We paused in the open, shocked at the
sudden change in direction. We couldn’t turn around - we were in the assault -
so what was the trooper running away from?
‘Turn around!’ the trooper repeated
angrily.
We still hesitated, until the platoon commander
emerged from the trench, heading in the same direction.
‘Fucking turn around!’ he yelled,
gesturing angrily.
I turned back to the line of confused troopers
stretched out behind me.
‘Withdraw!’ I ordered.
There was no time to peel backward, or
come up with some other effective method of transforming our charge into a
retreat; running backward from an assault wasn’t something troopers practiced.
I ran backward along the line, hurrying
my men to follow suit with frantic waves of my arms, crying, ‘Move back! Move!’
We withdrew back to the slope in a ragged
formation, chased by the platoon commander and spurred by the crack and hiss of
passing darts.
The sergeant major was waiting in the
same dip that I had been lying in moments ago.
‘What’s going on?’ he demanded, as he
saw us dropping back over the slope, the battle still raging behind us.
I held up my arms. ‘I don’t know!’
Mr Barkley didn’t stop as he descended
onto the slope, sprinting past us both with his team in tow before turning at a
right angle, moving in the direction of Two Section’s position on the left.
‘Change of plan!’ he shouted, ‘Follow
me!’
None of us hesitated, breaking back into
a run as we followed the platoon commander, traversing the slope whilst keeping
out of sight to the enemy on the hill plateau.
I quickly realised what Mr Barkley was
doing - though I wasn’t exactly sure why he was doing it - he was changing the
direction of our assault so quickly that he didn’t even have the time to mark
it on the platoon net. Sometimes a commander saw something - a chink in his
enemy’s armour - and it was up to him to grasp the opportunity … to seize the
initiative before that opportunity was lost. He would tell me what I needed to
know as soon as he could.
‘Cut the net!’ I hissed back to my
section. ‘Go silent!’
The green crosshairs that marked the
troopers in my section swiftly disappeared, and every trooper powered down his
rifle as we sought to minimise our electronic signature; if we were going to
change the direction of our assault, then it was critical that we didn’t give
the game away.
As we ran, I noticed large, dark shapes
descending onto the foot of the hill, and I realised that the first company of
Guardsmen were landing in their dropships, their approach having been covered
by our attack, as well as the bombardment from the saucers. Using the landing
zones we had marked, the fresh soldiers would soon be charging up the hill to
take over the battle, directed toward us by Four Section.
Mr Barkley stopped after two hundred
metres, turning to face the plateau once more. I realised straight away that an
assault from our new direction would put us right on top of the two additional
bunkers that Two Section were engaging.
‘Three Section’s trench is small,’ he
said, as I skidded to a halt beside him, followed swiftly by the sergeant major.
‘But the two bunkers here are part of a larger trench network. They’re
preparing to counterattack from here, going for Two Section. I want you to
assault, straight up and onto that position. No fire support. Weapons powered
down until the last minute. Catch them out. Understood?’
I nodded. ‘Understood.’
Mr Barkley looked to the sergeant major
- who lay amongst the grass behind us, looking slightly irritated by the sudden
change in plan - ‘Sorry, Sergeant Major,’ he said.
He held up a hand. ‘No apologies, boss.
You do what you do. I’ll make sure Two Section know what’s going on, and then
bring them up as the reserve once you make your break in.’
‘OK. Thank you.’
The sergeant major doubled away, his
team of troopers following close behind.
So, it was another full-frontal assault,
but this time as part of a platoon flanking manoeuvre. The enemy, having seen
Three Section assaulting on the right, would not be expecting us to suddenly
change the direction of our attack; at least I hoped that they didn’t.
Mr Barkley cast a glance down the hill,
to where the Guard were disgorging from their dropships.
‘Once you reach the enemy trench,
continue to assault until you reach your limit,’ he instructed. ‘Don’t over
extend. I’ll have Two Section and the Guard hot on your heels. This will be the
entry point through which we’ll drive the Guard like a wedge. We’ll crack this
hill open like a nut!’
‘No dramas, boss.’
Wasting no time, I beckoned my section
to close up toward me, and then quickly explained the plan to them: we would
move as far forward as we could before forming up ready to assault, and would
then bound forward in fire teams, mine moving first whilst Puppy’s Delta fire
team gave cover.
I then started up the hill, moving up as
far as I dared without becoming exposed onto the summit. I dropped to one knee,
holding my arms out either side of me to direct my section into extended line.
They fanned out rapidly, my own fire team forming up with Myers on my left and
Skelton and Griffiths on my right, and Delta fire team forming up on the far
left.
I looked around me, holding out a
down-turned thumb, and then pointed toward the red crosshair that marked the
nearest bunker: enemy - that way.
The hand signal passed rapidly along the
section line.
A hand gripped my shoulder, and I
realised that Mr Barkley was right behind me.
‘Launch when ready,’ he whispered.
‘Charlie, prepare to move,’ I hissed,
leaving a pause for my fire team to ready themselves. ‘Move!’
We sprinted forward, weapons raised as
we zigzagged toward the red crosshair that menaced the centre of our visor
displays, just over the rise of the hill.
I fell to the ground after no more than
ten metres, anxious not to draw too far away from Delta.
‘Down!’ I hissed.
My fire team followed suit, dropping
onto their belt buckles with barely a sound. Seeing this, and without any need
for a verbal command from me, Delta broke cover moments later and bounded
forward. They went firm the moment they came in line with my fire team, so that
we were back in our original formation.
‘Move!’ I hissed again, and my fire team
charged forward again.
This time I spotted the bunker at the
end of my bound, its crumbled roof flashing with sparks as darts occasionally
struck it - Two Section were still suppressing the position, albeit with far
less ammunition. I became acutely aware that I was running into friendly fire,
and hoped that the platoon commander and sergeant major knew to stop it before
I came too close.
The bunker had already been reduced to
little more than a smouldering crater strewn with rubble by the saucers. I
couldn’t make out if it was attached to another trench, and no additional red
crosshairs appeared to mark enemy spotted by my visor, so I scanned the bunker
through my sights as I waited for Delta to complete their bound, wondering if
anybody was there at all.
Then I heard something. My headphones
were amplifying a sound coming from somewhere around the bunker: somebody
whispering.
I didn’t say a word to initiate the next
bound, instead I used a sweep of my arm to wave my fire team forward, accepting
that there would be a slight pause for them to respond to the sudden change in
communication. It was worth the risk.
I had barely moved forward a couple of
metres when I finally gained a view into the bunker and saw that there was
indeed a trench connected to it, but it was what was inside the trench that caused
my eyes to widen in surprise. Tens of Loyalists were crammed into the trench - maybe
an entire platoon of them! They were crowded so tightly that some of them were
crouched side by side, poised as if preparing to attack - they hadn’t expected
an attack from a different direction.
You wouldn’t think that a man could
express emotion through a visor in the dark, but those men did as they turned
their heads up to look at me. First there was shock, and then there was horror
- all within the tiny fraction of a second that it took for me to power up my
rifle, my finger then flicking down toward the trigger.
I didn’t have time to switch to
automatic - a firing mode on our rifles that we seldom used due to loss of
accuracy - instead my trigger finger went into overdrive as I fired round after
round into the mass of bodies.
A millisecond afterward, three more
weapons opened fire as my fire team joined me, including Skelton’s mammoth
which roared as it hacked into the hapless Loyalists.
Some of them tried to fire back, but it
was hopeless, they were caught in a hail of steel darts, and those that didn’t
get hit were knocked backward by those that were, or were pushed backward by
those trying to flee.
I leapt over the ruined bunker, storming
into the trench, with my rifle still firing. I stabbed a man with my bayonet as
he attempted to free himself from under a fallen comrade, whilst Myers stepped
past me, the magnets of his rifle screaming next to my ear.
Stepping over the dead, we stabbed and
hacked at the press of desperate Loyalists as our assault onto the bunker
quickly descended into a slaughter.
A couple of Loyalists clambered out of
the trench and tried to make a dash for safety, only to be cut down by Skelton
and Griffiths. Covering outside of the trench, they allowed for Myers and me to
focus upon clearing along its length, treading upon a gruesome carpet of bodies
torn to pieces by magnetised steel.
The wash of adrenalin that had carried
me through the encounter subsided. I remembered to activate the section net,
knowing that there was no longer a need for silence. If the enemy hadn’t known
where my section was, then they did now.
‘Puppy, close in, mate!’ I ordered. ‘You’ll
see me in a trench. Shit-loads of enemy dead!’
‘Roger!’
Myers and I quickly stalked toward the
far end of the trench, twenty metres along its length where it split at a
T-junction. Keeping his knees as bent as his muscles allowed, Myers kept a low
profile as we approached the junction, allowing for me to stand slightly higher
and aim above his head. Though it was risky for us both to fire, this position
gave me the added advantage of being able to pull him out of the way and shoot
if he took a dart or if his rifle magnets failed.
‘One-Zero-Alpha, this is One-One-Charlie
- position clear,’ I announced, keeping my voice hushed. ‘I have a large number
of enemy dead. I think it was a platoon preparing to assault.’
‘One-Zero-Alpha roger,’ the platoon commander
responded quickly, a hint of surprise in his voice. ‘Confirm you have an enemy
platoon preparing to assault?’
‘No,’ I corrected. ‘I have destroyed a
platoon preparing to assault.’
There was silence on the net. I imagined
for a second the platoon commander’s bewilderment. He had anticipated a
Loyalist counterattack, changing the direction of our advance in order to catch
them off guard, but even he could not have imagined his gambit would pay off so
spectacularly.
I didn’t have time for Mr Barkley to
answer, though. I had been given the instruction to continue clearing until I
reached my ‘limit’ - that being the point where my section couldn’t stretch any
more without becoming vulnerable. He had effectively given me the green light
to keep attacking until I couldn’t go on any more, or until somebody pulled
back the reigns to stop me.
I gripped Myers by the shoulder and
stopped him a metre back from the trench junction. Glancing back over my
shoulder, I looked past Skelton and Griffiths in search of my Delta fire team.
The other half of my section were just
dropping into the trench, and as I watched, Thapa landed awkwardly on one of
the dead Loyalists, rolling his ankle and collapsing amongst the bodies with a
startled yelp.
‘Get up you nutter,’ Puppy scolded, as
he landed behind him.
This was no time for sympathy. He yanked
him to his feet and propelled him up the trench toward my fire team.
Wildgoose froze just before he leapt
into the trench. He snatched up his sniper rifle and fired at something ahead
of him, the sudden blast from its powerful magnets causing all of my fire team
to jump. Holland then opened fire with his mammoth only a second afterwards,
and the two troopers quickly dove into the trench to take cover from the unseen
threat above our heads.
‘What are they shooting at?’ Griffiths
asked from behind me, as Puppy’s fire team clambered over the bodies to take up
fire positions. Wildgoose was frantically pointing outside the trench,
indicating to Puppy what he had seen.
Skelton followed Wildgoose’s pointing,
scanning across the plateau. ‘I don’t know …’
‘Andy!’ Puppy called out to me. ‘There’s
more enemy in the trench - reference my mark!’
A fresh red crosshair flashed on my
target display, placed by Puppy over the net. The distance was less than ten
metres, suggesting that the enemy spotted by Wildgoose were around the corner
to my left.
There was not a moment to lose. I had no
idea how many more Loyalists were around the corner.
I snatched a grenade out of its pouch,
prepping the timer for one second. I didn’t want the Loyalists to throw it
back. I then thrust it forward, holding it directly in front of Myers’s face so
that he could clearly see the timer. He gave an exaggerated nod, indicating
that he was happy for me to throw.
I tossed the grenade around the corner,
throwing it with enough force to cause it to bounce along the trench to our
left; our headsets beeped, removing the need to shout out in warning.
We braced, though not for fear of the
detonation, but because it was the detonation that gave us our cue to launch.
The grenade exploded with a thump that
shook the ground beneath my feet and caused my bones to rattle. Wet mud
spattered across the junction in front of us.
We sprang forward, rounding the corner
as though we were joined at the hip. Skelton and Griffiths quickly followed,
mirroring us in the opposite direction.
The new section of trench continued for
another twenty metres, before turning sharply to the right, but there was no
enemy to be seen within it. The crosshair placed by Puppy floated harmlessly in
front of me, right by the small crater blown out by my grenade. Whoever
Wildgoose had seen had made a run for it.
‘Clear left,’ I said quietly, just loud
enough for the other members of my fire team to hear.
‘Clear right,’ Skelton replied in turn.
I looked back over my shoulder toward
him and Griffiths. Their section of trench was identical to ours, except that
it turned to the left at the end.
My section couldn’t split to attack in
opposite directions, otherwise the two fire teams wouldn’t be able to support
one another, and so I would need to continue in one direction or the other,
with Puppy leaving at least two of his men behind to hold the junction so that
the enemy couldn’t sneak up behind and cut us off from the rest of the platoon.
I weighed up my options, knowing that I
couldn’t simply stall the attack whilst I waited for the platoon commander to
direct me. I remembered the orders he had given me: once you reach the enemy
trench, continue to assault until you reach your limit. Don’t over extend. I’ll
have Two Section and the Guard hot on your heels.
I didn’t need to look for Mr Barkley. I
had no doubt that he was behind me somewhere, watching my assault onto the
trench whilst planning his next move, and the sergeant major would be bringing
Two Section around to join us, their fire support position no longer being
necessary.
It was pretty obvious that the left-hand
trench connected to the other bunker. The red crosshair that Mr Barkley had
used to mark it still hovered in that direction, and I could just about make
out a faint wisp of smoke hanging in the air above it - no doubt the result of
the attack by our saucers. On the other hand, the right-hand trench appeared to
snake away toward the centre of the hill, most likely connecting to the warren
system beneath us. The platoon of Loyalists had probably emerged from there, I
figured, since I couldn’t imagine such a large force being kept out in the
elements all night long when there was perfectly good cover underground.
In my mind, it made more sense to
advance to the left, securing the final bunker before going firm and allowing
the next unit to push on to seize the warren entrance. Bypassing the bunker and
the potential enemy it contained was unwise.
The time I had taken to consider my
options was less than a couple of seconds, and now that I had chosen my course of
action, there was nothing else to do but go for it.
I flicked onto the section net. ‘Puppy,
tell the boss I’m going left! Follow on and drop a pair on the junction!’
‘Will do!’ was the swift reply.
I heard shouting as the message was
passed back. Though Mr Barkley wouldn’t be too far forward, he would be close
enough to communicate verbally with my section - just in case he had to pull
back the reigns. He was a leader of men, after all, and nobody could lead by
hiding at the back.
‘Skelton, Griffiths, follow on,’ I
ordered, and then gave Myers a pat on the shoulder.
We trotted along the trench, keeping our
heads below its grassy walls with our weapons trained onto the bend ahead of
us. Following on behind, Griffiths kept his rifle pointed outward, whilst
Skelton covered rearwards with his mammoth; we weren’t about to get caught out
like the Loyalist platoon we had slaughtered only a minute ago.
Behind us I knew that Puppy would be
moving forward with his fire team. As I had instructed, he would leave two
troopers to hold the junction, whilst he and one other followed on behind me.
Unlike us, his men would be stood erect, covering outward across the plateau of
the hill - during trench warfare it was the job of the rear fire team to cover
the open ground above us, removing the risk of enemy counterattacks from
outside.
We were halfway along the trench, when something
suddenly caught my eye - an object flying through the air in an arc toward us.
It took us a fraction of a second to realise what it was.
‘Grenade!’ I hollered, and we dove to
the ground in a splash of muddy water.
I barely had time to feel it soak into
my combats before the grenade exploded somewhere above me. An instant cloud of
smoke engulfed us, and tiny pieces of burning phosphor rained down into the
trench, hissing in the rain.
I knew within milliseconds that it was a
smoke grenade, and that fortunately for us it had landed somewhere outside the
trench - but that didn’t mean that we were safe. Grenades were rarely used to
kill - they were used to shock, to stun, and to mask movements … the Loyalists
were close by, and they were up to something.
‘Get up! Heads low!’ I shouted, quickly
pushing myself up from the muddy water and scrambling to my feet. I raised my
rifle again to point down toward the corner of the trench, my vision slightly
obscured by the smoke that poured into it from the cloud hanging above us.
‘Mammoth - into the smoke!’ Puppy
ordered from behind me, and his order was swiftly followed by an extended burst
of fire into the smoke outside the trench. If anybody had been using it to
cover an attack from above, then the rapid spray of darts would end their
counterattack abruptly.
There was another mighty bang and a
flash as another grenade exploded without warning, causing us to duck down
again instinctively. Puppy’s mammoth stopped firing as everybody dropped down
inside the trench.
‘Fucking hell!’ one of them shouted, in
a mixture of annoyance and fear as they cowered from the blast.
‘Screw the nut!’ Myers exclaimed through
gritted teeth.
I hefted my rifle upward, pointing it up
at an angle toward the north and selecting a high explosive grenade on my
launcher. It was a stab in the dark, but if the small guided missile saw the
enemy thrower, then it would make short work of him.
I never managed to fire the grenade,
though, because just then a black object landed inside the trench, right on the
corner, splashing in the mud ten metres ahead of us. My eyes widened in horror.
‘Shit the …’ Skelton hissed.
‘Down!’ I shouted, and once more we
dived for cover in the mud. Remembering my last head-on encounter with a
grenade, I tucked my chin tightly against my chest, allowing the water to lap
against my visor as I pressed it into the earth. Myers was in front of me, but
there was no way I could protect him.
With a dull thump the grenade detonated,
tossing clumps of mud over us.
No warning icons flashed on my visor to
warn me that I was injured - not that I would have noticed if they had. I knew
that somebody was throwing the grenades from nearby in an attempt to slow us
down, or as a prelude to a counterattack. Either way I wasn’t going to allow my
attack to stall, no matter what they threw at me. The enemy seemed more intent
to throw grenades at us - a ploy which would only work if I chose to stay where
I was.
‘Go!’ I ordered Myers, hefting him to
his feet.
Stunned by the grenade that had exploded
in front of him, and perhaps even more surprised by his own survival, Myers
stood. I shoved him forward, and we rounded the corner, weapons raised.
Nobody was there. The trench continued
for another twenty metres again, this time turning left. I quickly glanced over
my shoulder. The remainder of my section were up and moving, spread out along
the length of the trench, hugging the wall for protection against the grenades.
Another grenade exploded nearby, and
Myers hesitated, looking to see where it had landed.
‘Keep going!’ I hissed urgently, and we
ran toward the next corner. I drew another grenade from one of my pouches as we
ran, tossing it over the top of the trench in the direction of the bunker; two
could play at their game.
Taking a firm grasp of Myer’s daysack, I
stopped him and waited for my grenade to detonate.
Several darts cracked overhead just
before the grenade exploded, but I didn’t have the time to wonder where they
had come from, I was committed to the attack - and I had the taste of Loyalist
blood in my mouth.
Under a hail of mud and rubble, we
stormed around the corner.
Myers was the first to shoot as a
bloodied Loyalist soldier tried to get to his feet, the supersonic dart
knocking him back into the mud. The bunker itself was only five metres in front
of us, and we quickly swept into it, stepping over the rubble as we advanced. I
shot a man as he cowered in the corner, and before I managed to switch my aim,
another Loyalist fell to his knees just outside the bunker - a dart fired
overhead had brought his escape to a swift end.
As I swept the bunker with my rifle, it
quickly became apparent that many Loyalists had attempted to climb out when I
threw my grenade and had been cut down by Puppy’s fire team. Their terror had
caused them to forget that the outside of the trench was always covered. They
would have fared better against the grenade.
‘Position clear!’ I shouted.
Whilst the message passed verbally along
the trench, I switched to the platoon net, seeing that there were no more
trenches leading away from the bunker.
‘One-Zero-Alpha, this is One-One,
position clear. No connecting trenches. It’s a dead end,’ I announced.
‘Roger,’ Mr Barkley replied instantly.
He would redirect the next assaulting section to the right, continuing our
clearance of the trench system until the Guard arrived.
Skelton and Griffiths quickly took up
positions on the edge of the bunker, looking outward just in case the enemy
decided to attack - I doubted that would happen, somehow - the Loyalists had
taken a kicking, and the small group of them that had holed-up in the bunker
were only doing so out of desperation.
Myers took a knee in the middle of the
bunker, running his hands over his body in search of any wounds.
I suddenly remembered the grenade that
had exploded close to him. Adrenalin could cause him to fight on, despite suffering
life threatening injuries … I knew, because the same thing had happened to me.
Without a word I crouched next to him,
looking him over. There didn’t appear to be any blood on him, not that I could
see, and his combats hadn’t detected any injuries. Since my section net was now
live, casualty information had to be passed directly to the rest of the
platoon.
Though it was hard to see his face in
the dark, I thought I saw the young trooper’s lip quiver; he was pretty shaken.
‘You OK, mate?’ I asked, running my
hands over his helmet in search of holes or cracks.
‘I thought that was it,’ he said,
blinking disbelievingly at his vital readings on his datapad.
‘The blast of the grenade was absorbed
by the mud,’ I explained, snatching his arm. I pulled it toward me so that I
could have a look at his datapad for myself. He was fine.
He nodded. ‘I know, but God, that thing
was right in front of my face!’
‘What do you want, a medal?’ Skelton
joked from his fire position on the edge of the bunker.
Puppy emerged from the trench, stepping
over the rubble. ‘Everyone alright?’
I looked up at him, releasing my grip on
Myers’s arm. ‘No casualties.’
‘Blinky’s done his spine in, though,’
Skelton said, a hint of humour in his voice.
Myers shot him an angry glance. ‘Cheers,
mate,’ he said sarcastically.
‘You’re welcome.’
There was nothing angry about the exchange
between the two comrades - if anything Skelton’s dark humour would probably do
Myers some good, keeping his mind off his near-death experience. Telling jokes
and making fun of each other was the way that troopers coped with the stress and
horrors of war; it reminded them that they were still human beings.
Puppy stooped over the young trooper,
the light of a distant explosion flickering across his visor. The FEA artillery
had started firing.
He patted him roughly on the helmet.
‘Chin up, mate. We’re almost done.’
I decided not to remind them that we
were far from done. We had barely started.
