Five Past Midnight - James Thayer [90]
Clay launched himself at the tank commander, who was just bringing his pistol up through the hatch. Cray smashed the handle of his pistol into the German's temple. The black beret fell to the turret top, and the commander began to sag back down through the hatch. Cray straddled the cupola and dragged him out of the turret, his hands under the German's arms.
Running toward the tank, soldiers hesitated because Cray used the commander as a shield, but a few bullets clipped the air, and a few more clattered uselessly against the tank.
A second bank of flares lit the night. More shouts and curses and orders.
Cray threw the unconscious commander off the turret and jumped down through the hatch.
His feet landed on the commander's empty seat. Cray gripped the hatch rim, and let his knees buckle. He dropped fully inside the tank's fighting compartment.
The loader was bringing around a pistol. Cray lashed out at him with a boot, thrusting the loader's head back against the steel of the turret wall, and smashing it there. The loader slumped.
At the same instant Cray's pistol came around for the gunner, who was in his chair on the other side of the gun breech and recoil protector. One of the gunner's hands was still on the gun's elevating wheel. Two voice tubes were near his ear. He was unarmed. He spread his hands, his eyes locked on Cray's pistol. Behind the gunner was a gas-mask canister attached to the turret wall and in iront of him was his traverse indicator. The turret was lit by dull yellow lights.
Cray barked, "Tell the driver to back up the tank."
The gunner had a burn scar along his cheek. Probably an Afrika
Korps veteran Tough, not someone who would bend easily. The gunner shook his head, just a fraction, and said, "The driver—"
He didn't get out another word. Cray shot him through the arm, through the meat of his right biceps. The sound filled the turret and was gone just as quickly. Blood and bits of skin painted the turret wall.
"My next bullet goes through your head." Cray brought the pistol to the gunner's nose. "Do as I tell you."
The gunner blanched and swayed but knew better than to hesitate. He pushed his mouth into the speaker tube and weakly called the order. Slumped on the fighting compartment floor, the loader groaned and grabbed for his head. Cray kicked him again, and the loader was still. Then Cray swung the hatch above his head dosed and secured it with a lever. He was surrounded by steel thirty-four millimeters thick. He was scaled in. He felt better.
The hatch to the driving compartment began to open beneath Cray's feet.
"Walter?" the radio operator called.
When the metal door opened further, Cray yanked it out of the radioman's hands, aimed his pistol down into the compartment and sent a bullet into the radio operator's thigh. The man howled and slipped backward, clutching his leg, his headset slipping off him and dangling below the radio. He fell against a shell locker.
Cray moved the pistol several inches so that its snout was against the driver's beret. Staring down at the driver, Cray said, "Get me out of the Tiergarten or none of you will ever leave this tank. Do you understand me? Back your tank up."
"I can't see behind me." The driver had a soft Bavarian accent. He looked up at the American.
"Do you think I give a good goddamn about what's behind you?" Cray prodded the man's forehead with the pistol barrel. "The question is, are you living your last seconds?" He had learned the phrase from Katrin.
The driver turned to face the vision block with the armored binoculars hanging over it. With his right hand he pulled the gear lever back. In front of the driver, to the right of the vision block, was an electrically driven gyroscope direction indicator, and to his right was the instrument panel with a speedometer and an oil-pressure gauge and a water-temperature meter. Spilled sideways against the compartment, the radio operator gasped against the pain in his leg.
The driver wound up the Maybach engine, and the tank began to vibrate. Cray's compartment acted as a sounding