Strike Hard, Strike Deep

  By Todd McLeod & Eric Meyer

  BOOK 8 OF THE HEROES OF THE 82ND AIRBORNE SERIES

  SHORT FICTION

  Copyright 2021 by Todd McLeod & Eric Meyer

  Published by Swordworks Books

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

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  Chapter One

  They clustered around the fire, hands outstretched trying to get some warmth into their bodies. The men of 1st Platoon, 82nd Airborne Division, had seen six months of hard fighting, ever since they parachuted into Normandy on the eve of D-Day. They fought a tenacious, bitter enemy, who’d defended every foot of ground with ruthless reluctance to give way. They’d hit back with machine guns, with well-prepared ambushes, and with armor. Yet the Allies had beat them back at every turn. Until they reached the Ardennes forest on the edge of the border with Germany, and the fighting became more intense. They’d beaten the enemy's attempt to stage a stealthy counterattack in the dark gloom of the dark, dripping forest. Yet the Germans were still out there, bitterly determined to stop the Allies from advancing another step. The American generals didn’t agree, and their troops continued pressing east.

  Harry Byrd shivered and edged closer to the blazing woodpile. He was pale-skinned and inclined to a degree of flab. Unusual for an Airborne trooper, as was his loathing of the outdoors. Yet underneath the flab lay solid muscle. At nearly six feet, he was tall, with blonde hair, a throwback to his Viking ancestors, like his piercing blue eyes.

  “It’s New Year’s Eve, so you’d think they’d give us a break. Instead, they’re sending us back into action in the next couple of days.”

  His buddy Ray Cassidy wasn’t concerned about the cold. A direct opposite to Byrd, he was an outdoorsman, shorter than the other man, wiry trooper, and leathery. Before the Army, he’d spent every spare moment in the outdoors. Indulging his passion for hunting, frequently tracking an animal for hours before he lined up the perfect shot. In the mountains, the bitter cold was just part of the routine. He frowned a reply. “Harry, they’re not in the business of giving their troops a break. Why would they, we’re fighting a war?”

  He snorted. “After what we went through in the Ardennes, we need some R&R. The Division lost a lot of men, and for a while, it was touch and go. We’re exhausted, yet they leave us here to freeze our butts off. Now they’re talking about a renewed assault. Jesus!”

  The platoon sergeant, John Logan, strolled over, and men sat up and took notice. He was the glue that held the platoon together. A leathery vet, hard and immensely strong, he didn’t take shit from anybody. And that included both officers and men. “Private Byrd, those troops we tangled with aren’t beaten. Headquarters reckons most of their soldiers have pulled back and dug into new defensive positions east of the forest. That’s half the 9th SS Panzer Division and the remnants of the 62nd Volksgrenadiers. They’re still a powerful force.”

  Harry reacted angrily. “They should bomb the bastards, save us the trouble.”

  “The cloud base is too low for air operations. It’s been like that for weeks.”

  “I don’t give a shit about the cloud base. If they can’t bomb them they should use artillery.”

  “They haven’t pinpointed their exact positions, that’s why they’re sending in the 82nd. Our battalion, the 507th, will hit them from the south, and the 551st from the north. A pincer attack, and we’ll have support from other infantry and armored units, as well as artillery. We won’t be here much longer, the attack is planned for the 3rd of January.”

  “That’s two days after New Year’s Day. Sarge, I need a vacation. Someplace warm.”

  “You’ll get warm enough when the attack starts.”

  They glanced up as Lieutenant Bond, the platoon commander, appeared. He’d been wounded during the fight for the Ardennes, and was limping slightly, but refused to stand down while there was still fighting to be done. When he first arrived he’d been useless. Weak-willed, and weak-minded. The battle in the forest had changed him, and his indecision had all but disappeared, to be replaced by a new, pugnacious, and aggressive platoon leader.

  “Sergeant Logan, we’re moving to new positions at dawn tomorrow. Make sure they’re ready, and they can draw rations and ammunition for two days.”

  Every head jerked around to stare at Bond. Logan grunted, “Lt, they said the attack was scheduled for the 3rd. It’s New Year, the men were looking forward to standing down for a couple of days.”

  “They can forget it. They asked for a platoon to scout forward to locate the enemy positions, and I offered them our services.” They were too dumbstruck. “That’s all, get them ready for leave at dawn.”

  He stalked away, and Harry shook his head in disbelief. “They can’t do this.”

  “They just did,” Logan grated. “You and Cassidy, stop moaning and get on your feet. You want to be warm, so you can get over to the quartermaster, and grab those supplies. That’ll get the circulation moving.”

  Through the evening they distributed the supplies, and as the encampment went quiet, every man tried to get some sleep. To find us someplace that wasn’t snow-covered or wet, and preferably less cold than the Arctic. Snow was still falling, and when they dug foxholes they filled with snow, which leached out the men’s body heat and the snow turned to wet slush. Cassidy managed to keep their asses dry. They’d brought up a squadron of Sherman tanks and parked them one hundred yards away. He led the way back along the track, and they climbed onto the sloping rear hull of the nearest Sherman and found the armor was still warm with heat from the engine. They settled down for an uncomfortable night, but at least it was warm. And dry.

  He started to doze and he heard Harry something about enemy aircraft.

  “What was that? I’m trying to get to sleep.”

  “I said it’s good they can’t fly aircraft in this weather. It’s the same for the Krauts, so we don’t have to worry about some Messerschmitt shooting the shit out of us.”

  “You’re right, yeah, that’s good. Now pipe down and let me get some sleep.”

  He started to doze again, but his eyes flicked open when he heard the roar of engines overhead. Two engines and he looked up into the night sky. He saw stars, which meant a patch of cloud had cleared, and he was in time to see the dark shadows of two aircraft swoop in from the east, skimming the treetops. A second later flames belched from cannon and machine guns in the wings, and bullets stitched into the ground and tore into the soldiers down around the fire.

  Cassidy and Byrd watched the carnage helplessly, and it had been a mistake to light a fire, assuming it’d be hidden by thick, low cloud. Now it was too late, and men scattered into the forest to escape the gunfire. Others shot back at the dark silhouettes, aiming for the gun flashes, in a doomed attempt to shoot the attacker down. The hatch of the Sherman opened, a soldier climbed out and took hold of the .50 caliber Browning mounted on the turret, pointed the barrel upward, and joined in loosing a long stream of lead.

  Every man on the ground was firing rifles and machine guns, but it was the Brownings mounted on the Shermans that scored the hit. The .50 caliber shells tore into the aircraft, causing it to lose power and catch fire. The pilot tried to bank away, but he was flying too low, and he flew into the trees. The wings cartwheeled over and over until the aircraft became a ball of fire, igniting the trees for a fifty-yard radius.

  The pilot of the second aircraft, unnerved by the intense ground, flew away. Cassidy was already on his feet, running to help the wounded, with Byrd behind him. They encountered a scene of carnage, men groaning in agony, and a half-dozen bodies lifeless on the ground. Sergeant Logan was shouting for medics, while Bond stared in disbelief, numbed with shock.

  “We lost half the platoon! Half the men, I don’t believe it. Logan, the moment you get the casualties cleared, I want a roll call, see what we have left.”

  “Roger that, Lt. We were already understrength, and my guess is we’ll end up with around a dozen men.” He grimaced. “Not enough.”

  He hurried away to help a man bleeding profusely from a bullet that’d torn a hole in his belly. Gently lifting him onto a gurney, and he made sure they were careful when they carried him away. More men appeared, slowly recovering from the shock of the sudden a ttack, and he took out a pencil and pad to start taking names. His estimate had been on the button, they had a total of twelve men on the platoon strength.

  He gave the grim news to Bond. “I guess they’ll have to find a replacement platoon to carry out the reconnaissance.”

  He gave him a surprised look. “No, Sergeant, that’s not the way it works. This changes nothing. Remember, it’s just a recce patrol, we’re not aiming to get into a fight.”

  He looked dubious. “It doesn’t always work out that way, Lt.”

  Hos expression darkened. “Then make it work. Nothing’s changed, we leave at dawn, 07.00.”

  Harry was listening, and he muttered, “Shit.”

  They didn’t expect further air attacks. The Jerries were notoriously short of fuel, and they were also short of aircraft and pilots since the USAF and the RAF shot them down in huge numbers. The Shermans pulled out in case the surviving enemy aircraft had spotted them and called in an artillery strike, so for the few remaining hours, they had to swap their warm, steel deck for a damp, freezing foxhole.

  There was more bad news. Company HQ sent orders for them to jump off even earlier, and at 04.00 Logan was rousting them from their beds and kicking them into action. They ate a cold breakfast of stale bread and tinned spam that left them hungry, and even the coffee tasted like engine oil. Tired and disgruntled, they left the camp and began walking east. It was still dark, and Bond insisted they stay on the track rather than risk getting lost in the thick woods.

  They walked for an hour and saw nothing. The Lieutenant looked puzzled and he called for the Sarge to join him. “Much further and we’ll be out of the forest and crossing the border into Luxembourg. I’m thinking they may have retreated, headed back to Germany. Maybe it’s all over.”

  “They’re Krauts, Lt. They haven’t shown any inclination to retreat, not so far.”

  He looked unsure. As if the attack during the night and the destruction of half his platoon had moved a switch in his brain as if the old, indecisive, and nervous Lieutenant Bond had resurfaced. “We need to find out. It’ll be light in less than an hour, tell Cassidy and Byrd to scout ahead for another mile and report back.”

  “Lieutenant, isn’t time you gave the shit assignments to some other men?”

  He scowled. “Give the order, Sergeant. And tell them to take the BAR along just in case they run into the enemy.”

  “The Browning Automatic Rifle? A .50 caliber machine gun will slow them down.”

  “I don’t give a shit.”

  “Yessir.”

  He swung around, and they were close enough to have heard. Ray grunted, “We’re on it, Sarge.”

  He led the way with Harry behind carrying, the BAR. He didn’t complain about the extra weight, pointing out the extra firepower would be worthwhile if they hit trouble. Cassidy watched and listened for any sight or sound of the enemy. The rattle of metal equipment, a shouted order, a curse, or the tramp of jackboots. He heard nothing, and he began to think maybe the Lieutenant was right, they’d packed up and left. He started to relax as they plodded forward until he recalled the night before when they’d lost half the platoon to an unexpected air attack. They hadn’t given up and gone home.

  Harry started to shout a question, but he held up a hand to stop him. “We need to be more careful, these woods could be full of Germans.”

  “Right. How far do we…”

  He stopped speaking, and both men dived to the ground, rolling off the track as a storm of gunfire tore through the air overhead, bullets buzzing and whining like angry hornets. They crawled further from the track, hugging the ground and burrowing through the snow until they took cover in a clump of thick trees.

  “We’re in trouble,” Cassidy grunted. “They’ll be looking for us, and they’ll follow our track in the snow. When they come, our only chance is to give them a taste of the Browning.”

  “How many do you reckon?”

  He peered through the trees, and they were all around them. Running forward in short rushes, dropping to the ground and covering other soldiers as they leapfrogged past them. “Too many. Twenty-five or thirty.”

  “Jesus. We should get out of here.”

  “Yeah.” He looked at the route they’d followed, and the enemy had blocked the way back. “Harry, they’ve cut us off. We can’t go back.”

  “What do we do?”

  “Kill the bastards, that’s all we can do.” All of a sudden the enemy charged, men sprinting toward them, blazing away with rifles and machine pistols. “Shit, there’s a lot of them to kill.”

  Chapter Two

  Harry pulled the butt of the Browning tight into his shoulder, one eye staring along the barrel, squinting through the iron sights. Waiting until they were close, real close. Ray fired first, his Garand spitting out bullets, peppering the oncoming troops, but in the darkness and dense tree cover, he didn’t hit much. Everything changed when Harry opened up with the BAR, scything volleys of bullets from the forty-round box magazine into the multitude of targets. As fast as a magazine emptied he snatched another from his pack.

  It wasn’t enough. The trees were too thick, the darkness too intense, and the enemy came closer. Clouds of 9mm bullets fired from machine pistols enveloped them. They were about to overrun them, and their corpses would lie rotting in the damp, dripping forest. Except for the BAR. Harry Byrd emptied another magazine, and Ray dropped his rifle to assist and load a fresh magazine in the precious machine gun. He fired again and had almost emptied the replacement magazine when the firing intensified. More soldiers had arrived, and he nudged Harry to fall back.

  “We need to move deeper into the forest.”

  “What difference does it make, we’re done?”

  “Do it, Harry. I’ll be right behind you.”

  He ran, and after the first few yards floundered into a patch of snow that hid a deep gully. He dropped the BAR and fell, with a loud shout of alarm, and sank out of sight.

  Cassidy didn’t have a clue what’d happened to him and didn’t have time to work it out. He snatched up the Browning and resumed firing. Germans dived for cover, a man shouted an order, and astoundingly the incoming fire slacked. It was only at the last moment he saw a faint reflection in the distance. The waning moon was enough to throw light onto the lens of a telescopic sight, and the weapon whipcracked as it fired a shot that narrowly missed his helmeted head, ricocheting off the breach of the Browning, and the bullet tore into his side.

  Agony knifed through him, but he didn’t have time to favor his wound. He went to retrieve the machine gun and found the bullet had put a deep dent in the breach, making it unusable. If he stayed here, the sniper would fire again, and he went after Harry. Diving into the snow-covered gully in which he’d disappeared and his boots skidded off the slippery surface, so he was sliding down the bed of a frozen stream. The bed was solid ice, and he slid downward, through a narrow tunnel that he assumed Harry had created when he fell. He was beginning to think he’d got clear, when his webbing snagged on a tree root, pulling him to an abrupt stop. He struggled to free himself and stopped as a spade sliced through the snow close to his neck. The sharpened edge of the implement was within inches of decapitating him. The spade moved, clearing a hole through the snow above him. The beam of a flashlight shone into the dark space, and a guttural voice shouted, “Raus!”

  He understood a few phrases in German. ‘Get out,’ was one He also recognized the muzzle of a German rifle, the iconic Mauser KAR98. Held by a soldier wearing white snow camouflage, and the muzzle was pointed at the center of his chest. The soldier with the spade worked to widen the hole, and another rifle pointed down at him. A huge, hairy hand reached down, grabbed hold of his webbing, freed him from the tree root, and hauled him out into the open.

  He was lying on his back in the snow, looking up at a crowd of grinning Germans. They babbled in their language, and he failed to understand, until the guy who’d dragged him out, a monster who had to be seven feet tall, knelt close to him. To his surprise, the guy was an officer, and his rank tabs identified him as a captain.

 

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