The group finally sets out after dropping the prisoner near to the road. There has been no sign of the escaped Pole who had shot at the prisoners.
Sgt Guido and Major D'ammond lead the group south east with the other riders following a reasonable distance behind with the UAZ.

The first couple of kilometres passes without incident. With the sun starting to decend in the west, your stomachs begin to rumble - or is that the distant sound of artillery?

Using his many years of experience in the military (even the Canadian military), and his greater number of years of experinece with his own body, Gary carefully attempts to distinguish between the stomach-rumblings of hunger and the sky-rumblings of artillery.... and if it ends up being the latter (rather than just the GM's poetic license), he attempts to localize the bearing and distance.
If it is the former, the location and distance should be obvious.

Assuming for a moment we are merely hungry, suggest to Colonel Nelson that we should fine a bivouac area for the night. Yes, we're in hostile territory, but we will be for a while. And we have wounded. Travelling through the night is possible, but probably not the most pleasant idea.

The time is now around mid afternoon and it is your stomachs (nobody posted lunch). You do, however, occasionally hear the sounds of distant combat from time to time, but never close enough to be of immediate concern.

If we see ANY place to forage, I'll point it out and have a go...

[OOC: as good as forage 1 can get me! I'm supposed to ahve loosely survived on it for a while]

Hoping that others can forage, and better than me!

" 'ey laddies. Let's get to eat some of the cans instead. I'm rather hungry, and we probably will be able to find food further on this road. It is better that we are in perfect shape, if we encounter anyone on the road."

The Scotsman makes a jump forward with the UAZ before getting it into a good pace.

" 'ay. Lots better than to ride those lassie-vehicles. Let's go home, to sweet ol'Scotland."

Don starts to whistle the tune 'the lone piper'. Even if the tune is rather sad, he looks very content with his new position behind the wheel.

"Ok, Mr Nelson, you find us a place to eat, and let's eat"

A suitable "harbour" is quickly found and a filling lunch had by all. Perhaps this could be a good time to re-evaluate where you are going as a group?
At present you are in the edge of the forest approximately 10km south of Lask. your biggest concern at the moment is fuel, followed closely by food.

Well, when we're stopped at lunch, Gary will give his advice to Colonel Nelson

"Sir,

I'll offer my advice, and you can take of it what you will. Hopefully some of it will be of use.

It strikes me that -

1. We want to avoid large enemy concentrations. We want to use our latest intel appreciations to guide that, realizing that they'll be stale in the not too distant future.

We have logistical issues as well -

2. First is fuel for the UAZ. Any time we can stop and buy or acquire some wheat, we should be okay, but it will be a slow process, the distillation.

3. We have a food issue. We can forage as we go. I have a small bit of experience, but I'm sure some of you SF types have far more. But that will slow us down.

And then of course, foraging is best accomplished (I'd imagine) in game-rich forests and woods, which are ideal for moving unobserved and hunting  game. On the other hand, they suck for vehicles. Horses will do fine in all but the thickest forest, as will those on foot. So, as long as we plan to be vehicle mobile, we'll end up foraging only from areas near some sort of road.

The cross country efficiency of the vehicle is bad enough that I can't see us spending inordinate amounts of time traversing land that doesn't have roads.

So, if we want the best of both words, roads leading near or through forests may offer us some of the best opportunities to forage while remaining wheel-mobile. OTOH, they offer wonderful choke points for ambush.

But one way or another, we need to eat, probably more than we need to drive. I can walk and do without a ride. What I can't do without is a meal every so often.

4. We have wounded. They'll need constant care. It might be ideal if we could find a field hospital or even a civilian aide station to help get them fixed up. I'm sure our field medic, no matter how good, can only go so far.

So, my recommendations:

Plan with the following priorities
1 - avoid enemy force concentrations
2 - take us through the best terrain for foraging possible
3 - try to keep us on back roads where possible, avoiding main concentrations, keeping us moving a bit more easily than raw cross country, but also allowing the horses to move with the UAZ without being left behind too badly.
4 - worry about fuel and if the worry becomes too large, dispense with the UAZ. We can rig transport drag frames and haul a rather large amount of gear behind the horses that way, or try to find a cart or wagon somewhere.
5 - try to vector us towards anyplace we can find medical assistance for our wounded

Frankly, as someone who just had the joy of being a captive, then the joy of being almost murdered by my captors, I'm in no big hurry to revert to that status. I'd rather be hungry and on foot than in captivity. That's my feeling anyway.

Kett concludes his assessment and sips water from his canteen, wincing at the brackish taste.

"Are we staying in this ruse Lieutenant? If so we should of grabbed more uniforms earlier, would of come in handy" William says between mouthfuls of the armys best.

Throwing the now empty tin of corn and peas into the grass near to where his is sitting, Dimitar wipes his hands on a patch of grass between his legs.  Climbing to his feet and checking the state of his mount he says to the assembled group, "Sergio and I came from that way.", pointing to the distant hills in the South East.  "We walked long way.  We see many farms, not all with people but there must be food.  Maybe benzin for car as well.  If we have something to trade, we could even leave wounded there."

Looking around at the group momentarily, he returns to rubbing down his horse with handfuls of grass.

And if we don't have anything to trade, there is enough of us to just take what we want anyway., he thought to himself.

"Yiach. I just cannot handle this army-food. Not long ago, one could get a nice lobster, even in Warsaw. Or why not some caviar in Moscow? Or lovely, lovely shrimps and oysters from sweet Ullapool, back home?

Don closes his eyes, travelling back to his beautiful home of Scotland. When opening them up again, and grabbing some more food from the can, he gets back to reality, too fast. Making another face to the distasteful food, he gets rid of the can, throwing it to one of the newcomers.

"I guess you're hungrier than I. I'd rather eat haggis instead of this!"

"It would be nice to meet some nice peasants out here. The Poles are often very nice people."

"Might even be able to sleep in a real bed again. 'ey lassies?"

Don again gives the girls a wink.

NPC'd
Sgt Guido suddenly freezes in the middle of taking a bite of his late lunch. The sound of a snapping twig behind a nearby bush has drawn his undivided attention. Quickly placing the can on the ground, he picks his rifle up from his lap and points it in the direction of the bush.
Halt!, who goes there? He calls out loudly in faltering english. Advance and be recognised.

Hearing Dave's sudden words, Tanya also drops her food and aims the RPK in the same direction. Not having heard the sound, she has no idea of what is happening as yet.

Being deeply engrossed in her meal, Cam totally misses the activity around her. The sound of her spoon scraping the bottom of her now empty can, drowning out the sound of Dave's voice (to her at least).
OOC: (Not that she could understand his words anyway!)
Rolled 2, Initative 3 - not suprised (just blissfully ignorant)
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:28, Tue 04 May 2004.

As quick on the uptake as Tanya, Andy too responds quickly. Grabbing the RPK-74 from the ground beside him, he takes cover behind the UAZ and aims in the general direction indicated by Dave's rifle.
This message was last updated by the GM at 01:17, Tue 04 May 2004.

Everybody roll for suprise. Roll 1D6. If the result is greater then your initative rating then you may not conduct any actions for as many phases as the result exceeds your initiative.
However, if you are forced to freeze for more than one combat phase, you may go prone on the second phase and remain there until able to move again.
Obviously Initative 6 characters do not need to roll.

Gary, relaxing, leaning against the side of the UAZ 'enjoying' his meal, notes the fast reactions of the other people and simply hops into the back of the UAZ to the mounted MG and readies it for action, spinning it to face the direction of the noise. [OOC: If I've missed the fact their should be an MG mounted here, I just hop behind the UAZ and ready my C7]

He scans right and left about 90 degrees from the estimated source of the sound to make sure no other flanking threats are on hand.

Don sits back with his eyes closed against one of the wheels of the UAZ, listening to the humming bees and singing birds.

_{OOC: rolled 4 have 3}

Hearing the Dane's challenge and seeing the multiple weapons brought to bear on the bushes, Dimitar reacts in a swift manner.

The grass falls from his hand and he rapidly slides his AKMS around his body on it's strap.  He tucks the folding stock into his shoulder and grasps the pistol-grip firmly while turning to face the opposite direction and dropping to one knee, scanning the treeline for movement.

With the rifle's fire selection switch set to full-auto, he prepares to fire at the first sign of movement.



--------------------------------------------
[OCC:  Rolled 2 for surprise, against initiative of 3]

William drops his tin of food and spoon,  then draws a grenade from his belt whilst trying to locate where the threat is coming from.

Sgt Gallin will ready his rifle, but won't leave the wounded. he looks in the direction all the panic is coming from, if he can see it from the back of the UAZ.

OCC rolled a 4, have a 4 init.

OOC: rolled 5 Vs Init 3

Maj. Richard Smythe is too focused on the idea of teaching English as the common language whilst we move that he completely misses the commotion.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:43, Fri 07 May 2004.

17:17, Today: Sergio D'ammond rolled 6 using 1d6. inititaive v's 3 (WOW spelling!). Wahahahaha I'm doing some french thing obviously! lol!

[Ps. sorry for not posting, been in hospital! lol! All better now!]

NPC'd
Lt Col Nelson rapidly responds to the new threat bringing his weapon to bear in the direction indicated.
Alfred rolls 4 for suprise (Initiative 4)

40 metres away from you the bush shakes. A man in his late fifties stands up quivering from behind the bush with his hands pushed high into the air. He is dressed in a checked flannelette shirt in a dirty but otherwise good condition. On his head he wears a cap typically found with the local farmers. Underneath this his hair is dirty but has been cut sometime in the last few weeks. Dirty but robust trousers cover his legs and solid work boots are on his feet.
[Private to Donnachaidh; Sergeant Michael Gallin: Please. Don’t Shoot!]he begs in Polish.
[Private to Donnachaidh; Sergeant Michael Gallin: Help us, please.]
At the sound of his voice, what seems to be the population of a small village rises from the cover of the trees and brush. There are about 25 people of various ages from a baby up to the old woman holding them. They are extremely poorly armed (only clubs, spears, a couple of pistols and an old double barrel shotgun that looks like it is more likely to explode than fire) and appear to have spent at least the last few nights sheltering in the woods.

"Don't shoot, Mr Nelson, they want our help"