Lieutenant
Ellison gave two curt knocks on the door. When the reply came from inside, he
entered the room. He saw the usual staff of adjutants, clerks, and other
logistical workers bringing together various bits of information. Standing over a map, he saw Captain Marsh, of
Tango Company, and Master Sergeant Springfield. Something had gone wrong.
“Lieutenant,
come in. There’s a situation, arising
from a recon mission into the Axis flank. A Wildfire has become disabled in the
ruins of a building near Central Park. This Wildfire is carrying sensitive
information, vital to our operations in that region. We need you to retrieve
the information and, if possible, get the Wildfire and its pilot to safety.”
Captain Marsh looked up from the map. “You’ll be behind enemy lines on this
one, Lieutenant. We are expecting casualties. Do you have any questions?”
Lieutenant
Ellison looked back down at the map. He had been in Zverograd for a few weeks
now, and it has been a hard fight for every inch of ground. The men were
stretched as thin as their lines, but they knew their jobs. “No, sir. When do
we go?”
“04:00
hours. You should be able to reach the Wildfire and be out of there right as
the Sun is rising. You’ll be entering from the East, and will have the morning
light to provide a measure of cover.”
03:48
The
elements of 2nd Platoon came around a corner and spotted the hulk of
a Wildfire light walker in the ruins of a building. “There it is,
gentlemen. Stay sharp, this is Gerry’s
back yard.” They had been moving from building to building, staying in the
shadows as they made their way up. They had met with little resistance until
now. As they started to close in on the Wildfire, the buildings around them
opened up and fire spewed out. It was a textbook ambush, and they were all
sorts of screwed.
Master
Sergeant Springfield’s Heavy Ranger Attack Squad took some of the first hits,
with only minor wounds. Rockets and shrapnel exploded all around them and drove
them out of their ruins, now flanked on two sides by Heavy Flak and Laser
Grenadiers, and force them to make a fast jump towards the Wildfire. The rapid
pounding of machine guns and the measured pops of a sniper rifle started to
tear into the Heavy Rangers. Pinned down in the building, it was all they could
do to keep the incoming fire from hitting them. The Wildfire’s pilot pulled up
hard on his immobilized walker, and sent some suppressing fire into the upper
floors of a building, having seen a muzzle flash from a sniper rifle, but he
was unable to do much as beams of like flashed out of yet another building and
exploded the walker’s power cells. Lieutenant Ellison’s units made it into the
ruins as the walker lit up the night sky. Their entire purpose for being here
just went up in a cloud of greasy smoke.
An Axis
light walker, Heinrich class, had moved in to flank the forces that had made it
to the Wildfire. In an effort to bring their bazooka into the fight, Sergeant
Jacob Thornton’s Combat Ranger squad was moving to support them. They were
trailing right behind Lieutenant Ellison’s Attack Squad when hot metal exploded
out of the building to their right. In a volley of fire, his entire squad was
cut down. Caught out in the open, there was little Thornton could do but hit
the dirt. The only problem was that the dirt was flat and in the open. He heard
a fallback order given and saw Master Sergeant Springfield start to clear a way
open to the south. Lieutenant Ellison
and his squad ran interference against whoever was in the building that had
shredded his squad. He started to shout for them to stop, but it was too late.
As they ran into the building, ready with their flamethrowers, tracers rushed
out to meet them. At least they had expected them and it seemed that their
injuries were mostly minimal.
The
orders had been issued, 2nd Platoon was falling back. The Heavy
Ranger Assault Squad came to pick up Sergeant Thornton and give him some cover
on his way out, but the losses were heavy. The Wildfire was lost, whatever
information it carried was lost, Sergeant Thornton’s squad was lost, and Master
Sergeant Springfield’s Heavy Ranger Attack Squad was lost. Ultimately, the
information the Wildfire pilot was carrying would have allowed the Allies to
hold on to Market Square, but with Foxtrot Company’s 2nd Platoon
broken, there was little the Allies could do to hold it. But it was not the
heavy casualties, or even the loss of ground so hard-fought to win that broke
the spirit of the 2nd Platoon; it was the knowledge that they were
ambushed so soundly, and had not even wounded a single Axis soldier in the
fight.
That
hurt.
Battle Stats:
Scenario: Symbolic Victory
Deployment: FUBAR
Conditions: None
Winner: Axis
Axis losses: None
Allied losses: Gunners Squad, Grim Reapers Squad, Hell Boys
Squad, Wildfire Walker
Allies repurchased Hell Boys Squad.
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