Initiative (The Red Gambit Series Book 6) (14 page)

The last of the Soviet soldiers was dispatched relatively silently, the noisiest part of the exercise being the rush of air as the unfortunate’s throat was opened from ear to ear. The large soldier scrabbled and grabbed at his attacker, ripping the sleeve of the man’s combat jacket, earning him a second slice of the blade, by way of revenge for a ruined uniform.

With few spoken commands, the assassins had closed on the slumbering soldiers, who had hidden in the woods above the road, dispatching all fourteen men in as many seconds.

Showing practised ease, the professional killers moved into action, some keeping watch, some taking weapons and food, and others dragging the bodies into cover.

Within two minutes, apart from the occasional trail of blood, the scene had been returned to nature and gave no indication of what had happened there.

A few hand signals were exchanged and the group blended back into the woods and were gone.

Malicious eyes surveyed the scene and assessed the possibilities.

The ambulance, a Dodge WC54, was going nowhere, the driver buried deep in the engine compartment, his curses reaching the ears of the watchers with ease.

An army medic and a nurse stood outside the vehicle, sharing cigarettes with two men, clearly sporting tokens of their injuries, the white bandages fresh and clean.

Occasionally, one of the two medical personnel would take a close look at the other two passengers, men whose wounds were more serious.

What interested the watcher was the medical bag, and what it probably contained, for they had no supplies of their own, and two wounded men in desperate need.

The leader made his decision, understanding a second attack, so close together in time and location to the first, was a risk, but one he was prepared to take for the prize of medicine.

A flat-handed signal, followed by a curved roll of his hand, sent a group of efficient killers down the hillside, using the blind spot created by the bulk of the vehicle to close the distance at speed.

Back at their start point, two men sat behind Mauser sniper rifles, just in case.

The remainder fanned out to provide security in case other vehicles came to the party.

The doctor, nurse and two wounded men were too busy laughing to notice that the stream of swear words stopped in mid-flow.

Spilling blood, the driver’s dead body was controlled as it flopped to the road, the killer wiping his knife on the man’s jacket before running his hands over pockets in the hope of finding tobacco.

The nurse laughed in a high-pitched wail, and immediately died quietly, her squeal of fear stifled with a dirty hand and a blade in her heart.

The doctor turned in time to see his killer lunge, but felt no pain as the blade slid up through his armpit and into vital places beyond.

The wounded men both made a grab for the trophy they had insisted on bringing along with them.

Neither man made it to the SVT automatic rifle.

The snipers shot them both dead.

One camouflaged killer slipped aboard the ambulance and sent the two seriously wounded men to their maker.

The whole group was up and moving quickly, lent urgency by the sound of the two shots still reverberating around the valley.

The leader, struggling with a twisted ankle, gritted his teeth and moved past the site as his men threw the bodies in the back of the ambulance, having checked for anything of use.

The medical supplies were already safely in the possession of the second in command, and within minutes the bird songs started again, the killers having again disappeared back into nature.

Fig# 184 – Bräunisheim, Germany.

The group lay up on a height overlooking the area south of Bräunisheim, where they observed a US army medical facility at work, receiving and dispatching wounded in steady numbers throughout the day.

The need for medicines was still pressing.

There had not been enough in the bag… not enough painkillers, bandages, whatever…

The worst of the two wounded men was delirious now, the smell of his wounds carrying as far as his tortured groans of pain.

Two Russian prisoners, men who had been captured in the early stages of the new war, did their best to treat the injured men, but, in the case of Otto Jungling, SS-Sturmann, it was too little, too late.

A quick conference between the three senior men made two quick decisions. Firstly… they would move into the hospital and take what they needed the following night, just to ensure they didn’t run into heightened security. Secondly…

The commander moved to the side of the young werewolf.

Taking a wet cloth from the more junior Soviet officer prisoner, he wiped the soldier’s brow, leaning forward to whisper in the soldier’s ear.

The moaning stopped immediately, and Jungling prepared himself.

A knife opened up both his wrists.

Lenz, showing remarkable and unusual tenderness, recited words known to everyone present, and held the dying man’s hand until the life went from his eyes.

“Ich schwöre dir, Adolf Hitler, als Führer und Kanzler des Deutschen Reiches, treue und tapferkeit. Wir geloben dir und den von dir bestimmten vorgesetzten gehorsam bis in den tod. So wahr mir Gott helfe! Seig heil, Otto. Wiedersehen.”

Patting the dead man’s chest, he stood as quickly as his damaged ankle permitted, and ordered the two prisoners to bury the man where he lay.

Mikki and Nikki, their real names of Mikhail and Nikanor long since forgotten by their captors, set about digging a shallow grave for the cadaver.

There was not a day that went by without they wondered why they were still alive, as they had seen the Werewolves kill and murder their way through Southern Germany without compunction, hesitation, or scruples.

At first it had been the Red Army, but now, with the obvious reverses in fortune for the USSR, it was, apart from the occasional wandering group of Soviet soldiers, the Allies who received the full attention of SS-Kommando Lenz.

[* Der
Eidformel der Schutzstaffel/
The SS oath of loyalty - "I vow to you, Adolf Hitler, as Führer and Chancellor of the German Reich, loyalty, and bravery. I vow to you and to the leaders that you set for me, absolute allegiance until death. So help me God!"]

The MP unit had spread out in professional fashion, covering the woods to either side, road front and back, leaving two vehicles to disgorge their crews and close upon the silent ambulance.

Hanebury’s unit had responded to a possible sound of gunfire in the area, moving around the countryside until the lead element had spotted the medical vehicle sat on the roadside… bonnet up… silent… suspicious…

‘Just not right.’

Hanebury waved his men to either side, eight men responding, moving wide of the ambulance, but keeping constantly focussed upon it.

Stradley moved forward with Corporal Gardiner close at hand, the both of them touting Thompson sub-machine guns.

Moving up to the rear of the ambulance, they exchanged silent gestures and determined their course of action.

Stradley held his weapon in his right hand and reached for the handle. Gardiner offset himself from the likely line of fire, just in case.

The door opened slowly, allowing light from the idling halftracks to flood the inside of the ambulance, revealing its awful cargo.

Hanebury and Rickard closed up immediately.

“Goddamned fucking massacre, Top. Even a fucking nurse, for God’s sake!”

The First Sergeant cast his eye over the pitiful sight and could only agree with Stradley’s assessment.

“Two shots reported, Roger?”

Rickard and Gardiner dragged out the first body, that of the driver.

“Not him.”

With slightly more reverence, the two pulled the stiff body of the nurse from the vehicle.

The next body spoke volumes with its silence.

“Single shot in the head.”

As did the next body.

“And again.”

“The report said two shots… we have two here.”

Hanebury’s statement required no response.

The two NCOs moved aside as others from the unit closed in to assist.

“Bury them here, Top?”

“Not yet, Sergeant.”

Jerry Ringold, the unit’s unofficial medic, waited for the rest of the words to come.

“Set Bragg on that engine. See if he can get it going. According to my map, there’s a hospital a’ways up the 7312 here.”

A quick recheck of the markings suggested the ambulance did not belong to the unit on his map.

“If we can get it running, we’ll take ‘em there. Hustle Bragg up… I don’t wanna hang around longer than necessary.”

Hanebury and Stradley moved to one side, casting a professional eye over the dispositions and actions of their men.

“Thoughts, Rodge?”

“Bunch of commies bounced the truck… would have taken it, but it didn’t work… killed them off to avoid detection… had to shoot a couple… they bugged out on foot, heading for Moscow.”

Hanebury nodded, acknowledging some of it as true, but believing there was more to it.

“Maybe so, Rodger, but maybe not. The two guys shot… both wounded… but clearly lighter wounds than the other poor bastards on the stretchers.”

Grabbing his chin, the First Sergeant thought aloud.

“Driver gets the chop, as do the doc and the nurse. The two stretcher cases too, but not the two guys… single shots… not pistol… distance shots I reckon, not close up… pistol or a knife would have been used.”

He was on a roll now.

“No, distance… they grabbed for something, out of range of the knife guy… no, guys. The cover party did the shoot. Two shots, two kills… sniper rifles.”

Stradley could now see the scenario as clear as Lucifer.

“Smacks of military organisation, not the raggedy arsed survivors we’ve run down of late.”

Jerry Ringold strode up but waited for Hanebury to finish.

“Jerry?”

“Top, pockets rifled, medical supplies all gone. Quick deaths across the board. Single stab, cut, or bullet. Bragg reckons he can fix the engine easily enough… some worn cabling shorting out, that’s all.”

“Thanks, Jerry. If Bragg’s sure, load the poor bastards up again.”

Ringold doubled away.

“Rodger, watch over this. I’m gonna call this in.”

Hanebury moved back to his vehicle, where Nave was waiting with a thermos of hot coffee.

“What gives, Top?”

Hanebury went through his deductions, in between sips of the real stuff, prepared just the way he liked it.

“So we going up there?”

Nave gestured to the hillside behind his commander.

“Nope. We’re gonna get the ambulance going and take the bodies to the facility over at Bräunisheim.”

He swilled back the last of the coffee, and gestured at the silent hillside behind him.

“Why would we go there anyway?”

Nave frowned in genuine puzzlement.

“You mean you haven’t seen it, Top? See here.”

Moving around the vehicle, Arthur Nave moved towards the wood’s edge, his flashlight picking out marks that were now obvious.

“See here, Top. Many feet, spreading out from this point. There’s a strange mark too… regular… like every other step distance, if you look close… like a dragging foot possibly?”

Hanebury looked closer, even prising the torch from Nave’s grasp.

“Goddamnit.”

“I only saw it cos I went for a pee, Top.”

“Uh huh.”

“Reckon it’s where they come from, not went, Top.”

“Same as… how many you reckon, Art?”

“Hard to say, Top. Reckon fifteen… twenty tops.”

Hanebury was looking up at the dark wood, wondering if enemy eyes were upon him already.

He shivered involuntarily.

“Right, Arthur, get the vehicle started up.”

In seconds, Hanebury was at Stradley’s side, filling him in on developments.

His decision was assisted by the sound of a six-cylinder gasoline engine roaring into life.

“Rodger, change of plan…take your boys, get the bodies outta the ambulance… bury them quickly… right here… then take all the vehicles… leave me the ambulance… move down until you’re clear of the valley to…,” Hanebury picked a point on the map, “Here… and set up for all-round defence… and stay alert.”

“And you, Top?”

Hanebury inclined his head towards the markings discovered by Art Nave.

“That’s where the bastards came from. I’m going to quietly slip inside there with a section and see what we can find. Give us an idea of what we’re up against here, cos I’m goddamned sure as I can be that this ain’t renegade commies.”

He pointed at the ambulance.

“That was organised, efficient killing.”

From a distance, it looked like the entire platoon departed the scene, not that anyone was watching, save Hanebury and a dozen men who had slipped quietly into the woods.

He waited twenty minutes, keeping his men in check and silent, watching… waiting…

Nothing.

“OK boys, you two sit tight and watch that vehicle. Report anything to me. Rest of us… move it on out. Nave, you got point.”

The small party picked their way forward, silently reversing the trodden path of whoever it was that visited themselves upon the medics and wounded.

It was nearly a quarter to one when Nave held up his hand, halting the silent advance in its track.

Everyone dropped to a knee and watched their assigned area for signs of trouble, all save Hanebury who noticed the summons and moved forward to Nave’s side.

Even the studied whisper seemed like a church bell in the quiet darkness of the forest.

“This is where they camped, Top. See the flattened grass and undergrowth… fire circle… trimmed wood…”

Hanebury got the idea, and waved his men into a skirmish line, expanding outwards to embrace the modest clearing.

Whilst the men were shaking out, both he and Nave studied the area for booby traps, their torches flicking across the ground in front of them.

None were apparent but…

The two moved forward, assessing each step, checking the ground before they lay a foot down, moving apart… just in case…

Crack…

Hanebury froze, the faint sound and tremor of something breaking under his foot causing him almost panic with fear.

Almost… but his training and natural courage rose above the immediacy of his plight.

“Move away, Arthur, move away.”

That his Sergeant was stock-still, and clearly tense, was enough for Nave.

“Where, Top… which foot?”

“Back away, Arthur.”

“Not happening, Top. Which one?”

“Front.”

Nave crawled gingerly, going flatter the closer he got to Hanebury’s left boot.

Torch lodged firmly between his teeth, his knife was out and probing the area, seeking out whatever it was that had so spooked his commander.

Standing still is not normally a particularly draining exercise, but standing still when the slightest movement might send you and one of your men to Valhalla is as draining as it can get, and Hanebury, minute by minute, started to feel the strain.

His leg wanted to work, the muscle sought to get going, but he fought against it as hard as he could.

“Arthur, leave it now… my leg’s got a fucking mind of its own here… move out, soldier!”

Nave hummed a response as he worked closer around the boot, scraping away earth and leaves and…

The laugh nearly made Hanebury lose it.

“What the fuck!”

Nave allowed the torch to fall away so he could talk.

“Err, Top… you can move your foot… it’s clear.”

Almost reluctantly, despite the urgent requirements of his aching legs, First Sergeant Jim Hanebury picked up his foot, revealing the cause of the alarm.

“Make a wish, Top.”

The broken wishbone of some long since consumed fowl lay taunting Hanebury.

“Goddamnedsonofafuckingbitch!”

A couple of the others drifted in close, just to see what the fuss was about.

Hanebury’s relief did not stop him from slapping Nave on the shoulder.

“Nice work, Arthur, but next time I give you an order, you better fucking obey it!”

Neither of them believed the harshness in his voice was anything other than relief.

Half the men moved through the clearing, whilst the others turned outwards and watched.

Hanebury was mentally rehearsing his report and citation for Nave’s recommendation; chicken bone or no, the man had shown real guts and deserved his reward.

The man in question rummaged in a pile of wood nearby, his demeanour drawing Hanebury’s interest.

“Shit!”

Nave jerked back, weapon at the ready, and immediately the whole group were primed and alert.

Nave beckoned the nearest man, and together they pulled some of the undergrowth away.