don't need it to be perfect, just because you have a picture for reference," he pointed out. "I doubt any of the others have been exactly like the hero appeared in life – at least aside from der Ritter. You can take artistic license with the appearance. I'm sure Buck will just be happy to see him appearing in the book."
Catania, Sicily, July 1943
"Come on, you louts!" bellowed Bucktooth Bill, spinning his oar onehanded in front of himself as bullets tinged off of the shield and down into the water at his feet. "Move your asses!" Carefully taking aim with his Colt, he stopped spinning the oar for a fraction of a second as the soldiers sheltering behind their berms above the beach reloaded. Before they could react, he fired two quick shots that just skimmed the top of the seawall and resumed spinning just as the first soldier raised his rifle.
Behind him in the knee-deep water the men of 4th Squad waded through the surf, staying behind Bucktooth Bill's spinning oar as best they could. Holding his rifle above his head to keep it out of the splashing waves, one of the soldiers turned the barrel toward shore, depressing the trigger with his thumb to fire wildly above the oar-shield. One of the Germans dropped behind the seawall for cover, but the rest remained where they were, raining bullets on the Americans. A soldier not far behind Bucktooth Bill let out a cry, and water splashed up Bucktooth Bill's back. Ahead of them, the three pillboxes continued to pour fire from their machine guns. Bucktooth Bill gritted his teeth, trying to hold the shield steady as the continuous fire threatened to push him backward. A bullet hit his gloved hand and he sucked in a breath, clenching his jaw and forcing himself to breathe through the pain – it was probably another broken finger. That was the one thing Stopp hadn't been able to provide him: reinforced gloves. His eyes narrowed, and he set his mouth in a thin line, letting out a low growl.
One of the three streams of machine gun fire diverged away from Bucktooth Bill's shield, raking across the men behind him and moving toward the squad to their right. Leading that group, Valley Forge ducked behind one of the anti-tank barricades jutting out of the surf a couple dozen meters in from the shoreline, poking his rifle around the thin metal structure only for a moment to fire up at the pillbox. Placing a hand on Valley Forge's shoulder, the Grenadier selected a grenade from his bandolier, pulled the pin, and hurled it through the air to land in the corner of the pillbox in front of them, almost 135 feet away. A dozen rifle shots hit the water around him, and he dropped low, sheltering behind Valley Forge, reaching for another grenade. An explosion rocked the pillbox, and the machine gun fell silent for a moment before it opened up on them again. Bullets tinged off the barricade in all directions. Three of the men with Valley Forge fell dead before the others could find cover.
Cover was a poor alternative to progress, however.
"Forward!" Gritting his teeth, Bucktooth Bill charged straight ahead, water splashing up around him in all directions as he barreled toward the exposed beach in front of them, a hundred feet or less from the slight rise up to where the pillboxes and seawall waited for them. They had to be facing at least a full company of Germans, more than the two squads with which they had begun the landing. "We have to take out the machine guns!" Bucktooth Bill called to the men behind him – far less than there had been when they disembarked from the landing craft. "Death is in the water; life is on the hill! Charge!"
As the men stumbled forward after him, Bucktooth Bill raced across the beach, leaving the water behind without slowing, kicking up sand with each step, until the middle of the three pillboxes was less than twenty feet in front of him. His squad spread out behind him as far as the edge of the surf. Bullets continued to impact off of his oar-shield from two of the pillboxes, and he turned slightly, angling his shield in their direction. Suddenly, a dozen pinpricks of pain impacted on his shoulder blade – the third pillbox.
A chorus of rifle shots sounded from the men behind him as they stormed up the beach. Half the soldiers dropped to one knee in the sand, concentrating their fire on the right-most pillbox while the rest of the survivors advanced. The right pillbox fell silent for a long moment, as did the infantry sheltering behind the seawall. The left-most pillbox, however, shifted its fire away from Bucktooth Bill, spraying across the Army Rangers. Six fell in a single volley, and the survivors raced to meet Bucktooth Bill, abandoning all thought of returning fire. At least a hundred rifle barrels poked over the ridge in front of them.
Reaching the sand, the Grenadier pulled two grenades off of his bandolier and hurled both of them over the ridge. One burst apart, sending fragments of the stone wall up into the air. The other came right back over the ridge and rolled down the hill into the no man's land between the bottom of the hill and where Bucktooth Bill stood, sending shrapnel into Bucktooth Bill's protected shins.
"I sure hope he does better than that for the Phillies when this is all over," Bucktooth Bill muttered under his breath, wincing against the pain he could still feel through his suit.
"We have to regroup!" shouted Valley Forge, trading fire with the German company on top of the ridge.
"Maca-Dam!" Bucktooth Bill bellowed, turning his head to the side and driving the blade of his oar into the sand at his feet. The ground rumbled beneath him as sand, dirt, gravel, and driftwood all pulled together into a massive structure that rose out of the sand, almost four feet high, stretching for thirty feet along the beach, parallel to the seawall. Bucktooth Bill ducked behind the shelter and turned to survey the rest of the Rangers. Valley Forge, blood pouring from a wound in his upper arm where a bullet had torn through his old-style uniform, dove up against the wall, breathing heavily, shortly followed by the Grenadier and the four surviving members of 5th Squad. On Bucktooth Bill's other side, the eight remaining members of 4th Squad huddled against the wall, two with their eyes closed, panting. Without looking, the Grenadier lobbed a grenade over the wall, which was followed by a brief lull in the shooting. The three pillboxes continued raining lead on the top of the wall, spraying the Rangers behind it with sand and dirt.
"They've got us pinned down here!" Sergeant Smith called. "Where is that fucking air support!?"
"I don't know!" Bucktooth Bill retorted. "The Eagle was supposed to come in when we reached the beach; something must have held him up."
"I thought I saw him when we left the landing boats," Valley Forge supplied. "I didn't see anything of him after."
"Trouble with that contraption of his?" asked one of the Rangers – Hawkins, maybe. "That thing looked like it would blow up as soon as it would fly."
Another Ranger scoffed. "It was a longshot at best."
"Looks like we're on our own here," Bucktooth Bill told them, opening and closing the fingers on his injured hand. A dull ache ran down his finger, but he could move it. That would have to do for now. Crouching low behind the wall, he hummed pensively, glancing toward the water. "With the sun where it is, they can't see us if we stay low enough," he mused, thinking for a long moment. "Right," he began, drawing two parallel lines in the sand and filling in with three squares and a third jagged line. "We need to flank them from behind the wall, come at them from opposite sides simultaneously. Sarge, take 4 Squad south, and wait for my signal. Valley, take 5 Squad north. Grenadier, you're with me. When I give the–"
Suddenly, over the steady sound of gunfire, came a low droning thrum from somewhere to the south. Bucktooth Bill froze, midsentence, and cocked his head, listening to the strange sound. Not mechanical, not voices… was that – was that music? A loud, high, reedy melody trilled up eerily over the drone. A chill ran down Bucktooth Bill's spine. There was a momentary pause in the gunfire from the German position before a wave of rifle fire rang out from south, from the same direction as the music. The Germans returned fire, but no more rounds struck the Rangers' shelter.
"What the fucking hell?" muttered a private, poking his head a little higher in confusion, just barely over the top of the wall.
"There's the distraction we needed, boys!" Bucktooth Bill shouted, his grip tightening on his oar. He tensed, glancing down the line. "Now!" With a roar, Bucktooth Bill sprang up on top of the wall, his oar spinning the moment he cleared the wall. Valley Forge laid his rifle over the wall next to him, below the spinning shield, and let loose a careful shot, picking off one of the Germans. A grenade fell just behind the seawall. Staring in shock at the scene before him, Bucktooth Bill's jaw dropped as the rest of the men opened fire to either side of him.
There, to the south, came a unit in the uniforms of the British Commandos… led by an officer blowing away on a set of Scottish bagpipes. The Brits charged en masse up the hill, just behind the seawall, letting out a wild war cry. The Germans, caught between the two enemies, fired in both directions, and three of the Commandos fell in the first volley, even as the first of their companions reached the edge of the German line. Reaching the top of the hill near the front, the piper dropped his bagpipes and drew a massive twohanded sword, slashing at a German lieutenant with a crippling chop that cleaved through his collarbone in a single hack. The officer fell to the ground as the Brit jerked his sword free and swung it around at the next closest German. That soldier turned his rifle around to use as a club, and the Brit ducked beneath the blow, stabbing his sword through the man's chest. Throwing the German to the ground, the sword still stuck in his chest, he pulled out a longbow and fired, narrowly missing a German who aimed his rifle in his direction.
Bucktooth Bill blinked several times in disbelief, until a grenade's explosion inside the pillbox to his right pulled his attention back to events around him. "Charge!" he bellowed, leaping off his wall and easily reaching the top of the hill, swinging his oar around and slamming it into one of the German riflemen as he tried to readjust his aim. Swarming over the wall, crossing the remaining distance, and scrambling over the seawall, four of the Rangers charged after him, racing up the hill with a shout. A gunshot rang out behind Bucktooth Bill, and he turned around to find a German standing behind him, pistol raised, and a hole through his chest. The German fell backward as Valley Forge loaded another round. Two Germans dove into the rightmost pillbox, and the Grenadier lobbed a grenade in after them, finally silencing that machine gun permanently.
The sword-wielding Brit barreled through the mass of Germans, even as a dozen of them peeled away in retreat, only pausing next to Bucktooth Bill to slash his sword across the chest of a German corporal before he could raise his rifle. Bucktooth Bill nodded to him curtly, just as movement behind the Brit's back caught his attention. Grabbing him by the shoulder, Bucktooth Bill pushed the Brit down to the ground, swinging his oar onehanded and knocking the German behind him up into the air and swatting him back down into the ground hard. Gunfire echoed all up and down the beach from the other landing sites, but for the first time in an hour, their stretch of the coastline was silent.
The Brit pushed himself up and dusted off his uniform before wiping his sword on a dead German's jacket. "I would've had him," he told Bucktooth Bill wryly.
"I'm sure."
"Captain Jack Churchill, His Majesty's Number Two Commando."
"Bucktooth Bill," he replied, taking the offered hand. "With what's left of 4th and 5th Squads, U.S. Third Ranger. Thanks for the… distraction."
Churchill grinned. "Bloody lucky for you chaps that we came along when we did!"
Bucktooth Bill shook his head ruefully, glancing down the beach to where Churchill's pipes rested against the seawall. "I have to say, Cap'n: you're my kind of crazy!"
AN: Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. Unbelievable as it may sound, while the scenario itself is fictionalized, everything about "Mad Jack" Churchill is 100% historical.