He braced himself, glanced upwards at the snowflakes drifting down. To the south, a ribbon of arc lights suddenly switched on, the swan neck light standards illuminating the £78 where it ran along the eastern shore of Lake Kilpisjarvi. The whole area was transformed into a luminous bowl, while, above it, the giant snowflakes tumbled down in the eerie reflected light. Burns went rigid, as the unmistakeable roar of a jet aircraft exploded above him. Then another… and another — their engines screaming in the snow-filled sky — there must have been a dozen of them.
As he jerked round to follow them while they terrain-hopped down the valley, he heard another sound, the rumble of numbers of large aircraft. He held his breath, listening: no way could he be wrong. These were large turbo-prop aircraft, flying quite low. The sky above him began throbbing, the whole valley reverberating with sound; the sky was stacked with aircraft, circling, turning back on themselves, away from the range rearing up at them from inside Norwegian territory. The dark night pulsated above him, as each wave flew in, seeming to circle above his head, then slowly lumbering away again, into the darkness whence they had come… another wave, then another and another….
Corporal Bums executed his kick-turn. As he pushed off down the hill, he glanced in the direction of the receding aircraft. The snow was falling faster now. He wiped the back of a mitt across his eyes, blinked then stared again.
Those huge frozen crystals — he'd never seen such bloody great flakes… and as they spiralled downwards, dodging, floating, drifting from the night sky above his head, he suddenly recognized them for what they were: airborne troops and they were floating from the darkness on their parachutes, swinging downwards in the snowstream and tumbling on to the frozen lake.
The air hissed as he sucked in his breath… he'd be cut off from the small lake, where the paratroops were also dropping thickly. Thousands must be landing on Lake Kilpisjarvi, touching down at this moment; they must be highly trained in arctic warfare, if they could cany out a drop in these conditions with such precision…
His skis were hissing through the snow, the flakes scalding his cheeks as he stabbed the ground frantically with his sticks. He did not know how he reached the bottom of the defile without falling but, as he crashed into the bank at the bottom, he saw that the leading paratroops were already on the move from the small lake. He could hear the cries of those trapped in the weak ice, shouting, whistle blasts and the commands of officers…
Burns shoved on to the foot of Sierra's ambush position, tore off his skis, snapped on his snow-shoes. Trying to subdue his mounting panic, he began scrambling up the face of the escarpment. He could hear the echoes of Russian orders in the valley below him, the crackle of walkie-talkies… then, far away by '
the customs post, the staccato coughing of tank engines roaring into life. But unseen hands were grabbing him and he was being dragged up the last shoulder which concealed the ambush position.
'Last night's tracks,' he gasped. ' We've not covered them.'
'It'll take a while for the snow to hide 'em,' O'Malley said. ' Worse than a signpost.'
'Man your fire-posts,' Burns rapped. ' Tucker, O'Malley, Grant: stand-by to engage with the Law. Wait for the first tank and don't fire until ordered.' He swung round on the others:
'Here, Budd and you lot. Man the GPM/G — stand-by sustained fire. The rest of you, get a load of grenades ready. Watch our rear…' As he scrambled for the radio, the first shots began plummet-ting into the snow around their heads. Lying prone, he watched the tanks jerking down the road with amazing speed, throwing up clouds of flying snow. He saw the shadows in the birches, white blotches against the blackness, gliding like spectres… and the red flashes spitting from the flame guards of their automatics. He could hear the cries of their officers, urging them on. From here, Sierra section could take care of 'em, pick 'em off like flies until the tanks came within range…
'Target: riflemen on the slopes in front of you,' he shouted to the GPM/G group. The crew waited, immobile, like a dummy-run for the Royal Tournament.' Open fire!' he yelled.
The stuttering of the machine gun drowned all efforts at raising Zulu on the radio. The screams and yells of the enemy echoed up from the cliff beneath.
'Check — check — check!' No. 2 tapped the gunner's shoulder and the sudden silence brooded with the stillness of death. He picked up the mike again.
There was a crimson flash from their right and a shower of snow drifted over them; a group of Russians was concentrating in the birches.
'See 'em, Tucker, right front?'
'On target, Corp.'
'Independent fire: open fire!' At that moment the first of the tank missiles plunged into the rock behind their heads — a whisper, a flash and an ear-splitting explosion…
'This is Sierra, this is Sierra. Do you read, Zulu, do you read, Zulu…?'
He looked at his watch: 0707. Zulu was due on the air in three minutes. For Christ's sake, how could he warn them? A dual crack! a shattering roar, a grey plume, an orange flash at its base, leaping at their feet. O'Malley was yelling: ' Within range, Corp.! I've got the leader.'
'Shoot!' Burns roared.
The agonizing wait, the muttered curses while the Ulsterman aimed his 66 mm anti-tank weapon… the long pause — and then the bright flash at the base of the tank's squat turret (just like on the ranges) — a T-80 by the look of the bastard.
A cheer from the crew and then Burns was on the radio again just as the GPM/G opened up, scything the snow slopes at their feet. There was an inferno of sound all about them and then, again, the flutter of missiles, the blast of explosion. There was a yell from Grant and curses when the GPM/G jammed. In that second, Burns knew he could sacrifice his men no longer.
One of them, he could not see whom, lay twitching in the snow by the charred embers of the fire. A dark stain was seeping across the snow from a severed artery. The machine-gun's crew were wrenching at their belts for the grenades.
Corporal Burns bellowed as the hordes began closing in from three sides: ' Follow me, lads! Let 'em have your grenades then disperse and scarper for the mountains. Make your own way to the coast…' and he sprayed the birds with a last savage burst. ' Get in among 'em and cause as much… nausea as you… well can.' His men were loping past him, grabbing their skis from the pile, crouching low as they retreated. He waited for Grant, then grabbed the radio again: For Christ's sake… The black night exploded in his face. A flaming, whirling mist, a shattering roar overwhelming his world — Corporal Burns spun into the rumpled snow. He twitched once, then lay still, face down, cut in two by a burst from an automatic weapon.
The first of the airborne assault troops had reached the lip of ambush position Sierra.
This was not Dick Stoddart's day. Since the early hours he had lain awake worrying about his two sections. He had certainly slipped up in not checking that the radio batteries were charged.
But his anxiety went deeper: for so long, he had tried to bring small ship's detachments up to scratch in amphibious warfare. After all his wangling to get his detachment ashore, he had been side-tracked to a couple of minor defensive posts in 42, miles behind the Commandos advanced positions, and 42 was secondary to 45 which was up on the northern border where the action was.
He was still trying to discover why the snow-hole collapsed. Just after 0300, when the relief sentry had returned, the entrance tunnel had fallen in. After the initial panic, they had managed to burrow out to the air from what nearly became their snowy tomb. The incident certainly shook everyone, and the rebuilding at dawn had not improved tempers. It was an effort to get them all on the move again.