In order to complete such a journey, I was going to need supplies.
For this journey, I packed plenty of food, water, fuel and ammo.
If I ever ran out, I figured that I could always pick more up along the way.
At least, I hoped I could.
When I packed as many supplies as I could take, I headed out for my grand journey.
Eventually, lush grasslands and rocky mountain passes gave way to flat, barren desert lands.
Originally, whenever I took a resting period, I slept inside the turret of Goliath.
Unfortunately, as I got further south, it became too hot to sleep inside the tank, so I needed somewhere else to sleep.
Suddenly, an idea came to me:
I dug a trench underneath Goliath, being careful not to dig too close to the treads, and slept there.
It was much cooler in here.
And so I slept.
Lately, I had been dreaming of Mia.
I dreamt that she was okay and that we were living happily ever after.
However, one night, these dreams had taken a weird twist.
During the dream, it began to fade away to a mysterious, dark, hooded figure, with some ominous chanting in the background.
However, I woke up before this image lasted for too long.
I wasn't too scared or frightened by what I had seen, but I thought it was weird, nonetheless.
One day, I awoke to a new peril:
For some reason, a cobra had chosen to cuddle up with me in the trench that I was sleeping in.
I wasn't afraid of snakes.
I was, however, afraid of getting bit by one and dying a slow, painful death.
Slowly, I drew my Tokarev.
I must not have been slow enough, because the snake awoke and started hissing at me.
When I started to aim, it bit me on the arm.
Luckily, it bit a piece of armor plating instead of clothing.
After it struck, I blew its tiny little head off.
I then cooked it and had it for breakfast.
I can't exactly describe how it tastes, but I can tell you that it tasted good.
Maybe I should eat these slimy little bastards more often.
Then again, it's probably not worth the risk.
After further traveling, I made it to a riverbed in Egypt.
However, the River was completely dried out, with nothing but Sand in it.
Furthermore, when I got there, there were already two companies fighting with each other.
One of them was a German company, the other French.
Both sides had their tanks painted in a "desert" camouflage scheme.
Also, both sides had tanks I'd never seen before.
Rather than join the fray, I decided to wait for one side to lay waste to the other.
After a few minutes, the French emerged victorious, but it was clear that their remaining tanks were badly damaged.
Perfect.
The first tank I encountered was a tank of unknown type, most likely a heavy tank given its apparent size.
BOOM!
Goliath's cannon made mincemeat out of it.
I ducked back into cover to reload.
When I came out of cover, I sighted an ARL-44.
The strange thing about this ARL-44 was that, unlike other ARL-44s I'd seen, it had a more streamlined turret rather than the box-shaped one I was used to seeing.
Regardless, this guy landed a hit on me, but I didn't receive too much damage.
In contrast, he received critical damage, putting him out for good.
While waiting to reload, a BDR G1B showed up and broke my track.
I wasn't too worried, though.
As long as he didn't do too much damage, I could finish him off easily.
And how!
After he was gone, I worked on fixing up the broken track.
When I was almost done, a round whizzed by me, just barely missing me.
I finished the job and hopped back into Goliath, only to discover an AMX-40 targeting me.
BOOM!
That was the last tank he'd ever target!
I got ready to leave when I saw a Renault FT-17 targeting me.
This one only had a .51 caliber machine gun.
Rather than waste my time with him, I simply sat there and waited as he expended all his ammunition.
Since Goliath was faster, I just drove away.
Even though it wasn't much of a threat against Goliath, even that thing could still flatten me despite the fact that I wore a few kilograms of armor.
As such, I had to be somewhat quick as I grabbed supplies from the knocked-out tanks and attempted to identify my new "friends".
After this search, here's what I found out:
The German tanks were with a company known as "Die Apfel Korps", a company that wasn't very interested in fulfilling the mission of the Third Reich.
Rather, they just wanted to create their own little paradise by reforming the harsh desert lands of Africa into a lush oasis.
Judging by the conditions here, they hadn't gotten very far.
Among their new tanks, they had a medium tank called a Panzer V "Panther", a tank destroyer based off the Panzer IV known as the JagdPanzer IV, a hybrid medium tank called the Panzer III/IV, a light tank known as the VK 2801 and an SPG known as the Grille.
Given the apparent lack of any French SPGs, the other guys were lucky to have defeated the Korps.
Speaking of the other guys, the French belonged to "Les Serpents du Désert"*.
Les Serpents wanted to maintain control over French colonies in Africa, which was strange because, to my knowledge, Egypt was not a French colony.
Maybe they were trying to expand?
Whatever the case may be, they really only had one new tank, known as an AMX-M4 modèle 1945.
Wait…"modèle 1945"?
I had lost track of time, but I was pretty sure that we were not yet in the year 1945.
Maybe that signified the year that they intended to start producing it?
Who knows?
Barring that, the only other tank that could be considered new was an AMX-13 with a 90mm gun.
Having salvaged whatever I could from my vanquished opponents, I pressed further south into the unforgiving desert lands, leaving the FT-17 behind.
It didn't matter if I blew him up or not.
Out here, he was dead anyways.
*EN: The Desert Snakes
Criticism is gold. Negativity and nitpicking are pyrite.