The self-propelled gun was already starting to burn when a series of blasts turned it into an inferno. The partisans were close enough to throw anti-tank grenades at it. For a brief second, Knyaz actually felt sorry for the gun. It had been stolen from its original owners and brought so far to die in the pine forests of Russia. Then his mind snapped back to more important things. With the fascist flank and rear caving in, the battle was moving into end game. Crushing the fascist pocket completely. The fascists had also come a long way to die in the forests of Russia. Knyaz didn’t feel sorry for them at all.
It was an odd thing, Asbach mused, that the Night Witches overhead didn’t seem nearly so deadly in daylight. He’d never actually seen one before. All he’d seen were dark shadows flashing overhead or bursts of fire from the darkness. To see the grey jabos circle his position and occasionally dive down to deliver bursts of gunfire, somehow took the mystery away from the feared intruders.
“Colonel, our right flank has caved in, Kolchek tried to disengage but the Siberians had got behind him. There’s only one survivor, a runner he sent out. Captain Lang reports he’s had to disengage from the rear, he was outflanked and had the enemy behind him. Siberians again.”
Siberians, Asbach thought, always the Siberians. “Is Lang still alive?”
“Yes Colonel. He and the two surviving guns are heading here.”
That was it; Asbach saw that the game was over. His command was being squeezed back and would soon be overrun. That would be the end for nobody took prisoners on the Russian Front. Even the Canadians and Americans had given up that custom. Asbach shuddered slightly, in one way it was lucky they were fighting Siberians. Some of the American units had whole battalions recruited from the American Indian tribes, Sioux, Apache, Comanche. The SS had tried to demoralize some of the Apache troops. They had taken a few prisoners in night raids then left their mutilated bodies for the Apache soldiers to find. Only, it hadn’t worked. The Apache had buried their dead and then replied in kind. When the SS had found what had been done to the bodies of the victims, even the hardest of the SS men had vomited in horror. No, it was better to be fighting the Siberians.
Asbach stared at his map. He had one option left. He still had his three Pumas although the 75mm tank destroyers were both gone. He had nine surviving halftracks and the two self propelled guns. Any hope of catching or destroying the last railway gun was gone but he could save what was left of his command. He’d make a panzerkeil, an armored wedge that would drive through the Russian force on his left flank. The Pumas and self-propelled guns would lead. All the surviving men would be in the half-tracks behind. They’d just crash through and keep going. There was a road a little to the south, the one that they’d come in on. Once on that, they’d just keep heading south until they ran out of fuel or they reached safety.
He rapped out the necessary orders, watching the men pull back from the forward positions he’d set up so carefully to stop the train. The devil’s train, he was certain that gun was possessed by the very devil himself. It had won, it had won the battle that it shouldn’t even have fought. Asbach shook his head. There was no way that gun should have survived. It had to be the devil’s own work. Halfway through the hasty preparations, Lang and his guns arrived. Asbach repeated the plan, such as it was, for him.
The partisans and Siberians were already closing in when Asbach’s force launched its attack. There was no pretext of holding ground or seizing anything. This was a breakout and that was all it was. The three Pumas started off the assault. They fired their 50mm cannon at the suspected partisan positions in the woods. Lang’s two remaining 150mm guns joined in and lobbed shells over open sights into the trees. They killed the partisans hidden there and opened the way for the armored vehicles. Then, the armored cars and half-tracks surged forward and sprayed gunfire wildly into the trees.
Surprise, the sudden gunfire and the violence of the attack pulled it off. One of the Pumas blew up when it was hit by a Panzerfaust. A half-track got hung up on a treestump and was grenaded to death but the other vehicles got out. They headed south in a straggling column, determined only to get clear of the death trap that had destroyed their unit.
Behind them, ski-troops and partisans watched them burst out of the trees and run. Some felt tempted to cheer but it was neither the time nor the place. The partisans had lost a lot of their people in this battle. The rest of the bands would have to disperse and hide for the Germans would surely want revenge.
Circling overhead, Quayle saw the flurry of explosions. The German column erupted from the woods and headed for the road leading south. Night Mare had already set off back to base, her guns almost empty and her fuel tanks running dry. Quayle reckoned he had enough 23mm ammunition left for one quick pass then he too would have to head home. It was broad daylight and no time for Black Widows to be up. He swung the big fighter over, dropped the nose and made his run. The vehicles filled his gunsight and he pressed the firing button, seeing the red-orange tracers streak out to hit the center halftrack. Then, his guns ran dry and he pulled out of the dive, setting course for home. It was definitely past his bed-time.
Captain Lang saw the half-track lurch off the dirt track and topple into a ditch. It was already burning, its engine compartment gouted black smoke. In a few seconds, the fire would spread and the vehicle would explode.
“Stop! Now!” His command was definitive, unanswerable and the driver of the self-propelled gun responded instantly. The gun stopped dead, rocking on its suspension, so sharply that the gun behind was barely able to avoid colliding with it. By the time the column had stopped, Lang had grabbed a pry-bar and was running over to the ditched vehicle. He didn’t bother with the driver’s compartment. It was already shot up and on fire. There was no hope for the driver. But there was hope for the men in the back.
The door in the rear was jammed. Lang had expected that. He rammed the pry-bar into the crack between the frame and the door and started to heave. He felt his face reddening from the heat, could smell his eyebrows singing but the door would not shift. Then, another man added his weight to the bar and the door finally sprung open. Lang jumped inside, the smoke making his eyes water. A man was sprawled on the floor by the rear hatch. Lang seized him under the arms and dragged him out. It was Sergeant Heim, burned, unconscious and hit by fragments from the armor but still alive. The other men threw snow over him to put out the smoldering greatcoat wrapped around him.
Lang heard the whumph behind him as the fuel tank on the half-track exploded. The whole vehicle burned, an orange ball spread underneath it as the blazing fuel ran aft. He didn’t think, he didn’t even wonder what to do. He ignored a cry of ‘stop’ from somebody and plunged back into the burning rear compartment of the wrecked halftrack. He had his arm up to give his eyes some protection, but he could feel his skin tightening and cracking as the fire started to do its work. In his mind was the picture of a pig roasting on a spit at one of the staff college rides and in his mind, the pig had his face. He stumbled over the other figure in the back of the half-track, and reached out with one hand to grab Colonel Asbach by the collar.