Chapter 59: The Fall of the Artillery King

The lingering devastation of that final shot had clearly struck terror into the hearts of the nearby Soviets.

Faced with such point-blank carnage, even the most fanatical soldiers found their primal fear of death restored. Within the ice fog, the Soviet charges and their rallying cries sputtered into an abrupt, jagged silence.

They dared not charge blindly with fixed bayonets into that zone of absolute erasure. Instead, they dropped into the snow at a distance, frantically pulling triggers toward the general direction of the anti-tank gun and hurling grenades blindly into the white void.

"Withdraw! Now!"

Walter gave the still-bellowing Vatanen a violent shove, and the group turned, disappearing into the fog.

Behind them, several heavy thuds signaled the arrival of Soviet grenades. Shrapnel and frozen earth peppered the anti-tank gun's protective shield with a series of metallic clangs.

Vatanen's adrenaline hadn't faded yet; he was still rambling, his mouth running a mile a minute.

"Squad leader! Did you see that? That Russian... it was like he was rubbed out with an eraser! I've never had such a grand old time in my life—mph!"

"Shut up! If you can't keep that trap of yours closed, I'll rub you out right now!" Walter growled over his shoulder.

Walter's head was swimming from the overexertion of the Eye of Death; his thermal vision was flickering intermittently. Even so, he could see clusters of red dots, Soviet soldiers, rapidly mobilizing and spreading out in a fan-shaped search pattern.

Leading the three veterans, Walter wove through the ice fog. With his guidance, they precisely bypassed several groups of stumbling Soviet search parties.

However, the density of the Red Army within the pocket was simply too high. Disaster struck just as they attempted to navigate a graveyard of frozen ZIS-5 trucks.

In Walter's vision, the half-buried ZIS-5s looked like rows of blue steel coffins, yet they pulsed with a sickening red glow. The soldiers nearby had long since been jolted awake by the thunder of the cannon; such a roar was enough to rouse even the most exhausted men.

The situation was messier than expected.

A few bolder soldiers, or perhaps those on sentry duty, had jumped down from the truck beds. They stood with rifles leveled, necks hunched against the cold, searching aimlessly through the fog.

Yet many more remained huddled inside the cabs or under the canvas covers of the trucks, driven by extreme cold and despair. To them, the battle outside felt distant; as long as the lethal shells weren't falling on their own heads, they had no desire to leave the meager pocket of warmth generated by their own body heat.

"Stay close to the sides. Keep your heads down," Walter whispered.

They reached the rear of one truck. Walter could clearly see the faint outlines of two bodies in the cab. The two Soviet soldiers were huddled in their seats, rifles clutched to their chests, staring numbly out the window into the chaotic gray. Even as Walter and his men crouched and slipped past right under the window, the two frost-dulled soldiers noticed nothing.

Luck, however, does not always favor the infiltrator.

As they rounded the side of the fifth truck, a Soviet non-commissioned officer, who had just hopped down to scout, turned around, blowing on his hands to warm them. His frost-reddened eyes locked directly onto Walter's cold gaze from less than two meters away.

In that heartbeat, the ice fog seemed to freeze solid.

The NCO's pupils constricted. He clearly hadn't expected the Finns to be bold enough to cross through the truck park in broad daylight... or rather, in the heart of a massive encirclement.

Just as he opened his blue-tinged lips to sound the alarm…

Psh!

Walter didn't use his Mosin-Nagant. In the narrow gap between the trucks, he drew his combat knife and drove it upward in a reverse grip, piercing the man's jaw and driving the point straight into the brain.

The NCO's body seized up, his throat emitting only a muffled, gurgling string of bubbles. But the sound of the struggle alerted a soldier hiding in the truck bed nearby.

"Who's there? What happened?" a raspy, suspicious voice called out from behind the heavy canvas.

Immediately after, a hand clutching a Tokarev pistol yanked back the corner of the flap.

Bang!

The moment the man's head appeared, Walter fired a snap-shot, guided by sheer instinct. The bullet punched through the wooden sideboards of the truck; the thermal signature behind the canvas jerked violently and then slumped over.

That single gunshot kicked the hornet's nest wide open.

"Finns! Over here!"

The truck park, previously a collection of isolated, shivering men, exploded into action. Some soldiers remained too terrified to show their faces, merely poking rifle barrels through the canvas gaps and spraying lead at random. Those already outside, however, grew desperate. Ignoring whether their own comrades were in the line of fire, a dozen rifles simultaneously opened up on Walter's position.

Walter refrained from throwing Molotovs or grenades; at this range, the light would only expose them further.

"Move! Follow me, there are fewer of them this way!"

They abandoned stealth for speed, sprinting forward.

"Agh! Damn those motherless Russians!"

Vatanen, bringing up the rear, let out a muffled groan. He pitched forward, slamming hard against the front tire of a truck.

"Vatanen!" Ojala cried out, spinning around.

"Stop shouting! Grab him and move!" Walter hissed, turning to fire two rounds to suppress a Soviet soldier charging from the side of a truck.

Lindholm and Ojala hoisted Vatanen up between them. Taking advantage of the Soviet confusion in the fog, they bolted for the edge of the dense woods behind the truck park.

Only when they were safely out of sight did they stop behind a towering pine.

Vatanen lay facedown in the snow, his features twisted like a crushed tomato. The man who, only minutes ago, had declared himself the "Artillery King of Lemetti," was now clutching his backside. Blood seeped through his fingers, venting wisps of steam into the frozen air before instantly congealing.

"My ass... Squad leader, they shot me through the ass!" Vatanen wailed, his voice nearly loud enough to drown out the wind. "The bastards! I was blowing their heads off with a cannon, and they go and shoot me in the ass!"

"Quiet! If you want to live, keep it covered!"

Walter leaned down, ripped an emergency bandage from his kit, and pressed it ruthlessly against Vatanen's wound.

"Yeow—! Easy, Squad leader! That's meat you're pinching!" Vatanen nearly jumped out of his skin.

"If we leave a blood trail, the Russians might actually track us."

In this frozen hell where water turned to ice instantly, they supported their "Artillery King," who continued to curse and complain despite his perforated posterior, and the four shadows vanished into the depths of the thick ice fog.

Vatanen clutched his rear, hissing through his teeth, still muttering under his breath.

"Just wait... once this heals... I'm dragging that anti-tank gun back... I'll aim right for their tailpipes... blow 'em apart one by one..."

The glorious era of the Artillery King had lasted less than ten minutes before coming to a sudden, undignified end.