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Backyard Barbecue
pathfinder.rtf
Keywords male 1234520, scalie 26349, man 19779, dinosaur 15530, battle 3446, war 1806, army 782, soldiers 263, prose 77
June 5 1944
RAF North Witham
County Lincolnshire, England

Dusk had settled, the sun was well beyond the horizon and the sars of the Airborne’s “Pathfinder School” were preparing for battle, laden with gear and looking like walking burlap sacks. The Pathfinders were a select group of troops from the US 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions, along with the Irish 1st Parachute Brigade, who would drop ahead of the main invasion force in the Contentin Peninsula in Normandy. They would parachute in the dark, to meet battle with the Communards and begin the long struggle to aid the Norman people in ousting a puppet regime that had been in power for nearly half a decade. It would be a bloody fight and the paratroopers were ready for it, Calvin Barnes being among them.

Barnes was a replacement for one of the rifle squads, a greenhorn who had enlisted in 1942 and was about to get his first taste of combat. He was a tall, hulking tyrannosaur from Omaha who was a wee bit shy but was privy to a good joke or prank, leaving employment at his father’s store to sign up for the Airborne. He was motivated by seeing news footage of Denver, London, Cologne, Rotterdam, and Warsaw aflame, reports of the Army’s new experimental units, and by hearing of the deployment of paratroopers by both the Comintern and the Germans fighting them.

Physical training was generally a cinch for him due to working as a stock boy back home, it was the mental condition by the instructors that rubbed him the wrong way, trying to instill harsh discipline and get recruits like Calvin adjusted to the harsh realities of military service and warfare. Months of running, of rifle drilling, of memorizing weapons and terminology, and finally of practice jumping eventually proved grueling but it did shape Calvin into a sar who thought he could take on the entirety of the Communist forces all by himself. Departing New York, he and his unit would find themselves in Ireland, the first time he had ever been overseas.

Whether it was in Ireland or in England, the sar had always attracted the eye of the local girls, much to his great embarrassment. He had never pursued girls like the other boys, he merely chatted with them but he was rarely one for dating them in spite of his interest. Nevertheless, certain girls were drawn to Calvin for his strength, shyness, and soft-spoken nature and he was never sure how to deal with them. The Army guys relentlessly teased him, giving him the nickname “Casanova Cal”, further alienating from most of his unit. Only Joe Singleton stood up for him and dissuaded the other soldiers from teasing him.

Singleton was an older sar, some five years older and a Lance Corporal, a veteran of the African and Portuguese campaigns and one willing to work with greenhorns like Barnes. Most of the other vets shunned replacements like Barnes, saying it was no use to get to know someone who was likely to be dead by the end of the next campaign. It didn’t help that the Africa vets were looking forward to finishing their third deployment, since it would mean being shipped back across the Atlantic for home, a rare luxury within the front line Army units. Singleton was one to share stories about his combat experiences, facing the battle-hardened Armee d’Afrique in Morocco and the sheer chaos and terror of the Husky landings in Sardinia. Despite being shorter and skinnier than the tyrannosaur, Singleton carried a cool, confident air with him, being a former firesar and lumbersar from the Pacific Northwest.

To prove himself to the skeptical vets, Calvin volunteered to be a pathfinder for the Regiment, a dangerous task for they had to drop in advance and setup beacons for the airborne landing. Singleton was the other volunteer of Pathfinder, knowing the importance (and risk) of the designation; they would board a transport that would take off well prior to the rest of the 82nd and would have to drop off close to the ground over Normandy. Everyone in the Division was well-versed in the recon gathered both by aircraft and by the local resistance, so they knew of the geography, where the major enemy deployments were, and what obstacles the Reds had put in place to dissuade potential invaders. Before they climbed onto the plane, Calvin turned to Singleton and asked, “Did you ever feel scared, your first drop into combat?”

The Europasaurus nodded. “At least a little. When we departed Tefia, I did have a little doubt in the back of my mind that I would never make it.”

“How did you overcome it?”

Joe’s response was, “When the bullets started flying, it faded from my mind. I was focused on my duty and helping my compatriots in arms whenever I could. It was only when things settled down and I was able to sit down for a rest that the fear and doubt returned. I then had the sudden urge to vomit.”

“Jeez,” Calvin replied with a grimace.

“Yeah, it wasn’t fun,” Joe sighed.

It was then that a sar came from the direction of the plane and told the two, “Alright, fellas, you can chit-chat on the plane, we need to take off now.”

“Oh, right.” Calvin shook his head and turned back to the plane, as he and Joe climbed on board with the other members of their Stick. They sat together, making sure their gear was firmly strapped in before the commanding officer, a Lieutenant, addressed the sars. The Plateosaurus was standing in the middle, near the tail end by the door, having to arch his long neck so his head wouldn’t bump against the roof. He looked left to right as he said, “Alright, gentlesars, listen up. We all knew this day was coming; we planned, studied, and trained for it. General Ridgway and the rest of the 82nd are counting on us to mark the DZs, so think fast, stay together, and complete your objectives.”

The Lieutenant sat down as the members of the Stick alternated between gear checks, chatting with their buddies, and reading through Eisenhower’s address paper. Soon, the engines outside could heard starting up and idling, before the plane began moving up from where it had been parked onto the runway, alongside several other Dakotas carrying the various other Pathfinder Sticks. Finally, there was a lurch as the C-47 started racing down the runway, lifting off into the evening sky.

Calvin glanced out the nearest window as he saw the English countryside become smaller and more distant as the aircraft gained altitude, the last traces of the setting sun beaming down on them as it steadily disappeared behind the western horizon. They would fly a path over eastern England as twilight turned to night and the plane’s interior became shrouded in darkness, only a few scant lights remaining on. The tyrannosaur gulped as he sat there, hearing the thunderous roar of the engines outside and wondered what would await them in Normandy.\

The Mission Begins

Over the Cotentin Peninsula

The flight had finally taken them over the English Channel, Calvin only caught glimpses of the immense invasion fleet below; as someone whose only experience with watercraft was watching the passing barges and ferries on the Mississippi, his mind boggled at the sight of ships as far as the eye could see. “Never seen anything like it,” Joe commented.

Someone sitting next to him said, “And we’ll never see it again. Can’t even imagine trying to describe this to my kids after this is over.”

“If we make it,” another voice muttered, before being interrupted by the Lieutenant. “We WILL make it, Private. Just remember your training and you’ll do fine.”

T

When he peered out the door, he momentarily paused on seeing how close the plane was to the ground, before he finally jumped.

Calvin engaged his parachute just as he was above the treetops of a little grove; Calvin's parachute snagged on a branch, leaving him hanging a few feet above the grass. The bulky theropod struggled to unbuckle his harness, fearing an enemy patrol might spot him and kill him while he was vulnerable; he finally managed to free himself and dropped to the ground. Calvin checked his gear and weapons, all were intact, and then, staying crouched, he slowly moved through the grove to a nearby field. Once out from the cover of the trees, he was wary, for there was a chance someone could spot him in the darkness as he walked parallel to a road a few hundred feet away to his left. He could see what seemed to be one of the beacons lying in the middle of the grass-and-weed-filled field, “Jackpot.” Now, all he needed was to reconnoiter with Cpl. Singleton and-

The sound of an approaching truck

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted headlights in the distance, moving along the road. Calvin immediately hit the deck and lay still next to the beacon, hoping the vehicle wouldn’t spot him. A truck passed by with little fuss, it had a canopy over the bed and in spite of his limited night vision, the paratrooper did spot a three-pointed red star on the canvas (a symbol used by the Republican Spanish). Once the vehicle was some distance away, Calvin got back on his feet and proceeded on his route, heading towards a farmhouse on the other side of the field, away from the road and adjacent to some woods. He hoped Singleton was there so they could assemble the beacon needed to signal the big wave of C-47s coming in from England.

The farmhouse had some lights on the outside but no one was around, save for one soldier standing next to a tree to the right. Calvin could clearly see that this fellow was urinating, his olive green uniform, dark green helmet, and brown boots almost made him blend in with the darkness were it not for the house’s exterior lights. The para slowly approached the Spaniard from behind and, just as the enemy was finishing up, he whacked the soldier on the base of neck with his carbine’s wire stock. With a soft grunt, the Spaniard dropped to the ground snout first, his tail flailing around in the process; Calvin was tempted to whack the fallen enemy a second time but decided it was unnecessary. He quickly searched through the Spaniard’s pockets for anything useful but only found personal trinkets, which were useless to both him and the Allied war effort.

Stepping around the body, Calvin began making his way toward the forest, checking to make sure no one in the house had spotted him or had gone outside to check on the guard he took out. T

“Greece!”

“Sparta!”

Pathfinder

Lance Corporal Sweetwater and Privates Allen and Lightfoot

Irish para, dressed like a German Fallschirmjager

Fire on Lake

As Calvin laid down to get some much-needed sleep, he prayed that

Road to Hill 30
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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A story I started on two years ago now after playing the American campaign in the original Call of Duty, inspired in particular by the opening Pathfinder mission and the quiet atmosphere of the mission's bulk as you traverse the Norman countryside to plant the beacon for the rest of the 101st. I decided early on to make the protagonist a member of the 82nd due how the focus with the airborne landings in the early morning hours of June 6 is on the 101st (and the British paras at Pegasus Bridge to a lesser extent), with him being part of a Pathfinder unit. And replaying Brothers in Arms gave me the motivation to write some more after months of the story just sitting there, collecting dust.
Keywords
male 1,234,520, scalie 26,349, man 19,779, dinosaur 15,530, battle 3,446, war 1,806, army 782, soldiers 263, prose 77
Details
Type: Writing - Document
Published: 4 months ago
Rating: General
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