Breakthrough (The Red Gambit Series) (40 page)

Flight Lieutenant Johnny Hall and the youthful Pilot Officer Andrew
McKenzie
each had a new pilot in tow, recently arrived replacements for comrades lost since the 6th August.

Turning to port over Garstedt, enemy light anti-aircraft fire reached up at the RAF ground attack planes, filling the sky with angry metal.

The
eight
Soviet
Lavochkin f
ighters that had been tasked to overwatch Luhdorf had problems of their own
, self-
p
reservation being their only
goal,
as
twelve
Mk XVIe
Spitfires of 603 Squadron RAF harried them. 603 had been due to disband in
Scotland
but had reassembled and
returned to
Europe
the day before. Despite being configured as Lf versions for low-altitude work, the needs of the moment detailed 603 to act
as
interceptor/escort fighters for this operation.

The
Soviet
pilots had been fighting day in day out since hostilities started
,
and it showed. The fresher RAF pilots hacked three
of them
from the sky in as many minutes
,
and knocked important pieces off three more.

182’s T
yphoons were unopposed as they approached their target.

The main road bridges running west out of the town were still ruined, having not been repaired since the devastating heavy bomber attack.

The rail bridge to the south of them, and the
small bridge
two hundred
metres below that
,
were the targets for this raid.

Hall lined up the road bridge and quickly thumbed off
his RP-3 rockets, all eight completely missing the bridge and doing nothing b
ut chewing up the riverbanks,
soaking Russian anti-aircraft crews desperately serving their weapons.

To add insult to injury
,
Hall’s Typhoon took a few hits in the port wing as he turned away
, inducing a light flutter until he pulled out of his turn.

Pilot Officer Rawlings, former POW and new addition to Blue Flight
, went next. He also failed
to hit the bridge but inflicted
more than a mere soaking
on the Soviet gunners.

Two 40mm Bofors positions on the east bank were destroyed in an instant.

McKenzie
lined up his target
,
and was about to fire
,
when his line of sight was obscured by a
Soviet
fighter. Hauling hard on his stick and pushing on pedals, the young Canadian skilfully managed to avoid the Lavochkin but almost struck the pursuing Spitfire.

The swift destruction of the Russian followed
,
but his attack run was ruined and he swept back into line, his rockets still in place.

Sean Dwyer was flying his first mission, having been with 182 for only two days
since
leaving his
training
squadron
.
He lined up the target and drove in hard through the flak
,
but his
attack failed completely as he
was unable
to release his weapons, the safeties still on as fear and excitement took precedence in his mind.

His comrades were already formed up for a second sweep
,
but he was so thrown by his failure that he banked right by mistake.

The Russian M1910 Maxim was an old weapon but it was still in use in great numbers
,
as it was a reliable and effective weapon capable of
six hundred
rounds per minute. The Russians used them in a number of ways, and one particularly effective
method
was
as
the Quad AA weapon mounted on a Gaz truck or similar vehicle.

The
Soviet
39th Anti-Aircraft Division boasted a large number of these weapons, of which eight were presently sat on the main highway north of Luhdorf, waiting their turn to cross the
river by way of the damaged bridge at Roydorf
.

Dwyer had banked right and was now lined up perfectly for the
Soviet
gunners
,
who made the most of their opportunity.

The T
yphoon slowly disintegrated as scores of bullets
struck home. The armour plating kept the aircraft flying, protecting many vital parts but nine bullets were already lodged in the most vital part of the aircraft and
,
with lifeless hands on the stick
,
the smoking aircraft rolled lazily into a right hand turn and crashed into the fields two kilometres east of Luhdorf.

Blue Flight commenced their second run, as Hall strafed the flak positions around the
road bridge, successfully ripping
a gun crew to shreds with his H
ispano cannon.

Rawlings bored in and was rewarded with two hits on the bridge, either of which would have doomed the hastily repaired structure.

The remnants collapsed into the frothing water below.

McKenzie
held his rockets back, contenting himself with a short burst of cannon fire
,
before falling back into formation again, ready to attack the second target.

Flight Lieutenant Hall le
d once more, his cannon again successful, a fixed 20mm quad position, once of Luftwaffe ownership, instantly destroyed
with
those who crewed it
.

Rawlings, elated by his success, shot up the river, churning the water to
foam
with his cannon shells.
Banking left he sustained a few hits from
previously silent
machine-guns
hidden around the hedges and
fields
,
a thousand
metres west of Luhdorf.

Mackenzie’s ordnance was already boring in, inexorably eating up the yards before striking the rail bridge in three places.

The structure had been
badly
damaged during the big raid but had been swiftly
and expertly
repaired, enabling trains to use it, albeit at slower speeds.

The bridge still refused to die, shrugging off the RP-3 hits, seemingly unscathed, save for the obvious twisted rails reaching dramatically skywards.

Despite hitting his target
,
McKenzie
cursed
his failure
as he rejoined the flight, taking formation for the journey home.

Stelmakh sat quietly with his crew, listening and watching as the Engineer Captain ripped into one of his Lieutenants.

The unfortu
nate man had opened fire with a
DSHK
machine gun, mounting
one of Stelmakh’s IS-III’s to shoot at an allied aircraft
,
and in doing so, encouraged others to open fire too.

Corporal
Stepanov spat in contempt and grabbed for a cigarette.

“What’s the fucking point in hiding away if some
fucking
idiot officer fires off the damn guns and shows the
fucking
enemy where we
are?
”

His young CO took the
proffered
Belomor and lit it before replying.

“These engineers have had the devil of a time with the British air force
,
Stepanov. Over
one in three
of them have gone already
,
and they haven’t seen a ground soldier yet. He just wanted to hit back that’s all. Be kind.”

The tank driver snorted in disgust.

“He missed the
fucking
thing by a kilometre too!”

“Maybe so, but this time there is no harm done, and he will have learned.”

Both their conversation and the engineer’s admonishment were interrupted by the swift approach of aircraft engines.

Three Spitfires flashed overhead, one trailing a thin wisp of smoke, evidence that they
had
not
had
things all th
eir own way with the Lavochkin R
egiment.

Stepanov idly played with a
Y-shaped
scar on the tank
’
s flank, product of the brickwork collapse during the air raid.

The sound of S
pitfires decreased
,
until the steady patter of r
aindrops on camouflage n
ets took over.

“Anyway
,
Comrade Kaporal, just leave it and keep out of the way. I’m off to
see what the new Regimental C
ommander has in mind for us.”

Hall and
McKenzie
could do nothing.

A kindly WAAF Lance-C
orporal had pressed mugs of tea into their hands
,
and the obligatory cigarettes had been provided by the remaining members of
Y
ellow flight.

In silence
,
they
all
watched as fire crews gradually gained control of the
inferno
that had engulfed XM-S when it crashed on landing.
Unknown to the pilot or his watching comrades, a
single bullet had clipped the port tyre. The impact of the aircraft on the tarmac had burs
t it immediately, throwing the T
yphoon violently to the left
.
The undercarriage gave way, resulting in the aircraft
cartwheeling for a hundred yards before coming to rest upside down and exploding.

The brave fire crew fought hard
to hold back the flames
,
and were rewarded
as the rescue crew finally broke thr
ough into the cockpit area, dragging
out the parts of Pilot Officer Rawlings that the fire had not
yet
consumed.

Alive
,
but extremely badly burned
,
the young flier was loaded into the ambulance and whisked away to the base hospital
,
where the business of saving his life could begin in earnest.

Hall and
McKenzie
said nothing; there was nothing to say that hadn’t been said a hundred times before by fliers from all sides.

Handing back empty mugs to the horrified WAAF
,
they went to be debriefed on their mission, suppressing their horror and sorrow at the loss of another comrade.

When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep, and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way.

Sing your death song and die like a hero going home.
 

Tecumseh

             
They had all been up since four
-forty
a.m.

T
he hotel
night
receptionist
had apologetically rung the room
two minutes
prior to that
, waking Mayakov from a light sleep
.
Explaining, the receptionist said that the
caller had been insistent that the message was passed immediately
,
but the man still baulked at waking paying guests at such ungodly times, especially for a message
that
could
obviously wait until daylight.