Hello, Readers! I would like to inform you guys that my busy season is slowly approaching with standardized tests. That means that soon, I will be getting busier and it may be a sporadic schedule of updates that are made with my help. So remember I would like some questions from you all no spoilers to stories though.
*Dylan_Walts*
| Chapter 3 |
| Lucky or Unlucky? |
Commence week three of my stay at the camp from hell. One star, for sure. The food was terrible, the accommodations were horrid, and the workload per day was back-breaking.
I mean, I knew that joining the army would be no cake-walk, and I knew that the United States had a pretty brutal training regimen, but none of the rumours could prepare me for what it really was. By the end of the second week, I got used to it, but it didn't mean that I had to like it. Maybe it was the demigod resilience in me, or maybe just something from deep inside me, myself.
All the running, the situps, and the push-ups - drill after drill after drill, I was ready to collapse every night into my designated spot on the ground.
It was just another day. We reached the firing range at oh-six-hundred hours, as per usual to begin our accuracy training. As I leveled my hands, I thought of how I was when I first got to Camp Half-Blood. I hadn't been able to shoot an arrow to save my life. I still couldn't, but I'd mastered disassembling and reassembling my weapon of choice - an M3 submachine gun. I knew almost everything about this gun, but occasionally, I'd use a colt revolver. It was one of the only other guns that felt right in my hands - though I still didn't know the reason why.
Along with the mastery of those two guns, I was taught close-combat with a knife. I'd picked it up after about the first week, and by now, I'd become the best knife wielder at the base, topping even our instructor.
That day, thirteen-hundred hours was when it really got interesting. I was marching with the other recruits, my eyes sharp as the sound of evenly stampeding boots echoed in my ears. The drill sergeant was ahead in an open-backed jeep, yelling into a megaphone.
"We're approached the halfway point!" he yelled. "That means that we're as close as we're going to get to the front lines before we ship you out!"
I almost paused. I'd heard this before. The halfway point of our everyday marches was only a couple hundred yards from the front lines. I knew that if I listened hard enough, I'd be able to hear the cracks of sound from the guns in the distance. If only there weren't any other sounds around me, that is.
"Our army begins just over that hill! Those boys out there are in the real world! Pretty soon, you'll be joining them so don't get comfortable! Pick up the pace!"
We had just about turned the corner to head back to camp when the first Nazi came up over the hill. Without thinking, I broke rank and dashed to the jeep.
Before the drill sergeant could even yell at me, I grabbed a submachine gun out of the back and turned it on the Nazi, the poor soul that followed under the evil dictatorship of Hitler.
Spraying down the first line of German soldiers, I dove to the ground, behind a mound of sandbags to avoid their own spray of bullets. Not too soon, my fellow comrades started firing as well, each with a gun in their hands and rushing forward.
Some ran, only to be shot down either in the chest or the back, depending on whether they were cowards or brave idiots. I stayed where I was, peeking over the mound of sandbags to fire at the invading men, gunning them down easily.
There were still more coming, though.
They were getting to close.
As twenty-six more Nazis hit the dirt, I made a break for it. Dashing over to some drums where a few of the other recruits were taking shelter, I dared not look at them. I knew they were being shot. I knew that some of us wouldn't make it out. I just couldn't face the fact of who was going to live and who was going to die. Not yet.
I tossed aside my gun. In one quick movement, the knife was out of its sheath and in my hand, becoming pure destruction at the end of my arm. Getting closer to the German ranks, I began slitting their throats, my knife slicing efficiently through their flesh.
Halfway through the enemy soldiers' ranks, I felt a sudden burn in my thigh. It spread like an inferno, the pain running up and down my leg and even settling into my belly. Risking a quick look down, I saw blood - a lot of blood - running from my leg.
I'd been shot.
Dropping to the ground, I let out a scream - loud and shrill and pain-filled. It was terrible. Like acid flooding my veins. Like the time I had lava thrown at me - that was a bad day, too.
Everything was suddenly too loud and muffled at the same time. The crackling of machine guns was like lightning raining down. The stomping of boots in the dirt was a stampede of wildebeests. My own ragged breathing - sore and tired - rang in my ears. Through all that, one thought raced through my mind: I couldn't stop. I would be done for if I stayed on the ground. The only reason I was alive still to have this conversation with myself was because they already thought I was dead, but that wouldn't last long.
So, digging my fingers into the dirt below me, I unwrapped my fist from around my knife and looked around, pawing for a gun of some sort. Out a stroke of luck - for me, at least - Thompson's gun was nearby, though still resting in his cold, stiffening hand.
I tried not to think about the dead look in his eyes as I grabbed the submachine gun out of his hand, quickly checking the cartridge. Just my luck, it was still half-full. I'd have to make every bullet count if I wanted to survive this battle and get my friends to safety. Well, as safe as you can be while in the army during a time of war - WWII, in our case.
Without wasting time, I dove behind another mound of sandbags and barbed wire, taking in the scene. There were only fifteen men left on their side out of the original hundred fifty or so.
Raising my gun, I begin to shoot. One man got a bullet in the kneecap. He went down. Another, in the brain. Another, in the chest. I just kept shooting and shooting, not even taking my finger off the trigger. Subconsciously, I felt a wave of concern for the state my shoulder would be in later, after having to absorb the shock of the gun, but I wouldn't worry about it now.
As the last German soldier fell, I used my borrowed weapon as a crutch. Walking through the field of corpses, I saw both enemy soldiers and the bodies of my dead friends. I didn't know all of them well. Only well enough to name them as I saw them. To replay images of the time we spent together as I knelt beside each of them, closing their eyes.
Those that were still alive, I helped them to stand and carried them over to the jeep, where, surprisingly, a medic team had arrived and set up. The drill sergeant must've radioed them sometime earlier. They sure got here quick, it was about a five-mile journey.
Slowly, I hobbled over to the German soldiers that were still alive, yet writhing on the ground from their injuries. We'd be able to question them, at least. They might not know much, due to their rank, but I had to hope that they would have some information that would be of use to the allies.
Approaching the soldier I'd shot in the knee, my heart rate increased. He had a bird patch on his uniform - the mark of a high-ranking officer. It truly was my lucky day! Picking him up, I dragged him back over to the jeep.
The drill sergeant, one of the only dozen men to survive the battle, smiled as he saw the Nazi that I was carrying. He came over and clapped me on the shoulder, hard enough that I staggered, making my knees nearly give out beneath me. Now that my adrenaline was wearing off, I could once again feel the dreadful pain of the gunshot wound in my leg. I knew that if it wasn't treated soon, they'd have to amputate and I would most likely never get home from this hell.
"Good work, soldier!" the drill sergeant congratulated me. "Now get yourself patched up. I'll deal with this guy."
Nodding feverishly, I stumbled over to the medics, dropping the enemy soldier as I went. As soon as I sat down on the back of the jeep, Jenny - one of our medics - came over and starting patching me up. She applied an ungodly amount of alcohol on the wound, pulling out the bullet and cleaning the hole thoroughly. Once she was done, she stitched me in record time, only giving me a leather strap to bite down on.
Pretty soon, I was on my feet again, a patch of white contrasting greatly with my muddy training uniform.
"You're lucky," Jenny said, and she supported me to sit in the jeep.
"How so?" I asked. I gave a groan as my butt hit the padded seats.
"The bullet went in but didn't hit anything important. No arteries have been punctured, and it was centimeters away from hitting your femur, but didn't.," she explained, "Like I said: lucky."
I let out a harsh laugh. Yes, I was lucky. Unlike the other sixty men in our squad that didn't make it. "Yeah. I guess I am."
Later, when we got back to base camp and the sergeant explained what happened, I was commended.
I didn't want to be.
What I'd done was selfish - only looking out for myself in survival and leaving the others to die. Sure, I'd killed the last of the Nazis when all the others were incapacitated, but that meant that I' killed a dozen lives to save a dozen, and I'd killed way more than a dozen Nazis.
Nonetheless, I was given a badge to wear on my uniform and named a Staff Sergeant - something I wished I knew what it was, but didn't. Well, I guess I'd have to figure it out soon because I was headed straight for the front lines.
When?
Within the week. It would be great fun.
***
Word Count: 1763
Posted: Saturday, February 3rd, 2018
~CSP2708~
*Dylan_Walts*