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ambrafoxtrot17
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Posts: 82
Joined: Sat 19 Jun 2021, 17:29

Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Mon 05 Jul 2021, 17:21

“When he saw the dim lights of Stopen Michael stopped walking and crouched down. He slung his AK-74 down his chest and grabbed map and compass.
“Yeah that must be Stopen” he told himself checking that his navigation from Mariestad had been accurate.
Michael put map and compass back in his backpack and raised his binoculars to his eyes. He observed very carefully the access road. The last thing he wanted to happen was being shot by some trigger happy village kids. The Swedish civilians were not usually armed or particularly aggressive, unless they were gangs, but you never knew. He gave a long look at the surrounding area, past the city limit sign on the right side of the carriageway. At first he didn’t notice it, but looking better, Michael managed to spot a helmet behind a thick fence on the left side of the road next to a low building.
“Damn!” he though. “Military in town.” He brought the binos back up to his eyes to have a better look. He even removed his sky mask in order to see better. It looked like an American shaped helmet. That was plausible. The yanks had their divisional command in the area.
Americans in town meant that he still had to exert some degree of care, depending on how much the cowboys were nervous or gung ho that particular night; but at least it would be easy to communicate with them.
He decided for a direct approach to the guard post.. He took cover behind a tree and exploded a single tracer of his AK in the air, being careful to direct it high and left.

Corporal Bartoli jumped at the explosion of a single shot right in front of his position 50 meters ahead. Why in the hell someone would shot in the air like that to give out his position. Then he occurred to him that the someone in question wanted to give away his position. He yelled at Alpino Magli to come out of the car shop. He didn’t have to wait long. His man rushed out keeping low and carrying with him the radio man pack and the rifle.

“Somebody shot in the air from somewhere on the right of the road. He is probably hiding in the trees around there”. Bartoli tried to lean over he fence a little bit to see if he could see better. He looked for a short while

“There...right there! There is a man in the woods at the edge of the road!” announced Bartoli to his subordinate. “Do you see him?”
Magli carefully scanned the area indicated by his Corporal. “Yes...I see him...there he wears cam of some kind.” Both alpini pointed their rifles using the fence as a support point.

“Hey...tu...stop...esci da lì e vieni verso di noi...piano!” Bartoli yelled, as he did the day before with the Russians.

“What bloody language is that?” thought Michael. “Certainly is not yank...may be Spanish...yeah it sounded like Spanish.” Michael didn’t have any report ever about Spanish troops in Sweden, but he was better to get in the open before those soldiers started being less polite. He carefully left the cover of the trees and walked on the road, holding his rifle over his head with both hands so that they could be seen very well. The two soldiers didn’t move but continued to cover him with their rifles. Michael gathered all the Spanish he could muster.

“Amigos…Amigos...Soy Inglés...Inglés!”

One of the two Italian soldiers carefully left his position and moved tactically towards him, rifle still pointed at him. These were the moments one had to be very careful.

“Inglese?” asked Bartoli…“Good, put rifle down keep hands up” babbled Bartoli trying to look as calm as he could.

Michael promptly and slowly complied. The second soldier was now living the fence as well and creeping toward him, with his rifle pointed at him as well. When the first one came close to him, he noticed that his helmet had a small black feather sticking out on the left side, and he understood why the language sounded Spanish to him. He also remembered that a regiment of Italian mountain troops had been attached to 2nd US marine.

“Italiani?” asked the man who had started searching him under the cover of the other soldier’s rifle.
“Yes” answered Bartoli. “Who are you?”
“Mi name is Michael Quincy saar. I am an English security guard. I worked in Mariestad for a Swedish shipping company.”

Bartoli understood the name and security guard; the rest was Greek to him. So he answered based on the limited information he managed to grasp. “Mercenary?”

“If you want to put that way” smiled Michael.

Bartoli removed a combat knife from a holster on the chest of the English man, and when he was sure that he didn’t hide any other weapon, ordered to Magli to call the HQ.

“Come” he gestured to the stranger...”we go in warm” and lead the Englishman inside the car dealer building. Magli recovered the weapons and followed.

Not more than three minutes later, Major Sivglia appeared on the scene with the VM. He parked it outside and quickly entered in the shop house. The Englishman didn’t even stand up, he didn’t want to do any unauthorized move before the Italians were a bit more confident with him.

“Good morning Sir. My name is Alberto Siviglia, I command the garrison of this town. May I ask who you are?”

Michael was glad that that Major (he had glanced at the Italian officer rank) had a decent English.

“Saar. I am Michael Quincy, English national. I work for a London security firm. My detail worked for a Swedish shipping company which transferred values and money among locations on the lake
Vänern. The Russians occupied the town for a long time before they moved the majority of their troops East, at which point I and my colleagues tried to slip out of town to join the NATO lines. We were caught in ambush two days ago and my two friends were killed. I am the only survivor. It looks like I reached the NATO line saar.”

“Can you please wait here a minute Mr. Quincy?”
“Course”
Corporal Bartoli accompanied Major Siviglia in a separate room were he had put all the Englishman equipment.
“Sir, this guy is seriously over equipped sir... binoculars, compass, maps, individual portable radio, combat knife, AK-74 with grenade launcher, British Army issued flack jacket...the guy is better equipped than we are sir. A private guard Sir?” He look interrogatively at the boss of his boss.

Major Siviglia massaged his chin. He walked back and forth trough the room for several a minute or so. Then he glanced at Bartoli walked back to the other room.

“Mr. Quincy...I don’t have any way to check the veracity of what you have told me, therefore you are free to go. I will give back all your equipment and set you off for whatever place you were going. Since you are alone, we can probably even spare some extra food rations for you. How about that?”

“Frankly Major, now that I found a military unit, I would love to be able to join you.” answered Quincy quite excited.
“You mean fitting in my chain of command?”
“Yes Sir. Something like that. Be honest with you I don’t have a lot of places where to go right now. All mi mated got killed far as I know. What are your plans Sir?”
“We haven’t decided yet. For now we are here, using this village as defense and at the same time defending the village. Our chain of command is broken and we are without orders for the moment”
“I am ready to help; working or whatever you say Saar. Fore sure I can work. I served in the Graen Jaikates regm’nt saar, got military sperience.”

Siviglia gave one more inquisitive look at Quincy. He certainly didn’t want to turn away an alone man that sought protection, if he could earn his due.

“Look, for now you might be with me at my HQ. I have a recon unit out on an assignement. When it returns. I might assign you to that unit...if you want to be with us, you will have to follow orders, and you are free to live at any time you don’t like them.”

“at’s alrig with me saar me I’m used to follow ordaars.”

Michael Quincy
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ambrafoxtrot17
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Wed 07 Jul 2021, 19:40

02-01-99 Skara northern outskirts. Day Shift [Dark] Weather Heavy Snow

NIBBIO team was cold wet and miserable. Soon after lunch the weather had changed for the worse and heavy snow was falling. Tactically speaking It was a beautiful position for an OP, at the edge of a wood and plaaced on an artificial embankment, which commanded a superb view on Road 20, the northern access to Skara.

Rossi looked around and felt the desperation mounting like a wave in a stormy sea. He wanted to leave that place and go back home. He wanted everything to go back to normal. It didn’t want to be any more in the dark, in the cold and in the snow with the constant danger of being killed maimed or fucking freeze to death. Sven had told him that that was the worse winter he could remember in a long time, with way lower than average temperature for the south of Sweden, and an unusual level of precipitations.
What kept Rossi together and prevented him from just deserting and disappear form the scene was essentially that one, there was really nowhere to go and two he didn’t want to let down Ottonese.

Lieutenant Holtz had selected the position for the base camp, 40 meters from the OP, well inside the wooden area, in order to keep the campfire concealed. After the position was selected, Sven got to work in order to prep it, while Ottonese and Rossi dealt with its concealment, using in part materials found on the spot and then adding some camo tarp prepared back in Stopen in order to camouflage the position even better. Holtz stood guard while the other guys prepped the camp and the OP.

They haven’t been working for long when Lieutenant Holtz heard an engine coming form the north. He immediately run to the eastern edge of the wood, raised his binocs and pointed them on the road. Visibility was of course pitiful, but Holtz nevertheless managed to spot a vehicle coming down the road. It looked like a Humvee proceeding quite fast. The other members of the team rushed along the embankment to see what was going on. They too had heard the engine noise.

“What is it” asked Ottonese as soon as he arrived, scanning with his binoculars as well.
“I am not sure. I can’t see very well yet. But it looks like a Humvee.” answered the Lieutenant.

The identity of the vehicles became certain when suddenly it was caught by a devastating explosion originating from the side of the road right in front of the Italian position. The conflagration rocked everything in 40 meters radius, and the men of NIBBIO team had been lucky to stand on an elevated position. The Humvee was lifted two meters in the air and crash landed belly up in the middle of the road with a thundering noise of twisted and shredded metal.

“Santa Madre di Dio!” exclaimed Ottonese while protecting his eyes. The entire party ducked for cover.

“Nobody move...stay down!!” Ordered Holtz, while with the binoculars tried to get a better picture of the situation down there.
“It must have been a roadside bomb or a mine.” suggested Holtz.
“More a roadside device” retorted Ottonese. Burt if it was a mine must have been an antitank mine... Damn!!...Have you seen that?” continued the specialist. “That fucking three tons vehicle being thrown in the air like a tennis ball?”

Holtz didn’t answered anything and limited himself to observe the road. He was able to distinguish some human figures trying to crawl out of the ablaze wreck. Somebody incredibly had survived the attack.
Ottonese spotted the survivors himself some seconds after Hotlz.
“We have to go help those men Lieutenant.”
Holtz glared at him with the coldest expression.
“There is no point we are not equipped to assist, and it’s not our mission.”
“But they are still alive answered Ottonese, and you are a medical officer.”
Holtz gave another hard look at Ottonese.
“You are going to get us all killed Ottonese”. Holtz thought for some seconds how to proceed. Then he rapidfired his orders:

“Sven...you come here and grab my assault rifle. It’s the longest range weapon we have. You cover us from here...Rossi give your radio to Sven and come with me. Ottonese...with me.”

Everybody nodded.

Liutenant Holtz grabbed the personal med kits he had in his backpack and raced down the embankment, armed only of his sidearm, hoping that the victims of the attack didn’t take them for the perpetrators. His men followed him as one.

Holtz was the first to get to the location of the incident, which was no more than 30 meters from the embankment. At that point the visibility was great, despite the heavy snow precipitation. He found an apocalyptic scene in front of him: the soldiers were indeed Americans. Two of them were trying to put off various fires on themselves; Holtz noticed that one had extended burns on his face, but the adrenaline prevented him from realizing it yet, as he was trying to put off a principle of fire on his hair. A third man was trying to drag one comrade from the flipped vehicle. The smoke and the acre smell of burning gasoline and plastic filled the air. Holtz noticed that part of the front of the vehicle was missing. The engine was the area that absorbed most of the impact. The US soldiers were screaming and crying. In total shock they were trying to react...on pure adrenaline. They didn’t notice the Italians running towards them, as they were all bailing out having failed the CUF roll.

Then everything went south: when the Americans saw the rescuers they thought they were enemies. Ottonese tried to talk to them, to make them understand who they were, but was attacked by a big American soldier who pulled out a combat knife on him. Otto blocked the first shot on pure instinct. The yank, not in total possession of his faculties, missed the second swing. All the Italians tried to calm the Americans down. They tried to show the itailian flag to their shoulders, to non avail; the Americans were too pumped up and too scared. One of them crawled back inside the burning Humvee to retrieve his weapon, which he managed to.
Finally It was Hotlz that solved the situation the hard way: he pointed his carbine at the yanks and yelled with all his voice.

“STOP...STOP! NATO forces, NATO forces!!”

Fortunately for everybody the Americans finally realized who they were dealing with and Ottonese didn’t have to shoot anybody, because sure as hell, he would have, as he told Rossi after the fact.

“I am a medic” yelled Holtz. “We need to pull you guys out of here...who is wounded?”
“Lieutenant Moore is wounded, and Private Phillip is dead inside the Humvee." answered one of the Americans. "The rest of us are Ok I think apart from some burns." By then the vehicle was burning so fiercely that it was impossible to access it to retrieve anything else or anybody from it.

Holtz looked at the wreck and shook his head. He was still wandering how somebody came out alive from that vehicle. Then he snapped into action.

“We need to get out of here before who planted that IED shows up to finish the job. Let’s get back to our positions and then will see.”

Holtz approached the soldier crouched on the American officer. The Lieutenant had passed out. Holtz checked him out. There were no visible wounds.
“He must have something broken” the young soldier said indicating the lower part of his commander body. “He cannot walk and before passing out he was in terrible pain.”
“We need to move him out than I’ll be able to check on him.” answered Holtz.

Calmly and methodically, the group started to withdraw towards the Italian position on the embankment which by the way were not completed yet. Ottonese was in the tail turning back at regular intervals to check that nobody was arriving on the scene to follow up on the IED attack. Thanks God nobody did. Rossi and one of the unharmed Americans carried the wounded officer. It took several minutes to reach the Italian half prepared camp. Fist thing Holtz checked the American officer. He examined his lower body.

“I think his legs are ok” said the medic officer. I suspect the problem could be on his pelvis or hip. Without X-rays it’s difficult to say. Let’s keep him worm. When he regains consciousness we’ll see”

The Italians laid the American Lieutenant in one of the prepared position that they managed to complete before the attack.

Then Holtz addressed the foreign group again.

“Now...I am Lieutenant Kurt Holtz, 8th Reggimento Alpini, Italian Army”, continued Holtz “who is second in command here?”
“That would be me Sir. I am Corporal Denise Ruger 2nd Infantry Regiment 2nd Division United States Marine Corps” answered a woman voice behind Holtz. He turned around and found himself in front of that big soldier whose blackened face and helmet prevented him from recognizing as a woman when she attacked him with the bayonet.”
Holtz looked at her open mouthed for a second or two. He was about to comment that nobody would ever marry her, but he thought that yanks could take that as a sexist joke, so he simply closed his mouth. When he reopened it, his tone was professional.

“Corporal, can you give me a sitrep of the situation here? My regiment is attached to your division but we lost contact with our liaison officer Lt. Colonel Bailey days ago.”

The Marine corporal, surprised that a foreign officer was familiar with the Brass of the Division HQ, answered with no hesitation that 2nd regiment had lost contact with the overall command as well because in all probability said command had been wiped out by a tactical warhead in Alingsas. She added that the 2nd Marine Regiment was deployed in Skara and that the town was contested by a vicious band of marauders. Their group was on its way back from a trip to Götene to draw supplies from a logistic base that was supposed to be there, but they found it empty and abandoned.

“What’s the mission of you regiment in Skara Corporal?” asked Holtz bluntly.
“That I’ve no idea about Sir. Probably when Lieutenant Moore regains consciousness he would be able to answer that question.”
“Is he in command of the regiment?”
“No he is not Sir...we had Major Riley in command of the regiment in town, until he got killed in an ambush by the Marauders. I’ve heard on the horn that a Captain coming from outside, precisely from the Marine Recon Battalion has assumed command of the regiment. But I don’t know him Sir.”
“How bad is the situation with these marauders corporal?”
“Pretty bad sir. They claim control of Skara and also the control of the surrounding territory. Their agenda is to liberate the country from any foreign presence.”
“Noble idealist bastards out of contact with reality” answered Holtz. “Considering that the majority of the foreign troops just want to leave this country and go back to theirs.”
“Yes Sir” was the short answer by the corporal girl.

“Ok Corporal Ruger listen to me...my men were preparing an observation point and the related camp out here. What is the situation in town...is there any possibility that we can scrap the OP plan and directly confer with this captain of your?”
“I’ll tell you what Sir...the town is a contested area between us and these civilian insurgent, which by the way have mixed support from the local population. Since we lost our weapons in the vehicle fire, it would be even good at this point if you could escort us downtown to our command. I am certain that you will be able to speak with the new officer in command.”

Holtz thought a little while about that.
“Fucking hell, I don’t want to be an officer any more” thought Holtz between himself. “Too many decision for too much of the time.” Then he looked at Corporal Ruger again.

“Let’s do that corporal.”
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ambrafoxtrot17
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Thu 08 Jul 2021, 18:58

The mixed party was walking south on Road 20. Corpotal Ruger had told Holtz that the 2nd Marine Infantry Regiment HQ was located in a hotel next to that same road, on the Southeastern outskirts of Skara. Thanks God the snowing had stopped even though the sky was still cloudy and threatening. Ottonese was on point, while the only armed Marine closed the line. Three hundred meters from their destination there was a roundabout which the party didn’t enter, preferring to cut straight on the elevated road to make it faster. May be that was a mistake because in the middle of what would have been the roundabout, Ottonese froze, knelt and raised his right fist. Then he whispered into his mike.
“Nibbio 1 this is 2...Russian BTR 12 o’clock 50 meters...troubles.”

The entire column froze and hit he deck. Holtz addressed Corporal Ruger, who was with him in the column.
“Corporal do you think can you contact your HQ. May be they can come help us with this one.”

Ruger had already thought to ask the Italian officer to let her use his radio to contact command before approaching it and so she was more than glad to comply.

“2 This is 1 cease movement...repeat cease movement. Stand by and check enemy activity. I’m going to have the Americans call their command to see if they can assist, over”

“Copy that ...Nibbio 1. Point element stand by and check over and out.”

Corporal Ruger then grabbed Holtz radio and maneuvered it on the right frequency.

“Bravo Delta...this is Alpha Papa do you copy?” Ruger tried to contact her command in the Best Western Hotel a kilometer south, but she only got static noise in return.

“Bravo Delta...this is Alpha Papa radio check over!” The statics buzz was interrupted by the scratchy noise of someone pushing the mike button on the other side.
“Alpha Papa authenticate or get off my frequency over.” Ruger recognized the voice of Gunnery Sergeant Alan McCafferty, who probably didn’t recognized her, or maybe he did and was being paranoid.

“Bravo Delta...Mount Rouge…repeat Mount Rouge. Our commander is WIA...Delta Romeo in command operating under NATO counterpart junior officer. Do you copy over?”
“Solid copy Delta Romeo...what kind of apparatus are you using, interrogative over”
“We’ve been attacked on the way back. We got support from NATO troops. I’m using their commo over”
“Copy that...Status Delta Romeo”
“We are stuck at the roundabout 20-49. We’ve got a roadblock guarded by a Russian APC at 12 o’clock on the other side of the roundabout, and an unknown number of infantry, nationality also unknown. Can you spin up some armor and come to help us interrogative over”
“Repeat your last Delta Romeo.”
“Bravo Delta...I repeat Warsaw Pact APC type Bravo Tango Romeo blocks road south of the roundabout, manned by unknown dismounts. We could go around it, but it would be long. If you can activate a Lima two five, that’d be faster and safer. We have lost, I repeat lost our Humvee.”
“Stand by Delta Romeo.” was the final answer of the command.

The mixed Italian American party slid to the two edges of the road to keep the troops and the stretcher with Lieutenant Moore as concealed as possible. They waited for some more than a minute.

“Delta Romeo this is Bravo Delta do you copy over.”
“Lima Charlie...Delta Bravo...go for Romeo over.”
“Be advised we are sending an armored vehicle your way to deal with the Bravo Tango Romeo. Do you confirm it sits in the open on the southern side of the roundabout interrogative over.”
That is an affirmative Bravo Delta. We can’t see the dismounts but the vehicle is right there, over”
“Good copy Romeo. As soon as the Lima Alpha Whiskey engages the vehicle, try to take out the infantry and breach through the roundabout, confirm over”
“Roger that Delta Bravo. I’ll inform the NATO counterparts of your directives over”
“Copy that Romeo...execute. ETA 4 mikes. Over and out.”

Denise gave back the headset to Holtz.
“My regiment is sending an AFV up here in 4 minutes Lieutenant. They request that we support them when they begin the attack, pushing south to open our own way.”
“Roger that corporal. Let me organize my troops then”
“Aye Sir”

Lieutenant Holtz moved towards the head of the column bringing Rossi with him. They reached Ottonese in front; he had taken position on another artificial embankment from old interrupted road works.

“The Marines are going to send armored support in 4 minutes” said Holtz to Ottonese. “They want us to push south as soon as they engage. We are looking for enemy infantry.
“Are we sure the BTR is a hostile?” asked Ottonese.
“It better be...It is not American; we know that much. It might be Russian or captured by those insurgents the American were talking about.”

Then Holtz turned to the American girl again.

“Corporal Ruger”
“Sir”
“Here!” Holtz handed over his Beretta Assault rifle and his two 5.56 mags, and kept his sidearm for himself.
“Take care of my ammo Corporal. Those are my two last magazines.”
Ruger smiled. “Aye Sir.”

Holtz organized his force. He had Ottonese, Rossi and 2 banged up US Marines. Sven was designated tactical reserve to assist the wounded American officer and the other marine with a burned face, who was really starting to feel the pain.

“Listen carefully Corporal. You have the long range weapon. You are our base of fire. I and my two men plus your buddy are assault. This is the button to release the magazine of the AR when you need to change it. If you need to shoot, make your ammo count corporal, You are overwatch.”

Denise was about to protest about being left behind, but Holtz anticipated her objections.

“You Americans are already the major effort from the south. Leave something to do for us too, will you Corporal?” Holtz smiled at her. A smile charged with the tension of the imminent action.
“Aye Sir”
“Don’t worry corporal, we will crush them like grape and will see what king of juice they’ll spill.” said Holts to hide his own fear. Then he gave the last instructions to his fire team and resigned himself to patiently wait for the Marines to attack along the road from the south. He tightened his grip on his 92SB.

Holtz heard the screams of the enemy infantry in front of him before the he heard the dry bark of an autocannon south of the position occupied by the enemy. The entire scene was out of his visual range. He only managed to see some flashes in the dark and some sparks originating from the BTR; a clear sign that he had been hit. The infantry that was flanking the enemy APC scrambled to take cover, hitting the deck. There was no cover on that elevated portion or the road. His assault group started to advance. Corporal Ruger went prone on top of the embankment assuming overwatch position.

When the assault team was 30 meters from the enemy position, he noticed a Lav-25 charging directly against the BTR position, his 25mm autocannon blazing away in long bursts, while the enemy vehicle was trying to traverse his turret to face the threat. Too late: the BTR got hit again by a burst of 25mm high velocity bullets. The crew bailed out unscathed, but terrorized as the vehicle started pissing fuel from several holes in his hull. The Lav-25 was now practically on top of the BTR and Holtz who could now clearly see the US vehicle in action, thought that his commander had to be crazy. Holtz also admired the precision of the American fire during movement. He wandered if the Lav-25 had any kind of stabilization and fire control system.

Inspired, the Italian Lieutenant advanced determined to force the enemy infantry to surrender or die, even though the Americans from the southern side were doing all the heavy lifting.

“NIBBIO avanti! Neutralize that infantry in front of us for me!” Yelled Holtz to his men, and started firing too as soon as his pistol was in decent range. Adrenaline pumping, he squeezed the trigger multiple times at the enemy soldiers in front him who by the way were turned towards the Lav-25 assaulting their position from the south, and didn’t see the Italian infantry advancing on their six yet. Rossi, Ottonese and the Marine did the same with their rifles, methodically advancing and shooting. Multiple enemies were hit. One of the three enemy infantry elements broke and raised their hands, finally realizing that they were surrounded.

The enemy commander tried to rally his men to react to the fire of the American vehicle, but Holtz just saw the coaxial MG of the Law-25 opening fire and decapitating the man with a long flashy bursts. Holtz wandered if it had been an aimed shot or a random hit, but it was nevertheless impressed at the murderous efficiency of those armored marines. The remaining of the enemy infantry stood up completely broken and surrendered. They had their BTR immobilized and dangerously leaking fuel, some of their comrades injured and their commander brutalized by the precise fire of the Lav secondary armament. That was way to much to bear for them.

For some seconds nothing and nobody moved. The mayhem of the shock and awe maneuver by the American armor, had frozen everybody, including the Italian infantry advancing from the opposite side. Moreover, Holtz didn’t want to approach too close to that crazy armored vehicle whose devilish fire might even kill some of his men by way of friendly fire. During the short the pause in the action, Holtz could appreciate that the enemy didn’t wear military uniforms. They had dropped their AK assault rifle and were just waiting there with their hands in the air. The massive Lav-25 with its white and black zebra camo scheme, stood in front of them in the snowy road.

After that brief moment of silence, suddenly the M-240 coax roared again, its flashes protruding long in front of the turret and mowed down all the enemies who had surrendered. When they were all dropped, the machinegun ceased fire. After a acouple of seconds, the commander hatch of the armored vehicle opened, and Holtz could see a man climbing out with a certain difficulty given his size. He wore a white big hood which hide his face. Holtz was astonished and terrified.

“You” Holtz gestured at the American Marine. “Go see if your countryman recognize you and tell them that we are going to advance if they promise they won’t shoot at us.” Holtz was clearly scared by the attitude of the Americans cavalrymen or whatever they were. Their commander had just ordered or even personally executed the murder of troops that had clearly ceased to be combatants.

Corporal Ruger joined the groups of Italians. The other American in Holt’s assault group went ahead and completed all the identification procedures, and then came back signaling to the Italians to come forward. The American vehicle commander had taken the hood off and had dismounted his vehicle. He was now standing in the middle of the road, conferring with the Marine who had participated in the attack with the Italians. When he saw Holtz, Ottonese and Rossi approaching, he turned his head towards them. It was a mountain of a man, with black hair and a week old unshaven beard. He looked sideways at the Italians as if he wanted to to size’em up.

Holtz was the first one to speak. “I am Liutenant Holtz, 8th Alpini Regiment, Italian Army. We rescued your men a couple of kilometers north of here when they got blown up by an IED. Our original mission was to investigate the situation in the area. We lost contact with the 2nd US Marine division days ago. I must protest your action of deliberate killing of men who had surrendered to you. This is clearly against the Geneva conventions about the treatment of prisoner of war.

The man in front of him looked at Holtz unimpressed. He held an assault rifle at the low ready. He waited some time to answer while he was trying to evaluate the quality of those foreign troops Then he spoke with a low but deep voice.

“Those men were not prisoner of war. They were criminals who brutalized the civilian population of this town and who knows of how many others. In time of war, these offenses are punishable with death, according to the Unites States military penal code.

Holtz just stood there unable to find an immediate answer in front of that imposing man.

“Italian Army you said” continued the Marine commander… “My grandparents were Italian; from Avellino. I am captain Castle...Frank Castle. I am the provisional commander of the 2nd US Marine Regiment. I have been detached from the Marine Recon divisional unit.”
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Fri 09 Jul 2021, 19:12

02-01-99 Day to Evening shift [Dark] cloudy
03-01-99 Morning and Day shifts

The three stars hotel which served as command post for the 2nd Marine Infantry Regiment was in a quiet area. It was still relatively well kept and not damaged by the war so far. The NATO column, with the Lav-25 rolling on point was almost there when Lieutenant Holtz start to feel a pain in his side. The adrenaline of the fight was wearing off and a stabbing pain assailed him all at once while he was walking in front of his team. Sven, who was the only other member of the Italian outfit who could speak a decent English summoned Corporal Ruger immediately. The column stopped in order to have Lieutenant Holtz accommodated on the Lav. He wasn’t loosing blood, but he couldn’t keep walking. The passenger compartment of the vehicle was fitted as an ambulance where captain Castle was already checking on Lieutenant Moore, who was suffering but stable.

When the column arrived inside the wire in Skara, Captain Castle ordered to have all the wounded moved to the improvised infirmary, which had electrical power provided by a couple of generators. The most urgent case to look after was at that point Lieutenant Holtz. Castle realized that he needed surgery to extract a slug from his side. Holtz was conscious even if sedated. With the greatest care Captain Castle and a couple of Marines moved him from the Lav-25 to the infirmary without killing him. Quickly the room was prepared for surgery. Captain Castle wore an antiseptic robe, a surgical mask and gloves from one of the doctor kits the regiment had available. Then he went to work. Castle wasn’t a field surgeons, but he had good environmental conditions and adequate instruments to operate, plus it was not a particularly complicated operation. All that combined saved Holtz’s life. Castle failed the 8d roll, but got a 7 on the 10d roll, and that 10d roll had been possible only thanks to the positive modifiers due to the surgical instruments, plus the doctor kit. So at the end of operation, which lasted several hours, Castle was left sweating and Holtz was left in a stretcher with 3 points of damage but stable. Castle estimated he could recover in a week if everything went well. He would suffer one point of damage for any mobility roll he attempted before total recover, but once he recovered his 3 damage points could start functioning at least partially.

That night Holtz was not in condition to confer with Captain Castle, so the Italians assmbled in the room that was kindly assigned to them. The Americans were even more kind to bring them some chow so that they did not have to go through their precious rations for that day. Even though Lieutenant Holtz was out of commission, they were in town and they could start at least to send Sven to investigate among the inhabitants. Ottonese addressed him.

“Tomorrow you go around. You ask people information about area and town ok?” said Ottonese sounding blunt but in reality just not having enough acquaintance with English.

Sven nodded and continued to fix his bed for the night. “Man this Italian guy is blunt!” he thought.

Next day Holtz recovered from the anesthetic. He was still in pain but he could at leas talk. In the infirmary with him there were Liutenant Moore and Rossi who went to check on him first thing.

First Holtz addressed the American Lieutenant: “Glad to see you vertical again Lieutenant. I hope you sitting in that wheelchair is only a temporary condition” said Holtz to his American counterpart. Moore, still in a considerable amount of pain himself cringed and responded that he was glad to see Holtz still alive, and that Captain Castle had performed quite a piece of surgery on him.

“Is there any way I can thank him personally” asked Holtz.
“Well he should be coming to visit us at least once a day to check on our recovery.”
“what is the mission of your regiment here Lieutenant?” asked Holtz nonchalantly
“We basically grant security, establish positions out of the wire, and escort merchant convoys up and down the strip.”
“The strip?”
“Yeah” answered Moore “A strip of territory from here to Nossebro on which a number of towns and little villages are trying to resume some production and trade. The area is infested with bastards that want free lunches at the expenses of the people that break their backs in order to recover some semblance of normal life around here: marauders mainly, but also stragglers from Russian units and also some American renegades and local gangs. Where is your unit located?” asked Moore.
“My regiment is in a little village called Stopen, 10 clicks north of Skovde. We are taking shelter there after a lost battle against the a Russian motorized division which broke trough our position. It seems like the entire front collapsed without really any major battle fought. When we asked for orders to the divisional command, we got no answer.”
“You got no answer because there is no fucking divHQ no more man. Wiped out by a tactical warhead. “
“Then it is true” said Holtz
“Did you now?”
“We had some news from Swedish civilians”
“So now Captain Castle is in command of this outfit” continued Moore. “We didn’t manage to get in contact with any sister regiments. Castle’s original unit has been nuked too in Fallöping just a few hours after he was on the way to reach us.”
“Holy shit” answered Holtz grimacing for his pain in the side.
“Yeah” continued Moore. “And 10th arty met the same fate. But on the other hand Ivan seems to have halted his ops too, at least big organized ops. Must be in bad shape too.”
“We encountered a Russian unit on the way here in the Ekeberg forest. We had to detour big time to reach Skara.”
“What??” The American officer assumed a worried expression. “How big of a unit?”
“Pretty big infantry unit, with heavy MG support. We barely managed to slip out”
“Dammit...that’s bad news” exclaimed the American Marine lieutenant.

Sven entered in a tavern called the Red Rooster and looked around. There wasn’t a lot of people around even for a town of the size of Skara. He was armed with the semiautomatic handgun that Ottonese had given him and five magazines; more than enough to fight a war. But his mission was about gathering information, no fighting was expected. He approached the bar and asked for something to eat and if a magazine of 9mm would be satisfactory as payment. The owner looked at him.
“It is the first time you come here isn’t it?”
“It is”
“Well then I’m telling you that we deal only in 5.56 or 5.45 here.”
Sven pulled out two magazines of 9mm and put them on the bar.
“You can keep the holders” said the owner. “Put the bullets in this bag.” 10 minutes later he came back with a fresh beer and an abundant plate of roasted meat and potatoes and a side dish of salad. “It’s basic” he said “but it’s the best I can provide.”
“Don’t worry” said where I am from we can only dream of a meal kike that.
“Where are you from?” asked Adolf, that was the owner’s name.
“Skovde”
“Holy shit” answered Adolf. I thought it had been vaporized.
“It has been, but the village north of it where I am from got only marginally effects.”
“What’s that”
“Stopen”
“Ah”
“I was trying to move somewhere where things are not so bad. We are just dying up there. How have you been fearing around here” asked Sven noncommittally.
“After the collapse we have been surviving...we have trade relationships with some towns down towards the coast. Not much but better than nothing. We have these American troops here. They are a pain in the ass. They periodically requisition what they need, with the excuse that they provide to our defense and they police the town.”
“Do they...I mean are they useful to the citizenry?” Sven casually asked while taking a sip from his beer.
Adolf ratted out the question as suspicious, and glossed over it.
“I don’t know...I don’t really deal with politics.”
“But you told me that the Americans are a pain in the ass”
“Well someone is not happy to have to keep their HQ stocked with medical supply and food provisions. They are worried that they will never leave.”
Sven pretended to let the subject go, but he just changed the angle. He wanted to know who were...they.
“I’ve also heard that there is a constant danger of marauders around here.”
“Well...that’s what the yanks call them...They…” Adolf realized he was about telling what he didn’t intend to…“they just don’t like foreign military in our territory….but you will excuse me now. I have to go check on the tables...I hope you’ll enjoy the rest of your meal.”
“Certainly. Thank you for the service” answered Sven.

Captain Castle came to check on his patients right before lunch time.
“How are you doing Lieutenant” he asked with his usual deep voice.
“The pain is still there, but it’s better. I think I am ready to resume my duties. All thanks to you Captain. You saved my life”
Castle looked at him sideways. “I would be very careful Lieutenant if I were you. That wound of yours...I plugged it, but I didn’t go quite deep enough to see if something inside got seriously damaged. I removed all the fragments I could see, but I doubt it’s safe for you to move for at least a week. A complication during the recovery could still kill you.”
“One week? Sir...I have to go back to my unit in Stopen. My mission is to gather information on this area, which seems is the only one that has not been submitted to nuclear strikes. Lieutenant Moore gave me the gist of the situation around here this morning.”
“I am glad he did” answered Castle. “I wanted to ask you instead; what is the intent of your commander?”
“In the long term to find a route to a secure port and reembark the regiment to bring it back to Italy.” answered Holtz with no hesitation.
“And in the short term?”
“I guess to stay safe and keep it together. We have occupied a small village and we are trying to establish a profitable relationship with the population until we understand what’s going on.”
“Same thing we are doing here Lieutenant. We lost contact with DivHQ but the order to protect this country from the Soviets still stands, and that’s exactly what I am going to do until we also...understand what’s going on.” Castle paused to see what effect his words had on the Italian pretty boy.
“Well, for the sake of coordination may be Captain you could come to confer with my commander. With one of your AFVs we could be in Stopen in a couple of hours, three tops. We could coordinate our units starting from there.”
“We are very low on fuel Lieutenant, and fuel is one of those commodities this town cannot provide at the moment. We are organizing ourselves to produce alcohol and to convert our engines to burn it. But it will take some time. The chivalrous fight of last night costed us some more precious fuel from our strategic reserve.”
“We have diesel fuel in Stopen Captain. If you can take me and my men back there, we can refund all the fuel for the two ways trip.”
Castle looked at him with that same inexpressive stare he had shown after having executed those marauders the night before.
“Let me think about it Lieutenant.”
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ambrafoxtrot17
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Sat 10 Jul 2021, 13:07

03-01-99 Evening shift [dark] weather cloudy
04-01-99 Morning shift [dusk] weather Heavy Snow

Captain Castle had just finished to prep one of his Lav-25 for the trip to Stopen. Mission: bring back the Italians to their base, and investigate the possibility of some kind of cooperation with the 8th regiment to “keep a grip on the strip” as he liked to say. It made sense. Captain Castle wouldn’t waste a breath on something if he didn’t think the activity was mission beneficial. And that had to be beneficial for his mission: securing the cooperation of a military unit in his area of operation in that moment of great uncertainty was of the greatest importance. Lately he had seen too many stragglers wandering around; even from the 2nd Marine Division regiments. A clear sign that things were quickly falling apart in the chains of command. That late afternoon Captain Castle wrote in his war journal:

“War Journal Entry # 411: In order to maintain control of my battle space, I have decided to accept the risks of moving out of Skara for the chance of a parley with the commander of an Italian infantry regiment stationed in Stopen. For this reason I decided to temporarily divide my forces in order to provide a detail to escort the Italian advanced team back to its command. My goal is to convince their commanding officer to join forces with me.”

The plan was to prepare the movement during that evening shift, have dinner, a good night of sleep, and taking the risk to travel in dusk conditions the day after.
That night Castle payed another visit to Lieutenant Holtz to see how he was doing and to tell him that he had accepted his proposal. Apart for the Marines on watch, everybody had a quiet sleep with no encounters for that night.

The following morning the weather reverted again to pitiful. Heavy snow and a strong wind from the north made the perceived temperature even lower than it was. Captain Castle, on top of the turret of his Black and white camo Lav-25, was ready to go. He wore his big arctic hood and his sky goggles. Marine Gaigher drove the vehicle, corporal Ruger was the vehicle mechanic. Castle reserved for himself the double role of Commander and Gunner. He wanted to be sure that he was the one who maneuvered the weaponry and Ruger didn’t mind to hand over the position to him given his diabolic accuracy with the Bushmaster and with the Coax. In the passenger compartment were Lieutenant Holtz on his stretcher, Rossi, Ottonese and Sven. Fortunately the compartment could be insulated from the governing stations of the vehicle, Because Castle had the damned habit of traveling with the commander hatch open, and his head and torso exposed for better visibility. When the vehicle was in motion, Castle was in permanent overwatch. In cold weather he periodically stopped the vehicle everytime he was about to freeze, in order to recover for a few minutes inside. Usually his A++ stamina limited those interruptions to a very limited number during any given shift. Often his men wandered if the Captain was really human or if he was some kind of comic character.

The ETA to Stopen was estimated at two hours and a half, lacking any unexpected events, but in 1999 Sweden unexpected events were the order of the day when traveling along the desolated and abandoned roads in the wooden expanse, and especially in contested areas like that one.
The party wasn’t even 15km into their planned route when exiting a wooden area, smoke at 2 o’clock become visible. Proceeding along the road the smoke revealed to be coming from a burning big compound. Looked like some kind of farmhouse as there were the three silos on the right side of the road, them too ablaze. Something very bad had to have been going on very recently there. The acrid smell of the smoke penetrated inside the vehicle and Ottonese moved to one of the lateral slid that the Lav-25 had in the passengers compartment, to see what was going on. He saw bodies of civilians lying in the open, some of them only children. A woman was lying on the ground next to a toddler missing a leg. The bodies were half covered by the falling snow, but still clearly visible. At the same time, just a second before the horror wrapped him with its related 3 points of stress, Ottonese felt the vehicle coming to a stop.
On top of the turret Captain Castle raised his googles incredulous at what he was witnessing. He looked around for immediate danger. “Who would slaughter an entire compound of civilians like that, and for what reason?”

“Sven please go out and give me a report on the situation” ordered Holtz from his stretcher on the bottom of the passenger compartment, frustrated by the fact that he couldn’t act on his own.. The Swedish man opened one of the back doors of the vehicles and got in the open, while Captain Castle and Corporal Ruger were already investigating the situation. There were 6 corpses lying around, half of them children, an adult male and two women. “A fucked up total disaster” thought Castle, he himself not immune to the 3 points of stress, despite his killer specialty and his resilient EMP attribute. The entire compound was on fire and the smoke covered most of the scene. There was one main buildings that looked like the living place of those poor people, while the rest were barns, stables and other facilities. Everything was ablaze. Sven just stood there with his mouth open for a while, before going back inside the Lav to report to his commander.

“Corporal...stay here and cover 360 with the machinegun. I’ll go inside to see if they are any survivors.” yelled Castle to corporal Ruger.
“Please Sir...it’s way too dangerous those structure could collapse at any time!!”
“Shut up and give me that Axe Corporal” ordered Castle peremptorily but calmly.

Ruger threw the tool to his commander, and he started to resolutely advance towards the main building. Castle tried to find a door or a window that wasn’t engulfed in the flames yet, and he found one on the backside of the construction. Without any hesitation he ventured inside to inspect the building, got 3 successes on his mobility roll to avoid trouble and started to look around calling aloud for any human presence. He had done the right thing in deciding to risk an inspection of the building because despite the roaring noise of the flames he could suddenly hear somebody crying: a young voice. Quickly Castle made a recon roll at -1 for the noise and the smoke. In the thickness of the smoke he could see nothing; he desperately pushed the roll calling out loud to attract the attention of whoever was in there. Then orienteering himself on the sound of the voice, he walked in another room and he saw him. Between a closet and an indent in the wall, Castle finally saw a child curled up holding his knees on his face, and screaming in terror and desperation. With no hesitation he grabbed him.

“Hold tight to me!!” Castle screamed at the child, raising his voice above the noise of the raging fire. He wasn’t sure that the little boy could understand him but may he could, because he complied with the order. Another pushed roll on mobility took them out of there, among the falling pieces of wood and other materials on the way. Castle miraculously managed to draw the child from certain death, with a freaking 7 on his fourth dice. Very, very close to fail the rescue.

“Jesus double Christ” Castle sighted when he got back to the Lav. The Italians had formed a perimeter around the vehicle, all of them crouched down, weapons at the ready. Ruger was still in the turret scanning 360 with the M-240.

Castle laid the child down in the Lav compartment to check that he was OK. Two successes on a medical roll confirmed that the young boy was scared to death and in shock, but physically he was all right. Sven run up to the backdoor of the vehicle and climbed inside. Holtz too tried to comfort the kid.

“Are you OK?” Sven frantically asked in Swedish. The kid still wide eyed was about to respond, when Ruger screamed from the top of the turret.

“Dismounts 9 o’clok coming down the lateral street crossing the top of that little hill. She clearly indicated the direction of the incoming infantry with her arm.

“Fuck”...Castle run out of the Lav and crouched on the left of it automatically bringing his binocs up.

“Armed civilians!!” he yelled. “I count five of them. At least three rifles.
“I concur” confirmed Ruger also with her eyes glued to her binoculars I also see one handgun.

The civilians were walking down a secondary road with trees on both sides and a stone wall at the end, where it crossed the main road where the Lav was standing. As soon as they crested the hilltop, they started to disperse and to take cover among the trees evidently realizing what was the picture in front of them.

“They are arguing among themselves” reported Ruger, still observing with her binoculars.
“What? Asked Castle.

“Take cover!!” screamed Ruger, just before some shots started to fly around.

The Italians dropped prone in the snow, and Ruger tried to take some cover in the vehicle hatch, still observing what the civilians were doing.

“Do not fire back!!” screamed Castle on top of his voice. “Hold your fire!!” he run behind the position occupied by the Italians and repeated the order. The Italian troops turned their heads up at him like if he was crazy, but obeyed the order. Ottonese gestured to Rossi to hold fire. Sven did the same. Castle took cover behind the vehicle. Then he talked to Ruger. Some stray bullets were still flying, but the fire wasn’t particularly effective. Castle thought that those civilians were either ballsy or enraged to attack a mechanized infantry unit with hunting rifles; may they were both.

“They could be part of the people living here. They must be thinking that we are the ones who attached their place and set it on fire.” Yelled Castle…“Hold your fire!!
“In this case we are royally screwed” answered Ruger.
“May be not” retorted Castle, rushing again for the back doors of the vehicle. Before entering in it, he yelled at Sven to join him.

“Ask the boy if someone of his family were not at home when the farm got attacked…” Castle saw Sven hesitating in front of the still shocked kid.
“Ask him!!!!” shouted Castle.

Sven talked to the child who answered that his father and his uncle went to Herr Hansson’s farm early in the morning to ask for some tools that they needed.

Castle rushed out of the vehicle once again.
“Ruger...turn that fucking turret at 3 o’clock...execute!!”

Ruger didn’t even think about asking for an explanation and complied immediately.

“Sven grab the kid and come with me” Castle quickly addressed Ottonese on what he had intention to do. The Italian understood may be a quarter of what Castle said but didn’t dare to discuss either.

Castle and the Swedish man started then to walk on the road totally in the open, towards the civilian who had by then solid position behind the trees and were covering the area with their weapons. The Marine Recon Captain carried the kid in his arms, hugging him to protect him from the strong wind.

The civilians did not open fire. Ruger observed the entire scene from the top of the vehicle, knowing full well that if something went wrong she couldn’t do much having the turret brandished in the opposite direction. One of the civilians left his cover and started to walk towards Castle and Sven. Hesitantly another civilian imitated him. The others remained in overwatch.

The two parties meet 30 meters in front of the position held by the civilians, and stood there for what appeared to Ruger like an eternity. Then one of the two took the child from Castle’s arms. The other one gestured at the remaining characters to come out from behind their covers. Everybody surrounded the party in the middle of the trail, until after a while all of them started walking down the road towards the farm.

At the spot where the civilians met Castle, two red dices of the persuasion roll still laid in the snow: a 7 and an 8.
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ambrafoxtrot17
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Sat 10 Jul 2021, 21:00

Still morning shift of the 4th of January 1999, weather still sucks.

Investigation

“Do you have any idea about who could have done this?” Captain Castle asked to the group of men who just learned that had lost wives and children. One of them at least was lucky to have had US military save his boy.

“We didn’t have any warning or reason to believe that we would have been attacked so violently and so suddenly” answered the man who seemed to be the leader of the farmers.
“Do you know of the presence of any military units camped in the vicinity?” inquired Castle, who knew from the Italians that a Russian infantry unit had indeed been spotted in the Ekeberg forest park, 4 clicks south of there.
“No we don’t” answered the same farmer and he looked quite convincing.

“If you guys think is appropriate, I could examine the bodies and the area in order to find some clues, before you bury your dead. I mean, if you want it.”
“Of course” they all agreed. Despite the desperation of having somebody examine the bodies of their deceased loved ones, the civilians hoped to learn something about who could have done that.

“Here” said Ruger after a brief examination of the surroundings “cartridges” Ruger picked up one and handed it over to Captain Castle, with a puzzled and worried expression on her face.
“Captain...this is a NATO 5.56 cartridge”
Castle picked up the piece of metal, closely looked at it and then clutched it in his hand looking all around the horizon, like if he was looking for the perpetrators somewhere.

“Ruger, let’s see if we can find some more of these” said Captain Castle. They looked for a while. There were some more cartridges, but not many. They were pretty difficult to spot in the snowy terrain. It looked more and more like a surgical job, rather than an indiscriminate shooting. That indicated professional soldiers and not undisciplined rubble. And yes they were all 5.56x45 standard NATO cartridges.

The group of civilians were too busy sobbing and crying on the body of their lost ones in order to follow what Castle and Ruger were doing, and even if they were following, they probably wouldn’t have really distinguished between a 5.56 from any other war caliber in the cray world.

Castle and Ruger looked at each other with serious expressions. Ottonese had joined the two Americans, and he was starting to catch up on what they were doing.

“Let’s have a look at the bodies” suggested Captain Castle to his Corporal girl. They reluctantly went to disturb the farmers who were trying to compose the bodies of their wives and children. The view of a female blond teenager with her face horribly disfigured by a bullet, and her beautiful hair mixed to her own blood, almost brought Ottonese stress to 4. He forced himself to look somewhere else. He didn’t reach his stress 5 breakdown threshold during the battle of Kackestad and it would not happen now either, he told himself. His resolve did not diminished the level of devastating craziness he had been surrounded by in the last months. He knew full well it would pile up and that he would eventually breakdown.

The Americans were now having a close look at the bodies of the deceased people. All of them had fire weapons wounds. And with a well placed 8 on a medical roll Captain Castle could confirm that they were compatible with the 5.56 caliber. So all in all, no big forensic mysteries there: some western troops or somebody else using western military grade weapons had murdered those women and those children together with the only adult male that probably tried to defend the position. Then they probably torched the entire compound, which would probably burn down to the foundations in a few more minutes, as the intensity of the fires was starting to diminish for lack of combustible material.

As a last chance to understand something more, Castle thought they could question the child that he pulled out of the burning house; but in order to do that he had to consult his father and to ask him if he wanted him or not to do that.

Castle approached the civilians and with Sven’s help he explained to them what he had found out regarding the attack by examining the premises.

“I don’t know if your son saw something” Castle told the father, “you might want to ask him...may be if he did see something, it could help us to understand something more about this tragedy.”

The man looked intensely at Castle for some seconds, then he gave him a nod in agreement. They walked towards the Lav where the child had been left together with another couple of adults farmers. The conversation happened in Swedish between father and son. At a certain moment the kids became very agitated, so his father stopped asking questions and turned back to Castle.

“He says that he saw what happened through the window. Some men came and called everybody out of the building. Then they started talking. After a while there was screaming and they shot everybody. Then he felt the fire. He ran and hid.”
“Did you ask him if the soldier wore white uniforms like ours?”
“Captain...he is a four years old boy”
“Try”

The man patiently asked the question to the child, and he confirmed that the men where dressed in white.

“OK” said Captain Castle. “Men in arctic fatigues probably means legit soldiers; and I don’t see soviet troops using captured western assault rifles, even though it cannot be totally excluded. Let’s call It improbable” said Castle more to himself than to Ruger or the farmer. “Swedish renegades? American stragglers? We have an Italian regiment 30 clicks from here. Could be Italians? Or may be marauders with captured military equipment?” Castle shook his head, “Still too many possibilities” he thought.

“don’t worry Captain. As much as We would like to put our hands on the perpetrators, I think there are way too many bands of crazy people going around this area. We never received any threats in the past and we probably got too lax about our safety. May be we forgot this is a war zone after all We are now paying for our mistake. In any case there’s not much for us left to do here Captain. We have nothing left here”, the man said not being able to hold his tears. When he pulled himself together again, he turned back to Castle. “We know that there is a regiment of the Swedish Army stationed in Karlsborg. If it is still there We will try to reach the place and to enlist in the Army.

Sven approached the group after having updated Holtz about the entire situation. He addressed the Marine Captain first:
“Liutenant Holtz proposes that if these people want they could reach Stopen with us. If we alternate men traveling on the vehicle and inside it, it would slow us down but we could all reach Stopen. These men might join the citizenry there. Lieutenant Holtz knows the Mayor personally, and he is sure that she would have no difficulties to accept five able men like them in town.”

Sven wasn’t as convinced. He had seen Madam Berglund turn away refugees before, and the Italians saw that too. However he reported what he was told to say.

Castle didn’t have anything particularly against the proposal, so he simply turned to the farmers to elicit a reaction. For a long moment they looked at each other. Most of them shook their heads, but the father of the boy was interested. Manfred talked a little bit more with his companions and then turned to Castle.

“I think I will accept the proposal of the Lieutenant. It might give me the opportunity one day to uncover what happened here. If you think that it’s possible, I will join you. I would gladly take the opportunity” said Mr. Lindgren.

“Nothing against it. Mr Lindgren. We still have an empty seat in our AFV. I will give you some more moments with your friends, then we need to move. We have already lost the entire morning shift with this tragic incident today. Since you are at it, please ask your friend if we can provide them anything that could help them.”

Manfred joined once more his friends, talked to them a little bit more, hugged them all and then came back to the group of soldiers standing with Captain Castle. Sven accompanied him through the backdoor of the Lav-25. His son was already inside, plying rock paper scissors with Holtz and Rossi.

Our mechanized party entered the day shift and its inevitable sad darkness dressed for the occasion with thick falling snow.
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ambrafoxtrot17
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Sun 11 Jul 2021, 21:50

4th of January 99 day shift weather turns to fair

Proceeding towards Stopen the weather gradually improved, thus sparing “Mechanized Italian American team” a -2 modifier on the driving roll. Unfortunately despite that benefit, on a particularly tricky bend inside an old industrial zone, Gaigher lost control of the vehicle for a second and crashed it into a big rock on the side of the road. On the fortunate side of things, the vehicle was traveling at slow speed, given the dark conditions so the damage was proportionately low. That did not prevent Holtz stretcher to slide forward pretty violently. The lieutenant banged his right arm against the internal structure of the compartment, cursed heavily but he wasn’t anything more that a little banged up.

“Is everybody ok?” Captain Castle jumped down from the turret to the hull and from there to the ground. After the impact the vehicle had bounced back on the road and slid sideways because of the snow. Castle knew better than blaming Gaigher for the accident. In those road conditions and at night, mishap like that weren’t totally unexpected, especially after a certain number of hours behind the wheel.

The Captain instead concentrated on inspecting the right front part of the Lav-25 which had sustained the impact. Having the vehicle bounced back, it was now completely on the road again. Castle proceeded to the backside of the vehicle, opened one of the doors to make sure that nobody was hurt, and finally completed his inspection tour around the AFV. Everything looked OK apart from dents and scratches where the vehicle had impacted the rocks. The only problem was that walking on the left side of the Lav, Castle spotted a protuberance in the snow cover on the road. He froze in place and looked on both directions forward and back. He knew what he was looking at. He banged on the driver hatch. Gaigher stuck his head out after having opened it.

“Can you please turn on the headlights Marine?” Gaigher complied immediately.
“Dammit…” sighted Castle after he scanned the road for a second two in the lights
“What is it?” asked Gaigher.
“Antitank mines right ahead” hissed Captain Castle keeping as cool as he could.
Gaigher swallowed nosily but he didn’t say a word.
Ruger stuck her head out of her own turret hatch.
“Do we have a flashlight corporal” asked the commander.
“Yes we do Sir” Ruger disappeared inside the vehicle for some moments to rummage in the turret compartment mess, reemerged with a flashlight and handed it over to Castle. The Captain walked again to the back of the vehicle, and found that Rossi and Ottonese were coming out to see what was going on and why they didn’t resume the movement yet.
“You guys go back inside.” ordered Castle authoritatively. The Italians understood “go back inside” but not the you guys part.
Ottonese had the presence to ask “what problema?”
“Don’t you say Problemo in Italian?” asked Castle to defuse the tension.
“No…” said Ottonese puzzled. “We say problema”
“Well we have a problema man...I spotted a Minefield right in front of us” answered Castle looking at him sharply.
That word Ottonese knew very well despite his lack of sophistication in English. He played a lot of Minefield for Windows before the war, but that was not a game.
“We go back?”
“...NO!”…snarled back the Marine Captain. “No point...we might be in the middle of it already.”

Castle turned the flashlight on. It wasn’t a very powerful device, but bright enough to light small sections of the road. The Marine Recon officer observed the road behind the Lav, and looking very carefully he saw more bumps in the snow cover.
“Holy shit” he thought but didn’t say. He wasn’t used to use bad language in front of the men. “We indeed are already in the middle of it.”

“OK go back inside” repeated Castle to the Italians, then he stuck his head in the compartment.
“Liutenant Holtz...we are in the middle of a damned minefield” Holtz sat up and frowned. “I will go ahead and try to get us out of here. I need all your men not to leave the vehicle. Please be sure that they comply. I don’t know how far we are into the minefield, but we are in the middle of it. So we will try to slip out on the left side of the road. Usually a minefield along a road is less wide than it is long. I will proceed on foot in front of the vehicle. We will try to avoid any antitank mine and I will try to disarm any antipersonnel one. So far I only saw antitank mines, but you never know. You guys stay put and don’t worry OK?”

Holtz and Sven, who understood everything Castle said, tried to look unconcerned and professional. Holtz relayed everything to his men. Manfred instead looked very worried for his son, but there was nothing he could do.

Captain Castle walked around the Lav and reached its left side. His pilot and Denise were all ears for whatever he would tell them.

“Julian we will try to get out of here in the safest way possible OK? I’ll be in front and I will spot for you. If I spot a mine I’ll tell you how to avoid it OK?...If I yell STOP you stand by: it means I detected an antipersonnel mine and I need to disarm it. Even an infantry mine could damage the vehicle and kill somebody; so it will still need to be dealt with...All clear Marine?”
“Yes Captain!” Answered Gaigher in an unsteady voice.

Castle cocked his head and looked at him as dearly as he would look at his son.
“Put your mind in the game Marine...I need you at one hundred per cent do you copy?”
“YesssSir” the pilot straightened up, inspired by Castle’s EMP A and Command A

Castle and the two crewmen prepared for action.

Castle zoned his mind into it, and proceeded to the first hex on the left the road. He looked at the sky…
“The fucking Gods of war don’t want us to get to this damned town” he thought. “Minefield in dark conditions! Recon roll -2 for each hex of this mess” he cursed.

All he could hope was that the minefield wasn’t laterally deep and that his A tech skill plus combat engineer specialty would be enough to take them out of that mess. He carefully swept 45° right and left of his PIM, and started crawling very slowly on all fours, probing the ground in front of him with his knife. In the first ten meters he did not spot anything. The Lav crept 4 or 5 meters behind him, with Gaigher giving a little push on the gas every time Captain Castle made progress. Needless to say, the process was nerve wrecking.

Ottonese had the temptation to climb on top of the hull and taking Manfred’s son with him in order to minimize any penetration effects in case of detonation underneath the vehicle, and asked permission to Holtz do do so. The Lieutenant thought it was a good idea and told all the occupants of the passenger compartment to do the same.

“What about you Lieutenant?” Asked Ottonese.
“Move” was the irritated answer by Holtz.

Five meters in front of the vehicle, Captain Castle wiped out the sweat off his forehead, despite the subfreezing temp and prepared himself to proceed for the next ten meters. It was extremely difficult to concentrate on spotting antitank and antipersonnel mines at the same time. For the first type a keen sight and a good deal of attention were enough. That kind of attention though was difficult to maintain while also probing the terrain for possible antipersonnel devices. Castle proceeded 20 meters more without detecting or detonating anything. Gaigher revved a little bit more to make the Lav proceed right in Castle’s ass wake.

Castle repeated the process for ten meters more. Then he stopped and turned to Corporal Ruger, who had held a horrified stare on him for the whole time.

“OK Denise, I think we can now take the risk to assume that we are out of the minefield. I will sit on the front of the vehicle for the next 20 meters; I don’t spot anything, we should be out of it. We must have been in a point where the minefield wasn’t very deep.”

They slowly drove some more towards a dismissed construction site with Castle sitting on the bow of the Lav-25. Nothing happened. Glacial as always, he turned back to Ruger.

“We are out of it” he grinned.

Corporal Ruger look conveyed a mix of love, respect and awe for her leader. He had taken them out of a very hairy situation.
“Aye Sir”

“It is almost dinner time Corporal” Castle smiled at her. We’ll now find a suitable place for setting camp and we’ll prepare for the evening shift. I believe we had enough emotions for today. Pass the word on to the Italians will you?

The Marines/Alpini unit camped in a wood not too far from Road 26. They could have reached Stopen within the evening shift, but Castle wanted to get there during the limited daylight time window. So he decided to stop anyway. Pending any other nasty surprises, they would be at their destination the following morning. Castle prepared the camp with the help of Sven. They found the best spot where to hide and camouflage the Vehicle. With 3 success on the hide camp roll, the position would have been very difficult to spot even for the most trained scout. Ottonese and Rossi prepared the camp fire together with Corporal Ruger.

“Your Captain” said Ottonese summoning all the English he could muster “Great soldier...great leader...He does everything.”
“Yes he does” answered Denise talking more to herself than to the Italian…“And yes he is…” she said looking at Castle gathering branches and foliage to hide the Lav like if he was a simple private.

Ottonese and Rossi were the designated watchmen for the night, so they consumed their dinner kindly offered by the US Marine Corps quickly, and went to catch some hours of sleep. The same thing Manfred told to do to his son Ludvig. The other characters stayed longer around the campfire, enjoying a rare moment of relaxation. Lieutenant Holtz was given the luxury of a camping recliner that Corporal Ruger had found no one knew where inside the Lav. He was feeling better and he craved to start carrying his share of daily workload. Castle examined and changed the medication on his wound and cooled off Holt’s enthusiasm.

“It’s looking good, Lieutenant but I would give it three of four more days. I stitched it up pretty hastily you know? I’m not a luminary surgeon. I’d be careful to be sure that everything is closed up good and stable.”

“You are a luminary to me Captain. You saved my life back in Skara.”

Castle grinned and chomped into another piece of the roasted chicken leg he was eating, donation of the Skara farmer community.

“Tell me a little about you Captain” asked Holtz. “What brought you into the profession”
“Not. much to say really Lieutenant...always dreamed to be a marine. enlisted at 17 and came up the ranks. I am what they call a Mustang. I’ve seen some action and I like to be a marine.”
“Did you ever expect to see the kind of action we are seeing here Sir? I mean like when you gunned down those men with no afterthought?” asked Holtz
“This is what we have been created for Lieutenant...to fight wars...Those man you are talking about were criminals. They had to be punished.”
“And you would be the Punisher Sir?”
Castle gave him a look in between compassion and contempt.
“I suggest we all go to bed now Lieutenant. Tomorrow, barring other incidents, I will have the pleasure to meet your commander. Might be the beginning of a profitable cooperation.”
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ambrafoxtrot17
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Mon 12 Jul 2021, 19:35

5th of January 1999 Morning shift [Dusk] Weather Fair

For the first time Holtz tried to stand and walk. He couldn’t really take anymore of lying in a dirty wet stretcher. Castle recommended at least that he didn’t carry any encumbrance and that he didn’t try any mobility rolls whatsoever. The stitches pulled a little bit, but Holtz thought he could survive, besides, finally he felt free again. Following Captain Castle’s advise he just carried his handgun and the spare magazines in his web gear. He joined him while he was talking to Sven about what route to take to go around the estimated position of the minefield. The Swedish man, being from that area, didn’t even any difficulties in devising an alternative route which would cut through the fields and get to Stopen from the northern side instead of the programmed west side.

“It’s even better if we approach from the north” thought Holtz while following Sven’s description of the way they would follow. “It will put us right in front of the positions of the 17th company.”

In a half an hour the party was ready to roll and Castle took his place half out the commander hatch. He had good hopes that he could run the entire 10 klicks left to get to Stopen with no further stops, being the temperature a little bit higher than average that morning. The Lav-25 moved placidly in the uncertain sun of mid morning among the Swedish fields and the secondary trails that contoured them. Sven traveled sitting on top of the turret, every now and then giving indication to Captain Castle about this or that turn, which would have taken the vehicle right into the northern outskirts of Stopen. Gaigher drove the vehicle confidently and safely for this shift.

At about 2 kilometers from the town, dusk conditions started setting in, which gave to the entire scenery a touch of exotic look, with the white and black Lev-25 at the center of it.
The atmosphere became less exotic though when Castle brusquely ordered Gaigher to stop the vehicle, which he did immediately. The commander had seen something way before anybody else.

Corporal Ruger emerged from the gunner hatch. “What is it Captain?”
“Soviet dismounts 200 yards ahead. They have set a roadblock with a truck
“Gaigher...let’s back up. I don’t want them to see us. Not yet.
“Aye Sir.”

Quickly Castle dismounted and pointed his binoculars at the Russian patrol. It looked like it didn’t see them; a plain miracle. Then he moved to the backside of the vehicle to alert the Italians.

“MANGUSTA...this is NIBBIO...do you copy over?”
“MANGUSTA...this is NIBBIO reporting from SIERRA ECHO...do you...copy?”
“Go ahead NIBBIO, we have a good copy. Glad to hear you nearby!” Lieutenant Holtz was glad as well to hear Major Siviglia’s voice.

“Roger that MANGUSTA...our position is two klicks north of the nest. We are mounted on a UNIFORM SIERRA mechanized element...approaching ISTRICE check point how copy?”
“That’s a good copy NIBBIO...approaching ISTRICE side of nest onboard UNIFORM SIERRA mechanized asset...acknowledged...I’m going to notify ISTRICE at once. Status?”
“No casualties, NIBBIO ONE light WIA over”
“Sorry to hear that That NIBBIO, welcome home.”
“Stand by MANGUSTA. We visualize a Soviet motorized patrol on the road, 200 meters ahead of us. Be advised UNIFORM SIERRA leader in overall command strongly recommends you send element from the south assist our breakthrough how copy?”
“Good copy NIBBIO we…” Siviglia could not complete the sentence.

“BREAK BREAK...MANGUSTA...this is ISTRICE we have a single Soviet dismount creeping along the wooden edge of the road 150 meters from our check point.

Siviglia didn’t take long to put one and one together.
“That’s a Roger ISTRICE...you are probably seeing a scout from a motorized element two klicks north of town spotted by NIBBIO on his way home...capture or neutralize. Do not I repeat do not put your unit at risk...acknowledge over.”
“Copied LIMA CHARLIE MANGUSTA...WILCO...ISTRICE out” Corporal Bartoli grinned at the news that NIBBIO was back home.

“NIBBIO this is MANGUSTA...come in over.”
“Go for NIBBIO”
“You are probably in contact with stragglers from the First Motorized Guard Division. According to a POW we captured days ago, the division mutinied on its way to Karlsborg. Advise UNIFORM SIERRA overall that element might be not hostile...repeat not hostile.
“Roger MANGUSTA.”
“Be advised ISTRICE is going to deal with the scout and possibly assist you afterwards.”
“Roger that, I’ll report to UNIFORM SIERRA commander, over and out.”

Captain Castle had quickly ordered Caigher to back up the vehicle behind the left bend they entered before spotting the Russians. He saw that Holtz was done with the horn and addressed him again.

“Two or three dismounts behind an Ural truck deployed as a road block...did you inform your command”
“Yes Captain. There has been quite a bit of movement of stragglers from the 1st Guard Motorized in the last days. My command told me they have POW who said the division mutinied on its way to Karlsborg...the element in front of us might not be hostile.”

Castle looked at him intensely trying to digest all the info as quickly as he could. Then he snapped back.
“Would you put your life on the line over that?”
“I’d make an attempt not to fight yet another battle today, if I don’t have to Sir.”

Castle gave him a disappointed expression, turned around and made a couple of steps away. He stopped, put his hands on his hips and thought for some seconds. Then suddeny he turned his head.

“Have your men and the civilians get out of the vehicle Lieutenant. I will kill the Russians and then we will join your command in Sropen.” Castle paused for a second. “This trip from Skara has not been easy at all” he sighted.

Holtz looked at the American dejected. Then, resigned he answered.

“Sir if you decide to attack, I and my men are going to be with you. We are certainly not going to stand aside while you fight.”
“You are going nowhere Lieutenant. In your conditions you would just get yourself killed. As far as your men are concerned, they are not able to follow my orders in combat without your liaison. So have your men dismount the vehicle and keep the civilians safe; and that is an order Lieutenant. When we are done, you will rejoin us.

Lieutenant Holtz swallowed hard but he had to admit that Castle had a point. If only he wasn’t so feisty.

“Yes Sir...be advised that you might see Italian troops along the road scooping up a scout probably belonging to the same Russian element. For the love of Christ let’s avoid any Blue on Blue Sir”
“That’s noted Lieutenant” answered Castle dryly.

Holtz moved to the back of the Lav to recover his men. “The Activity around Stopen is becoming thick” he thought while walking towards the vehicle.

Corporal Ruger set herself steady on the gunner seat and prepared to move. The plan was that the Lav would reveal itself past the corner and engage form a safe distance with the COAX. Castle would advance inland and flank the enemy element In order to conduct the final assault under the covering fire of the Lav. Corporal Ruger would have liked better the other way around, but the Lav required at least 2 people to move and fight, and the range of its weaponry self determined with no shadow of doubt who had to provide the base of fire.

As soon as The Lav-25 showed up around the bend, the two Russian soldiers left their positions near the Truck and started to advance in the middle of the road waving their arms vigorously.

“The fuck are they doing” said Gaigher to Corporal Ruger in the turret.
“No idea man...keep closing the distance.”
“Havock...this is Lima 2” the enemy soldiers left their position and are advancing towards us waiving their hands...request of orders over.”
“Keep moving Lima...request surrender and be ready to engage.”
“Copy that Havock.”

Castle literally flew across the woods on the right flank of the Soviets and in three rounds had eyes on the enemy. He took cover behind a tree and went in overwatch, aiming his M-16. An A+ in ranged combat (one of my house rules to simulate bigger than life characters) gives him 3 fast actions or a slow one and two fast).

As the Lav-25 got closer, the two Russians realized that it was a NATO vehicle. They put their weapons down and raised their hands. Gaigher maneuvered the vehicle along the road up to 90 meters from the Russians. Then Corporal Ruger opened her hatch, and gestured at the two enemy soldiers to advance slowly with their hands up. To make them understand the gist of the situation she covered them with the pinted mounted M-240.

The Russian complied, at which point Castle left his position and approached the Russians I the open. He glanced at the weapons on the ground: an RPG-7 and an AK-74. He froze for a fraction of a second. The RPG could have been trouble for the Lav, and he was therefore glad that the Russians didn’t decide to use it. The weapons and the truck would be juicy spoils of war for the 2nd regiment. The truck especially would substitute the lost Humvee.

“Voyna Okonchena... Voyna Okonchena”...the war is over, yelled the Russians seeing Castle moving towards them armed to the teeth. Castle’s size, augmented by his winter fatigues, coupled with the M-16, the M-203 and the sidearm strapped to his leg, gave him a particularly mean look.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” asked Castle without not much regard for the language barrier. The young Russian soldiers looked at each other, then back to Castle. Evidently they didn’t understand English. Corporal Ruger had dismounted from the Lav and was covering the two enemies with her M-16.

Castle made the two Russians knee down and searched them thoroughly. Once he was sure that they didn’t hold any other weapons, he lead them in the Lav pack compartment, where he set in front of them and personally guarded them until the Italians were back to pick up that job.

“The Russian have surrendered Sir” Corporal Ruger simply reported to Holtz. After have walked all the way back to the position behind the corner in the road.
“The scout the was approaching the town surrendered to our infantry as well” answered the Italian Lieutenant to compensate for part of the frustration that he felt for not having been able to participate in the action.

“This Guard Division must really have melted down” commented the Marine Corporal. “That should mean that the road east is open. That division guarded the front of Mariestad”

Holtz looked at her disinterested.
“If the war is really over, it is the road to the west that we should worry about.”
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ambrafoxtrot17
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Tue 13 Jul 2021, 13:59

5th of January 1999 Day Shift Weather still fair

The Powerful Lav-25 parked right in front of the 8th Alpini Regiment Headquarters in Frösve skola
Outside the building Major Siviglia and Mrs. Berglund were both waiting together with Michael Quincy. When the back doors of the vehicle opened it regurgitated a multitude representing of all the problems for the better and for the worse that had hit the country in the last two years: civilians in distress, Russian prisoners of war, and a variety of other troops that still occupied the Sweden. Mrs Berglund wasn’t particularly happy to see any of them, especially the Russians and the Americans, who had given problems to the town in the past. She already asked and obtained from Major Siviglia that the first Russian POW was released, and once NATO squeezed all the possible information from these new two ones, she counted to do the same with them too.

Captain Castle and his crew jumped down of the vehicle while the Italian recon platoon exited from the backdoor like all the others who weren’t part of the crew. It took quite a long time to complete the introductions of all the different characters and authorities involved. Then everybody moved into Major Siviglia office, where young Alexandra Smenova had been summoned to help with interrogating of the Russians; the two captured by the Americans and the one picked up by the 17th company.

The first odd thing that came out of their questioning was that the prisoners did not belong to the 1st Guard Motorized Guard Division. They declared to be part of the 171th Motor Rifle Division, a category B division which had been dispatched to Sweden in the last six months to plug the bigger and bigger holes that were opening in the Russian OB in Sweden. According to the three POWs, the division was stationed north of Götene, but was rapidly disintegrating. The prisoners repeated more or less the same story that their predecessor had been telling to Siviglia in the same room days before: their division, lacking any king of support and supply was in the process of melting down. Some of the troops were trying to somehow get back to the east coast, some scattered around and turned to marauding, and some others like the three of them, were trying to find someone to surrender to. The prisoners confirmed that the war had to be over.

Siviglia and Holtz looked at each other.

“Sir...did you make sure that the previous POW belonged to the 1st Guard or you just believed what he said.”
“These people don’t have any distinctive emblem on their uniforms Lieutenant, I didn’t have any reason to suspect that the prisoner was either lying or having any interest to do so.
“Hmmm,” Holtz was disappointed at his superior lack of professionalism in treating the matter, but didn’t show it. Captain Castle on the other hand, was seriously pissed and walked away from the table moving to the closest window, where he started to stare outside. Wso we don’t know who are facing” he commented bitterly.

Michael Quincy intervened to defuse some tension.

“The Guard Motorized division was in Mariestad up to last week, I can guarantee that. An infantry detail occupied the offices of the company I worked for. The soldiers had the Guard insignia on their chest and they were very disciplined troops. They strolled around on horses. They also had heavy artillery. I saw horse towed 152mm howitzers at the southern outskirts of the town, while me and mi colleagues tried to slip out.”

“Do you have any idea of the strength of that division asked Castle? “
“No. I’ m sorry saar.”

“So” continued Captain Castle getting back to the table, “where all this leaves us at?! We have a guard motorized division presumably holding the front line between Mariestad and Karlsborg, and a second Soviet infantry division stationed somewhere north of Götene”

“Let’s not forget about the unit we encountered in the Ekeberg forest, composition and faction unknown, but they ambushed us.” added Lieutenant Holtz.

“Also let’s not forget about the burnt down farm north of the Ekeberg forest by somebody using NATO weaponry” added Captain Castle. “Are you sure the troops that ambushed you in the forest used Aks?”
“Sure like hell” answered Holts. “They also had a DUSHKA machinegun. They have to be soviet troops”.
“If it is so” continued Castle, the Reds have a salient between our two regiments, he gestured on the map, and they didn’t encircled and destroyed us piecemeal yet, just because they can’t close up on Skovde, which must be heavily irradiated.”
“That’s a good interpretation” concurred Lieutenant Holtz.

Castle silently cursed at the total lack of information, communication and intelligence, since when the Russians liquidated the Division HQ in Alingsås.

“Any news about Swedish elements around our positions?” asked Captain Castle.
“Not that we know of” answered Siviglia. “Before communications were interrupted we knew there was a Swedish light armor regiment in Karlsborg but I could not confirm that”.

“OK” Castle moved on to more practical considerations:

“My regiment present situation is that we garrison the main center of Skara. The town is trying to recover after the collapse that followed after the atomic attacks. It managed to restore some food production. The locals have abountant supplies of semi-finished products to manufacture medical supplies, and a functioning factory producing optics items like binoculars and compasses. The town has trade relations with two other main centers along the road to the West Coast: Vara and Nossebro. We regularly escort merchant convoys in the corridor. Is one of our activities in support of the population, but we have been facing the opposition of factions of insurgents who probably don’t tolerate our presence in town. Some of these factions only attack us, some other are violent towards the Swedish civilians as well. Probably common criminals organized in gangs. The brutal attack to the farm compound east of the town might be connected with these scum. The last band we encountered planted an IED which killed one of my man and gravely injured another. They even stole a Russian APC somewhere”.

“May be from this 171th ghost division?” intervened Holtz

“May be” said Captain Castle. “In my opinion” he concluded, “there are only two courses of action for us given the fact that our units nominally belonged to the same division: one, we continue to pursue the original intent of the division and continue to defend our assigned area. Two, we accept the fact that we are not going to reestablish contacts with command, and in this case we would be better to try and bring our soldiers back to our respective countries. In both instances it seems to me that some form of cooperation between us could make our task easier”.

“We made a commitment with the locals to defend this town and the surrounding area until some Swedish legal military authority shows up or until the local population is able to provide to their own defense. We are going to honor that commitment” answered Major Siviglia. “So for the time being we will continue to be stationed here” the Major crossed eyes with Mrs Berglund who didn’t open her mouth yet, preferring to pay attention to everything the military had to say.

Meanwhile Louise entered the building followed by Ottonese who had resumed his CP duties. She made sure to be as inconspicuous as possible not to interrupt the meeting. Holtz raised his eyes from the map and briefly looked at her, but he didn’t divert his attention from the matters on hand.

“I was thinking about doing the same with Skara Major” concurred Captain Castle.
“Your recommendations?” asked Major Siviglia.

Castle massaged his chin, still looking at the map spread ever a couple of teacher desks attached together.

“I think we should start by establishing some permanent radio coms and procedures between us. Secondly we could create a joint QRF to assist each other in case of unexpected problems, like an attack of the Soviets or a surge or marauder activities in our respective areas of influence. Thirdly, after the two fist conditions are in place, we could start talking about trade. If and when you have something valuable to offer, we would introduce you to the trade net we have established with the other centers of the corridor so you can benefit as well”.

“May be these kind of matters, the representative of Skara, Vera and Nossebro should discuss with me Captain” interrupted Mrs. Berglund. “I believe it is my country we are talking about here Sir, and about our own effort to try and go back to some semblance of organized civil existence after the disaster your government in cooperation with the Russians have provoked here and around the planet”.

Siviglia and Holtz raised their heads form the map surprised, slightly embarrassed, but not in total disagreement with Jonna’s speech.

Captain Castle wasn’t particularly moved by Mrs. Berglund’s heated statement. Politician never impressed him at all anyway. Dreamers and utopians in the best case, interested wicked liars in the worse, they always left him totally indifferent.

Captain Castle gave a stiff glare at the Stopen Mayor.

“Skara doesn’t have any representative...Madam. My Marine regiment controls the city and exerts authority. We trade on the base of direct agreements with traders from Vera and Nossebro, and I have no idea who is in charge there. Not my problem, not interested.”

“May be that’s the reason why you have insurgents in your area of operation Captain. You are not interested, and you think that your military forces can simply act as an occupation force in somebody else’s home Sir”.

Castle felt that he was about losing his patience; not that he had a lot of it to begin with.

“I command a military force Lady, not a charity organization. I must grant security for my men and for the civilians in my area of operation. To be honest with you I didn’t decide to start this war. I was sent here to defend your country against a Soviet invasion. To be even more honest with you, I intend to remove my occupation force, as you called it, from this frozen shit hole as soon as I can, provided I find a ship to embark my men and equipment, unless somebody orders me otherwise. If you want to discuss politics with your politicking fellows in Vera or Nossebro, you are welcome to grab a vehicle, a horse of good pair of boots, and go there yourself, if you think the roads are safe enough. I am certainly not stopping you. Now if you don’t mind I and my men will get out of you hair...Major Siviglia” Castle turned his eyes on the Italian officers, “you can contact me over the radio or in person, whenever you’ll find it suitable...I believe you know where to find me...the code name of my regiment is Havoc”.

For a moment a dead silence fell in the classroom.

“One last thing Major” concluded Castle. “Your kind Lieutenant Holtz promised me a complete refund on all the fuel that I used to bring him and his men back here. Banged up as it was, I don’t think you would have seen him for a very long time, had his man have to carry him back on a stretcher. I would fully expect you to honor your officers commitments.”

Major Siviglia looked at Holtz who nodded to confirm the fact. The Italian Major, slightly disappointed by the attitude and the tone that Castle had assumed answered coldly:

“I have 20 liters of Diesel fuel in left in my strategic reserve Captain. I’ll have it delivered out here rightnow, if you really want to leave”.
“20 liters? Lieutenant Holtz promised me an amount that would cover my two ways trip”
“Lieutenant Holtz didn’t know that we consumed part of our reserves in operations in the last days” answered Siviglia firmly.
“That’s OK Major, I trust the word of a fellow officer...I will wait that you carry the diesel to my vehicle and then we will move out. Think about my proposals Major. They are still all on the table”.

That said, Captain Castle and his men left the room to go back to their vehicle. Short after, Rossi appeared with the VM and transferred two jerrycans of fuel to the Americans, who in turn gave two of their empty ones to the Italians. Military salutes and shake of hands were exchanged between the military personnel of the two nations, and then the Marines left on the same road they had come from few hours earlier.
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Re: to honor this wonderful 4th Edition

Tue 13 Jul 2021, 18:45

5th of January 1999 Evening shift weather still fair [Chaos Factor 4]

“Promise me that you will rest for all the time that you need” said Louise truly and visibly worried. “You have been shot and there is no way to say what internal damage the bullet did.” She was almost crying. Holtz remembered what Mrs. Berglund told him about all the people that Louise had already lost in those two years.

Lieutenant Holtz, and Major Siviglia were guests at Mrs Berglund’s for dinner, and were waiting that Jonna and Sven put it together. The Mayor insisted that when the officers were guest in her house they had to relax.

“Louise…” answered Kurt…“I can assure you that all my vital functions are normal” he spoke as a doctor; “they wouldn’t be if the bullet damaged something seriously”, lied Holtz, who was having some considerable problems with his peeing. “The surgical incision needs to heal a little bit more, but I assure you...I can work if I don’t carry too much load and I don’t strain myself more than necessary...you see” he spread his arm and looked around…“I only carry my sidearm...no rifle, no ammo, no nothing OK?”

Louise looked at him not completely convinced.

“That American Captain Louise” continued Holtz, “he really saved my life operating on me. He is a great man and a supremely skilled soldier, and he leads a courageous bunch of American Marines...I have seen him in action. I am very sorry that he had that confrontation with your mother.” Kurt tried to sway Louise attention from his wound.

“Sometimes my mother can really annoy people Kurt, I’ll tell you that much!”

“We have been proceeding with our projects while you and your unit was gone Lieutenant” interrupted Major Siviglia, to get his Lieutenant out of trouble with young Berglund.

“As you have seen we have completed the fortification of the main access points into town; the positions of the 17th company and of the mortar battery. We were waiting for your return to start planning on the training of the civilians, and your project on the psychological relief for the population. I would say that for as long as we are here, the first one has the precedence; before relieving you need to secure”
“I really think we are able to do both projects at the same time Major”
“If you say so...by the way, who were you thinking to use for the training program?
“For sure Specialist Ottonese of the Scout platoon, and I was thinking about Magli of 17th.”
“I agree on Magli. He is an excellent infantry soldier, but Ottonese is assigned to our sweet Miss Berglund close protection here.” Siviglia smiled at Louise.
“I would temporarily shift Scanna to that role for that single daily shift that Ottonese will be engaged in the instruction assignment. Ottonese too is an excellent soldier. He is a certified sniper isn’t he?”
“Yes he is” confirmed Siviglia.
“Just a bit of a hothead...” sighed Holtz
“Why do you say that?” asked the Major concerned.
“Nah...nothing important Major...just a feeling.”

“What do you intend to do with the three prisoners?” asked Holtz while Berglund senior was still in the kitchen with Sven.
“Mes Berglund doesn’t like to have Russians or Americans around here. She already convinced me to release that one Russian POW that we captured after you were gone. She’ll push for having these three out of here as soon as possible as well.”
“Will you do what she asks?”
“I don’t see any advantage In keeping them as prisoner of war, what war anyway? And Mrs. Berglund is absolutely opposed to have me enlist them in our outfit.”
“That I can understand, I would be opposed to that too...I don’t like foreigners in the Regiment. Speaking of which...what about that British national who walked here on his own.”
“He says he’s a contractor...” answered Siviglia “...that he worked for a Swedish company up in Mariestad. But I think he might be some kind of spy. I just hope he’s on our same side. He came here from the northern side all alone after having lost his mates he says. He is armed and equipped to the teeth and he seems to know his stuff. If he really is what he says he is, he could be an excellent asset for us. For now I assigned him to the HQ section.”
“I’m not sure Sir...enlisting foreign personnel in the Regiment…”
“I didn’t enlist him Lieutenant...I just temporarily attached him. Besides what’s the fuss...aren’t you a foreigner too, Mr. Holtz?”
They both laughed.

Sven and Mrs. Berglund finally brought the dinner interrupting the conversation. Holtz briefly went outside where Rossi and Ottonese were standing guard, freezing their asses.
“You guys go get some chow and send here Magli and Scanna to relieve you”
“Sir” answered Rossi, really happy to call it a day.

At dinner the subject of the conversation centered on some exciting news: an electronics amateur in town had started to receive a radio station emitting from somewhere in Sweden. A different station from the usual “we are the new legitimate government of Sweden station” that he usually caught on the various frequencies. That particular station relayed a signal from somewhere else, probably England, given the content. It continuously aired music hope messages, prayers and the obvious share of propaganda on how bad the Reds were. The station was called Rebirth West End.

“There is this brand new English singer they air all the time.” said Louise. They call her the Marlene Dietrich of the Third World War. Her name is Dido...I swear she writes the greatest songs I have ever heard. There is this song in particular among the others called...Here with me. I think It’s about a girl waiting for her love coming back from the war...Every time I have a free moment, I go to Herr Olaffson to listen to his radio. He has a little generator going and he turns on Radio Rebirth West End every time he sees me”

The meager dinner was consumed pretty quickly and then the Italian officers went down to business with the Mayor.

“The production of food is not sufficient yet” said Mrs Berglund. The population still suffer for lack of food when the farms don’t manage to deliver enough. And I am afraid that this situation will last until we can plant for next season. And I am afraid that even then, without machines and chemical fertilizers it won’t be easy.”

“The Americans have plenty of food in Skara” said Holtz. “If we just could make some kind of agreement with them, we might import food and relieve the situation.

“Louise didn’t you say that Mr. Olaffson is an electronics amateur” Asked Holtz
“Uh-Uh…”
“and he has a generator”
“Yes”
“Well may be we can find somebody in town that has expertise on how to build a mill, to make alcohol fuel...that is something the Americans need.”
“Can’t they have the same idea and do that themselves?”
“They didn’t yet did they?” said Holtz. If we manage to precede them on that project, we might specialize in that kind of stuff and start exporting fuel. That’d be a valuable commodity.
“We need to find somebody with the necessary expertise” objected Mrs Berglund.
“But we can” answered Lieutenant Holtz. If we don’t have the experts here, we’ll go find them somewhere else. We have the strength and the capabilities to move around and do our research.
“And then we do what” asked the Mayor… “kidnap them?”
“One problem at a time” said Holtz already wandering with his mind on how to implement the project.

“Well I guess it is decided then” said Major Siviglia. “We can put this one among our other projects.”
“If you are serious about that” said Mrs. Berglund, “This project must have the highest priority”

For the night shift, Magli left Scanna alone at his overwatch duties at the Mayor residence with the campfire that they had set up in front of the guard post. He would relieve him in four hours.
Before walking away, Alpino Magli looked up at the window on the first floor. There was still light inside.

In bed, after he changed the bandage on his side, Kurt was showing Louise the CDs that he had taken from the house where he had found an entire family shot by the father who subsequently blew his own head off with the same shotgun. He lied to her saying that the father gave the CDs to him for a 9mm magazine. Covers and titles were barely visible in the candle light.

“Rock?” said Louise. “Not exactly my cup of tea Kurt.” she laughed.
When she laughed she made his day...every single time.
Holtz looked at her hypnotized for some moments before smiling back. “I was thinking that this electronic expert...Mr. Olaffson...if he has the right equipment and some electric power, might format these CDs and then burn on them some of the songs that you like so much from that English radio you were talking about.”
She smiled again at him. “And then we listen to them”
“Every time you want Baby”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-otodgfrlI
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