Screaming Eagles

^TWENTY GRILLO

The bullets stopped flying. Grillo and the Sergeant rolled into a hole that was already occupied by specialist Robinson.

Nat had been more or less friendly with Grillo when he’d arrived with his pre-combat swagger intact. He’d told Grillo to stop looking so damn cocky, because the Germans could sense new guys. Thanks to seeing action right away, the hazing hadn’t been all that bad.

Nat Robinson didn’t look so good now. He clutched his belly, and even through his combat jacket, Grillo saw a lot of blood.

“Medic!” he screamed.

Sarge leaned over Robinson and tried to look at the wound.

“It’s bad, Sarge. I got hit bad,” Robinson said.

“Can you move? We’re heading for the Alamo,” Sergeant Pierce said.

“I can move. Gotta help me though, Sarge.”

Pierce got his arm under Robinson and struggled to get the man on his feet.

“Here they come,” Grillo said.

The Krauts advanced on their location. A handful of them had broken from the trees, and came at their location. They carried guns, but thankfully weren’t shooting yet. To Grillo, it seemed like the Krauts were running away from their own army.

“Grab my Thompson and shoot them. Keep us covered while I get Robinson out of this hole. Then we’re running again. Got it?”

“Got it,” Grillo said.

He picked up the sub-machine gun. Pierce handed him a pair of magazines and then, together, the three of them struggled toward the Alamo.

Bullets sprayed out of the trees as the Germans advanced. A burp gun sounded from somewhere to the east. Grillo wanted to bury himself in this damn foxhole and wait out the rest of winter like a bear. Just let the Germans do their thing, let them take this ground. He’d come up in the spring ready to fight. The thought brought a hysterical smile to his face.

A BAR opened up and a couple of Germans dropped, but that only urged the others on. Grillo tucked the stock of the machine gun next to his ribs—thankfully not on the side where he’d been wounded—and fired at the mass.

Sergeant Pierce moved, Robinson helping the man to the rear line.

“Come on Sarge, we got ya covered,” one of the men in the company yelled, and backed up his words by shooting a German soldier in the chest. The man dropped, but then struggled to his feet again.

“These guys wearing some kind of armor or something? Second one I zeroed in on who got right back up,” the guy said.

There were more white suits in the trees. Many more. They wove between trees and over stumps and mortar holes. They carried gear that included potato mashers, rifles and pistols.

A pair of soldiers joined Grillo and Pierce to help cover the retreat. Grillo fired until his weapon ran empty and he hastily reloaded. He kept moving. It was only later that he thought to ask the same question that had been troubling him earlier.

“Why aren’t the new fellas shooting back?”

“Shit if I know. Maybe they ran out of ammunition,” Sarge said, and urged the men on.

SERGEANT PIERCE EXPECTED a bullet to punch into him at any second. He’d grown used to the feeling of always being in someone’s sights, but it was not a pleasant feeling. As a Private first class, he’d fought at Normandy and advanced quickly through the ranks, thanks in large part to his ability to be lucky and not get shot.

He’d led an assault on a pill box that had decimated his squad, and managed to toss a grenade into the portal, eliminating the threat. That night he’d slept in the same spot, and tried to ignore the bloodstains on the wall and the smell of death and burned off explosives.

Now he was stuck in the Ardennes forest with just over five hundred other men, and he’d been asked to delay the Krauts for as long as possible. He was afraid that would only be a few hours at best.

Lines collapsed all around him, and he feared that he’d be surrounded, so with too many casualties, he’d made the hard decision to withdraw and regroup. Captain Taylor would understand. The man trusted his company commanders to make calls like this.

Something punched Pierce in the leg and made him stumble. He recovered and kept going, even though inside he was screaming that he needed to get to cover. He spun and fired again, then stumbled on his bad leg. Robinson hung around his neck and didn’t let go.

“You hit Sarge?” Robinson asked.

“You worry about you. Keep your hand on that wound and I’ll get us out of here.” Pierce replied.

Something was wrong—very wrong.

His limb wasn’t responding the way it should, but he didn’t have time to inspect the wound. Just press on, keep going, shoot back, and for god’s sake, don’t stop running and don’t let go of Robinson.

They were everywhere!

White and black clothed figures swarmed out of the woods and came at them. A BAR fired to his left and dropped some of the Krauts, but was quickly silenced.

Then it boomed again, from a new location.

The Germans weren’t even firing. They were just coming en masse.