Langer and his crew tried to pull themselves deeper into the dirt floor of their bunker. There was nothing they could do to fight back, they just had to take it. They slept only when exhaustion finally claimed them. Even the shaking of the frozen earth was not enough to keep their grime laden eyelids open. They slept unmindful of the hell that raged around them.
Manny's body was no longer a problem; a 105 shell had disposed of it forever.
German sentries on the forward observation posts were the first to know that hell was on its way. From the distance, winking eyes of light joined together until there was one continuous rim of flashing illuminations, setting the horizon on fire. Then came the screaming of the shells. The Russian offensive had begun! Over a thousand pieces of artillery, and hundreds of multiple rocket launchers pounded a three-mile section of the front for five days, twenty-four hours around the clock without cease. Russian gunners and crews worked themselves to death, hearts breaking under the strain of loading their guns with the heavy shells. As they fired, many lost their hearing forever. The shells fell in hundreds and thousands, over a hundred rounds fired for every German in the target area. Men and animals died. The screaming of the horses, wild-eyed and trembling, was worse than that of the men. Eardrums were shattered, blood running from the ears to freeze in blackened clots on the side of the face.
A seventeen-year-old private, who had been on the front for only three days when the barrage began, stuck the muzzle of his Mauser rifle into his mouth and pulled the trigger with the aid of a stick. Many more took his way out of the nightmare. Others by the dozens merely walked away, no longer able to cope. The pounding, interminable concussions ripping their minds apart and sent them stumbling back slack jawed, hands dangling at their sides or holding their heads trying to keep out the sounds. They staggered to the rear, only to find peace at the hands of the SD. Like children they cried and obeyed when they were told to kneel, still holding their hands over their ears to keep out the sounds of distant thunder. They didn't even hear the neck shots fired by their comrades that finally took the nightmares away.
Russians came by the tens of thousands, white winter camouflage mixed with mustard brown. They swarmed into the gap, killing the still stunned Germans by the hundreds before the Fascists even knew they were there. In their ears they still heard the thunder. For the Russians, it was inconceivable that anyone could survive the hell of fire that they had laid on, much less be able to fight when it stopped.
But, somehow, men did survive it; and the few moments of respite they had while the Russians mopped up the men in front gave those in the rear time to crawl out of their holes and burrows. Tears streaming from their faces, black from grime and filth, stinking filthy apparitions. They came out with guns in their hands. At last here was something they could deal with. Many, in their frustration, beat at the sides of the Russian tanks with riflebutts and shovels; pounding, striking, anything to hit back at the terror that had torn them for the last five days. Like insects they attacked, beating and screaming at the steel beasts until, when they annoyed it too much, it would turn and trample them under. But many of the beasts died too. Desperate men fired Panzerfausts from twenty feet. Others threw themselves bodily onto the Russian tanks holding mines and sticky bombs; exploding themselves and the Russians, turning both into warm spots on the frozen fields.
Langer raised his head not sure of the silence. Why had the earth stopped shaking? It didn't feel natural. The earth was supposed to tremble and move with the vibrating waves of the barrage. Blood dripping from his nose and ears, he pulled himself out of the bunker, pushing aside fallen planks.
Crawling back inside, he kicked his men into awareness. Cursing and shoving, he forced them out into the open where the habits of years took over. Behaving as automatons, they went about their duties clearing the junk off the Tiger. They climbed inside shutting the hatches.
Gus's face was that of a man about to go mad, but his hands hit the starter switch by themselves. The Maybachs roared into life again. The rumbling gave them some sense of purpose. Teacher loaded and sighted. Yuri sat on the hull MG, his face the only one that showed no sign of strain. Calm, peaceful, ready to kill or die as he had always been. Only he had been able to lose himself inside his own mind and block out the thunder.
"Move out!" Gus's hands and feet moved, sending the eighty tons out of its hole onto the frozen surface. It rose from the ground in time to strike out at the first wave of Russians, mowing them down like fields of wheat beneath the raking fire of the hull MG and that of the turret. Teacher reloaded and fired with HE rounds. There was no way to miss.
Langer raked the field, the heat from the breech of his MG was welcome warmth. He fired, killing men by the dozens, but nothing could stop the Russian advance. Not tanks, not courage, only death could still them, and there were too many. They split the German forces and the tides of battles surged their own way. One took Langer's Tiger to the north until the tank ran out of fuel on the edge of the battlefield. It rested in the thin trees of the edge of a forest. The battle passed them by as it did hundreds of others. Ivan would come back for them later.
Hauptmann Heidemann thrust his Panther in the way of four assaulting KV-Is trying to give a hospital unit a few more seconds to get away with their wounded. He had taken out two when a 76 mm shell tore through the side plating of the turret, cutting his body in half before it exploded in the ammo racks. The Panther burst open to burn for a few minutes and then die.
The hospital was next. The Russians killed them all, wounded or whole made no difference. They drank medical alcohol, raped the few women there and then killed them. Urra Stalino, this was war the way they liked it. They had been promised the women of Germany and took them wherever they found them.
CHAPTER TWELVE
"I'm hungry." Gus was back to normal and that one statement broke the tension. Teacher and Langer fell to laughing as Yuri looked with amazement at Gus's yawning maw, down which incredible lengths of blood sausage were disappearing. Gus fascinated him. If he had been from the steppes he would have been a Hetman, a chieftain. There, excess in anything was admired.
Langer dug in his pack and took out a last pack of cigarets, handing one around to each of his men. Teacher tore his in half and stuck half in his pipe.
They emerged from their steel shelter, and stood in the drifts, listening. The sounds of battle were far away and receding, the storm was passing them by, leaving them for the moment, alone.
Without being told, Gus and Yuri began to take their gear out of the Tiger. Personal weapons and food would be all they could take. It might be a long time and way until they rejoined a German unit. More likely Ivan would find them first.
Langer spoke softly. "Teacher, what do you think?"
Stomping his feet to keep the circulation going, he puffed slowly at his pipe. "I don't know, Carl. Only death waits to the south. We might have a better chance of connecting if we go north. Maybe the front's still holding there."
Langer stuck the butt between his lips. Taking a deep drag he held the smoke in his lungs for a moment, enjoying the biting of the fumes.
"I don't know. More than likely Ivan has taken Krivoy Rog. It might be better if we headed northwest to where the railway crosses the Bug. If anything is still holding, it will be there at Pervomaysk. It's a long way, though, old friend."