The reason why Sokov assigned the task of rescuing Victor to Kirillov was because Victor was a student whom Kirillov valued highly during the later training at the Frunze Military Academy.
As a teacher, if you know that your students are in danger, there is no reason not to rescue them.
Sure enough, Kirillov was still very concerned about Victor's safety. As soon as Sokov finished speaking, he immediately said: "Comrade Commander, I understand. Please allow me to hand over the command to the deputy division commander, and then
I will personally lead two battalions to rescue Lieutenant Colonel Victor."
"Lieutenant Colonel Kirillov, your troops are very quick. Whether Lieutenant Colonel Victor can escape safely depends entirely on you."
"Don't worry, Comrade Commander." Kirillov vowed: "I will definitely rescue them safely."
Besides, the assault camp in the town of Golovanivsik has been divided into two parts by the German troops in the town. One part is the first company and the third company commanded by Victor himself. They are relying on the church to fight against the German attack with all their strength;
The other part was mainly composed of the Second Company, with a small number of wounded soldiers from the First Company, and was commanded by the commander of the Second Company. They occupied buildings on both sides of a street near the church, condescendingly blocking the enemies who tried to rush towards the church from here.
Although the positions occupied by the assault battalion were good, because they rushed in lightly and carried not much ammunition, they fought for such a long time and inevitably ran out of ammunition.
The third company commander found Victor and reported to him: "Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, we don't have much ammunition. If reinforcements don't arrive, we may be in danger of being annihilated."
Victor was shocked: "When we set out, not every commander and combatant carried a basic amount of ammunition. How could the ammunition be used up so quickly?"
"Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, you don't know something." The third company commander explained to Victor: "There are many new soldiers in the team and they don't have much combat experience. Moreover, they are fighting at night. In order to overcome the fear in their hearts, they all
If you hold the trigger tightly, all the bullets in the magazine will be exhausted in one go."
Victor just asked Sokov for help not long ago, but he knew in his heart that even if Sokov wanted to send someone to rescue him, they would not be able to arrive in a short time. Now the only way to survive is to allow the commanders and soldiers to save ammunition.
Reinforcements arrived. He could only say helplessly to the third company commander: "Comrade Captain, tell the soldiers to save ammunition, we still need to persist here for a long time."
"Okay, Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, I will convey your wishes to the soldiers."
Just as the third company commander was about to leave, Victor stopped him and asked with concern: "Have you contacted the second company?"
"No, Comrade Lieutenant Colonel." The third company commander shook his head and said: "The enemy blocked the road between us and the second company with fire. I sent several soldiers in succession, but they were unable to pass the enemy's fire blockade.
"
"We still have to find a way to get in touch with the Second Company," although Victor knew in his heart that sending someone to contact the Second Company would be equivalent to letting others die. But in this case, he could only take risks. After all,
They fought independently, and in the end they were defeated by the Germans: "Now we don't understand the situation of the Second Company, and the Second Company also doesn't understand our situation, which makes it impossible for both sides to support each other."
Regarding the order issued by Victor, the third company commander could only bite the bullet and agreed: "Okay, Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, I will send someone to contact you as soon as possible."
"Wait a minute, Comrade Captain." Victor saw the embarrassment on the third company commander's face and said to him: "Although the enemy has blocked the passage between us and the second company with firepower, it is night now, and the Germans are
Visibility is limited, so as long as the people sent to contact you don't walk on the street arrogantly, it will be difficult for the Germans to spot them. Do you understand?"
After hearing this, the third company commander was stunned for a moment, then nodded vigorously and said, "So that's it. Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, I understand what you mean, and I know how to let the soldiers pass through the enemy's fire blockade."
Seeing the third company commander limping forward, Victor said behind him: "Comrade Captain, you are injured and have difficulty moving. If anything happens, send a soldier to tell me."
That’s fine, there’s no need to run around in person.”
Faced with Victor's concern, the third company commander stopped, turned around and nodded to him, smiling and saying: "I understand, Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, thank you for your kindness."
The third company commander returned to the position outside the church, found a veteran named Lokima, and ordered him: "Comrade Lokima, I have an important task now that I want to entrust you to complete."
Lokima saw with his own eyes that several soldiers sent by the third company commander died unfortunately while passing through the German fire blockade. At this moment, the third company commander took the initiative to find him, indicating that he planned to let him carry out this extremely dangerous task.
"Comrade Company Commander," he couldn't hide anyway, so he might as well be more proactive. Rokima asked the third company commander: "Are you planning to send me to establish contact with the second company?"
"Yes, Comrade Lokima." Seeing that the other party had guessed his intention, the third company commander said truthfully: "The enemy's firepower has blocked the road between us and the second company. If we carry out this mission, then
The chance of survival will be infinitely close to zero, so you have to think carefully. If you don’t want to go, I won’t force you..."
"Comrade Company Commander," Lokima unexpectedly said, "I accept this mission."
"This is great." The third company commander held Lokima's hand and began to assign him a task: "When you see the second company commander, tell him to use new rockets to bombard enemies who try to approach the church.
, to reduce the pressure on our defense." The reason why such an order was issued was because most of the new rockets brought with them when they came this time were in the hands of the Second Company.
"Understood, Comrade Company Commander, I will convey your words to the Second Company Commander." Maybe he thought the gun was in the way, so Lokima handed the weapon in his hand to a recruit next to him and said to him: "Recruit,
Keep it for me and return it to me when I come back from the Second Company position."
Lokima was a veteran with more than ten years of military experience before the war broke out. He can survive to this day entirely because of his rich battlefield experience. Therefore, after leaving the fortifications in front of the church, he did not behave like the previous few
Like a new recruit, he rushed straight forward, trying to rush through the hail of German bullets. Unfortunately, no matter how fast a person ran, he could not outrun the bullets. Several people only ran more than ten meters before falling in a pool of blood.
Therefore, Lokima crawled away from the defensive position in front of the church, and as soon as he entered the firing area of the German machine guns, he pressed his body tightly to the ground and squirmed forward little by little. His movements were extremely slow, and he could not even turn his eyes away.
The third company commander who stared at him even thought that he was lying there and not moving.
After watching Lokima climb out seventy or eighty meters, the third company commander suddenly felt much more at ease. As long as he climbed forward forty more meters, he would be able to enter the blind spot of the German machine gun, and the safety factor would be greatly improved.
The ground has improved.
At this moment, the German army suddenly fired a flare, and the surrounding area of the church was suddenly illuminated brightly. When the third company commander saw this, he screamed that something was wrong, fearing that Lokima would be discovered by the enemy, and then his success would be in vain.
The moment the flare was raised, Lokima, who was crawling forward, was also startled. In order to prevent being discovered by the Germans and being fired by machine guns, he could only lie on the ground and pretend to be dead. Fortunately, there were corpses lying around him.
, both Soviet and German. The German machine gunners in the distance did not find that there was a living person hidden among the corpses.
When the flares went out, Lokima still lay still in the distance. He was worried that the Germans would launch flares again. If he happened to be moving at the time, wouldn't he become a target for the Germans? It was precisely because of this consideration that,
He didn't crawl forward recklessly.
Sure enough, the Germans quickly fired new flares to observe whether any Soviet troops tried to pass through the road they had blocked. Lokima, who lay motionless on the spot, naturally escaped again without any danger.
The third company commander on the position could not help but be anxious when he saw the Germans firing flares again. If he wanted to kill the enemy's firepower point, the position of the German machine gunner happened to be the blind spot of the two Soviet positions.
No. Therefore, he could only pray secretly in his heart, hoping that Lokima could successfully reach the defense area of the second company.
Lokima, who was lying on the ground, was also thinking of a solution. He accidentally saw the corpse of a German soldier lying next to him. The tattered military uniform was in tatters and stained with blood. He had an idea, pulled off a piece of blood cloth, and covered it with blood.
On his own head, he carefully continued to crawl forward.
When the flare was raised, he lay there motionless. Even if a German machine gunner saw it, he would think it was just a corpse covered with a piece of blood and would not observe carefully. In this way, Lokima relied on his own
With his cleverness, he successfully climbed through this road of death.
When the third company commander saw Lokima successfully passing through the death zone, he excitedly pumped his fist and said, "That's great. Lokima is so great. He actually passed the enemy's blockade smoothly."
Besides, after Lokima passed the Road of Death, he soon met the soldiers of the Second Company. Fortunately, he was a veteran of the company, and the soldier happened to know him, so he took him directly to see the Second Company Commander.
Seeing that it was Lokima, the Second Company Commander asked curiously: "Lokima, how is the situation at the church?"
"It's not good, Comrade Captain." Lokima raised his hand to wipe the sweat from his forehead and said to the second company commander: "When we rushed into the church, the German commander had already retreated to the basement of the church. We are still there for the time being.
We have no ability to eliminate them, we can only block the exit and wait for them to come out on their own."
"It seems that your situation is not good." The second company commander shook his head and asked, "Tell me, what is your order, Comrade Lieutenant Colonel?"
"He authorizes you to use new rockets to attack enemies trying to get close to the church to reduce the defensive pressure on the third company."
"How many people are left in the Third Company?"
After a moment of silence, Lokima replied: "Including the first company, we have more than seventy people left, many of whom are wounded."
"The situation here is a little better." The second company commander said: "There are about eighty people in the whole company plus the wounded in the first company. Moreover, we occupy a favorable terrain, and the Germans cannot attack at all for a while."
He paused for a moment and then asked tentatively: "Lokima, did you hear anything over there at the church?"
"What news?" Lokima asked confused.
"That's it, that's it..." the second company commander said with some embarrassment: "It's just the news about when the reinforcements will arrive. You are not an outsider, so I won't hide anything from you. Even if the enemy can't attack for a long time, but
Our ammunition is almost exhausted, and if we continue to fight, the soldiers will have to fight with the enemy with bayonets."
"I'm sorry, Comrade Captain." Lokima spread his hands, shrugged, and said helplessly: "I am just an ordinary soldier, and I have been participating in the battle on the defensive position outside the church. I don't know at all.
When will reinforcements arrive?"
As a commander, the Second Company Commander had some knowledge of the situation before participating in this operation. He originally thought that as long as his troops invaded the town, the friendly forces in front of the town would be able to launch an attack in time, rush into the town and fight with them.
Our forces have joined forces. But now we have been fighting in the town for more than three hours, but we have not seen any sign of friendly forces.
Lokima guessed what the second company commander was thinking and said to him quickly: "Comrade Captain, you heard the sound of gunfire in the south of the town. Maybe our reinforcements are coming, but they are temporarily blocked by the Germans.
I believe that it won’t be long before they come over to join us.”
"Lokima, I no longer have any hope for the friendly forces in the south." The second company commander smiled bitterly and said to Lokima: "The gunshots in that direction have been ringing for more than an hour. When the gunshots first sounded,
The enemy who was attacking us chose to retreat and seemed to go there to stop our attack. But less than a quarter of an hour later, some of the enemies who left returned and continued to participate in the attack on us."
"Alert, battle alert." At this time, someone shouted from somewhere, and soon the shouts became louder: "The Germans are coming, hurry up and prepare for battle."
Amidst the shouting, gunshots rang out, and soldiers fired at the enemies who appeared in their field of vision.
But a moment later, a whistle sounded in the distance. Hearing the familiar melody, the second company commander quickly issued an order loudly: "Stop shooting, stop shooting, it's our own people, don't shoot anymore, or you will hit your own people."
Already."
After the gunfire stopped, the second company commander quickly sent two soldiers to check where there was movement to find out what happened.
Watching the two soldiers leave, Lokima curiously asked the second company commander: "Comrade Captain, what is going on? Why do our people appear in the east?"
"Yeah, I'm very surprised too." The second company commander nodded and said: "If our army broke through the German defense outside the town, it should have appeared from the south. Why did it appear from the east? It's really surprising.
It’s confusing.”
A few minutes later, the two soldiers sent returned, along with five or six others.
When a soldier walking at the front saw the second company commander, he waved his hands desperately and shouted: "Comrade company commander! Our own people, our own people, our reinforcements have arrived!"
"The reinforcements have arrived?" Although the second company commander had been looking forward to the reinforcements, when he heard the soldiers' report, his heart was full of questions: "Which part are they from?"
At this time, the group of people had already arrived. One of them walked out of the crowd and greeted the second company commander with a smile: "Comrade Captain, do you know me?"
The second company commander narrowed his eyes and looked at the other party. After a moment, he exclaimed: "Lieutenant Colonel Kirillov, you are Lieutenant Colonel Kirillov! If I am not mistaken, you are Kirilov, acting commander of the 252nd Division."
