Re: Blood and Iron

A young man sat within the hull of an armored personnel carrier.

He pulled out his sidearm and looked at its grips.

The black synthetic checkered panels had been swapped for transparent replacements, and beneath them lay a photograph of his wife waiting for him back home.

She stood there in the picture dressed in her wedding gown, taken on the day of their marriage.

So beautiful, so graceful, so tender.

He could only smile bitterly and place a finger on the grip, gently caressing the smile that lay beneath.

That is until the thunder of a shell detonating in the waters nearby jolted him and the men beside him back to attention.

The man quickly holstered the pistol as the radio operator leaned in and spoke.

"Hauptmann, we're just about at the launch point. The ramp will be lowered any minute now… we're expected to lead the charge."

The captain sighed heavily and shook his head, letting his thoughts slip beneath his breath like a confession.

"I should have listened to my grandfather…"

The soldiers in the back of the APC looked away. They knew exactly who he meant.

Ludwig von Zehntner, one of Reichsmarschall Bruno von Zehntner's eight older brothers, and the Reich's most ardent isolationist.

Few knew the full story of why Ludwig had campaigned so hard throughout his career in the Reichstag and later the Bundesrat against wars of foreign aggression.

But those who did would never dare to call him a coward.

Not after his service as an officer in the Iron Division all those years ago.

Not after the role he had played in exterminating the Red Menace from this world.

Sadly, for all his bluster, the Reich continued to find itself at war.

A war his grandson, Konrad, now found himself a part of.

Before anything else could be said, the signal came over the radio.

Konrad gave the order.

"Onward and to victory!"

The engines of the armored personnel carrier roared to life along with sixty others of the E-25 series vehicles.

They dove from their assault ships into the Pacific, swimming toward the shores of Palawan like a voracious pack of steel crocodiles.

Inside the hull, the air felt thin and heavy all at once.

Diesel fumes mixed with salt spray seeping through the seams. Sweat rolled down faces pale beneath the red cabin lights.

Nobody spoke above a whisper.

Someone muttered a prayer in a Bavarian dialect, another kissed the edge of a medallion, and the rest just stared at the floor, counting the seconds by the rhythm of the engines.

The armor groaned as waves slammed against it.

Every impact jarred teeth and spine alike.

A few men fought to keep their stomachs steady; one didn't make it, and the stench spread fast before being swallowed by the next crash of surf.

Konrad wiped his brow with the back of his glove.

His pulse thundered louder than the turbines.

Somewhere above, artillery shells fell into the sea with the slow, monstrous rhythm of gods knocking on the door of the world.

The Royal Thai Army and their more primitive landing craft flowed between the ranks of German armor, drawing the defenders' fire from the shoreline.

At first, the Thai craft came under heavy fire from machine guns and anti-tank guns.

But when the Americans saw that the German armor was swimming under its own power, terror gripped their hearts, and they foolishly turned their guns on the approaching hulls.

The .50 BMG was a fearsome cartridge against light vehicles and soft targets, but against the composite plating of the E-20s, it was useless.

The rounds simply bounced off, no more threatening than pebbles on steel.

Inside Konrad's vehicle, he felt the thuds against the hull, a constant metallic drumming, more nuisance than danger.

He shifted his gaze toward the commander, who had already spotted the source.

"Target sighted," the commander said. "Heavy machine-gun nest with what looks like a PAK being wheeled into position. Range twelve hundred meters, three o'clock. Light them up before they can get that piece of junk online."

The gunner grunted in acknowledgment.

A moment later, the 30mm autocannon thundered to life, firing airburst shells downrange.

When the roar subsided, the gunner spoke with detached finality.

"Target eliminated."

The commander looked through his own sight to confirm the kill.

It was nothing short of gruesome.

The PAK had been reduced to molten scrap, and the men around it were no longer men at all… just crimson pools of flesh and bone.

The commander paid the scene no more attention than necessary.

He turned away and called out another target, his voice steady over the comms.

He wasn't alone. All sixty E-25s coordinated their fire, obliterating fortified positions as they advanced through the surf.

Eventually, the wheels struck sand.

Konrad offered a brief prayer before stepping out into the blood and the tide, leading his men behind the armored behemoths as they charged forward….

Rolling fortresses of steel and fury that shielded both his unit and the Royal Thai Army advancing behind them.

Konrad raised his rifle and sighted an American soldier shouldering a spigot mortar, an early and crude anti-tank design, closer to a British PIAT from Bruno's past life than a proper rocket launcher.

He didn't hesitate. The moment the reticle aligned with the man's skull, Konrad squeezed the trigger.

The soldier fell dead just as the mortar fired wildly into the air, detonating farther down the beach between charging Thai troops.

The blast tore several to pieces and wounded others with shrapnel,

but Konrad had no time to lament.

He'd saved the vehicle from a crippling blow and could only press forward, making the Americans pay in kind.

But He didn't need to. By the time he had arrived at the trench line, the airburst munitions from the E-25 IFVs had rendered everything within them to dust and meat.

The battle for the shores of Palawan continued to rage on.

By the time evening reared its ugly head, the Americans had been expelled from their fortifications, and the Reich's banners stood over the island's blood-soaked sand.