L/Cpl Bethers had been surprised at the earlier O Group to find himself assigned the responsible slot of commanding the rear protection party, a task that CSM Probert almost always gave to the capable Sergeant Osgood when he led a patrol. It had dispelled the nagging feeling that he had screwed up during the grenade incident.
As important as it was, guarding everyone’s back, it was also one that entailed an aspect of divorce from the main proceedings in not knowing what was happening elsewhere. In some, this could be the cause of restlessness, and in others lethargy, so the young NCO was alert for signs that members of his small party had mentally switched off, or might compromise them all by fidgeting.
They had endured the wind and rain in much the same way as the rest had, by gritting their teeth and enduring it, but Bethers had found himself wishing the enemy would get his skates on so they could all get back to the company location and roll into their maggots.
With the springing of the ambush Bethers had switched on his night scope, scanning their surrounds without the device being hindered by the trip flares light. It had shown only the wet landscape in green hues, and reassured by this he had switched the device off.
His next look had been a different story as the shapes of armed men were now moving amongst the trees to at his twelve o’clock and ten o’clock, moving cautiously to envelop the British position, whilst several more were picking their way silently through the undergrowth, heading straight for the lance corporal and his gun group.
Bethers froze momentarily as he tried to decide what best to do, whether to call up the CSM and report, leaving the decision making to someone else, or whether to act. Immediately to his left lay his gun group and he alerted them to the danger with a thumbs down gesture before removing the safety on his own clicker and tugging on the communications cord before firing the mine.
On the track, the searching pairs stopped what they were doing but took differing courses of action in response to the fresh firing. The left hand pair dropped to the ground and began looking for threats, whilst their neighbours turned and ran back the way they had come. The runners were caught in a hail of fire from the direction their prey had come from, and sent tumbling into the mud before the unseen firers switched aim to the second pair.
As the trip flare sputtered and died Colin located the clicker for his number five Claymore, which was actually the first mine he had placed and was sighted along that track but facing towards his own position.
Colin filled his lungs and yelled at the top of his voice. “Incoming!” and the Guardsmen hugged the wet earth. Some of the mines seven hundred ball bearings sent splinters of wood down onto the exposed backs of the British troops but the six soviet paratroopers further down the track who were doing the firing were torn to shreds by the mine exploding behind them, allowing the second pair of searchers to regain the Guards position.
Switching his night scope on Colin swept it around and decided that the time for radio silence was long past.
“Hello all stations One One, this is Sunray, sitrep, over?”
Answering in sequence clockwise starting with the right cut off group, then the right flank, rear protection, left flank and finally the left cut off group, CSM Probert learnt their situation.
“One One Alpha, we have movement from our ten o’clock through to four o’clock, all foxhounds okay, over.”
“One One Bravo, movement to our front, all foxhounds okay, over.”
L/Cpl Bethers sounded breathless, the product of adrenaline still coursing through his system.
“One One Charlie, we bumped four attempting to infiltrate, we have movement from our eight to two o’clock. No foxhounds down, one Claymore expended, over”
“One One Delta, no enemy seen but we can hear them to our front, all foxhounds okay, over.”
Colin bit his lip; he had an awful feeling he did not want to hear what his final callsign had to say.
“One One Echo, troops in the trees from our eight o’clock, that’s who Delta are hearing, through to two o’clock, no foxhounds down, over.”
His platoon was surrounded which left him with two options, to break out or to dig in and hang on. It took a moment to decide on his course of action, and on changing his PRC 349 to the company frequency he sent his own sitrep.
Making his way to the company CP, Oz passed the mortar section attached to 1 Company and damn near got shot by their sentry who had been paying more attention to his mates laying on the 81mm tubes for a fire mission, than to what he was supposed to be doing. He hadn’t seen Oz until the sergeant was almost on top of him and had received a brief yet ear-blistering bollocking.
Oz could not get inside the CP, all the signallers had been roused and there was no space but CSM Tessler saw him peering through the blackout and squeezed his way out to join him above ground.
His eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness and he inhaled the smell of the trees and damp earth about them.
“How’s it going Oz?”
“That depends, is the platoon in trouble?”
The earlier high rate of fire in the distance was ebbing and flowing with periods of silence in between.
“They may have bumped the point section of a company, and not another patrol. They just fought off one attack and Col is digging in and calling for mortar fire support.”
Oz nodded.
“I passed the mortars on the way here, they aren’t firing though?”
“Brigade have tasked an Apache to do an over flight with infra-red to get a handle on opposition numbers, they won’t fly with rounds going down range… as soon as they are done then Colin gets his fire missions.”
Oz frowned but in the dark Ray Tessler couldn’t see the wrinkled forehead. “A handle on numbers, am I missing something here?” Irritation was growing within him. “… just shoot the sodding missions and worry about sodding numbers later, for God’s sake!”
Ray let the fit of pique pass before gesturing toward an unattended Warrior, which he headed towards whilst fishing a packet of cigarettes from a breast pocket. Once inside where the light wouldn’t show he handed one across.
“The company commander doesn’t like me smoking, he thinks it sets a bad example to the boys and is bad for my health… like being an infantryman in a war zone isn’t.”
When they had both lit up he blew out a lung full of smoke.
“There’s the remnants of a soviet airborne brigade wandering around somewhere in our rear, the brigade commander wants to know if this is some of them trying to regain their lines and the recce that got spotted was them looking for a safe route, rather than an attack on our support units.”
Sat across from him in the darkness Oz took a drag on his fag, illuminating his features in orange light.
“If it is a small group they’ll call it a day and try to find another way around Ray, but if it’s more than a company they may try to fight their way through.”
“I think that has occurred to them up at brigade Oz, and they will see it as a chance to take out some of those soviet airborne.”
Oz stubbed out the cigarette angrily.
“That’s my platoon and my mate out there, Ray.”
“And your platoon and your mate are British soldiers Oz, doing a soldiers job.”
“Yeah I know, I don’t have to be ecstatic about it though.”
Back in the forest a panting Guardsman crawled through the undergrowth dragging a pair of Bergens. Rounds cracked through the trees above him but only enough to harass the Guardsmen and remind them they weren’t alone.
The sounds of feverish digging by men hampered by the necessity of having to do it lying prone, filled the air. On arriving back at his position he found CSM Probert had carried on digging a shell scrape for him, and he uttered a word of thanks as the CSM picked up his bondook and crawled back into the trees, taking six of the riflemen and a gimpy with him.