Based on the ABC Television Series:
Combat!
Story Copyright 2003 by Terry Pierce
They never had a chance.
Outnumbered, exhausted, and
outflanked, the Americans were flushed from the woods like quail. They stumbled onto a wide field blanketed by
drifts of new-fallen snow as the enemy closed in at their backs. A sunken road lay a few hundred yards ahead,
its sloping sides offering a breastworks suited to a
last line of defense. Slipping, falling,
struggling back up, the GIs tried desperately to reach
it.
The Germans reached the edge
of the forest and turned the field into a bloodbath.
The first American to be hit
staggered, dropped his M1, and fell to his knees. Gushing blood from a hole in his neck, he
tore at his collar, frantic to breathe.
A soldier nearby grabbed the wounded man’s arm while shouting at him to
get up. Before the GI could react,
another volley of shots cut both men down.
The other Americans returned
fire. A machinegun roared and bullets
chased them in jagged lines kicking up clouds of snow. Tracers zipped past, piercing the air like
glowing javelins. Within seconds,
another GI fell.
He clamped a hand over the
gaping hole in his right thigh and his severed artery. Gasping for air, he yanked open his first aid
pouch. The slush around him turned dark
red as he unwrapped and tried to flap open a bandage. More bullets snapped by his ears, and
startled, he dropped it. He clawed for
the wet gauze, beginning to see double, and finally panicking, howled for
help.
A soldier farther ahead
heard the agonized cry. Turning, he saw
the bleeding man collapse. He changed
directions, running serpentine, firing his M1 from the hip. As he got close to his squad mate, the burst
from a Schmeisser caught him full in the chest. Knocked backward off his feet, he slid into a
snowdrift, a crumpled, khaki heap.
His commander saw the
rifleman’s death a split second before being shot in the face. The bullet slammed into his right cheek,
snapped his head sideways, and exited his mouth. Losing his submachine gun, he fell to his hands
and knees. Blood splattered the snow
beneath him as he wavered, choking on his severed tongue, but he collected
himself, drew his sidearm, and raised his head.
The Germans watched incredulously as the lone American struggled to
stand. It wasn’t until he was upright
and swinging the gun around toward them, that they finished him off.
Silence settled over the
landscape and not a single American moved.
Blood collected around the bodies in steaming pools that stained the
killing field red. Rushing forward to descend
like vultures on the corpses, the Germans pushed and shoved each other,
stripping the dead of cigarettes, gloves, and boots.
Less than a quarter of a
mile away, Saunders’ squad stood frozen in place. The snow sifting between the men and the
shadowy evergreens was the only buffer between safety and discovery by the
enemy. For a moment, no one spoke in the
sudden ominous silence. Then as another
barrage started up in the distance, Littlejohn uneasily shuffled his feet.
“Who
else you figure is out here?” he whispered.
“You
mean besides Krauts?” Kirby whispered back.
Littlejohn
squinted sideways. “Of course that’s who
I mean.”
“Must
be a small unit,” Doc said, cupping a hand over his red nose. “I didn’t hear more’n
a couple automatics and a few M1s.”
“That’s
what I heard too,” Littlejohn agreed.
“What
do you think, Sarge?” Doc asked.
“I
don’t know…” Saunders murmured, going
back to his compass and trying to get an azimuth. He leveled it and peered at its radiolite markers. “Could be a gun crew that got overrun…some GIs from the
roadblock…another patrol.” He saw
the squad was still on course and, relieved, snapped the compass shut.
“Whattaya think happened to ‘em?”
Littlejohn asked, his voice muffled by the coat collar
buttoned up around his throat.
“They
got hit,” Kirby said. “And by a big
Kraut unit that’s pretty close.”
“Then
get going,” Saunders said, looking up, “before we get hit by it too.”
He signaled Caje keeping watch farther away, and the scout waved,
stepped out from cover, and pointed the men north.
They trudged forward in a
loose diamond formation, Saunders limping along at the rear. He worried about the late hour and night
falling so early this time of year. If
any more time was wasted dodging German patrols, waiting for bigger units to
pass, or just trying to walk on the slippery mix of snow, moss, and pine
needles, the squad could get caught in the woods after dark.
He stumbled over a root and,
thrown off balance, grabbed at a nearby fir.
Latching onto a branch, he pulled a shower of snow down on him. A heavy clump hit his back and, biting off an
oath, he fell to his hands and knees.
Endless, he thought. It was endless. The cold. The worries. The misery.
He used to look forward to
weather like this a few years ago. Sledding, ice skating, getting into snowball fights...
Snowball fights.
He wiped his face and sucked
in some air, nauseated at the thought. Fighting, combat, battling on and on…to hell with heavenly peace. He felt around for the Thompson and, blinking
snow from his eyes, thought grimly of all the latrine rumors he’d heard
recently…but known better than to believe.
Home for
Christmas. The whole VIII Corps. First to Berlin, then
shipped stateside in a couple of weeks.
Hell, he’d be glad just to
get out of these woods.
He pushed up, clenching his
teeth as pain flared in his calves, and staggered to his feet. He leaned against the tree trunk and adjusted
his helmet. Squinting at Doc’s bloody coat
just disappearing through the next row of trees, he brushed off his arms,
pushed his hair out of his eyes, and lurched forward to catch up.
Doc was plodding along
behind Littlejohn, who was preoccupied with thoughts of the Dasburg-Bastogne
Highway. Concerned that Krauts would be
on it, Littlejohn fingered one of the two clips of ammunition Caje had shared.
Eventually, he increased his pace, sidled in closer to Kirby, and in a
low voice asked, “Do you figure the Krauts’ve got
that bridge up yet?”
Kirby moved his eyes from
the firs on his right back to those on his left. “If they do, I’m thumbin’
a ride back to town.”
“On what? A panzer?”
“C’mon,
Littlejohn.” Kirby turned his head. “On the first GI wheels I see.”
“Then you think no matter
where the Kraut tanks are, our guys’ll
be pulling out of Marnach?”
Kirby shrugged and looked
back into the forest. “If
the new CO’s got any sense.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, with all the tanks
the Krauts got across that river…”
“Unless they’re already on
this side,” Littlejohn interjected.
“…the company’ll
hafta pull back.”
Kirby swept out a hand as if to dismiss Littlejohn’s pessimism. “It can’t hold off all that Kraut armor we
heard. Not without some help from ours
anyway. So if Captain Elsbourne ain’t buckin’ for a promotion, he’ll have our guys advancin’ to the rear.
“But what if the colonel’s
got support moving up?”
“So what if he does?”
“We’re still attached to the
110th , right?”
Kirby frowned.
“If the reserve’s trucking
forward,” Littlejohn went on, “the company’ll stay
put. And that means Sarge’ll
probably get us a lift right back to Marnach.”
Kirby’s eyebrows shot
up. “But the whole Kraut army’s on the
move! What’s a few Bloody Bucket guys
and one lousy rifle company at half strength gonna
do? The brass’d
be nuts to make us try to hold on to that burg.”
“Well, that’s what they
wanted Fox Company to do last month when it was attached to the 112th. Those guys didn’t have anything in Schmidt
except for the couple bazookas and mortars they dragged though the ravine at
their backs. And you heard what happened
when the Krauts moved in their tank reinforcements; the 112th got
clobbered. Then when it fell back to Kommerscheidt, it got clobbered there too. If it hadn’t have been for some of the fellas bugging out, nobody would’ve made it back to Vossenack.”
Kirby said nothing, but
gritted his teeth.
Littlejohn, oblivious, went
on.
“And don’t forget we were
supposed to take that road junction at Rafflesbrand,
even though the Krauts had the whole place mined…plus all those bunkers…boy,
I’ll bet I haven’t seen that much concertina wire since we hit Omaha…”
“Littlejohn, do me a favor,
will you?” Kirby interrupted.
“Sure,
Kirby. What is it?”
“Drop back and cheer up
Doc.”
Surprised, Littlejohn
halted.
Grumbling, Kirby trudged on.
Doc
approached and, glancing Littlejohn’s way, smiled encouragement as he continued
past. Littlejohn watched the medic’s back a moment,
then shrugged, hefted his rifle, and double timed to catch up. When Doc looked his way a second time,
Littlejohn asked, “Do you figure the Krauts’ve got
that bridge up yet?”
Caje, alone in front of the
group, peered carefully into the gray and white maze of trees. Looking for snipers, trip wires, and
Grenadiers wearing winter camouflage, he strained his eyes to catch anything
out of the ordinary in the bleak December light. He spotted a patch of ice and went around it,
knowing better than to risk cracking through the frozen puddle and warning the
enemy of his presence. Another
ambush…another round of being cornered and outnumbered, and…
Caje pushed away the thought and
ground the heel of his hand into the bandage on his face, trying to relieve the
itchiness underneath. He wondered if
Germans were on the highway. If they
were, it would mean keeping to the woods.
Plus even more hills to climb.
And with the way his…
Caje shook his head. So much for that smiling
and cheerfully accepting your lot in life crap.
He shifted his rifle to cope
with its weight. It seemed to be getting
heavier by the minute. So was his wet,
mud-caked overcoat. He glanced up at the
icicles forming on the brim of his helmet and, pulling his head lower into his
collar, wondered how things could possibly get worse.
McCall suddenly loomed in
his thoughts, and Caje knew exactly how things could
get worse. McCall had been alive this morning, bumming cigarettes, baiting
Kirby, griping about going out on another patrol. Now he was just another bloody, frozen
corpse. And with the Kraut push going
on, KIAs might never be recovered.
McCall would lie over here and rot while his folks wondered where he
was, whether he’d suffered, why they’d never get to bury their son…
Caje shook his head again,
irritated at becoming distracted. Too much more of that kind of thinking and he’d get himself killed
next.
Besides, he thought, a
familiar dull ache in his chest, brooding over dead men never brought any back.
He forced himself to
concentrate and soon noticed a change in the pattern of trees. A clearing, a road, maybe another firebreak
was probably straight ahead. He’d seen
Saunders and the Kraut’s maps and knew that the latter lay at the base of the
next ridge. Pausing, he listened
carefully, but he couldn’t hear anything except the men behind him and far-off
explosions. Still, that didn’t mean too
much. With at least a Kraut division
sneaking up to the Our, by
now half the German army could be using whatever was up there as a route of
march.
Unsnapping the next pouch on
his cartridge belt, he gave Kirby a high sign.
Kirby signaled the rest of the squad to hold up as Caje
eased himself forward to check things out.
Keeping his breathing even, his muscles loose, Caje
carefully slid his numb fingers along his rifle’s stock. He took up the slack on its trigger and,
ready to react if so much as a pinecone dropped, darted his eyes back and
forth.
The silence was unnerving,
the footing treacherous. A sudden
plopping noise sounded, and Caje jerked sideways,
whipping his rifle to the right. He
caught sight of a nearby fir bowing under a heavy layer of snow and got out of
the way as another clump slid off its branches.
Pausing to draw in a shaky breath, he made sure nothing else was moving,
then threaded his way between more fallen pine boughs
and tangles of brush. When he neared the
edge of the woods, he drew up behind a large spruce and looked out into the
clearing.
It was the firebreak, all
right, but one wider than most.
He turned his head left,
then right, listening intently and trying to guess at the break’s width. Fog had again begun settling over everything,
its milky fingers clutching at the growing shadows drawn like curtains between
the trees. In the cloudy atmosphere, he
couldn’t see much, but things seemed quiet enough
and, easing up a bit, he pressed his fingertips into the bandage on his cheek.
He shifted his gaze to the
ridge lying beyond the firebreak.
Lurking in the mists, it loomed ominously, a nearly vertical slope
covered with more of the endless rows of evergreens planted by the local lumber
interests. But somewhere up there, the
Dasburg-Bastogne Highway slashed its way through the pines crowning its heights
and led in snaky curves to Clervaux snuggled up
against the ridge’s northwest slope.
His hopes soaring at the
thought of that, Caje glanced around again in a last
security check. Then he backtracked a
short distance and waved the other men up.
Moving his hand to his left shoulder, he probed at it gingerly until he
spotted Doc and Saunders coming forward.
He quickly dropped his hand to the M1’s receiver, and folding his palm
over it to keep its action from freezing, he watched
the squad form up.
“Whattaya
got?” Saunders asked when he drew near, his face red, his breath short.
“It’s the firebreak,” Caje answered, noticing he wasn’t the only one the day’s
hike was taking a toll on. “And it looks
clear.”
Saunders thought of the two
maps in his coat and took in what there was of a view over the scout’s
shoulder. “And beyond
that?”
“The ridge and highway, I
figure, but it’s pretty hard to see.”
“Okay. Better check it out.” Saunders reached down to tug closed the slit
Doc had cut in the left leg of his pants.
“You ready?”
Caje wondered if Saunders knew
about the blood still smeared on his face.
“As I’ll ever be.”
“Shake a leg.”
Caje turned away, pulling up his
rifle, and retraced his steps. Saunders
waved Kirby left and Littlejohn right as they followed. The two men crept farther off, down the tree
line, to get into position to provide Caje
cover. Caje
moved back toward the spruce, while Saunders and Doc hunkered behind a nearby
log.
Caje checked his cartridge belt,
making sure the flap over the last clip he had was still open. A nerve in his cheek twitched. The firebreak seemed empty, but who knew what
lay on its other side?
He’d never get used to this
job, he decided, no matter how many times he did it.
Nodding at Saunders, he took
a deep breath. Saunders, Kirby, and
Littlejohn raised their weapons as Caje pushed the
scarf mantling his head back from his face.
He exhaled slowly, checked the safety on his rifle a last time, and
stepped out into the open.
Nothing happened.
His heart drumming
quick-time, he took another step. Only
fifty feet, he told himself. The
firebreak couldn’t be more than fifty feet across. And if no one shot him while he was in it,
maybe the woods over there would be safe.
The snow became deeper, and
he lifted his legs higher to keep it out of his boots. Frozen ruts left behind by lumber carts threw
him off balance, and Caje broke out in a cold
sweat. He hoped he wouldn’t slip and
twist an ankle as he picked his way more carefully between snow-covered
lumps. By the time he reached the
halfway point, he was breathing hard and wondering if he’d ever make it across.
At least he could finally see
the weeds lining the opposite side of the firebreak…weeds that looked sculpted
in ice…ice that would make a helluva lot of noise if
he tried to push his way…
Something suddenly crashed
out of the underbrush. Caje spun to shoot it as a black whirlwind roared, throwing
his aim off. He swung the Garand in a
vicious arc to meet the streaking blur hurtling toward him, but struck and
thrown backward in a smoky red spray, he hit the ground hard, rolled once, then
slid forward into darkness.
“Doc!” In the tree line, Saunders lunged for the
medic. “Keep your head down!”
Doc sucked icy air into his
lungs, his muscles coiled for action after the explosion.
“Sarge!” It was
Kirby, his voice too high, his face white.
“Shut up!” Saunders yelled,
still holding on to Doc. “Just keep your
mouth shut!”
He shoved the medic into the
snow, threw a leg over him, and hissed, “Stay down! You got it?
Stay put right here!”
Doc trembled as adrenaline
raced through him, but closed his eyes, nodded, and forced himself to lie
still.
Saunders let him go, yanked out the maps he was carrying, and ran his eyes
over the grids.
“The firebreak’s not
marked,” he muttered. “The damned
thing’s not supposed to be mined…”
He looked up again through
frosty clouds of his breath. Maybe
Krauts were laying mines over there and Caje had seen
them so that’s why he’d twisted around like that. Or maybe the Kraut engineers were finished
and some unit had set up defensive positions on the ridge flanking the highway…
“Sarge,
Caje might be alive…” Doc tried.
“And he might be dead,”
Saunders cut him off.
He jammed the maps back into
his coat and, with his heart in his throat, crawled off Doc and toward the
spruce Caje had hidden behind. He had a fast decision to make and didn’t
have time for arguments. More Krauts
were close behind and had probably heard that blast.
He hugged the tree and
shinnied up its rough bark. Getting to
his feet, he leaned past it, but he wasn’t prepared to see Caje
lying face down, surrounded by body parts, a crumpled, bloody mess. Saunders’ knees suddenly went weak and he
snapped his eyes shut, his thoughts scattering in a whirling kaleidoscope of
panic.
“…the squad’s old men…chewed up and spit out again…whattaya
wanna do next, Sarge…whattaya wanna do next…”
What
did he want to do? Shut down. Let it all go. Walk into a bullet and put an end to this
whole damn…
“Sarge?”
But that was bullshit. He’d do what he always did. Just like the medic.
Keep it together, suck it
up. Push on and not crap out on the rest
of the men.
And the war would go on and
on and on…
“All right, Doc,” Saunders
said, opening his eyes. “I’m getting a
fix on things.”
Doc lay down again,
relieved, but watching him.
Saunders cleared his throat,
steadied himself against the tree, and looked back at Caje. The first thing to do was figure out if the
guy was KIA. The only problem was it was
damned hard to tell. Not only were the
fog and storm cutting down on visibility, but Caje’s
scarf and right arm covered his face.
And snow hid most of what was left of him, making it impossible to see
which limbs had been blown off. But
considering all the blood and the force of the blast…
Saunders stared at the
smoking black crater, wondering how a Bouncing Betty could have thrown Caje like that.
Castrate a man, take off a foot, but lob him a dozen feet? It was hard to believe anything of the guy
was left.
Saunders wondered whether to
go out there himself. Check
on the soldier…try to pull him out.
But he’d risk getting himself blown up, or even walk into a field of
fire if the Krauts were already holding the highway and dug in below it. And if Caje was
dead, it wouldn’t make sense. He should
follow the break west, see if he could bypass the Krauts, find
some other way to get the map and the rest of his men back…
The hell he would.
Saunders swung up the
Thompson and fired a burst across the firebreak. He raked the trees with half the bullets left
in the gun’s magazine. Startled, Kirby
and Littlejohn yanked up their weapons, but Saunders yelled at them to keep
their heads down. He listened to the silence,
then swung out from behind the tree and emptied the rest of the magazine.
Not so much as a Mauser answered his challenge.
He eased up and tipped back
his helmet, hopeful now the enemy wasn’t in the woods past the clearing. After throwing away the magazine, ducking
under the Thompson’s sling, and situating the gun crossways on his back, he
beckoned to Kirby.
“I’m going out there…see if
I can reach Caje.”
He reached into his coat and raised his voice, so Littlejohn could also
hear. “Give me cover, but don’t shoot
unless you see something. If I don’t
make it, get out of here and into Clervaux whatever
way you can.”
Kirby didn’t say
anything. He only watched Saunders unholster his Colt and flip off its safety. Saunders glanced at him, then over at Doc and
Littlejohn. He saw that if he'd wanted a
volunteer to go out into the firebreak, he could've had his pick.
He jacked a round into the
Colt's chamber and directed Kirby to take his spot behind the spruce. Kirby hugged the back of the tree, and he and
Littlejohn raised their rifles as Doc pushed up just high enough to see over
the logs. Saunders pulled down his
helmet again, then looking around a last time, he cautiously moved out into the
open.
In the silence, Saunders
felt their eyes on him…their eyes and a hundred gray phantoms’. He stepped carefully into the first of Caje’s footprints, flicking his gaze back and forth between
the tracks in the snow and the ridge. Lifting
his legs high enough to strain his torn calf muscles, he forced himself to
ignore the pain and to concentrate.
Move left…careful…careful…step down lightly. Watch for Krauts…find the next track…raise
the right foot. Line up the
boot…easy…easy…
He
talked himself through the first few yards of the clearing, his heart
threatening to beat right out of his chest.
He didn’t know what was worse – the slow, torturous progress he was
making or nearing what might be Caje’s corpse. But when he saw Caje
move, his heart nearly stopped.
“Caje!” he murmured in disbelief that turned instantly into
panic when he realized what would happen next.
“Don’t move!” He raised his
voice. “Stay down!”
Caje pulled his hand away from his face and groggily
lifted his head.
“Dammit,”
Saunders muttered, nearly missing his next mark. The blast had affected Caje's
hearing, and facing the ridge, the soldier couldn’t see anyone signaling him, but
if he didn’t stop moving, he’d get himself blown to bits.
Caje pushed up, wobbling on his
hands and knees. He shook his head,
coughed, and fell into a sitting position.
Dazed, he wiped some of the blood off his face and stared at his
hands.
Saunders again felt a
mixture of relief and mind-numbing terror.
Caje was alive and miraculously intact, but
could trigger a chain reaction of explosions across the firebreak. Trying to swallow past his constricted
throat, Saunders took two more quick steps forward, sweat sliding down his
ribs. He overshot one of Caje’s tracks and, hitting a rut, felt his heel slip out
from under him. Fighting wildly for
balance, he tottered forward another step and barely managed to nail the next
footprint. He paused, trembling, to
straighten up and through the hair spilling into his eyes saw Caje grope for the scarf that had slipped down his
back. Horrified, Saunders knew what
would happen next.
Caje would get the scarf over
his head, then reach for his helmet. And when he spotted the Garand lying farther
away…
“Caje!”
His heart beating like a
stopwatch ticking off his and Caje’s last few
seconds, Saunders took half a dozen more reckless steps. Seeing Caje get his
legs under him, lurch to his feet, and begin looking for the M1, Saunders came
in close, shoved the Colt into his belt, and lunged forward to grab him.
Caje swung around, and Saunders
ducked a solid right hook. He glommed
onto Caje’s shoulders before the soldier could cock
back another fist.
“Caje! It’s me -
Saunders!”
Caje blinked and staggered back.
Saunders yanked him in
close.
Caje made a choked sound, his
face pinched.
“Stay put,” Saunders
hissed. “You’re in a minefield. You understand? A minefield!”
Caje clenched his teeth, his eyes squeezed shut, and tried to absorb what the
sergeant was telling him. “A…minefield?”
“That’s right.” Saunders said, remembering Caje’s shoulder wound and moving his hands lower. “A minefield.”
“I was in a…firebreak.”
“You’re in the firebreak,”
Saunders agreed, “but it’s mined.”
Caje gulped the December air,
shuddering, and soon nodded his understanding.
“An
animal…an animal. It came right at me,” he said,
opening his eyes as a bit of color returned to his cheeks. “I think that’s what happened, anyway…”
Saunders tried to assess his
injuries. “Where’re you hit?”
Caje focused on the squad
leader. “I’m okay. Okay.
Just hit my head…after something knocked the wind out of me.”
Saunders, his gloves red because
of the blood covering the man, stared in disbelief.
Caje turned his head left, then
still wobbling, tried to look over his right shoulder. “You see it?”
He was too close to Saunders to twist around. “Behind me?”
Saunders kept a hand on each
of Caje’s arms and looked to see what he was talking
about. A torn carcass lay in the bomb
crater a few yards away, strips of hide, pieces of bone, and chunks of flesh
surrounding it. Closest to Caje lay what was left of a head and, surprised, Saunders
realized what had happened.
“A boar charged you?” he
said, stunned by the size of the animal’s tusks.
Caje was looking at the blood on
his coat. “I got this all over me…”