June 6, 1944
D-Day: aka Operation Overlord
Sergeant Buckshot, 502nd, 101st Airborne Division
En route to Drop Zone Alpha
Time 1:02 am
Flak shook the plane as I stared out the doorway and into the forests of Normandy below me. In front of the thick hedgerows I saw the the beach designated as Utah. I saw other planes around mine as they were getting shot down or just getting their hulls filled with lead. The operation were dropping into, Operation Overlord as I heard, involved us dropping in behind Germane lines under the cover of night and disrupting their troop movement while our invading forces hit the beaches in the morning under probable heavy fire. The way I'm saying it, it sounds like we have the easy job. I knew this won't be easy, all of us would be dropping into unknown territory and and possibly under intense flak and machine gun fire.
" 30 seconds!" yelled the parapony next to me.
I tugged on my gear as I made sure it was tight on me. Parachuting out of moving airplane over intense flak fire I wanted to make sure nothing fell loose when I jumped out. I checked again. Good. Everything was tight. With my parachute over my back I prepared to jump out of the plane when the light turned green.
" 10 seconds!" he yelled again.
I looked around the plane one more time before I leaped into the darkness. The plane was filled with mares and stallions of my company, A Company, along with the C-47 flying next to us. We all trained together at boot camp and learned to respect on another as we all got to know each other. My two best friends were not with me. They were on the other plane and I hoped that they landed safely as well as us. As I looked into my plane for the last time, I stared at everyone else and I wished to them to myself Good luck everypony. Just then the plane exploded.
That's all I could remember before I was freefalling through the sky on my way down to certain death as I continued my way toward the ground. Being an earth pony I had no magic like unicorns or wings like pegasus ponies. I know I had no chance of surviving this fall unless...
That right! I realized that I had my parachute on me. I searched my chest for the pull, finding it I gave it as hard of a tug as I could. Expecting a parachute to pop out all I got was a pull that was supposed to release my chute. Shit I though as I tried to grab the handle for my backup chute. Grabbing it I pulled again and hoped for a chute to be deployed this time. Sure enough, a large white piece of cloth came out of my pack as I slowly descended to the ground, hoping that nopony has saw me.
Hitting the ground was the next thing I felt after what felt like forever of falling out of the sky. Being an earth pony I had a heavy tolerance for pain and shook of the disorientation. I soon recovered from the fall and quickly ran into the nearby foilage to avoid being seen easily by Germane patrols. I checked my equipment to make sure I had everything. Canteen? Check. Bandages? Check. Rifle... wait? I thought. Wheres my rifle?! I looked around me desperately trying to find my rifle. I peered into a nearby bush and found my weapon, an M1 Carbine, sitting among the leaves. I checked it over and, seeing that it still works, wrapped the sling around my neck and ran deeper into the forest.
After what felt like forever of walking through the thick forest and avoiding at least two patrols I heard the distinctive sound of a Germane AA battery close by and decided to investigate it. Upon arriving though I noticed two figures crouching behind a hill which appeared to overlook the gun site. One looked like it had a purple coat with a dark purple mane with what appeared to be a highlight running through it. The other on had a white coat and a styled purple mane. As I made my way up to them I whispered the codeword that we paraponies used to identify if a pony is friend or foe.
" Thunder."
Upon hearing this the two figures turned around to me and responded.
" Flash."
Hearing the correct response I trotted quietly over to them. I was just glad that they were friendlies and I neared them I could tell they were mares. Somewhat of a relief I thought.
" Whats your name and rank soldier?" I asked the pony next to me.
" Private First Class Twilight Sparkle." she replied. I saw that they both had horns on their head, meaning that they were unicorns.
" Private Rarity is my name darling." said the second mare. I could tell by the look on her face that she didn't enjoy lying in the dirt too much. Oh well, that the life of a soldier in my opinion. Lying in dirt all day and getting shot at by enemies determined to take your life. " Who are you?" she asked me.
" Sergeant Buckshot ma'am. Pleased to meet you both." I said.
" Oh!" they both replied," Sorry for the disrespect sir." they said together, clearly embarrassed by their lack of respect toward a higher ranking pony.
" None taken," I said " Whats the situation you have here?" I asked returning to the subject at hand.
" We got an AA battery and some ground troops protecting the gun sir." Twilight said. " I've been trying to figure out a way to take it out without alerting anypony for the past ten minutes."
I can tell already that Twilight was a pony to over think a situation like this and block out everything else. For ten minutes they both let this AA gun to fire on our fellow paraponies in the skies without doing a thing about it. i felt a little disappointed in her not silencing the gun as quickly as possible to save numerous lives still in the sky.
" Got it, here is what we'll do about it." I said, taking command of the problem. " Twilight, I want you and Rarity to lay down suppressive fire on those Germanes protecting the gun while I flank. Got it?"
" Yes sir!" they said together.
As I ran along side the mounds of dirt that I think the Germanes used to protect the gun I could see the enemy infantry as they took cover in trenches surrounding the emplacement and firing back at Twilight and Rarity. I have to give them credit, despite not looking like ponies who could put up a fight they were giving those Germanes hell. They had already dropped three by the time I killed the crew of the Flakvierling 38 and destroyed the gun. The Germanes soon saw this and started to turn around to shoot me. This gave Twilight and Rarity the chance to stand up and shoot the flanks of the occupied ponies that were concentrated on me. After a few more minutes every Germane protecting the gun was dead, silent minus the numerous other gun emplacement firing on the planes above us.
" Good job girls, one less gun site to worry about." I said to them as they trotted down the hill.
" Thank you sir!" they both said.
" Until we link up with the rest of the division you two are with me. Understood?"
" Yes sir!" they said again.
We continued to walk about the country and thick hedgerows and forests of Normandy, trying to find the rest of the 502nd and in doing so we took out two more AA gun positions along the way. Twilight and Rarity, being residents of Ponyville, had never experienced such violence and chaos before in there lives from what I found out from them. They had never fought in hoof to hoof combat before and never seen another pony with his or her limbs being blown up by grenades or other explosions. I felt kind of bad for them, hearing that they never have fought in a battle before. They both told me that they came fresh out of training when they got on those planes, and that they were separated from their friend during the drops.
That's when I remembered about my friends. Were they okay? Did they survive the drop? These thoughts continued to pop into my mind until Twilight came up to me.
" Sarge? Are you okay? You seem to be distracted by something." she asked me.
" I'm fine Twi." I said. " I'm just worried about my friends like you and Rarity are."
She told me about her friends, who's names were Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Spike. Rainbow Dash was in the same company as Twilight and Rarity but was separated from them after they jumped and the plane was shot by flak. They saw Dash jump out just before the plane exploded and saw her fly toward a nearby forest. When they went to go look for her, all they found were her goggles on the ground, next to a dead Germane.
That's all they knew of their friends conditions. They heard Fluttershy joined the medical corps and was now serving as a combat medic. Applejack and Spike were sent into the 1st Infantry Division, and they both hoped for them to stay alive for they would be involved in assaulting the beach codenamed 'Omaha'. All I thought is how brutal the assault will be to take those beaches. Pinkie had joined the armored corps and they read from her letters that she commands her own M4 Sherman tank. She even wrote to them that she put a 'party cannon' on her tank, whatever that meant.
As we kept searching for friendly paraponies, almost the entire next day had passed by without any luck. The only paraponies we found we dead ones who appeared to be either captured or were killed in a firefight. We were running low on rations and ammunition which was used during small firefights with Germane patrols. All of us were tired and were in desperation of sleep. Rarity kept complaining about how the lack of her 'beauty sleep' would affect her appearance and Twilight kept asking me about my life before the war. I tried to tune out both whining and questions as we continued walking down a dirt road but ended up yelling at Rarity to be quiet and at Twilight to stop asking questions. This caused them to stop talking until we came up to a sign that read,
CARENTAN
After reading the sign and looking behind it we saw the town and we all decided to rest there until the next day to go looking for the division. We entered an empty house on the near edge of the town and went up to the second floor. Seeing no enemy soldiers around we agreed to be on guard in shifts. Twilight and Rarity went to sleep with me on watch. I tried my best to stay awake but the fatigue eventually got to me.
June 8, 1944
Operation Overlord Day-2
Outskirts of Carentan
Time 5:02 am
Thud
I scrambled from my slumber to react to the noise that I just heard. Looking around and seeing nothing but the two sleeping mares that I rescued after the drop. I relaxed a bit, but only a bit, to seeing that nothing was around. I quickly glanced outside and still saw nothing but the dark countryside and wrecked city buildings that was called Carentan.
Just relax. I said to myself, Your getting too jumpy, and besides, who would be walking about at this time in the morning.
Returning to the center of the room, I resumed my guard shift that I dozed off from earlier. But the fatigue from walking nonstop and fighting for the past two days really took a lot out of me. Unable to stay awake, I soon felt myself drift back to sleep, dreaming of times before this war even began.
2 hours later
I was woken up by a rumbling outside of the house that I was sleeping in, instantly grabbing my rifle and aiming it at the source of the noise. I then woke up Twilight and Rarity as they were still asleep through the commotion. Grabbing their equipment we made our way over to a window that had its glass broken off and some debris covering the majority of the it. I told them to watch my back as I peered my head slightly into the open to see what was going on. As soon as I did though I immediately regretted doing so.
Outside of the house was what appeared to be a convoy of Germane infantry consisting of what looked like halftracks and armored cars. I also saw about a regiment of enemy infantry walking along side it, looking around to see any signs of threats. My heart immediately fell into my stomach. I realized that we had stumbled and slept in a Germane occupied town. Of all the rotten luck! We had to come to a town that was filled with Germanes waiting to kill us. I thought to myself. I thought about what the Germanes were going to do to us when they found us until Twilight tapped me on the shoulder.
" Hey sir, whats going on out there?" she asked me.
Holding my head from the predicament that all of us were in I told both of them about what was going on outside and that we stumbled into a Germane occupied town with no hopes of escape. Both of there jaws were hung open in shock about what I had just told them. At that moment Twilight started to freak out and began to hyperventilate into her hooves.
" Oh sweet Celestia, how are we going to get out of this?! Were... were going to die here not knowing if any of our friends are okay or not! Well be unknown on HOW we got killed and then everyone's going to forget about us! Do you hear me? WERE ALL GOING TO DI...!"
Rarity and I quickly pulled her down and I put my hoof over her mouth, trying to make her be quiet. All I hoped for is that the loud rumbling of the engines outside would have muffled her panicky outburst and no pony would be sent to look for the yelling.
Suddenly we heard the noise of a door opening downstairs. I knew that those soldiers were going to walk up here and see us and possibly shoot us on site. Looking around and seeing no way to escape, I quietly told the girls to not move and be silent. They both nodded, understanding what I said. They moved as quietly as possible to nearby pile of house debris that was part of what looked like the roof. I myself moved over to the darkest corner of the room and curled into a ball to show the least amount of me possible. Hearing the sound of hoofsteps and doors being opened I knew it was only a matter of time before those Germanes came into our room and find us.
Upon seeing our door being opened I shifted myself into an even smaller position in the corner and began to pray to Celestia to have mercy on us. I raised my rifle at the door in case he came too close.
But then the sound of the door opening suddenly stopped. My heart was pounding and I was sweating like a pig. I looked up and saw that the door was only halfway opened, Wondering why they didn't come inside. I then heard what sounded to be Germane coming from downstairs.
"Sind sie dort noch?" Are you done up there yet? I heard the one downstairs ask.
"Noch nicht, nicht jetzt." Not yet. He replied.
"Dann kommen wir nicht wollen, sich verspaten." Come down then, we don't want to be late. The one downstairs said.
"Fur das, was?" For what? He asked again.
"Nehmen sie sich einfach hier unten." Just get down here. The Germane answered.
"In the coming." I'm coming. He said.
I then saw the door close and the sound of hoof walking out of the house. After ten minutes I didn't hear the sound of hoofs or the noise of engines outside. Slowly I crept out from the shadows and found Twilight and Rarity still hiding amongst the debris from the roof. I told them it was safe to come out and that nopony else was near. After they crawled out from their hiding place Rarity began to thank me for warning them what was happening. As we were talking though I noticed out of the corner of my eye that Twilight was walking toward the farthest corner of the room. Seeing this I told Rarity to keep an eye out on the street in case more Germanes came by. With a simple nod, she grabbed her rifle and made her way over to the window, keeping a watchful eye on the street below.
Walking over to Twi I can see that she was crying. Tears were coming down her face as she sobbed into her uniform, trying to forget about the event that had just happened. I couldn't see her like this, knowing that every day on the battlefield you always have a chance of meeting certain death like the one we all just had. Having a heart I went over to her to try to comfort her on what happened. Hearing me walking in her direction she tried to stop crying, and upon reaching her she began to talk to me in a still sobbed filled voice.
" A-a--a-are y-you m-mad at m-me sarge?" she asked me, still trying to stop herself from crying.
"Why would I be mad at you Twi?" I asked her back.
"B-b-because, its m-my f-fault that those G-germanes c-came into the h-house to search f-for us." she said with tears in her eyes.
I gave out a sigh. Seeing somepony like this on a battlefield only strengthened the fact that they weren't meant to fight on the front lines. Either that or they are just scared shitless. For her, I'll probably go with my second guess.
As she continued to stop herself from crying in front of me I put my hoof on her shoulder to try to comfort her that everything was okay.
" Relax Twi, there not here right now. Just try to relax and get some more sleep, this experience looked like it took a lot out of you." I said in a reassuring matter.
" But s-sir..." she started before I cut her off.
" No buts Twilight, I mean it. Its not your fault that those two Germanes came in here trying to look for us."
" It kind of is." said a voice that I was not familiar with.
I turned around and saw myself nose-to-nose with a cyan colored pegasus. She had what looked like a rainbow colored mane and wore a standard parapony outfit. Seeing the tag on her uniform I could make out her name and rank.
Cpl Rainbow Dash 502nd 101st Airborne Div.
