Walter took over command immediately, working rapidly to re-establish defensive positions across the ruined terrain.
"Cook! Clerk! Take some men and connect those shell craters that haven't collapsed yet!"
"Move fast! Don't expect to dig waist-deep trenches. Just make sure your heads don't pop out when you're prone to shoot!"
A knowing nod passed between Simo and Walter. Simo selected a crevice in the rocks on the reverse slope; it offered a wide field of vision yet was well-protected from direct artillery fire.
While directing the others, Walter grabbed an entrenching shovel himself, swinging it with raw force against earth that was frozen harder than stone.
Just as the men were braving the icy wind to hastily improve their cover, an orange-red flash erupted on the distant horizon. Moments later, a shell detonated near their position—the Soviet artillery was registering its ranges.
"Scatter! Get in the holes! Fast!" Warrant Officer Niemi's face turned instantly ashen, his good right arm waving frantically. "Get down! It's a barrage!"
"Everyone into cover!" Walter bellowed, hurling his shovel aside. "Listen up! Once you're inside, crouch down and keep your mouths wide open! Do not close them, unless you want to try bursting your eardrums!"
The twenty new reinforcements and the remnants of the original garrison scrambled like rats into the reinforced cellars and deep pits. Walter and Niemi were the last to leap into a shelter reinforced with splintered logs.
"One more thing!" Walter clamped a hand tightly onto the shoulder of the trembling clerk beside him. "Do not lean against the walls! And don't collapse flat on the ground! Support your knees with your elbows and stand a little on your toes! Now!"
The words had barely left his mouth when the world was instantaneously stripped of all color and sound.
BOOOOM—!!!!!
It was a salvo from the Soviet 122mm howitzers and M-30 heavy artillery batteries. The sudden vacuum created by the massive explosions caused a violent, tearing pain in everyone's chest. Even with ears covered and mouths agape, the thunderous roar still pierced the brain like tiny steel needles through the pores. Dirt rained down from the shelter's roof, and the already fragile log supports groaned under the unbearable strain. Walter felt his very organs churning in sync with the quaking of the earth.
"Endure... endure until dark..." the clerk huddled in the corner. Even though he couldn't hear a thing, his lips moved mechanically, gripping his rifle in a death stare.
…
The bombardment lasted a full fifteen minutes. The overpowering stench of cordite and scorched earth seeped into every crevice, choking the lungs and nearly causing asphyxiation. Then, without warning, the continuous explosions ceased, plunging the world into an eerie, ringing dead silence.
"Get up! Get the hell up, all of you!"
Walter violently shoved aside a broken log pinning him down and stood up alongside Warrant Officer Niemi, roaring at the men outside the shelter.
"The most dangerous part is now! The Russian infantry are right behind the barrage!"
In Walter's experience, Timoshenko's tactics were exceedingly rigid yet effective: the cannons pound, then the infantry charges; if the infantry can't break through, the cannons pound again.
He rushed out of the shelter, ignoring the cloud of dust. In the world of the Eye of Death, countless soil-brown greatcoats were already pouring out of the forest seven hundred meters away. Ahead of them, three T-26 tanks belched black smoke, their tracks clattering as they crushed the snow.
"Machine gunner, don't wait, get into position!"
The deafened machine gunner was, paradoxically, the calmest man among them. Though he could not hear the orders, he saw Walter's hand signal. Wiping the mud from his face, he lunged behind a surviving Maxim machine gun, his bloodshot eyes locking onto the advancing enemy.
"Six o'clock... it isn't six o'clock yet." The cook raised his rifle, aiming at a Soviet soldier charging with a fixed bayonet.
The Soviet soldiers roared as they ran, celebrating their sacred Red Army Day. Walter, crouched against the slightly warm lip of a shell crater, had already locked his M39's four-power scope onto a Soviet commissar.
Bang!
With one final, precise report, the shouting Soviet commissar seven hundred meters away crumpled backward.
But there was no joy on Walter's face. He could feel that even with their commander down, this soil-brown tide did not waver for an instant. Alcohol, holiday fervor, and the muzzles of the blocking detachments behind them had transformed these Soviet soldiers into an unthinking colony of ants, mechanically driving forward.
The three T-26s were a greater problem. They advanced in a staggered diamond formation. The lead tank's turret rotated continuously, its DT machine gun raking the hill. Bullets struck the frozen ground, kicking up rows of black dirt columns and pinning the Finnish soldiers down. Soviet infantry hived behind the tanks, advancing in squad elements and using the tanks' flank and rear blind spots for alternating cover.
"Lieutenant! That iron bastard is only a hundred meters away!" the clerk cried out.
"Get down! Don't look at it!"
BOOM—!
The lead T-26 paused for a second, and its 45mm main gun spat a ball of fire. The shell smashed directly into the edge of the shelter, burying them in a deluge of dirt and splintered wood. This was Timoshenko's aesthetic of violence. Tanks were not shock troops; they were mobile bunkers and direct-fire artillery. They fought for every inch, and every forward step was accompanied by saturated fire cover.
"Everyone! Hide your Molotov cocktails! No one stands up without my signal!"
Walter wiped the mud from his face. In the face of such dense infantry-tank coordination, standing up to throw a firebomb was suicide. He had to wait, wait for these iron beasts to climb the slope, wait for them to enter the dead zone where their guns couldn't depress.
…
Sixty meters, fifty meters.
Because Hill L's slope had been subjected to days of shelling, it was piled high with loose topsoil and deep snow. The lead tank began to lurch violently, the sound of its tracks slipping clearly audible even amidst the fire.
"Simo! Hit the vision slit! Even if you just distract him!" Walter signaled to his right.
Simo pulled the trigger.
Clang!
A 7.62mm round struck perfectly against the edge of the driver's vision slit. The resulting spark and steel spall, though failing to penetrate the armor, were enough to make the driver inside instinctively flinch and turn the vehicle. The T-26 veered off course, its left track plunging heavily into a two-meter-deep heavy artillery crater. The entire tank listed at a bizarre angle, its main gun suddenly unable to depress sufficiently to point at the summit.
Walter erupted from his crater. He didn't throw; instead, utilizing his explosive burst of speed, he rolled and scrambled a dozen meters across the slick, frozen earth.
Rat-tat-tat-tat!
The Soviet infantry behind the tank opened fire. Bullets zipped past Walter, plowing furrows in the snow. Grabbing a Molotov cocktail with his left hand, he swiped the match head against the striker patch sewn to the side of his greatcoat. An orange-red flame instantly enveloped the bottle's mouth. Walter didn't throw it at the thick turret; instead, using his momentum, he precisely jammed the firebomb beneath the tank's exposed rear engine grating.
Boom!
Flammable liquid was instantly sucked into the searing engine compartment. Within seconds, a two-meter column of blue-black fire erupted from the rear of the T-26.
"It's not dead! Watch out!" Warrant Officer Niemi screamed in terror.
Indeed, even with its engine ablaze, the tank's machine gunner continued to fire wildly. The Soviet crew inside displayed extremely high combat proficiency, still attempting to pour ammunition onto the summit through the flames. One man even tried to push open the hatch to climb out and extinguish the fire.
Bang!
Walter switched back to his rifle, picking off the crewman the moment his head emerged.
Simultaneously, the other two tanks, seeing their comrade disabled, didn't retreat in panic. Instead, they accelerated, flanking left and right in an attempt to envelop Walter's position with crossfire.
"Hold back the accompanying infantry! Don't let them protect the tanks!"
Covered in mud, Walter rolled awkwardly back into his crater. The deafened machine gunner couldn't hear, but he saw the burning tank. He held down the Maxim's trigger like a man possessed, using the tank's firelight to pin the Soviet infantry attempting to support the advance to the bottom of the slope.
…
The first wave of the assault reached its boiling point in a collision of fire and blood. A dull explosion echoed from inside the T-26 with the burning engine, and fire gushed from every crevice.
"The one on the right! It's trying to go around!" Warrant Officer Niemi roared, pointing.
That tank, seeing its partner destroyed, realized a frontal assault up the slope was suicide. It put its engine into reverse, attempting to pull back and use direct fire to destroy the Finnish machine gun nest.
"Simo!"
Simo's bullet left the barrel almost as an echo of Walter's shout. The Soviet tank commander, who was half-exposed and attempting to direct the rear infantry to cover, suddenly had a red mist erupt from his chest. He slumped over the hatch.
Without its commander, the tank jerked to a halt. In his panic, the driver turned sharply, the heavy tracks digging a deep pit in the slick permafrost but failing to climb the high ground.
"Now! Grenades!"
Walter seized the opportunity, roaring at several shivering new recruits.
The clerk, who had previously huddled in terror, finally had the taut cord in his brain snap upon seeing Walter destroy a tank single-handedly. He stopped trembling, let out a high-pitched scream, grabbed a bundle of satchel charges, and rolled and scrambled out of the crater.
"Get back, you fool!" Walter reached out to grab him, but he was too late.
The clerk stumbled toward the slipping tank. Soviet infantry rounds shattered the rocks at his feet, but he seemed to be in a trance. Less than five meters from the tank, he violently pulled the igniter cord and hurled the explosive bundle between the tank's road wheels.
BOOM—!!!!
The T-26's tracks were completely blown off. Losing its balance, the tank rolled sideways down the slope, crushing several Soviet infantrymen hiding behind it into a pulp during its descent.
The third tank recoiled. Watching both its companions turn into fireballs and scrap metal, the tank driver desperately yanked the steering levers and retreated frantically toward the tree line, spewing white smoke.
Stripped of the armored shield of their tanks, the Soviet infantry exposed on the plain instantly became targets for harvesting.
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat—!
The deafened machine gunner was now completely immersed in the rhythm of slaughter, mowing down the Soviet soldiers in their soil-brown greatcoats as they struggled through the snow. Walter braced his M39 again; every time he pulled the trigger, an officer attempting to organize a retreat fell.
Finally, having left behind over a hundred bodies, the soil-brown tide retreated ignominiously back into the forest seven hundred meters away.
"It's only been one damn hour..." the clerk's voice rose again, as if talking to himself.
———————
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