Codegease: Air and Land Warfare 1946

Page 115

What was on the train? It was an armored vehicle and a mannequin that the young men from Berlin had brought back two weeks earlier. The American personnel here couldn't figure it out, so they just recorded some valuable data, packed it up, and crammed it into this train bound for an Allied port on the European coast. For safety, the armored vehicle was still in a flatbed carriage covered with a tarpaulin, while the mannequin's severed arms and legs were hidden in an open carriage covered with a tarpaulin.

"Hopefully these things will behave themselves on their way back home," a nearby officer muttered.

"Ha! I really don't understand how these bastards work." Patton lit a cigarette. "Sigh, I guess I'll just keep those babbling bastards at headquarters who're trying to make a big fuss by walking around the horse farm. If there's any mess, just take it out on the street! Stop dawdling!"

"Alright guys, let's go, the next place is waiting for us!"

"Hmm? Where? Sir?"

"Huh? Huh..." Patton turned around, gave everyone a cold laugh, and quietly took a drag of his cigarette. "Didn't they say that those Nazi dogs in Nuremberg were going to be transported to England for their safety?"

"Uh, yes, according to them, Europe isn't very safe right now."

"Damn it, I've never even died, and these bastards are being treated like baby nurses. What kind of idiots are they..."

Chapter 119, Section 178: The Path I Chose

It's another new day in District 11. Caronville and his adjutant, Major Leffer, have just come out of the office.

"Is this a good thing or a bad thing?" The lieutenant colonel seemed rather helpless about the conversation between the two. "The former commander of the 41st Army, Viscount Nasova, actually couldn't control his illness and passed away? How old was he?"

"Yes, the child is only a few years old."

"That's not a big deal. The key is his troops. Maren has probably worn down his army group in the 45th District. I guess this unit number will have to be sold to someone else soon."

"Yes, not just the designation, but probably the family fortune as well."

"Oh, right, haha." Caronville caught something funny, "What's the plan now regarding the brown bear the Viscount won at auction?"

"I don't know, but I suspect General Marendor probably has his eye on it."

"Heh, although I don't think much of him, to be honest, I felt a little sorry for him when I heard he was going to take over the Viscount's troops. Did you hear? The 41st Army once had funds allocated for upgrading to new night vision goggles, which the Viscount embezzled to use for filming bears. As a result... he was exposed to strong light in Berlin's 45th district and failed to activate the power cutoff system. And then, you know."

"Hmph, if the regular main force has someone like this, they might as well be with us."

"You're making it sound like some of them are on par with us in terms of real ability, hahaha!" The lieutenant colonel laughed a few times, then quickly pulled his tongue back.

"Alright, let's get serious about what comes next."

……

Upon reaching an open space beside a training field, a group of people could be seen standing there from afar: a few scattered soldiers in black uniforms on the outer ring, and then two rows inside wearing blue and white striped uniforms with hexagonal badges on their chests. The row of four was naturally the American soldiers, Davis and his group, while the other row had three people who were slightly shorter than the Americans and had somewhat different facial features.

"Sir!"

“Hmm!” Caronville dismissed the soldiers. “Let’s get straight to the point.”

“Well then, Sergeant Davis!” he said to the leading American soldier, “I have some news for you that could be good or bad.”

“Look, these are them.” He gestured toward the Soviet soldiers. “These three have decided to cooperate with us in the last few days. They are among the first Russians to surrender. In the next few days, they will probably only need to improve their English a little and understand some rules and regulations, and then they can be on guard duty and patrols like you. In other words, in the near future, they will be your assistants.”

“Ah, okay, but what bad stuff is in this? I’m curious.” Davis said indifferently.

“Some Soviets are starting to defect to us.” The lieutenant colonel leaned closer and lowered his voice. “Then there will be more Soviet soldiers, and then, maybe more countries, including you, uh, the United States, whose name is a bit of a joke.”

"Besides, as far as I know, the United States and the Soviet Union are currently having conflicts, aren't they?"

"what do you mean?"

“We will try to fulfill the role of fisherman.” Caronville smiled faintly, then walked back to the center.

“Alright, let’s move on to the second thing. Davis! You and the three new recruits step forward and memorize the faces and names of these three soldiers.”

As the four men approached, the lieutenant colonel also brought out the form and looked at the photos and names on it.

"Okay, first one, Ivanov, formerly a private."

Davis looked at the young man who had come to shake his hand first. The young man's eyes and face were still quite immature. When shaking hands with him, the young man stared intently at him, his lips trembling slightly. It was hard to tell whether he was nervous or had a lot of things to say but couldn't.

"The second one! Stasevich, Lieutenant."

The officer who came to shake hands was much more composed, giving Davis a casual smile as if he were meeting a new friend.

"Hmm..." Huh? I didn't expect him to still have something to say, "Nice to...to me...meet you..."

“Ah, meet you too.” Davis was a little surprised that this lieutenant could even use a bit of Maoist-accented English to argue.

The lieutenant gave him a friendly wink and retreated, followed by the third one.

“Cicherin, Corporal, this is the last one.”

The last person's expression darkened. Davis had intended to strike up a friendly conversation after the handshake, but...

Chicherin muttered a few Russian syllables, then ended with "Blyat," a standard Russian curse word stuck to his face.

"Pfft..." He understood what the word meant, so he could only give a wry smile and watch him return to his seat.

“Alright, Sergeant Davis.” Caronville put his things away. “Now, try to recall their names and faces, and match them up one by one. As for their previous ranks, just forget about them. Now, you go back to your missions and wait for them to patrol the streets with you someday.”

"yes sir!"

……

It was noon again, and Davis and his men were tired and hungry, so they sat down in a quiet tea and snack shop by the roadside to enjoy some snacks.

"Hey! Boss!" Taylor chewed on his hamburger, his face full of displeasure. "Can these Russians be trusted?"

"You think they're here to freeload? Couldn't that pretty boy have said something even clearer?" Philip sneered as he chewed on his fries.

“I actually think we could cooperate with the Russians,” Garcia said nonchalantly. “It would be great if they could at least put on a good show for us.”

“Hmm…that’s true.” Davis said, patting himself down. “Now that we’ve solved the language barrier, I guess we can have a good chat with them.”

"Huh? They want us to learn Russian?"

"No, no, no, no! We only need to master a few common phrases. The lieutenant colonel told me that everyone, whether German or Soviet, must submit their English."

"What the heck, is this a major overhaul and a complete overhaul?"

"Who knows, well, we..."

Just as Davis was about to say something, Garcia suddenly frowned, threw the pie he was holding onto the table, curled up his limbs to cover his head, yelled, and collapsed to the ground.

"Hey! What's going on?!"

"What's wrong with you, buddy?!"

The people in the store were terrified. No one knew what to do. They could only watch quietly as the other three soldiers held Clark down, who was lying on the ground yelling, seemingly to prevent him from having any accidents.

"Who's there?! Can you help us contact a hospital or something?"

……

Then, at night, in the barracks belonging to the Soviet prisoners of war.

"It must feel wonderful to cooperate with fascists, Lieutenant Stasevich."

So, Sergeant Androv, who had previously fought stubbornly against Karonville, had a somewhat unpleasant conversation with the lieutenant.

"Wonderful? If you make me think that after the Great Patriotic War, facing such a new enemy, I can serve my country on the road to defeating it and then regain my peaceful homeland, that would indeed be a wonderful thing."

"There are certain attitudes and methods to confront the enemies of our motherland. You are desecrating the red flag flying overhead."

“There is no red flag here. I think if I don’t do something and just go with you to these guys’ labor sites to do odd jobs, I will have no idea what’s going on outside the POW camp. Maybe one day I won’t see the Soviet red flag flying in front of me again. Instead, a white cloth will be covered over me and eventually cover my face.”

"Perhaps as a junior sergeant, I really can't convince you, lieutenant. I just hope that when you return to your homeland in the future, you won't be greeted by a military court or the gates of a disciplinary camp."

"A truly courageous and great man dares to shoulder everything, comrade."

Stasevich stood up and dusted off his trousers.

"If everything I do can help my motherland eliminate her enemies, even if it means dying ten thousand times and bearing all the blame, I will die in peace!"

Chapter 120, Section 179: The Swinging Scales

The sky is sobbing, the earth is wailing...

The fighters that shot down the KMF streaked across the sky and hovered in the heavens; tanks and artillery shoved down wave after wave of vehicles and robots that dared to stand in their way, and the setting sun shone down, staining the German land as red as hot blood.

Amidst this scene of relentless pursuit, reminiscent of a corpse-driving chase, several people dressed in KMF pilot uniforms were running around helplessly in a grove of trees beside a village.

Their vehicles had long since been engulfed in electric sparks, transforming into a burning altar on the ground behind them.

There was no quiet corner to be found anywhere. The engines of tanks, the turbulence of airplanes, the roar of cannons and guns—all these sounds had turned into a locking yoke, binding them to this red guillotine.

They ran through the woods, through the weeds, past a helicopter that had crashed inside, still emitting thick smoke and flames. Carbonized grass blades, blown by the wind, mingled with the sweat that soaked their clothes, leaving a dark, lifeless imprint on their bodies.

They fled westward; if they ran a little further, they might see the national flag with the lion and snake on it.

Finally, the rustling sound among the weeds stopped abruptly, turning into the gradually slowing footsteps of the group as they ran out of the woods.

Suddenly, all the noise around me seemed to subside. The tanks and fighter jets seemed to be moving away, and the bullets were flying off to other places as if by unspoken agreement.

"We're safe, sir."

"Ah! Yes!" The leader took out his pistol and answered a pilot behind him, "Take a look at the map, see where we are, and then contact command center."

"Okay, we are..."

A faint sound of falling rocks, accompanied by a hissing sound in the air, and the leader and those around him watched helplessly as the pilot was shot down to the ground by a bullet that seemed to come from nowhere.

"How...what's going on..."

Before the word "matter" could even be uttered, another soldier was shot down. Everyone looked around in terror and randomly opened fire with their pistols in various directions.

"Get down! Get down! We!..." Before the leader could say more, a sharp, urgent shriek approached, and then, in their eyes and ears, the world turned into a pure black stained with blood...

……

On the mottled ground, there were several more dead soldiers, and two gray-yellow figures cautiously gripping their guns and approaching them in a low posture.

"Whoosh!" After stopping, the two figures took off the hoods of their camouflage cloaks, revealing the faces of Ekaterina and Ilya.

"Hehe! Sure enough, there were some bandits who escaped the net, and they all crawled out of the dolls, haha!"

Ignoring the chatterbox's rambling, Ilia first rummaged through a corpse, examined its wireless radio, and then put it away.

“Let me see this bastard, ah!” Ekaterina found an identification tag on the leader of the group of corpses—it was easy to tell that the old man’s pilot’s uniform was a different color from the others.

“Hey?” She frowned, scratching her head, and handed the ID card to Ilia. “I only remember how the ranks were written in the German fascist army, this… I don’t know, can you help me take a look…”

“Hmm…” Ilya was also worried. During the long four-year Great Patriotic War, she only remembered that the ranks of German officers mostly started with “ob” (Colonel Oberst, Lieutenant Colonel Oberstleutnant, Lieutenant Obersleutnant), then Major, Captain Hauptmann, and Second Lieutenant Leutnant.

And now this thing says "Col.", and I'm totally confused...

"Oh!" After thinking for a while, an English word finally popped into my head, "Colonel! That's English! Colonel!"

"I'm shocked!" Ekaterina's eyes and mouth gaped open wider than a sunflower's. "Are you sure I killed such a high-ranking official?"

"Put it away." Ilya tossed the identity tag back. "Another large force has been wiped out by us, hmm..."

A formation of Il-2 attack aircraft flew overhead as she sighed, soaring toward the city of Berlin.

……

"Comrade Zhukov, the encirclement is complete."

"I see."

The marshal stood before the large map in the command post, looked up at it, and couldn't help but sigh.

On the map, the Soviet-occupied area has been bound by a belt. The black salient that previously appeared between eastern Berlin and the Oder River, spanning nearly 100 kilometers from east to west, representing the enemy, has been cut in half, leaving only a last tuft 50 kilometers from Berlin, which was peeled away and swallowed up layer by layer by the Red Army soldiers.

“Although we have completed the encirclement, but…” Zhukov shook his head and walked to the table, “There are too many enemies. It took us too long to close the loop, and our air support and supplies were always restricted, allowing many enemies to escape.”

"Comrade Sokolovsky, have we received a count of our casualties?"

"Our casualties? Uh, shouldn't we be considering our results first?"

"The enemy is a bunch of fools and lunatics who don't care about casualties right now, you don't need to remind me of that, comrade." The marshal's expression was serious. "I need to know exactly how many casualties we need to take them down!"

"Yes, Marshal." The general beside him handed over a newly received document. "From the time the enemy broke out of Berlin and drove us out, until now when we are only about 30 kilometers east of Berlin, the Eighth Guards Army has suffered 5,000 to 6,000 casualties, the First Guards Tank Army has suffered 4,000 to 5,000 casualties, the Third Shock Army and the Second Guards Tank Army have suffered a total of about 6,000 casualties, the Fifth Shock Army has suffered about 4,000 casualties, and with the addition of the air force units from all sides, we have suffered a total of about 21,000 to 24,000 casualties."

"Where are the weapons?"

"A total of 118 tanks and self-propelled artillery pieces were lost, along with 79 trucks and half-tracks. The exact number of aircraft losses has not yet been given, but we and the Polish side can confirm that the total is over ninety, but no more than one hundred and fifty."

Zhukov was not surprised by the number. Although the enemy's tactics and strategies were still the same, their numbers, the quality of individual combat units, and their air and ground control were much stronger than they had been in Berlin. Moreover, the Soviet army's situation was much worse than it had been ten days ago.

"Have the British in the west given us any definite news yet?"