Read Online The Katyn Order by Douglas W. Jacobson - Free Book Online

guns echoed off the buildings, Zeeka shouted the order and the Minerki team sprinted across the wide street. Natalia was fourth in line behind Ula and ahead of Berta.
    Suddenly a searchlight from the top of the tower illuminated the street, and a burst of machine-gun fire ripped along the cobblestones. But the Sten gunners took out the searchlight, and the street was dark again.
    Zeeka was the first to arrive at the base of the enormous building and disappeared through the breach, lighting the way for the others with a flashlight.
    When Natalia crawled through the breach and jumped into the damp, cavernous basement, the two women ahead of her had already opened their packs and were placing incendiary bricks under Zeeka’s direction. Berta was right behind her, and the four women set the explosives precisely in a predetermined chain that could be ignited from outside the building with the flamethrower. In three and a half minutes they were back on the sidewalk.
    The Sten gunners started in again, spraying the tower with covering fire as Iza moved into position with the flamethrower, and Zeeka yelled for the others to get back across the street.
    But the enemy machine gunners at the top of the tower refused to quit, spraying the entire length of the street with random, hammering bursts, shattering the last of the windows and filling the air with flying chunks of concrete and stone.
    Natalia lowered her head and dashed into the street right behind Ula and Alida. She’d taken only a few steps when she heard a grunt from behind, and Berta stumbled forward, almost knocking her down.
    Natalia reached back to grab Berta’s hand, but her friend fell to the ground and rolled over on the cobblestone street, clutching her left leg. Natalia dropped to her knees and crawled back to Berta, who lay curled in a ball, trembling and moaning, her shredded trouser leg already soaked in blood.
    Natalia screamed for Ula, then grabbed Berta under the arms and tried to drag her forward. A second later Ula was alongside, cursing loudly as a bullet struck her steel helmet and knocked it off her head.
    Holding Berta under the arms, the two of them dragged her across the street and behind the tank as bullets ricocheted off the steel frame. Natalia dug into her pack, pulled out a knife and quickly sliced away what was left of Berta’s blood-soaked trouser leg.
    â€œJesus Christ,” Ula muttered when she saw the wound.
    â€œGrab her arm and roll her onto her stomach,” Natalia said sharply. “Alida, get over here!”
    Berta groaned deeply as the two women commandos rolled her over, and Natalia examined the wound. It was a ragged laceration several centimeters wide running up the back of her leg from the knee to just below the buttocks. Blood seemed to be everywhere. It pooled on the ground, and Berta moaned louder as Natalia felt around with her fingers on either side of the ugly gash.
    â€œI don’t think there are any broken bones,” Natalia said as she straightened up and ripped off her blue uniform coat followed by her cotton shirt. She quickly folded the shirt into a rectangular pad, then placed it over the back of Berta’s leg and pressed down hard. “Take off your belts and cinch them around her leg,” she shouted at Ula and Alida. “Right over this pad, quickly, we’ve got to get the bleeding under control.”
    From across the street Natalia heard a
whoosh
from the flamethrower, then a momentary pause, followed an instant later by a rising crescendo of concussions that felt like hammer blows in her eardrums. The incendiary charges ignited in rapid succession, thrusting a monstrous fireball upward from the bowels of the PAST building.
    Their faces blackened with soot and dripping with sweat, Zeeka and Iza dashed across the street, scrambled behind the tank and dropped to their knees. Zeeka crawled over next to Natalia. “I saw her go down. How bad is it?”
    â€œNothing’s