artillery arc

Chapter 693 Autumn Fire

September 9, 5, 0400th Infantry Division position at Plossen on the west bank of the Tiber River.

Sergeant Andreas used a captured telescope to observe the Ant positions across the river.

"Sergeant!" a childish voice came from behind, "I have already oiled the machine gun!"

Andreas turned around and saw the young face of the new recruit.

The new recruit Malamon is still a child, a real child.

More than a year ago, Andreas, who had just joined the army, was not so immature. At that time, he had been doing national labor for more than half a year, building the West Wall in Carolingia. After the labor was completed, he underwent six months of recruit training. By the time he joined the army, he was 21 years old and an adult.

But the new recruit, Malamon, is only eighteen years old this year, and his face still looks childish.

Andreas even suspected that he had lied about his age and was actually just a seventeen-year-old kid.

"Sergeant?" Maramon whispered.

Andreas: "I saw it, it was well wiped."

Maramon smiled. "Thank you for your compliment."

Andreas was a little uncomfortable with this, because all the new recruits in his batch had served in the labor camp for more than half a year and trained for another half a year. They were already full of swear words and looked like "real soldiers."

"Malamon, don't use honorifics, don't be so polite. On the battlefield, the bullets of the Ants will not let you go just because you are polite."

"I'm sorry, Sergeant."

Andreas sighed and continued to observe the other side.

Maramon asked worriedly, "This morning, I heard someone say that the Ants might attack today. Does the sergeant also think that the Ants will attack today?"

"I don't know. It's the generals' job to judge when the enemy will attack. All we can do is stay alive as long as possible when the Ants attack."

"What? To survive? Isn't it to destroy the attacking Ants?"

Andreas silently put down the binoculars and took out a cigarette and put it in his mouth.

Maramon immediately took out a match and lit it for Andreas.

Andreas took a long, deep breath and then exhaled slowly, the smoke coming out of his nose like a little train.

"Is that what they taught you in boot camp?"

Maramon: "Yes, the people in the Propaganda Department said that Ant is bleeding to the last. They are sending women and children to the battlefield. We will win soon."

Andreas took another puff of his cigarette. "So on the way here, you didn't encounter any air raids, didn't you see any dead people?"

Maramon’s expression darkened. “Of course, when we got off the train in Bogdanovka, we saw the logistics troops cleaning up the debris left by the Ante Air Force bombing. There were many bodies lined up beside the railroad tracks.

"The lieutenant of the replacement battalion said that this situation is a special case."

Andreas: "How many times have the Ants bombarded the front lines since you arrived?"

Maramon: "Bombardment every day."

"And what makes you think they don't bomb the station every day?"

Maramon: "Do they...have so many shells and bombs?"

"Yes, even if Ant can't produce it themselves, the United States will supply it to them. If you don't believe me, look carefully at the shell fragments. Some of them are written in the United States' Ansa language."

As he spoke, Andreas spat out the cigarette, which was now only a butt left, onto the ground, stomped it out with his foot, and then looked at his watch.

"It's bad. The Ants didn't start the bombardment on time today."

Malamon: "What does this mean? The enemy is out of ammunition?"

"No, this means that the enemy has to coordinate the artillery of the entire front, and wait for the commander of the front to order the artillery to fire." Andreas grabbed Maramon's shoulders and said, "Hurry up and get into the anti-artillery cave!"

When the two men were running wildly in the communication trench, they met many veterans who were also running towards the anti-artillery cave.

Among them was Staff Sergeant Koslake, who also brought two recruits with him.

Just as Andreas saluted Sergeant Kosrek, a whistling sound was heard in the air.

Andreas simply lay on the ground, and pinned the bewildered Maramon to the ground as well.

Almost at the same time, the ground began to shake.

The dirt kept falling on Andreas' head and poured into his clothes through his collar.

This bombardment was more violent than the previous ones. Even though Andreas had taken an anti-artillery posture and opened his mouth, his head was still buzzing due to the overpressure, his ears were ringing like crazy, and he couldn't even hear the sound of the shells exploding.

I heard that Marshal Rokosov of Ant issued an order to flatten the entire position by one meter. Based on Andreas' experience, one meter may not be achieved, but flattening the ground by 30 centimeters is definitely possible.

Therefore, the experienced Plosson troops now dig trenches about 30 centimeters deeper than the regulations in the manual.

Suddenly, someone tapped Andreas on the shoulder.

He looked up and saw the company commander shouting something at him.

"What?" he shouted back.

The company commander pointed in the direction of the river bank.

Andreas guessed that it must be Ant who crossed the river during the bombardment, but he did not want to stand up or go to the gun position at all.

The company commander was still trying hard, but a heavy artillery shell landed next to the trench and the shrapnel cut off his head above the chin.

Andreas saw that the captain's tongue was still attached to his chin, swinging in the air, and blood was spurting out from somewhere behind his tongue like a fountain.

The company commander's weak body fell down.

"Fuck it!" Andreas cursed and continued to lie on the ground motionless.

If they were killed in the explosion, they would not be able to defend their positions. The company commander who had just graduated from the military academy probably didn’t understand this!
The bombing continued, and Andreas lost track of time. He looked at his watch but found that the dial was covered with mud. The walls of the trench continued to collapse, and the mud threatened to bury Andreas.

I don’t know how long it took, but the surroundings finally became quiet.

Driven by instinct, Andreas got up and looked for his secondary shooter first.

Malamon seemed to be still breathing, so Andreas pulled him to his feet and ran to the battle station.

After running for two steps, he remembered to pay attention to the situation of his old friend, Sergeant Koslake. He turned around and saw the sergeant pulling up one of the two recruits.

The recruit's ears were bleeding. Apparently, his artillery defense posture was not standard and he was shocked.

Koslake slapped him and turned to pull another recruit.

Andreas no longer looked at the sergeant, believing that the sergeant could handle everything. After all, he was able to escape from the danger before thanks to the sergeant.

He pulled Maramon and rushed into the bunker, grabbing the overturned tripod: "Come and help me, set up the machine gun!"

Maramon did not react, staring blankly in the direction of the Tiber River.

Andreas also looked at the Tiber River and saw densely packed sampans crossing the river, like migrating herds of cattle.

There was a whistling sound in the air, but this time it was the divisional artillery, whose shells sent columns of water flying in the middle of the Tiber without hitting any of the boats.

More shells fell into the river.

The 36th Infantry Division, as the second wave infantry division, has 150 heavy artillery pieces, and there should also be mm infantry guns in the infantry regiment.

But now the density of shells falling into the Tiber River was not very large, and it seemed that only a dozen guns were firing.

Some of them are small-caliber mortars.

The first batch of Ante boats had already reached the shore. The guards infantry wearing cloaks jumped off the boats, spontaneously formed a skirmish line, and walked towards the position of the 16th Division.

Andreas grabbed the confused Maramon and slapped him several times, imitating Sergeant Kosrek's behavior.

Maramon came to his senses, covering his face, and looked at the sergeant in surprise.

Andreas: "We have to get our machine guns in position and fire!"

"Oh, yes! Sergeant!"

The two men then turned the machine gun over. The surface of the machine gun, which had just been oiled, was covered with sand.

Maramon opened the magazine and inserted the belt into the bolt.

Andreas closed the compression plate, adjusted the wheel of the tripod, and started shooting.

Bullets knocked down several Ante soldiers, and the other soldiers immediately lay down, but the enemies who were not targeted by Andreas ran and had no intention of lying down.

Andreas turned his gun towards the warriors and just as he knocked down one, the others fell down.

But the Ants elsewhere rose again.

Damn Ant Guards, the deterrent power of machine guns seemed to be non-existent in front of them.

While Andreas was complaining, the suppressive fire from the Ants came, with bullets intensively hitting the sandbags that were blown to pieces, and some bullets hit the tripod.

Andreas had to get down.

Damn Ant Guards!

At this time, another Proson machine gun sounded, and the Ant people's supporting firepower immediately fell silent.

Andreas had no evidence, but he felt it was Sergeant Koslake.

He immediately got up and continued shooting.

At this time, the battalion headquarters finally reacted and realized that it was a waste to use mortars to bomb the water surface. Mortar shells continued to fall on the beach.

Andreas saw some of the Ant Guards being blown into the sky, their cloaks spread out like spinning windmills.

He was convinced in his heart that after today's battle, the riverbank would be filled with the corpses of the Ant people.

He continued firing until the barrel turned red.

"Change the barrel!" Andreas shouted.

"Yes!" Maramon stood up and put on gloves according to the operating specifications.

Andreas pushed him away, opened the bolt directly, grabbed the hot barrel with his hand, pulled it out, and threw it on the ground.

"Think about how I got the scar on the palm of my hand!" he cursed, skillfully installing the new barrel in place.

After completing the replacement, Andreas opened fire on the Ant people who had rushed to fifty meters.

An Ant threw a grenade, but it landed outside the sandbags of the bunker.

The sand and dust kicked up by the explosion obscured the view.

But Andreas did not stop shooting.

Anyway, the machine gun's scales were set, so even if you pushed the machine gun back and forth with your eyes closed, you could still fire at the enemy and stop them from advancing.

After the first belt was used up, Andreas dismantled the machine gun and kicked Maramon in the ass: "Go! Change positions!"

They had just run out of the bunker when a grenade fell into the bunker.

The dust kicked up by the explosion caught up with Andreas from behind.

He didn't care about much else and ran with Maramon, shouting as he ran: "Stop the Ants and cover us as we change our position!"

"Understood, Sergeant!" someone answered, but Andreas didn't look.

(End of this chapter)