We were like gods once... [of mice and men]
...
John halted, quietly going to one knee and raising a hand, open palmed, then curled into a fist.
Moose and Hank stopped and also went to a knee, Moose slowly scanning the surrounding area for Germans with his BAR. Another BAR was strapped to his back as well as loose bandoliers of grenades, ammo, several satchel charges and magnetic mines. Hank marveled at the ease at which Moose carried this load, but hell, he was over six-and-a-half feet and thick as a tree, he ought to be able to carry a few things.
They had been walking for close to a couple hours, stopping and starting, Smitty ghosting out in front of them and occasionally appearing out of nowhere to signal them forward. For the last thirty minutes they had been inside the city, but moving slowly so as to not attract a sniper’s attention or step into an ambush.
So far they had avoided contact with anyone hostile, though they did come across a couple groups of Dutch civilians heading out of town who warned them that the British were taking quite a beating up near the bridge. The bridge they should be getting pretty close to by now. They had heard distant sounds of tank or artillery fire, and occasionally a little bit of small arms fire, earlier in their walk. Well, Smitty said he could hear a good bit of small arms fire as they got close to the city; his senses were unnaturally acute, and Smitty didn’t say a whole lot but when he did you had a tendency to believe him, come hell or high water. So if he said there were British .303’s, PIATs, Brens, Stens, German MP40’s, Kar98’s, or MG42’s firing in the distance, as far as the boys were concerned it was a friggin’ fact.
Smitty silently moved back to John while Moose and Hank moved up when he motioned to them from the hidden lee of a ruined building. Hank had the map out and was looking for landmarks that matched the detail of the city map Smythe gave them with the bookstore on it; his finger was on one building and he was staring directly at a tall stone tower, possibly a clock tower of some kind, ahead and to their right about two blocks. Quite a few buildings had been torn up during the fight or before; there had been some shelling of some kind recently.
“Well thar, dingdangit it looks jes like we done found us a dang ol’ landmark thar boys”, Hank whispered, apparently proud, or surprised, that he’d been able to lead them this far by his map skills alone. “What say we dingdang spread out a mite and use that thar danged ol’ tower as a point to turn up thataways toward that thar bridge?”
Smitty, lighting a smoke, was the first to reply.
“Sounds good. We’ll just do this like we planned. I’ll go a little bit ahead and get up in that tower, see what I can and signal back to you. Be careful, boys, I could’ve sworn I heard tank treads on that bridge a few minutes ago and they were German by the sound of ‘em”.
No one questioned him; actually Moose took that as a cue to hand out a few satchel charges and magnetic mines to the others. Moose casually put one in Hank’s hand like a loaf of bread, who promptly overbalanced at the unexpected weight; the mine clanged on the ground at Hank’s feet with him holding it. He grabbed it with his other hand and hefted it back up a bit shakily. Hank smiled sheepishly at the other’s startled faces and looked around for a moment before whispering, “Heh. Sorry ‘bout that. Damn, Moose, warn a dingdang feller ‘fore you start huckin’ 20 pound mines at ‘im.”
Smitty waited until Hank settled himself and then continued.
“Look, I betting the Brit’s have either withdrawn or fallen; I haven’t heard a British weapon fired in a while, which means the Krauts are probably heading down that very street soon to mop up. We need to get into position fast, but let’s be as quiet as we can. We’ll try to spread out around that tower; Moose, you’re gonna pick a covering position on the left where you can see the street, right? Hank, you take the right side and be ready to hit any armor on the flanks. John, back ‘em up and have yourself ready to move in quick to that shop if we can spot it from the tower. Sound like a plan, fellas?”
“Yeah dere, Smitty, I got ya covered, eh”, replied Moose.
“Yup. Got it”, John answered.
Hank looked up from where he was fiddling with the mine he dropped and dented, the other three looking expectantly at him.
“Um… yeah. Dingdang got it thar, partner… ‘cept all that last part, ‘bout dingdang coverin’ and movin’ and sech…”, Hank said.
Moose snorted; John shook his head and let out a sigh. Smitty just stared at Hank like Hank had suddenly grown a horn out of the middle of his forehead. Smitty’s look said he wasn’t all that alarmed about it, however wouldn’t mind pulling it off for him.
And re-attaching it.
Somewhere else.
Somewhere… uncomfortable.
Smitty could say a lot with just a look.
He took a deep breath and started, “Hank, what I…”
“Aw hell Smitty, dingdang I’s just messin’ with ya”, Hank shot back at him, grinning, as he slapped Smitty’s leg with the back of his hand. He arranged his gear and got ready to go.
John nodded at Smitty, his eyes crystal blue like a wolf’s. “Good hunting” he breathed at Smitty, and Moose couldn’t help repressing a slight shudder at the predator rasp in his voice. John smiled at them, a smile more feral than friendly, and loped off towards his position.
Smitty clapped Moose on the shoulder, grinning, and headed out like a rapid ghost, a mere shadow of color on the grey city landscape as he moved silently and swiftly towards the tower.
Hank took off in a crouching quick-walk towards where Smitty had directed him. “Meet ya up thar Bullwinkle”.
Moose just shook his head and moved off at the double towards a good covering position at the end of the street. Heck, those boys are looking forward to this. To gettin’ at the Krauts. Bunch o’ nuts, he thought as he moved his hulking frame into position.
Moose could hear the growling of distant engines as he started to peek out around a building corner next to the tower. He saw a darker shadow move in front of a third storey window of the tower that was most likely Smitty, and thought he might have seen shadows moving in the half-ruined buildings on the other side of the street. Moose caught sight of John, who motioned to him with a closed fist, made a sign for “tank” and counted “three” on his fingers. He then made the sign for infantry and motioned as if to say “a whole friggin sh*tload”. Time to get to work, Moose thought, and ran around the corner sliding behind a low wall, facing down the street towards the Arnhem bridge several blocks away.
As soon as he registered the fact that there was a Tiger and two Panzer tanks moving slowly down the street in single file several blocks away, infantry walking the sidewalks beside them, Moose was flinching away from hot-stinging lead and bits of rock as the MG42 he missed opened up on his position from across the street and a half-block away. Moose took a few quick, deep breaths, blowing them out forcefully, then gritted his teeth and rose up from behind the waist-high wall, opening up a long stuttering stream of suppression fire from his BAR. Nazis caught out in the open scattered as several of their number fell under the withering sleet of .30-06.
Their plan had been simple; Smitty would take a position in the highest building nearest the main street leading to the bridge. Moose would get into position at the end of the street, providing cover and drawing fire from the unfriendlies so Hank and John could move up the street towards the bridge, and the book store that was only a couple blocks from it. He also was going to draw out fire from any Krauts squirreled away in the buildings across the street so Smitty could pick a few choice targets. Hank and John would move up the right side, hopefully out of sight, and only engage if Smitty or Moose needed a hand.
As Smitty settled into position at the top of the tower he recalled a saying once about the best laid plans of mice and men.
…
He could see that Moose was going to be in trouble and quick. There were 3 tanks rolling down the street with at least 20 infantry providing them a screen. The opposite side of the street from Smitty, on Moose’s left, had Nazi’s crawling all over it, and several had set up nice ambush positions. On his right side, near where John and Hank were supposed to be, was a halftrack moving slowly down the alleyways, several Krauts running a scouting screen for it. I bet it’s one of those flamethrower Hanomags, thought Smitty. That’d be just our luck. They were late, and Jerry had prepared them a little surprise.
No matter, thought Smitty, we’ll manage. First things first.
Smitty brought up his scoped Springfield 1903 and immediately sighted in on an MG42 nest that was ripping lead at Moose while a couple half-squads moved quickly towards his position. A Kubelwagon with an MG34 mounted on it zoomed down the alleyway towards the street.
Smitty brought the MG42, tripod mounted with at least a three man fire team, into his scope. They had set up on the second floor of a bombed out building, and he could see movement between the shattered brick and masonry. He let out his held breath and fired, noting the spray of blood out of the gunner’s helmet as he toppled sideways and the firing stopped. Smitty heard Moose’s BAR firing, and immediately swung that way. There were four Germans moving double-time down an alley to Moose’s left, probably just out of his sight meaning to catch him on his flank.
Smitty sighted up the rearmost and fired so as not to alert his forward companions as they ran in a straight line. The man crumpled to the ground when Smitty shot him in the throat, and his companions kept moving. Then the next one’s head jerked backwards, his helmet clanging as it flew off of his head. A little high, thought Smitty as he sighted up the third German and fired. The soldier had stopped and turned when he heard the helmet, and was just looking towards the tower coiled to spring towards cover with a “where the hell did that come from?” look on his face when Smitty shot him through his gaping mouth, open to shout a warning. The leading German dove for cover through a shattered doorway before Smitty could draw a bead on him. Smitty heard more machinegun fire, and swung his Springfield back towards the action after yelling a quick warning to Moose. He hated giving away his position, but he’d hate it more if that yellow-bellied Nazi got the drop on Moose.
The loader from the MG42 nest he had fired at before had taken over and was firing. Smitty could see he was crouching more and had pulled the gun back from the exposed edge a little, and at least one more German was trying to spot where Smitty’s fire was coming from. Like that’s gonna do you any good. Man, I hate machine guns. Jeez, you’d think these b*stards could take a hint.
…
Hank moved as quiet as he could across the alley between the tower and the next building, what looked like an old church of some kind. He nearly jumped out of his skin when the relative silence was broken by the staccato ripping of a German machine gun, followed by a barrage of small arms fire. He saw John at the other end of the alley signaling back towards the end of the street, (aw crap, dingdang ol’ tanks again, Hank thought) and then as he turned to rejoin Hank a second machine gun starting raining death on him from another building.
Hank took off running behind the church and stopped. He peeked through the broken windows, and could see a tank rolling by on the street on the other side. “Dingdang that feller’s gonna give ‘em sum trouble fer sure Itellyouwhat”, he said to himself, and began to concentrate.
Metal debris in the surrounding area began sliding and flying towards Hank, and as it began to revolve around him in a rough sphere of swirling debris Hank took the two magnetic mines that Moose had given him, one in each hand, and added them to the mix. He looked towards the roof of the church, and exerting his control over the magnetic energy in the surrounding area, raised his arms out by his sides, leapt upwards with a low hum, and rose steadily off the ground.
…
John wasn’t that used to running with the ground-pounders, but he was faster than anyone he had ever met now, and could move pretty quiet also. Leaving Hank at the back of the alley, he had skulked up towards the mouth, noticed the tanks and the infantry, and signaled Moose so he wouldn’t get caught with his pants down.
No sooner than he had signaled Moose and turned, the ripping sound of a second MG42 came to him and bullets whizzed and spanged under his feet and on the wall of the alley’s mouth. Chips of stonework sprayed painfully against his skin as he bolted for better cover.
He was smart enough to realize that the MG42 had good field of fire down the alley. He juked left out of the next volley of lead’s path as it tore into the paving stones and jumped through the broken front window of a church that made up the other side of the alley from Smitty’s tower.
John was just about to breathe a sigh of relief as he landed, cat-like, on the other side of the window when he realized he just landed behind someone wearing a grey uniform whose back was to him. A Wermacht grey uniform, with a black death’s-head patch on it.
Immediately John lashed out with both hands, wrapping his arms around the soldier’s neck and calling forth the aura of killing cold almost as a reflex. The Nazi threw his head back as if to scream, but frost was forming on his tongue and teeth as John crushed his windpipe like a cardboard tube.
The soldier’s companion yelled and lowered his MP40, firing a burst at John. John quickly flung the body of the first soldier at him, bullets thudding into the half-frozen corpse, following it with blinding speed. The Nazi barely had time to swing the butt of his submachinegun at John ineffectively before the pale-eyed man was on him, grabbing both sides of his head with hands cold like death and eyes as merciful as a glacier wall. John moved the power of his killing frost differently, concentrating it, and the German’s eyes flew wide in shock, feeling his strength drain from him as his internal organs began to freeze from the inside out.
John let the body slide from his fingers and took a deep breath. Glancing out of the broken window he could see Germans firing down the street, moving, and a Panzer rumbling by right in front of him. Just as was he was reaching for a grenade or anything to use on it, he heard, more acutely felt a strange vibration, looking up to see Hank floating over the shelled-ruined roof with a spinning globe of protective metal around him and two magnetic mines orbiting his waist in the sphere of metal.
He smiled, understanding what Hank was up to, and unslung his Garand. Taking aim, he quickly began shooting the infantry to scatter them away from the clanking monstrosity in front of him as they looked up at Hank.
John just barely noticed the Hanomag pulling up on the opposite side of the church, leaving him with a Panzer on one side and a halftrack on the other. He took a quick second to peer at it through the windows of the church, wondering what was that nozzle where the machine gun was usually mounted? And why was it… burning?
“Oh damn, that can’t be good”, thought John.
…
As Hank floated past the apex of the Church’s destroyed roof, he gestured at the lead Panzer with both arms, teeth gritted in effort, squeezing his hands into clenched fists and slowly pulling them apart.
The tank responded, shaking and shuddering violently while making strange CRREEAAUUNKK noises of protesting metal. Several sections of armor crinkled and warped free from their bolts, the protective shurtzen on the left side sprang off entirely, and a hatch twisted loose from its hinges as the engine went dead. Confused exclamations in German rose muffled from the interior. Several Germans on the ground looked around in confusion, and one pointed up at Hank, incredulous eyes goggling wide and screaming in German. Hank just smiled at them and yelled down “Hey, how ya’ll doin’?”, waving amiably as he saw John shoot several of them dead while they stared at him like hics at their first country fair.
Then he watched as the Tiger coming from behind the Panzer finished leveling its main gun straight down the street, and with a deafening PHOOM!, fired. Straight down at Moose’s position.
Hank didn’t dare spare a glance to see the results; he set his mouth in a grim line and dove down towards the ground in between the tanks.
…
Meanwhile, Moose had been firing relentlessly at the horde of Nazis now popping up in windows all over the left side of the street and the ones accompanying the tanks. He’d dropped several, saw Smitty pop a few more, but they were still laying heavy down fire on him.
A couple Nazi’s sprang out close to him, charging and firing wildly with their MP40’s. The small caliber submachinegun rounds slammed all around Moose, a stream of them walking up his left side as he grunted in pain.
The Nazi’s looked at him, confused, as they saw their rounds pillow into Moose’s leg and ribcage, his skin and muscle rippling like a small stone dropped into a pond before the skin sprang back, unharmed, and the bullets fell plinking to the ground next to him.
They had only a second to contemplate this phenomena before Moose deftly turned his BAR towards them, muttering “Dammit *that* sting’s a bit, eh?”, and shot them both dead with a burst of high-caliber fire.
Moose was having a little trouble catching his breath; he had been moving very quickly, firing-reloading-firing, ducking in-and-out of cover, and several rounds from the Germans had hit their mark. While they didn’t punch big holes in him like intended, they still hurt. He thought one might have even cracked a rib, but it wasn’t enough to slow him down. Nope; as they used to say in football, he was just hitting his stride now.
The MG42 and some of the rifle fire that had been plaguing him had dropped off, thanks Smitty Moose thought, though a Kubelwagon with an MG34 mounted on it just careened around an alley and began rushing at him, machinegun spraying wildly and hitting the building behind him.
Moose was just taking aim at the Kubelwagon when he heard Smitty’s voice yell out, “Moose! Left!”
Without thinking, Moose snapped out his left hand and glanced quickly. The sweater-necks back in England had given him a little going away present before he left: A large metal contraption, an oversized brass knuckle-looking thing made of some dull whitish metal. They said it would keep him from hurting his hand if he had to hit something harder than he was.
He thought it a bit silly-looking but breathed silent thanks now; Smitty’s warning was for a lone German soldier that had flanked him. The Nazi had a panzerfaust not 30 feet away, and was just depressing the trigger as Moose spotted the Kraut, rocket screaming away from him in a cloud of smoke and flame right at Moose’s chest.
As Moose’s left hand snapped out, he felt a jarring impact to his knuckles. He had swatted the rocket out of the air to explode behind him, showering him with rocks and debris. That brass knuckle has just saved him a world of hurt. The Kubelwagon fired another burst at him, one round glancing off of his leg as the MG34 jammed with a ker-chank.
This was getting just a bit too intense for Moose. Time to even up the odds a little.
“Oh, so ya wanna play *rough* now, eh?” growled Moose, rapidly losing his patience with the Nazis. He flexed his mighty shoulders and heaved against his own form, mentally pushing against the boundaries of his own flesh, feeling the power within him light his skin on prickling fire as he felt it flood his body and expand outwards in a violent surge.
The Nazi who fired the Panzerfaust fell back on his rump in surprise, scrabbling for his rifle, muttering “Gott in Himmel… Gott in Himmel…”
The large American he was sure he had just killed had just exploded outwards in a ripple of skin and flesh and now stood before him holding a paving stone ripped from the sidewalk that was the size of a medium table-top.
He was now over *nine* feet tall.
And five feet wide.
And very, very angry.
The German scrambled, hands shaking, for his rifle, and had just flipped the safety off of it when he looked up to see the paving stone heading straight for his head and chest. He then saw nothing but a flash of light, then darkness.
Moose turned, dusting his hands, satisfied that he had taken care of *that* Nazi. He heard the three Germans in the stopped Kubelwagon, grinding its gears in front of him, screaming at each other in their panic to clear the jammed MG34. He tore a large chunk off the wall in front of him off with two massive hands. At least now he saw why those brass knuckles were so big and his uniform was special made and hung like a potato sack on him, why the Materials scientist had warned him not to tighten his bandoliers any tighter than this mark as it all stretched tightly across his much-larger body. He raised the huge chunk of stone over his head and turned towards the Kubelwagon, grinning.
The grin slid off of his face as he heard the whirring of a tank’s turrent suddenly stop.
He saw the Tiger down the street, big gun aimed right at him.
Moose flinched, snapping the chunk of wall down in front of him reflexively.
“Oh shi..”
PHOOM!
There was a tremendous impact and explosion, the Nazis in the Kubelwagon ducking for cover as bits of rock and steel rained everywhere. The form of the immense American streaked backwards from the impact to CRASH into the building facing fifteen feet behind him, which promptly fell in a shower of bricks leaving a large gaping hole.
They all cheered and looked for a new target as they turned away from the smoking crater where Moose had just been standing, one smoking and torn jump-boot the only testament that he had ever been there.
...
(be sure to check out pics from this session in my miniatures thread, link is in my sig below)
. 
