ARC II chapter 2

Traf sighed in relief, when he took down the BT-7. That tank almost wiped at least a fifth of their forces alone and only God knows how many more it would be, if he hadn't fired at it. "Bandits, the Queen is on her way to you," he announced, when he saw Darjeeling and her last remaining Matilda II escort retreating.

"Hammer? This is Bandit leader. Ten Knights are on us!" Boris's voice responded and Traf cursed under his breath. "With the Beast?" he asked and he didn't need to wait too long, when Boris shouted an affirmative."Well, this is where the fun begins," Traf muttered and relayed the information to both Miho and Nishi.

"Hammer?" the voice of Eriwn suddenly sprang into life. "Yes, Hippo?" he answered, prepared for the news of Pravda being spotted. "Eight of our Chi-Ha-Tan allies charged at the approaching Pravda column and got wiped out," she announced and Traf had a hard time resisting the urge to bang his head against the hatch.

"Retreat into the city and help Bandits deal with the Knights. We'll regroup there," he said after composing himself and nodded to Takashi to start the engine and get them to the city. "Hammer, where are you going?" Miho's voice suddenly asked and Traf sweated a bit as he heard the tone in it.

"Just going to provide Bandits some assistance with dealing with the Beast and Knights," he answered and watched as a hint of something long and green rode in the forest. But, before he had the chance to register which Pravda tank it was, he heard Boris shout something. "Sorry, Bandit leader, would you repeat that?"

"Vadim блять! We got taken out by the KV-85!" Boris announced and Traf sighed. "You did fine. See ya after this battle ends," he stated before changing the channel to tell Miho about the turn of events.

A minute and half earlier, city of Oarai

Boris smiled, when the two Panthers alongside his T-34/85 fired yet another salvo at the Crusader mk. IIIs and took out another one, yet there were still six of them and the KV-2 in operational state. But, his smile turned into a sneer, when he saw the KV-85 suddenly show up and block one of his shots.

"Bandits 2 and 3! Retreat now! I'll deal with the KV-85!" Boris shouted into their shared channel and soon, the two Panthers were retreating exactly as Traf advised: zig zagging and having the frontal armor facing the enemy at an angle most of the time. And it worked. As the KV-85 tried to shoot down the rightmost Panther, the shell just ricocheted into a nearby shop. The same shop which got rammed into by a Matilda II almost 6 months ago… he reminded himself and chuckled.

"What're you laughing about?" Grigori asked as he risked a quick glance from the KV-85. "Remember that Exhibition match before the 62nd Tournament? The St. Gloriana vs Oarai one," Boris answered and both Grigori and Ivan nodded at that. "That. Exactly that building got unintentionally rammed by a Matilda II," he explained after a while, yet it was enough for the enemy gunner to fire a HE shell on the tracks and immobilize them right on spot, while maintaining MG fire, so they won't try to fix the tracks.

Boris responded at that with a string of Russian curses, but he didn't realize that he shouted them all into the shared channel with Trafalgar. "Sorry, Bandit leader, would you repeat that?" his voice asked at the same exact moment, when his T-34/85 got taken out and a very familiar face peeked out of the KV-85's commander hatch.

"Vadim блять! We got taken out by the KV-85!" he said and sighed heavily, not noticing the last phrase for him and his crew that Trafalgar spoke.

Vadim smirked, when he took down the Traitor's crew and reported it back to Katyusha. "Good work. Now, stay near the KV-2 and snipe any enemy that might try to white flag it," she responded and Vadim nodded at that. "Understood. Vadim out!" And he smirked, when he heard Katyusha say that at least someone isn't speaking Russian.

"Товарищ! We have spotted the Heinkel model! It's entering the city!"

Vadim almost jumped at that. Heinkel meant only one thing: the Tiger I of Trafalgar Jameson and that meant trouble. "Alone?" he asked in hope of surrounding the Tiger before it reached the KV-2. "Negative. The StuG and Porsche are entering the city from the rocky formation," Valeriy answered and Vadim growled at that. The last thing he wanted was reinforcements reaching the Tiger I.

"Do not let them reach the Heinkel!" Vadim commanded after composing himself to form a coherent sentence. "Понял! Lev and Anatolii, with me!" Valeriy responded and Vadim nodded in approval at that. After all, his second-in-command was more than good in his job and proved himself as the right choice once again with getting support for his job almost immediately.

Definitely better than that idiot Knostantin, he thought and looked out from his hatch again, only to see the Tiger I already turning into that damned 45° turn, while slowly turning its turret to get a lock on his tank. "Damn it! Vitali, reverse!" he shouted and watched as the number 101 disappeared from his viewpoint and it fired, but not before he hid back inside his tank.

The next thing he knew, there was smoke everywhere. "Can we move?" he asked Vitali, but got only a negative response. "Sorry, onee-chan! The Heinkel one got us!" he said into the shared channel of the joint team, before the hole that the 8,8 cm KwK 36 L/56's round had left in the middle of the front plate.

"Next time, we'll survive the battle," he muttered to himself and smiled. His part was done and he knew that more training is the answer to avoid being white-flagged next time.

Katyusha stared at her tank's cannon breech with shock written in her eyes. Somehow, the Tiger I E of Oarai outmaneuvered her more agile T-34s and gave the Panthers enough time to regroup with the Tiger (P) and StuG III. But, she already had a backup plan prepared just for it.

"Nonna! Go kitty-hunting now!" she commanded and soon, the IS-2 broke off from her formation and drove towards the city. Katyusha took a deep breath, before continuing with a small smirk forming on her lips. "Bears and Eagles, go after Mihosha! Ura!"

"Ura!" the girls responded in an almost deafening manner, while Klara said something in Russian again. "And Klara," Katyusha growled, "SPEAK JAPANESE!"

Miho looked over the regrouped commanders that weren't fighting in the city and sighed. She had already lost 14 tanks, while the enemy lost only half of that number. "What are we going to do, Commander?" Taeko asked suddenly and Miho found herself thinking far longer than usual to form a plan.

Rather let them prepare for an assault from Pravda. I bet that Katyusha sent most of her forces against you, her inner self supplied and Miho blinked, when several plans flashed in her mind, ranging from simple retreat into the city and regrouping with the rest to entrenching here as best as they can and meet the attack head-on.

She knew that Katyusha would expect her trying to reach the city, so she chose the entrenchment in her mind. "We'll entrench ourselves here, or we lose the battle," she said with a quiet and almost toneless voice, scaring some of the gathered commanders.

"We'll entrench here!" Miho repeated louder, this time confusing the commanders. "And how, nya~?" Nekota asked the obvious question first. "Use the sandbags, branches… simply anything that'll provide at least temporary protection," she answered and soon, everyone from the crews started with hiding in the forest or piling sandbags around their tanks, creating a perfect three-sided ambush with her Flag tank as bait for Katyusha.