//------------------------------//
// Silence the Guns 
// Story: Bronies in Arms: Road to Hill 30 
// by BlazingAngel 
//------------------------------//


Silence the Guns


D-Day 0145 hours


Near St. Mere Eglise




Baker- You really start to notice the quirks a person has when you think he might be dead in a week. I remember the first time I saw Stanzan. It was in the breakfast tent. He was cutting a hardboiled egg into small pieces with a knife...like ham. It occurred to me at this point I had never in my twenty-three years of existence seen a man cut an egg into slices like that. I don't know why I remember that.




Minutes after Sole left, Mac, Baker and Stanzan are standing outside the gate of the French Woman's house to go do the mission Sole has set upon them before he left to gather up some reinforcement.

Mac said to Baker and Stanzan in almost in a hushed tone, "There's an AA gun over there, we have to take it out.” He pointed over behind a hedgerow where the flashes are on the other side of the gate.

Mac then buck the door down, it breaking its hinges. The bucking didn't sound so much when something really did break and make a loud crack.

"Are you going to pay for that?" said Stanzan as he look at the gate then at Mac in a worried look, "You just broke her damn gate!"

Mac look at Stanzan in disgust and make a remark, "Stanzan, shove a sock in it.”

Stanzan look at Baker for support but Baker didn't say anything. He was smiling that the old Mac came back even after the time with his father. Surely Stanzan is overseeing his way of thinking about the locals and their property but hey, it war. Isn't it?

After Mac went through, Baker and Stanzan follow him until they reaches the base of the hedgerow. On the other side in the distance, they could see a C-47 plane in flames and a couple of Germane soldiers savagery it.

"Should we just bypass them?" said Stanzan.

"No," says Mac, not wanting to hear another one of Stanzan concern about everything, "If the AA guns is that-away, then we should go right through them." He turn to the two soldiers and smiled, "And I have a perfect plan for it."

"Oh great, here comes another one of Mac`s brilliant plan that will get us all kill." Stanzan said after Mac made is suggestion'

Mac hissed at him, "Stanzan, shut the fuck up and go die in the hole. You`re lucky you`re with me and not walking around in some rat shit with the whole Germane Army coming down on your ass. And I have the higher ranking than you. Listen to what I says and follow it, got it?"

"Yes sir." Stanzan nodded.

Mac sighed then continue, "Okay, here the plan. You boys will provide some suppressing fire and drive them to cover while I`ll flank them and hit them in their rear. There only a couple of them in the area so we got to make this quick. Don`t fire till I do, alright?"

They nodded. Mac pointed at a stonewall where they should take cover behind. After they`re in position, Mac raised his Thompson at one of the Germanes who is walking along the fence and squeeze the trigger gently. The short burst hit the Germane in the chest and knocked him down, but it also alerted his buddies who is next to so they took refuge behind another stonewall and begin to fight back.

Mac dashed forward and took cover behind a haystack. When he reaches there, he was taking fire from the Germanes behind the wall so he yelled at Baker and Stanzan, "I need fire on those Krauts!"

Baker and Stanzan complied back firing whatever they had at the Germanes so Mac could get in closer to take them out. Mac noticed the firing has creased and begin to take his chance to knock out the bastards. He went and flank their rear, first coming up on their side and unleash a barrage of bullets onto them, killing them all. 

After the area cleared, Mac waved them over to regroup when they stopped and gaze at the burning C-47.

"Poor bastards." Stanzan gasped as he was looking at the burning plane, “We should help them. Maybe there are still some alive! What do we do?"

Mac finally said something after a moment of silence, "There's nothing we can do"

"But Sarge-" Stanzan was beginning to says but Mac interrupted in an angry voice, "Keep moving Stanzan!" and walked away, leaving Baker and Stanzan behind with the burning plane.

Stanzan continue to look at the plane with a sad face and mumbled, "They shouldn't have died like that."

Baker grabbed Stanzan in the shoulder and said to him, "Stanzan let's go. There nothing we can do to save them."

Tears welled up in Stanzan eyes but he closed them and shook them away. He opened them and look at Baker and nodded at him then they both went after Mac who is crossing a ditch toward the sound of the AA guns. They reaches him as happen to came across a farmhouse when suddenly, a truck came by and five Germanes soldiers climb out and was about to go around the back of the house when one of them saw the three parapoines slowly approaching them. Before he could shout a warning to his friends, the three paraponies quickly cut them all down with a deadly force of fire then everything went silence again. They went up when they spotted an AA gun resting in place behind a piled of sandbags next to the house. There already Germanes soldiers operating the gun while they fired at incoming C-47s overhead. 

The three paraponies positioned themselves behind boxes of crates that allowed them to hit the gun in the rear and wiped out the Germanes that is operating it.

"What should we do now Mac?" Baker asked when they got into position. 

They could hit them head-on but that will take too much time and it would called out a meat-sack for other Germanes units in the area to come and kill them before they could even get to the gun.

"Same as before," said Mac as he look at Baker in the eyes, "Just don't fire till I do. We`ll wait till they have to reload then we`ll attack them."

Moments passed by and the damn thing is still firing, the three paraponies grew restless as the gun continue to fire at the C-47s overhead.

After waiting for so long, it finally stopped firing and needed to reload, which makes it gunners slurring around passing ammo belts into the gun.

Even after the gun stopped firing, Stanzan shouted out into the air, "Finally!" which froze everyone in the area, even Mac and Baker who shut Stanzan up before he could say anything else. Too late. The Germanes were completely off guards at first then went to cover and fire at them. 

"You fuck!" Mac at Stanzan then yelled out, "Cover me! I'm flanking them."
After repeating the same tactic as before, they managed to take out the gunners and set charges on the gun.

The gun exploded so loud, two Germanes soldiers went out from the farmhouse to investigate when they saw them and another firefight ensured. 

After clearing them out, the paraponies went around the house and spotted the second AA gun, firing from a field.

They attempted to make another sneak attack on the gun but, before they could get close to hit, they were taking fire from behind courtyard.

"Hit the dirt!" Mac quickly yelled after the first bullet went by and dove for the ground.

The other did the same and took cover behind a hedgerow with Stanzan yelling, "I think they saw us."

"Well no shit!" Mac yelled back and fired back with no effect. He turn to Baker, "Baker, get around them. We have to get a flank on them!"

"Alright" Back shouted and carefully dodge between cover until he reaches the side of the Germanes position. He put some fire into it and toss a grenade that eventually wiped out the Germanes. When Mac and Stanzan moved up, they went over to the second gun and killed all the Germanes that were manning the gun.

They approached the gun and Mac ordered Baker to disable the gun. Baker did so and the gun blew up like a big ass firecracker, only if it worse.

The second gun is now destroyed and the C-47s have no problem flying over without the risks of being shots down. But what now?

Mac answer it when he regroup his men and said to them, "We can't stop to rest now. The 4th Infantry Division is coming up through Utah Beach, and there are Germanes all over that area. Let's move." 

And off they went to fight out another battle in the night while the whole operation in now underway for the big show.