Peter Idone - Red Vengeance

“There’s nothing Schroeder can do for us.”

“I’d sell my entire family for a panzerfaust right now.”

Enveloped by mist and dusk, the T-34 disappeared from view. “What happened that night when the assault gun got hit? Detwiler and Schroeder lost in a thicket. Sounds coming from nowhere and everywhere. And then in the ravine on the following night. What made it so unusual and strange, like the way it feels now?”

“Don’t try to make sense out of any of it, Angst, and don’t make me try.”

The clatter of tank tracks could be heard, loud and clear. Angst felt the adrenaline jolt through his chest and shoulders, tightening the sinews. The silhouette of a Tiger loomed out of the mist and passed by the broken fuselage. Smoke poured from the rear of the vehicle, and the engine plant ground terribly. “Let’s try to catch up,” Angst said, “The crew might need help.” Hurriedly, they packed up the radio, grabbed their rifles, and climbed out of the midsection. The Tiger chugged along, slowly, maintaining a heading of almost due west. The grenadiers struggled through the ooze but were able to follow alongside the enormous tank and call out to whoever remained alive within. The 120 mm frontal armor had been punctured by armor-piercing shot, as was the turret’s left side, which housed the commander and gunner compartments. It was a sure guess both crewmen were dead. That left the gun loader in the right-hand compartment of the turret. If he were alive, Angst reasoned, he would have seen them by now. Figures approached from the distance: Braun, Detwiler and Schmidt. The scout car followed, slowly, but with far less difficulty than before. Their shouts garnered no response from the crew within. The tank maintained the same course for several minutes more until its engine coughed and spluttered and finally seized. The Tiger rattled and became still. The squad and the scout car, with Schroeder at the 20 mm gun, converged on the lifeless machine. “We tried to hail them on the radio but got no response,” Schroeder said.

Braun climbed onto the deck and opened the turret hatch, releasing a noxious cloud of exhaust fumes. He reached down into the opening and struggled. Schmidt joined him on the deck and helped. As they pulled and tugged, finally a soot-blackened face came into view. The head lolled, mouth slack, eyes closed; and when more of the body was freed from the hatch opening, an enormous tear in the panzer crewman’s black overalls, from groin to chin, could be seen. “Burst like a sausage,” Detwiler exclaimed. Once the crewman was laid out on the deck, Braun searched for any signs of life. He turned to face the others and simply shook his head. Schmidt made the sign of the cross, mumbled a short prayer, and followed Braun off the vehicle. Inspecting the damage, they all marveled at how the Tiger could be subjected to so much abuse and still keep moving for as long as it had. The armorpiercing round that had struck the front end made a jagged hole larger than the size of a man’s head in diameter. Scorch marks at the edges determined the shot was made at extremely close range. Using a flashlight, Detwiler trained the beam through the hole and looked into the smoldering interior. He reared back and made a noise of revulsion. “I could sell tickets to see what’s smeared in here.”

His crudeness was getting on all their nerves, even Schroeder’s. “You asshole, Ernst,” he snapped.

Unfazed, the machine gunner turned to Angst. “Sure you won’t have a peek? I’ll let you look for free.”

“Gawking won’t improve my soldiering any.”

“Maybe it will. Go on, look. Get used to it. That’s what I say.”

“You wallow in it,” Wilms said. “Everything is a big joke for you.”

“Only because it’s all too horrible,” Detwiler said, grimly serious.

Schroeder had climbed down from the scout car and approached Wilms and Angst. “Did you see what happened?”

“The radio wouldn’t function.”

“It was Red Vengeance,” Angst said, blandly.

Wilms turned on him, noticeably shaken. “We don’t know that for certain.” So that the others would not overhear, Schroeder took them both to the side. “Which is it, Wilms? Did you see Red Vengeance or not?”

“I overheard a transmission. The Tiger was taking fire.”

Angst butted in. “They sounded terrorized.”

“I thought you said the radio didn’t work?” Schroeder questioned the signalman.

“It didn’t. Not until I overheard the panzer patrol.”

“Was Red Vengeance referred to by name?”

“No.”

“I saw it slip out of the fog. Wilms had the binoculars. He saw it better than I did.”

“Is that what you saw Wilms? Wilms?” Schroeder persisted.

“Only for a second. I can’t say for sure.”

“You don’t forget a thing like that,” Angst said, “not that tank.”

Schroeder contemplated what he had just heard, and suddenly there was a shout. “Here comes the Hanomag and the captain.” Braun had reboarded the deck of the stricken Tiger and waved broadly at the approaching vehicle with a series of arm signals to indicate there was danger and to proceed with caution.

“Don’t tell the captain,” Wilms pleaded.

Schroeder’s look of surprise turned to one of contempt. “What are you saying? This is why we’re here.”

When the Hanomag stopped alongside the tank, the officers regarded the smoking ruin with concern. “It’s the work of Red Vengeance, Captain. Angst and Wilms saw it,” Schroeder cried exuberantly.

Falkenstein seemed to swell upon hearing the news. His face took on an almost beatific expression. “Which way did it go?”

“Southeast. Toward the minefield,” Angst said.

“Then we pursue” Falkenstein cried in a voice resonating with a crazed edge.

“It’s getting dark, sir,” Voss interrupted. “Let’s not be taunted into making a false move.”

“Retreat or give chase—it makes no difference, should Red Vengeance decide to engage us. Get the men aboard, Lieutenant.”

All but Schroeder scrambled on to the vehicle. “Should Sergeant Vogel and I follow in the Two-Twenty-Two, sir?”

“If you can keep up, Corporal, by all means. Man that cannon!”

The armored personnel carrier wheeled about, nose pointed east. Hartmann pushed the vehicle as fast as it could go over the muddy terrain, urged on by Falkenstein’s ranting. Had the captain been in possession of a whip, Hartmann was sure he would have been lashed like a pack animal to keep up the pace. They passed the burning wreckage of a Mark IV. A charred head and torso lay on the ground, enclosed in a section of the command cupola that had blown free of the turret. “First a Tiger, and now this,” Braun murmured in disbelief, “and we’re expected to stop a T-34 in this thin skinned bucket of bolts. This is crazy.” Schmidt laid a hand on his friend’s shoulder in an attempt to reassure him, but Braun shrugged it off. The fear among the crew had become palpable as darkness rapidly enveloped the steppe. Falkenstein was not so reckless as to plunge directly into the minefield. Knowing the area well, he guided Hartmann through the dummy field that weaved around the live perimeter. A thunderous noise rolled above their heads. Magnesium star shells arched across the sky illuminating the landscape in a rancid wash of yellow light. The shriek of 76 mm cannon shells followed, and the ground started to erupt. Crouched low in the crew compartment, the grenadiers prayed the armored siding would hold as a cold bath of muddy water rained down. They had the sense that they were being sucked in by an undertow, all except the captain, who stood erect behind the shield of the bow machine gun and cursed the driver to deliver more speed. Rather than being an inspiration to strengthen morale, the sight of the captain only caused the men to feel more frightened and appalled. The Hanomag plunged down and up through shallow gullies and around shell craters. The men collided with one another and tried to steady themselves on the hand railings as the vehicle dipped and elevated sharply. “Faster…faster,” Falkenstein raved on. A horse galloped by, harnessed to a flaming panje wagon. Behind this unwittingly spooked torchbearer followed a desperate parade of German soldiers, their shrill, hysterical voices screaming one word again and again: “Tanks!” This remnant of some lost unit now in flight begged to be saved. Almost a platoon-sized number of troops turned and ran after the armored carrier in an attempt to climb on. Schmidt began to open the compartment doors, but Falkenstein instructed him not to. “Bolt those doors shut, or we will be swamped!” The vehicle slowed considerably as Hartmann skirted around a series of shell craters filled with rainwater. Taking advantage of the near stop, several of the troops worked their way on to the mudguards and hung onto the siding. Brazenly, a grenadier started to climb over the siding, only to be rammed in the face by a rifle butt. Detwiler. He smiled ruthlessly and watched as the grenadier sailed off, arms outstretched, and disappeared into the mud and darkness. Voss ordered the driver to find a suitable place and bring the vehicle to a halt. Countermanding the order, Falkenstein told him to speed up, but more troops had surrounded the armored vehicle as voices cried out to be let aboard and begged the crew to turn about. “Keep moving,” Falkenstein cried. “Run them over if you must!” Hartmann wouldn’t, making every effort to swerve out of the way as arms waved frantically to flag him down. The scout car had been keeping up the pace, but now it too had attracted a mob. There was a sudden burst of machine gun fire and the clatter of tracks as enemy tanks neared. Many of the panicked troops broke away from the two vehicles and dove for cover in the shell craters. They looked like frogs leaping into a dirty pond. Slowing down, Hartmann positioned the Hanomag behind a ruined tank hull that lay cantilevered across a depression. Falkenstein was vexed. “Corporal, my order was to drive.”