Katyusha

Chapter X: Ghost warriors

Friendly reminder all translations are kept at the end with any additional info or shout outs, happy reading! : )
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The Panzer squadron is rolling the front with infantrymen staying behind the tanks for cover as they push down the street towards the factory.

It's a brigade sized counter offensive with 120 infantrymen of the 6th army and two squadrons from the 4th Panzer army.

Their order is to wedge themselves into the very middle of the Russian defense, that way they can pave a path for the SS-Totenkopf Panzers that are hanging back and waiting.

Panting with fatigue, Katya is running with all her might and she must. No, she has to beat this heavy hitting wave back to the factory.

It's now the Russians who're backed against a wall, but they'll be crushed if Katya can't make it in time to prepare them.

She can see the battle ahead of her as the tracers are lighting up the darkness that the blizzard is causing as it's beginning to cloak the city in darkness.

If this battle is going to be fought, it's now going to be in this blizzard, and the temperature's dropping rapidly. Even the Russians can only handle so much of the cold too, not just the Germans.

However, they do have the advantage over the Germans still, they're within cover of a factory building that's blocking this bone chilling storm that's coming in.

Hearing the fast crunching of snow behind him, a German soldier turns around quickly to see who it is. There's a burp of smg fire as Katyusha peppered the man with her Mp40, splattering the ground in front of him and her with blood.

Not waisting time, she runs and guns her way through the thin German line again, glad to see that the Germans haven't fortified this spot.

By the time she reaches friendly positions, she collapses to her knees gasping for air and coughing from her burning lungs trying to force much needed air into her body.

Seeing Katya collapse, Vladimir rushes to her side and quickly helps her up, supporting her against him he yells out to be heard "Keep the entrance covered comrades, I'll be right back!"

With Katyusha leaning against him and weakly shaking as her coughing racks her body, the young officer helps her into the building and out of the cold offering her his canteen.

She did really good for someone who wasn't physically trained in the military basic training camps, he knows this too because of how she's reacting from running a near mile on adrenaline alone.

As she quickly grabs onto the canteen and drinking the contents inside, Vladimir quickly and urgently asks "What's going on comrade? What did you see!?" He urgently pleads, needing to know what's coming their way and how bad it is.

"A large scale counter attack is coming our way, I counted more then eighty men with a tank support element of six panzers. With a heavier hitting force at the back." She says panting, and after a few minutes of sucking in air and recovering a little more, she forces herself to lean against the wall.

Looking at the young man she says "Prepare the outside for both the storm, and that counter offensive. Lay mines and infantry traps out and around the factory, but do not cover the main tracks that is right outside the door, we'll need to get out somehow if things go to hell." She orders and Vladimir nods quickly heading back outside and much to everyone's relief, the Germans are pulling back on account of the weather coming in.

Regaining her composure, only now does she realize how cold it's gotten and as she walks up the steps to the upper level of this huge factory heading to the enclosed office area in the loft where the manager of the factory would've worked at.