Young Writers Society

Unlike my Reg Carter series, this is a prologue I haven't proofed, continued or anything. I'd written it a long time ago and just ultimately wondered what your thoughts were:

Contains some strong language.

Prologue
1943 February 1st
SOVIET 62nd Army, Commanded by General Josef Stalin
Squad 002 under command of Lt. General Vasily Chuikov.
Stalingrad USSR, 1500 hours (Standard GMT time).

Lt. General Chuikov patrolled the front of 30 men. The medium-sized squad of the 62nd soviet army consisted of the meat and dignity of the USSR army. They were known as the Spetsnaz Army Corps - a regiment of expertly trained men, the best of the USSR army. In Lt. General Chuikov’s squadron, was his most prized soldier, Lt. Colonel Javori – known as the ‘get your hands dirty’ leader of the squadron. The 002nd squadron also included, 3 Majors, Major Henri, Major Fassiley and the ‘bitch of the three,’ Major Podolski. The 3 Lt. Colonel’s each controlled 3 separate divisions of 10 men within Colonel Javori’s squadron. Most of the other Spetsnaz soldiers were ‘high achieving’ privates or corporals in the USSR Spetsnaz corps, excluding Lt. Zhucov and Staff Sergeant Rokosi.

1800 hours (Standard GMT time) USSR Spetsnaz Corps -Base Camp.

Lt. General Chuikov sighed. The night was cold and the USSR Squad 002 had been ‘fighting’ in Stalingrad since late August in 1942. The squadron had lost 5 good privates and a Sergeant to a clumsily positioned shell attack by there own side – damn friendly fire... This, after being rubbed in by Chuikov, resulted in the execution of Sgt. Jassori who commanded the ‘practice’ shelling. In all those months and days the Spetsnaz soldiers had seen no action apart from the shellfire from their own team, that’s the problem with being USSR Spetsnaz – You get called into action if there’s a ‘special’ problem, the Spetsnaz were supposed to be “too valuable to risk in the field of intermediate battle,” as Major Henri once announced. The months away from home had lowered morale and made Lt. Colonel Javori’s work much harder, he had to resort to special ‘activities’ and ‘rewards’ to bring morale back up to a ‘working state’. Chuikov rose into view from the badly built small command shack. He studied the group for a bit and then pulled Colonel Javori over for a word and told the rest of the squadron to “stand at ease.” So they dispersed from their perfectly straight formation with their eyes envying war.

Chuikov led Lt Col. Javori into the small stone shack. Javori left ‘base camp’ behind him. However you can’t really call it that - The living conditions were poor and this got to the Spetsnaz’ morale too, not only that but the place stunk of weeks and weeks of waste and sweat from routine exercise sessions.
“Javori, there’s good news from General Stalin.” Spoke Chuikov slowly, he had a good, well known relationship with the Colonel, “however whether or not you take it as good news is up to you.” Chuikov’s voice spoke coldly with no emotion. Javori remained silent.
“Stalin has called on the 002nd squadron for action. By dawn we move from this shit-stinking camp and head for some real action, kick some Hun butt. Are you up for it colonel?”
“Yes. Yes indeed, sir. The squad will be pleased and, if you may excuse me, it’s about time too.” Javori spoke obediently but still had some sought of command over the Lt. General.
“Very well. I want your men ready by 2200 hours Lt Colonel. Get some rest and by 0600 hours we march to East Stalingrad. The dirty Hans are waiting son. You’d better get on with it.”
“Sir.” Javori spoke emotionless and left without looking back. He moved out of the badly lit shack and pulled back out in to the cold air. As he arched his chin up to a level rest he acknowledged that the men had quickly gone from being at ease and smoking casually to stomping on the cigarette butts and standing to a crisp salute. SSgt. Rokosi being the first – he’s always the first, keep it up and you might get a promotion, Javori thought.
“At Ease,” announced Javori in a darkened voice and pulled on his coat patched with ‘heroic’ awards and ‘patriotism’ medals. He crouched and pulled the dirt up into a pile in his hands and smelt the cold iron of the dirt and then stood back up again, opened his clench and allowed the dirt to preciously fall slowly from the dehydrated skin that cracked over his palm.
“Lads.” He voiced, “It’s time we kicked some Nazi ass, agreed?”
“YEAAAHHH,” boomed the squadron of 30 men, with a sudden new adrenaline intact.
“Well, lock and load! I want you ready by 2200 hours, then grab some rest and get ready to march by 0600 hours and step on it. You’re already 5 minutes behind schedule! Move Out!” Lt Colonel Javori barked, using the ‘5 minutes behind’ as a motivational taunt.

Major Henri took his10 men, 6 privates and 4 corporals, and led them to the weapons and ammunition shack on the eastern wing of the camp; they jogged over behind him still in formation. Whilst Major Fassiley took his 10 men, 4 privates, 3 medics, SSgt. Rokosi and 2 corporals, and got them stocked up with medical gear, C4 and the rest of the needed equipment. However, Major Podolski didn’t lead his men anywhere, which consisted of 4 corporals, 3 privates, Lt. Zhucov and 2 medics.
“I want you little fuckers stocked up by 2100 hours, got me?” he barked, especially looking at Lt. Zhucov – whom had a bad habit of ‘taking his time’. The men scattered totally unorganised into different directions, making as much distance between them and Major Podolski who paced the briefing shack. He had only ever won one medal, ‘service to the Soviet Union’ which he was awarded in 1941 for revealing an Italian spy amongst the USSR Army ranks when he was commanding officer of Squadron 035, but the Brigadier General in-charge of Podolski had his suspicions that Podolski was working with the Italian. He was demoted from Lt. Colonel in 1942 for ‘coward-ness’, the poor sod suffered shellshock in early 1942 and spend 14 days in a mental outlet off the borders of Moscow. He was then reassigned to the heroic Spetsnaz Corps, which were squadrons 001 – 013 of the USSR 62nd Army. Podolski was happy when he realised he was going to one of the best, being Lt. Gen Chuikov’s squadron 002 which had a reputation for getting things done. However before he didn’t know he would be under command of Lt. Colonel Javori – of which Podolski was over jealous and made him an even poorer leader, Javori and Podolski were both training Sergeants in 1936 when they fell-out over Javori’s early promotion to Staff Sergeant. Although this, Javori took a bad view on Podolski because of his extremely poor command and had tried to reassign him twice, however he failed to persuade Lt. General Chuikov. Podolski then showed good force throughout 1942, until they arrived in Stalingrad for a counterattack on the German 6th Army, however this had taken almost 6 months to happen and now Podolski was losing morale and becoming a reliability to Lt Col. Javori…









0602 hours (standard GMT time) USSR 62nd Army
Spetsnaz Corps, Special Stalingrad regiment
Squadrons 002 and 004
Minus 30 minutes from east Stalingrad

Lt Col. Javori marched through the humid air of dawn, steadying his paces as he led 30 men from his squadron up the side of a dirt road on the edge of a dried up canyon. The dust mingled with the soldiers and frequent coughing and sneezing occurred. Lt. Zhucov was depended on to keep the radio safe, as for the Spetsnaz, this was the only way they ever got out, it was all about keeping outer communications to the minimum to avoid being intercepted. This was ultra important because the Spetsnaz was a classic Spec Ops – Get in, get out, and don’t leave a trace. Squadron 002’s first objective was an outer stationed German camp out in the north of Stalingrad, here they would take out the 6th army reinforcements behind enemy lines and all dress as 6th Army Nazis to ‘creep up’ and take out the German headquarters – there objective: Secure Nazi HQ and Neutralise General Fallin (Last commander of the Stalingrad assault). Whilst Javori marched upfront and took on the humid hot draft of dawn, Podolski took the rear behind his ten men keeping his eye steady but not aware, and this would be their problem…

After 10 minutes, Squadron 004 had a hawk-eyed rear Major and they’d scattered behind rocks on the canyon below, however Podolski was too busy looking at Zhukov’s poor pacing skills and didn’t notice a 6 manned Spec Ops team trailing them 45 yards behind, all armed with standard Luger 9mm’s, they didn’t stand a chance against the USSR’s developed Spetsnaz Tommy Guns, renamed the Spetzy, but the German Spec Ops team had the element of surprise. Podolski didn’t notice them till a dull crackle echoed trough the canyon and Zhukov’s head split in two, blood boiling over his shoulders as he fell into his very own bath of the stuff. Podolski was quick to react and managed to get behind a rock with a bullet missing him by a whisker.
“Javori, down here for fucks sake!” Podolski barked.
Javori acknowledged and signalled to Major Fassiley and Major Henri, they quickly scattered and stood their ground. For Podolski and his ten men, it was a different story. His bad tactics led to his medics falling to their fair share of 9mm led and as did 2 of 3 of his privates, the other private and the corporals returned fire but their aim was poor and Javori put that down to shock. Javori had lost good men to Podolski’s commanding issues, but he knew it was too late to worry about that now. Corporal Shad, one of Podolski’s, left his cover and went all-in guns blazing. His Spetzy shook with the force of firing deadly hails of led into the Spec Ops team. Shad took a hit in the shoulder and knee, he lost blood fast but managed to take down two of them, but Shad didn’t stop there, he took his amazing courage and put his weight on the healthy knee, then braced his side-arm in his left hand and blew a Nazi’s head into 5 different groups of bloody wreck. Then Sgt. Yannin, leader of the remaining Nazi Spec Ops paced over to the dying corporal, pistol in hand but he didn’t fire. The Sgt bent down took the Corporal’s hand and shook it, he was over-amazed with his bravery, but Shad whispered one thing,
“Get rid of the pain… please…” And at that the Sgt took his pistol and regretfully shot the Corporal between the eyes. The sudden hot pain and scorching in his shoulder followed by a rain cloud of his own blood brought him back to the real world. As the Sgt fell he noticed his other two men fall to the Spetzy guns and then before Podolski could go finish it off, the Sgt brought his side arm to his own head and, with his sweaty finger, pulled on the trigger. The last thing he heard was the sound of Shad’s voice… Not his own gun, nor the Spetzy fire, not even the wind, but the gallant man he had been so privileged to face that day and that stuck with him forever…