After they had finished eating and drinking, the walkie-talkie finally crackled to life.
The order had come down: all of E Company was to advance dispersed by squad, moving quickly through the dangerous area.
“Pack up your things. We’re moving out.”
It was only a couple of shots; not enough to get Sholokhov drunk. But even that little bit of alcohol made him sound much more casual when he gave orders.
Gao Fei had his own pack on his back, with the rifle equipped with thermal imaging set on top of it. A pouch hung in front of his chest, his own rifle was slung over his right shoulder, and in his left hand he carried an RPG-27 rocket launcher. In his right, he picked up an ammunition box containing two hundred rounds of machine-gun belt.
Changing positions was practically like moving house. Strictly speaking, when infantry left their own trenches and entered captured enemy positions, they should advance light. But since the Penal Battalion was up front, it was better to bring a full set of gear.
After all, if a real fight broke out, who knew what might happen? If a tank came over and they had no anti-tank weapons in hand, wouldn’t they truly be left to take a beating and wait for death?
All four of them were heavily loaded. Added together, everything weighed nearly forty or fifty kilograms.
With that much weight, there was no way they could move very fast.
The position Wagner had lost yesterday had been retaken today. And because it had already been occupied before, there were communication trenches between the forward position and the rear position where Gao Fei and the others were.
But because the position had been held for too short a time, there were too few communication trenches. If the front-line troops wanted to shift forward as a whole, they could only leave the protection of the trenches and expose themselves on flat ground without any cover.
The distance varied from four hundred to six hundred meters. E Company as a whole was basically advancing in parallel. Where they ended up once they entered the position would depend on ability.
What ability? Speed, of course, and stamina.
“Quick, quick. I know there’s a stretch of trench with a roof over it. We’ll get there first and grab the position.”
Gao Fei had already felt like he could barely walk, but after hearing Sholokhov say that, he decisively quickened his pace.
At that moment, Glasky glanced to the left, then immediately cursed, “Those bastards from First Team are fast. They set out light!”
Gao Fei’s team was changing positions as if they were moving house, while the neighboring First Team had brought only basic combat gear. Of course they were much faster.
Everyone knew they would not be staying long in the position they were now taking, so there was little chance anyone would put in the effort for major construction. Naturally, everyone wanted to occupy a complete section of trench—preferably one so well developed it could be called a fortification.
The moment he saw the speed of the team next to them, Sholokhov knew they would not catch up.
“Those bastards…”
After cursing resentfully, Sholokhov said irritably, “We can’t abandon our equipment. Even if they grab the fortification, they may not necessarily get to use it themselves.”
With such heavy loads, they could not go fast even if they wanted to. Still, the distance was only four or five hundred meters; at most, they would get there in five minutes.
As Gao Fei walked, he suddenly saw a row of land mines laid out on the ground ahead.
Anti-tank mines. One every two or three meters, scattered unevenly into a line that stretched on so far he could not see the end at a glance.
Gao Fei was somewhat curious. “There are this many mines?”
“The Ukrainians laid them. When we pushed forward, the engineers moved the mines forward. When the Ukrainians pushed back, they laid mines this way. But now the engineers are already too busy to keep up, so nobody’s dealing with them.”
As they continued forward, Gao Fei suddenly saw a corpse.
He was not afraid, exactly. It was just a little nauseating.
He quickly shifted his gaze away, but before he had taken two more steps, Sholokhov suddenly said, “Down!”
Everyone immediately dropped forward to the ground. A moment later, a shell exploded a little over a hundred meters away from Gao Fei.
If a shell landed right beside you, lying down would be useless. But if you could hear the whistling sound of a shell flying in, that meant it was not directly overhead, though still not far away. It was still best to get down immediately.
At over a hundred meters, shell fragments could easily kill a person.
They waited a moment and found no more shells falling. They did not know whether it had been a ranging shot or a meaningless stray round.
They definitely could not stay where they were. Sholokhov said, “Keep moving. Pick up the pace. Quick!”
He was a bit tired, but with that shell as encouragement, Gao Fei was now filled with strength again, and even his speed increased once more.
There were already trenches ahead. It was a machine-gun position extending forward from the main position. Sandbags were piled up on three sides, and behind it was a trench leading to the main trench.
There were many machine-gun positions like this protruding outward, capable of forming dense interlocking fields of fire. Only, this was the enemy’s machine-gun position; Gao Fei and the others had no use for it.
Sholokhov was in the very front. He threw his things into the machine-gun position, then jumped into the trench.
They could not use this position, but they could follow the trench now and no longer had to remain exposed outside.
There were two corpses in the machine-gun position. The bodies were still fairly intact, but their clothes were in tatters. The heavy machine gun had been blasted over and was pressing down on the machine gunner’s body. The barrel had burned a blackened mark across the gunner’s face, and the skin around it had changed color.
The assistant gunner still held an ammunition belt in his hands.
Gao Fei had seen it by accident, and this time he could not even look away.
It was not that he wanted to look, but after seeing it, he grew a little curious. If this position had been hit by artillery, it should not have left intact corpses. If it had been blown up by a grenade, the heavy machine gun should not have been overturned.
If he did not understand, he asked. It was all experience.
“Team leader, what did this?”
“Mortar, of course. Do you even need to ask? Oh, you’re a Blue Hat, no wonder you don’t know.”
Russian military police were Blue Hats.
After drinking a little, Sholokhov had started saying more barbed things.
“The situation is obvious, isn’t it? A shell came in and landed outside. The blast wave flipped the machine gun over and killed the two gunners who had half their bodies exposed. There was another man inside who ran off. Just from the look of them, you can tell it was an 82-millimeter mortar.”
They followed the communication trench from the machine-gun position for more than twenty meters. At a turn up ahead, Sholokhov suddenly stopped.
Logically speaking, there should not have been anyone in the trench. But the fact that Sholokhov had stopped was wrong in itself. So the moment Sholokhov stopped, Glasky instantly dropped the ammunition box in his left hand and swung around the machine gun that had been slung over his shoulder, though his right hand had been holding it the whole time.
Glasky could open fire at once, but Sholokhov turned and said, “It’s fine. Our own people.”
When Sholokhov turned to speak, he gave them a look.
It was not fear, exactly, but there was some tension. After signaling to the others with his eyes, Sholokhov turned back again and said, “Hey, brothers. How are you?”
No one spoke. Sholokhov’s greeting received no response.
Glasky brought the machine gun across, but he did not pick up the ammunition box.
Gao Fei followed behind Glasky around the corner, and then he saw four people sitting against the wall in a relatively wide section of trench.
All four of them were wounded, but they were definitely not dead. They were simply staring at Sholokhov with cold eyes.
Beside the wounded, more than a dozen corpses had been laid out along the trench. There were enemy corpses, but even more were their own.
Every wounded man had blood on him. Light wounds, but the kind that made it impossible to continue fighting.
There were no seriously wounded. If someone had been seriously wounded, a merciful comrade would have put another bullet in his head to spare him suffering.
At least half the corpses in this trench had died from shots to the head.
Being stared at with strange eyes, Gao Fei met one man’s gaze. He felt a chill creep through him and quickly shifted his eyes aside.
It was not cowardice. It was just unnecessary.
These people were true desperadoes. Better not to lock eyes with them.
Sholokhov did not want to occupy this position anymore, but trenches with dugout shelters that could be lived in and fought from were limited. Even if he wanted to change places, there was nowhere to go.
The Penal Battalion had used this place as somewhere to settle the wounded and store corpses. They could only accept their bad luck.
At that moment, someone suddenly said in a low voice, “Got any water?”
It was Russian, but Gao Fei understood.
Do you have food? Do you have water? Do you have bullets? These were all Russian words Gao Fei had made a priority to learn.
And after hearing the wounded soldier’s question, Sholokhov immediately said, “Yes, yes! Brothers, you’ve had a hard time. Come on, have some water. Do you need help?”