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RP (non-canon) 1st SORT: Monte Cassino

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Being singled out by the commanding officer was hardly anything either new or surprising for Riikka. While this was the first time he seemed to have directly brought it up, over the past few months she'd heard more than one comment about how her beanie wasn't going to stop a Jerry bullet.

Of course Riikka had paid them no mind. Where some who survived what she had might have grown paranoid, it seemed Riikka had been rather nonplussed about it. Another scar - healed away by abnormal sciences that had turned her into what she was now. It seemed the only reason she wore any sort of headgear at all was to conceal her non-human ears from the very human soldiers in the area who didn't know the full extent of the program.

Overall, Riikka still looked rather relaxed and unconcerned. She'd risen to attention with the Lieutenant had entered the room again, stayed that way just long enough for the order to stand at ease, and then had resumed her previous stance: leaning back in her seat with her feet propped up on the back of Valerie's. All she offered in response to Fian's comment pointed at her was a raised brow and a tug on her beanie as if to make sure it was secure.

"Keksit, I think if we were all more like me then the Luutnantti would have a fit." She said loud enough for anybody interested to overhear.
 
The sarcasm had gone completely over Riikka's head. Maybe they hadn't invented sarcasm in Finland yet, similar to how empathy had only been discovered in England a few decades ago and only started getting used properly after The Great War.

"Yes, Bunny." Valerie replied, as though she was observing a cloud in the sky was superficially resembling a nondescript blodge of something she hadn't seen before. She slowly turned back around to look at the LT continue with the briefing. "Yes he would."
 
Morgan was left staring at the skull in his pack for a moment, it stared back at him. He blinked, and stared some more. Before he could do anything about it, though the LT came back into the room. Quickly closing the flap on his pack before the boss could see and standing at attention. He struggled not to show the discomfort he felt about someones head being in his pack.

----------------------------------------------------


Ilsa's posture changed dramatically as the briefing got underway, no long the brooding straight backed shell her father had taken so often during their last days in Russia, but and knees sliding together and the hands resting on her lap. A far more feminine stance, it seemed that the sight of things moving relaxed her somewhat.

"Riikka, ef there was more like you, ve would all be quite dead." She whispered back in that teasing, husky accent she had.
 
"Wul, 'twere'pleasure." Clayton said softly as the rain of explosions began, striking a match on his boot to light the fresh cigarette, "Reccommend hoppin' out and runnin' till y' don't see craters anymore, but do whatcha want."

Punctuating this sentence was a firm kick to the door of the truck, and the sound of boots hitting the mud. Clay slid his carbine out from its sheath on his back and crouched low as he jogged into the muddy patchwork of craters and smouldering wreckage on each side of the road. Clayton used this dangerous proximity to the craters to do some on-the-fly tracking. There was a forward observer unit somewhere nearby, and they probably had to come through here to set up. His eyes scanned the landscape as he traversed it, looking for tread marks or bootprints upon the soft ground. Sure, there were the marks left by destroyed vehicles, but those all lead to destroyed vehicles. There had to be something, some trace left behind.

Alternatively, the forward observers could spot him and start shooting at him. Getting shot at was another tracker trick. At least, that's what trackers told themselves while getting shot at.
 
Convoy
"Convoy Commander to Sergeant Baird, if we can get to the hill in the next few minutes, the reverse slope will afford us some cover. Best we gun it." the UGC radio crackled.

Checking the tracks around him, Clayton could only find marks of wounded or terrified animals presuming said animals wore boots. Other than his own tracks there was nothing that moved discreetly. With is relatively larger field of view without using a binoculars combined with the rising sun however, there looked like a brief glint of light coming from the monastery on top of the mountain. Did it come from sunlight hitting the stained glass windows or some kind of optic it couldn't be told, nor could he tell even if he had a set of binos. It was really that far.

The shelling began to edge closer. One slammed into a section of road in front of the lead truck and threw a geyser of dirt so high that some landed on the UGC two vehicles back. "Crater! Move to the right side!" The lead trucker yelled waving one arm outside his window. As the convoy served to avoid the new extra large pothole on the Italian highway of dubious quality, a second shell landed at almost the same spot as the truck in front of Baird negotiated the hole. About two tons of Allied supplies became air transported, and about a quarter of that found itself in various niches and crevices in the UGC as it 'undertaked' the truck.

Between the shaking of the earth and UGC, and between the dirt and parcel shower, supersoldier sight or not Milena could not spot anything out of the unusual through the binos.

If Baird really gunned it, he could pull ahead of the entire convoy even with the extra weight by the sole virtue of having tracks in extra shitty terrain.
 
Sniper Hill
"Blimey! I have no idea how did he get this close." Richard exclaimed as the Royal British Army Captain climbed out the turret side escape hatch and falling over with a plop, dropping and forgetting about his green beret, showing all the white hair he had gained over five years of war. He crawled over to examine the German that the Jewish NECO had so painfully executed.

"Your LT is going to love this one, Jane lass." Richard commented as he grabbed the body by the collar and started dragging it on his knees. "I'm bringing it back, everyone keep their eyes open."

As the Captain started taking the most natural (and most covered to the Commando) path back to base, Jane could now trace a winding line in the terrain where it seemed to be a little less than two heads deeper than the terrain around it, yet its undulations were subtle enough to escape general notice, and it seemed to lead into the horizon towards the German line. Could it be the best kept secret of some people?

It was around five minutes later when Richard was meters away from friendly trenches when the silence was broken.

"This is Sam, I think I see movement around the low brick wall. Do you see anything cat lady, Paulson?"

"This is Paulson (*slosh*). That brick wall was empty when I got here, I'll look again."

Here Jane could hear the low whisling again, this time it didn't sound like it would pass overhead. The nearby damp alcove cut into the hill that the radio occupied suddenly felt a lot more welcoming.
 
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Bunker
The LT ignored Rikka's snarky remark. The Finn was impossible to control, but at least she was still bringing in the dough... Or the skulls.

"Some background." Fian produced a telescoping stick and prodded at appropriate points on the map, starting from the bottom of the map of Italy. "Since the Allied invasion of southern Italy on the 3rd September 1943 and Italian surrender on 7th September of the same month, the Krauts have been conducting a fighting retreat up the boot." Now he pointed to somewhere in the middle. "Their objective is to buy time for the construction of a number of defensive lines just south of Rome. We have breached two of these so far, the second one harder than the first. The more time they have, the more bunkers built, trenches dug and guns brought in, the more of our guys are going to die taking them. Which is important that we keep the momentum of advance."

"At the moment that momentum is zero." The LT's expression took a grim turn. "Artillery strikes on our positions have wrecked equipment, supplies and anyone without their head down. We are shipping out men back home in boxes even before the battle has started. Intelligence has not reported any abnormal increases in enemy artillery counts so the only explanation is that they are enjoying an advantage in spotting targets. All fingers point to this place." Fian slapped the stick at a grainy picture of a picturesque hilltop monastery. "Monte Cassino."
 
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Convoy

"Do prdele!" Milena shouted as stuff was happening. With all the swerving, explosions and things flying around she could not see anything. Not to mention that all those flying things turned into raining things. Milena was soon covered in several boxes of things. She pushed as much as she could aside.

"Oh look a chocolate," she said as she hold onto one box. "Hell it is a bloody Hitler's Secret Weapon." She added with a frown and tossed it out of the UC.

"WILL!" Milena shouted at the driver. "Get us off the road! I cannot spot anything between all these explosions. Not to mention I would rather not explode."
 
"Convoy Commander, Desert Oasis. That works. Best of luck to you, but I have to break off."

Baird hung up the handset, driving all the while. The explosions were getting closer, a lot closer - only luck and Baird's skill was keeping their relatively fragile carrier from being tracked, a death sentence during an artillery barrage.

He decided that gunning the carrier would be the best choice, and got off the road to pull ahead of the convoy and continue on their way. It was getting pretty bad - if the shelling got any worse, it would be a miracle if anything reached Monte Cassino. Baird passed a crater filled with exploded C-rats and... what appeared to be entrenching tool heads. The strangely out of context contents of the shell craters inspired a a brief moment of wonder from the overworked Scots sergeant, but otherwise elicited no response.

It was drive or die, after all.

"Working on it my Czech rose!" Baird shouted as sarcastically as possible. "Only the best for you! And stop tossing my shit out of the carrier!"
 
Bunker
"Stab in the dark here, lef-tennant," Valerie said, using the odd British pronunciation of 'Lieutenant', "You want us to find our way up that mountain and disable any spotters, communication, and artillery."

She clicked her tongue and looked at the picture of the monastery, then where it was on the map, examining and judging the two. There were a handful of obstacles already - first of which was the uphill battle on a steep cliff. From the top of that mountain, the Germans could see everything that was crawling up. The fact that the mountain was white limestone rock meant concealment was nil. Their green and brown uniforms would stick out, and Valerie let out a sigh through her teeth, hissing lightly.

The position also meant that they had great visibility against air attacks, and if the Krauts managed to wheel an AAA gun or two up there, it'd spoil any sort of air raid unless it was done in force. Bluntly speaking, to Valerie, it sounded like a suicide mission. She turned around and offered the following tactical snippet to her companion. "Perhaps we should employ mountain goats instead of cats, kani."
 
Convoy

"For your information, my Scottish dandelion," Milena shouted back at the driver. "That was not your shite, that was my shite. Since it landed on my helmet. And since it was full of D-rations, it really was full of shite. Don't tell me you actually eat that stuff? It only saw chocolated from afar and waved at it."

The conversation was a good thing to keep mind away from the fact, that the UC could be hit by a shell any moment and they would both be dead. NECO or not, when a UC full of ammo and what not gets hit by big shrapnel grenade everyone in it is dead. Still now they they were about to leave the road, Milena could soon finally see. She peaked out again, looking for a good spots for spotter. Spotting spots.
 
The Narrator said:
Here Jane could hear the low whisling again, this time it didn't sound like it would pass overhead. The nearby damp alcove cut into the hill that the radio occupied suddenly felt a lot more welcoming.
Click to expand...
Oh no!

They'd found her. The Germans, probably using the road as a meter stick, apparently weren't above lobbing artillery at a single sniper perched on a hill.

Jane had seconds. She sprung up from the ground and landed on her feet. The tarp floated back to the ground and covered the spotting scope. She grabbed the headset off the ground with one hand and clutched her rifle in the other.

She swiveled to her right, where the radio sat in the hill depression 20 yards away. Jane was lucky -- she didn't slip in her first three strides toward the alcove, too-big boots throwing up dirt behind her. Then she did, and as she stumbled several times in the sandy, brush-ridden soil, she shouted.

Instinct told her to just jump and hope. She listened. Just as her body started to head toward the ground, she scrunched her legs and dove as far forward as she could toward the alcove.

It was as if she'd been flung from a catapult. Jane sailed through the air several feet above the ground, crossing a dozen yards in a second or so. She landed again feet-first on the worn rock floor at the mouth of the alcove. She skidded to a standing halt, nearly tripping on the phone wire.

The whistling pierced her helmet as well as any bullet. She hurled herself at the alcove wall and prayed.
 
Convoy

The Desert Oasis II's tracks veered off the Italian road into rocks, mud, low grass and packets of rations. In short, absolutely no difference. The two trucks that was previously behind the UGC moved up quickly to fill the empty space in a panic, a 20 meter gap between them was 5 extra seconds of being in the artillery shower, and that was too much to ask. One shell fell short of striking Bingo in the middle of the convoy and obliterated the jeep instead.

All Milena could see was a white bolt streak out of the clouds before it buried itself deep into the soft ground 10 meters to the forward left of her. The muffled underground explosion produced a rapidly expanding boil of dirt, pebbles and weeds that halted the UGC and lifted her side of the vehicle off the ground in a hurry, and the sheer momentum of that tipped the vehicle past the 90 degree mark. The 'extra' supplies started falling off the now vertical surface of the UGC while what was originally carried produced a bulge in the covering trap as they pressed against it trying to get out. In a few more seconds the Czech NECO's head would imitate a frightened ostrich with possibly fatal results, for the Scotsman it would be in half that time.
 
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Sniper Hill

Jane may have overestimated the time for the shells to arrive, due to being able to hear them much earlier than a normal human as a result of her NECO enhanced ears. It was six angonizing seconds before the first shell landed almost directly above the alcove. The last words from the radio before the explosions drowned it out was a resigned and ironic "Oh blow m-". A thunderous barrage followed, but most of the shells not landing around the NECO, rather from the muffled sounds, they instead saturated the area behind her back.

When the dust settled, there were new craters all over the Allied trenchline, including one where Richard and the body was the last time Jane saw. There was a profound atmosphere of misery enamating from the troops below, troops that either found cover in time or were one of the lucky bunch not to be pasted.

"This is Paulson!" One of the commandos sounded in muted excitement with a spot of blissful ignorance. "(Slosh) I see one of the spotters by the low brick wall!" If Jane was looking, she could see a pair of V-Binos poking over the top of the wall together with the uppermost part of a German helmet. Poking out of the opposite edge and side of the wall however was a rifle, its user completely hidden other than his weapon.
 
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Bunker

The Artillery barrage resumed again, with each shock dropping a sprinkle of fine dust over the gathered soldiers.

"Stab in the dark is just about right, Valerie my dear." Fian commented, with a small impressed smile. "Which is why we will be going in at night, tonight. We will be using the NECO's innate abilities of subterfuge and night vision to sneak into Monte Cassino, then split into three seperate teams to complete three seperate objectives."

He wacked the picture of the Monastery again, perhaps channeling the frustrations of the rank and file. "The first team will infiltrate the Monte Cassino Monastery itself to determine if it is being used as a spotting position by the German forces. Before this battle, the Germans have informed us that they will not use the Monastery for the sake of keeping an ancient and priceless House of God out of the fight of mortals, circumstantial evidence points to this being not the case. Allied High Command have almost made up their mind to bomb and shell it to ruin today, but certain higher ups and interest groups have brought us in and plus one day's reprieve to find and determine the question once and for all. Expect at least a few German MPs to be guarding the outside of the building, I prefer if you do not kill them unless you indeed find evidence that they are using the Monastery for artillery spotting purposes."

"The second team will secure the forrested and winding path up and around the mountain. It is not technically part of the agreement and spotters there will only see as far as no-man's-land. Still, eliminating them will make future assaults and our exfiltration from the area easier."

"The third team will scour the woodland around the base of the hill." Fian roughly traced the area with the stick. "This is the most forward and therefore most accurate source of German artillery fire. We have counterbatteried this location to no result. So even if the Monastery team does not find anything up there, finding and eliminating any pieces of artillery down here will remove a significant amount of fire being directed toward our lines."

"Team assignments, where are we getting climbing equipment and how do we get past no-man's-land will be announced closer to the end of day. Any questions?"
 
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Convoy

It could not get that much worse then this when one was in a vehicle and enemy was shelling you. Milena felt the Universal Carrier lift up. Just her side though, but it kept coming up. That blast must have been so close. There was ringing in her ears and for once she was glad that NECO process only changed inside of her earwaves. Other NECOes must have suffered from loud noises even worse. It was no piece of cake for Milena either.

As the UC went, up she grabbed onto the front, where Bren gun would usually be mounted. She hoped for the side of carrier to just lift up and then go down back again, but it just kept rising. In these fractions of moment, her NECO reflexes was what saved her as she realised that the UC was going to topple over. It was time to do something about.

Milena kicked off, launching herself from her seat, out in the open ground. As she flew, she rotated her body and fell on her hands and feet like a cat. There was no moment to waste though. The czech NECO charged forward, hitting the UC shoulder first, pushing with all her might to stop the vehicle from toppling over and trapping Willard.
 
Bunker

Abbie listened to the briefing given by the Lieutenant and had to quietly shake her head when he asked if there were any questions. All she wanted or needed to know at this point was answered. The monastery was not to be harmed, if possible, by anyone and that, to her way of thinking, was perfectly acceptable. She already knew where to get any other equipment she'd need, depending on what her specific task was, and looked forward to it.
 
Sniper hill

"S-stay off that fucking road!" Jane screamed into the handset. She slammed her fist down into the rock at her back, cracking it. She slammed it again. Chips crumbled to the floor.

She'd misjudged the damn artillery, sure, but really she has just let her own fear dictate what she did, and people had died because of it. Her fear was as much to blame as the German spotter.

Jewish guilt didn't run as high in her Norwegian-American blood as it did in others. She wiped at her eyes, swallowed hard and vowed to do something, by God.

Like kill Germans.

She twirled out of the alcove and got to the ground. She didn't glance down at the Allied lines. Jane put her scope right on the wall, and on the helmet. She realized now the engineer was a suicide spotter, one that had let the Germans know where she was, at least. Now they were going to kill Paulson unless she killed them first.

She sighted on the helmet. Was anyone under it? She hardly trusted her eyes anymore, let alone her judgment. As old as she was, she was very new to war.

Jane huffed and squared her rifle on her shoulder. Don't judge, she thought. Shoot. It's what you do.

"Stay down; sniper at the wall," she said into the radio, then squatted again. The rifle sticking out was a small target she couldn't reliably hit. The binoculars were shiny bulls-eyes. They waited for her fiery dart. She aimed for the space between the helmet lip and the glasses' eyepiece.

She slowed her breathing. She found the speed of the wind, the spaces between the rolling mists.

Jane fired.
 
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Bunker

Riikka gave a comical frown aimed at the back of Valerie's head at her words, "Why always Pupu? Are you saying I'm soft?" She gave the back of Valerie's chair, and by extent the back of the Brit herself, a gentle but chastising kick before dropping her feet to the ground.

Where the briefing was concerned, the Finn both did and did not like what she was hearing. Of course it was always good to know about where the enemy might be and work towards eliminating the damnable artillery that had been bombarding them for the last several days. But things like the monastery had always struck Riikka as odd. What was the significance of the building beyond its view of the surrounding landscape? Why place such importance in a building's history and meaning placed upon it by mean who were probably long dead or on the way there? Riikka was all for simply shelling the place if the Nazis were trying to use it. But those above her didn't want that and so for the time being - it wouldn't happen.

While she may not have liked the idea of avoiding the killing of perfectly good targets, it sounded like Riikka would best be able to ascend to the monastery. If not then she'd be just as well-suited for clearing the path up to it our scouring the forests for German guns.

As the briefing wrapped up, Riikka sighed theatrically.

"What are we supposed to do in the meantime, Luutnantti?"

Truth be told, Riikka wouldn't have objected to scouring the No Man's Land and surrounding countryside for German scouts. The morning had been slow and in the end she'd only had a single skull to show for it. One which Morgan could now someday polish and place as a trophy on his mantle place after the war.
 
Honestly, it happened almost too quickly for Baird to even contemplate. One second he was driving, the next, he was knocked flat sideways, his perception of the world rotated about 90 degrees. It wasn't pleasant. His helmet fell off. A pack of cigarettes fell out of his pockets, lost into the turf. All the blood in his body rushed from where it was supposed to be to his skull.

Baird looked to the side as the ground came up to meet him, suddenly terrified, sure he was going to die. He opened his mouth to scream but all that came out was a surprised sounding "Aah?" as the carrier tipped, further and further to his own demise. So. This was how it was to end, eh? Pinned under his vehicle like a bloody novice?

Then Milena hopped out. Well, at least she could save herself. Baird comforted himself with that prospect, that at least it would only be his fool ass to die, then she turned back around. Moving so fast he could barely keep track of her, Milena shoulder-checked the UGC back into place, the ponderous, tan form of the Desert Oasis tipping, tipping, then finally righting itself thanks to the counter-momentum provided by the intrepid NECO.

Baird jumped in his seat. All the gear in the carrier had suffered one, final re-distribution as the last jarring shock from being forcibly righted took it's toll. There still wasn't any time to waste though. He was shaken, but training kicked in.

"Good work Milena!" Baird shouted, entirely too loud. How could anything be heard over that awful tone in his ears? "Thought I was a bloody feckin' goner, that!"

He stood up in his seat, hopping out of the carrier. He picked up his helmet as he went, the pack of cigarettes long gone, and squatted by the carrier's hit side to inspect the damage therein. His ears were ringing something fierce, but that was okay. He was alive. Alive! He's just hoped the damage to the carrier was fixable, or else things would get 'interesting'.
 
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