Krimrov

Krimrov

            A man must know his own limits, unfortunately the Czar didn’t, had it not been for his stubbornness and his sky high pride for Russia, we wouldn’t be involved in this mess.

            Perhaps I should get the introductions out of the way, I am Peter Krimrov, native of Russia and involved in a war between Japan and France for territory in Mongolia. The war began in 1871 and has been going on for four years now, and from the looks of it, Russia is going to be the first one out. Our new Czar Barkenov IV is a true Russian nationalist, we do give him credit for industrializing Russia and adopting the new steam technology, but the only reason he’s involved in the war is not for imperialism, but only because he doesn’t want the “inferior nations” to border Russia. I would have loved to avoid this war at all costs, but I am one of the few men who knows how to employ a hissing tread, it’s supposed to be an armored box on treads with holes in the front and sides for attacking, it runs on coal and is very hard to handle without the proper knowledge.

            Anyway, here I am on my hissing tread, one man arming the front guns, two men arming the side guns, another man shoveling coal and then there’s me, driving it. Driving it in an abandoned field in Urumqi, but what else could I do? I began to strike up a conversation with Ivan, the front gunner when suddenly we were ambushed by the Japanese and their flying machines known as “The Meiji’s Wings”, seeing as how it was powered by coal I told Ivan to shoot at its coal supply so it could burn down and the Japanese would be out of our hair for at least ten minutes.

            The Japanese were getting real crafty with their industrialization, they started using coal, steam and other resources to power their machinery, and they even found a way to power their technology with boiled down rice and starch. They came up with all these crazy new inventions such as the Water Lotus, a Japanese form of the ironclad, Meiji Wings, a flying machine with holes for guns and can swoop down low to shoot enemies up close and Kokakura, a cannon which can fire out large shells with high explosive range and a deadly chemical gas to clear out any nearby soldiers. The Japanese have gotten really carried away with their imperialism ever since they industrialized, they have taken major cities in Southeast Asia such as Saigon and Phnom Phneh, and they won’t stop until they feel they have enough resources. Which, knowing them will probably continue until they have all of Eurasia under their hand.

            So, it was the five of us on our hissing tread, resting and letting the engine cool down for a bit when one of the side gunners fell asleep and accidentally shot a couple of rounds. I was hoping for a quiet hour for myself and my men, but now it seems we have gotten the attention of the French and they were coming over in large numbers. So we fired up the treads and loaded the front gun with a Moscow Bullet, a bullet full of gaseous Potassium Sulfate that sets off when it has reached its target. Ivan shot the bullet into a French soldier and 2 seconds later and greenish-yellow gas came out of his wound and after a few minutes of coughing and choking, the French group of soldiers was dead.

            Although the French were hard-fighters and had much more territory in China and Southeast Asia, the Russian army found out that their weakness was the Moscow Bullet. The French did not develop any chemical weapons yet, but what they used to compromise with the Russians was what they called the entente gun, a gun which did not focus so much on power, but more on speed, firing up to 800 per minute. I remember one time, my brigade was in Manchuria where we were sent to drive away the French from Mukden but the French brought their entente guns and fired away at us mercilessly, the only way I survived was by hiding behind a rock for the majority of the battle and firing a couple of times just to show I was actually taking place in the battle. But when the battle was over, the French had one and almost every Russian soldier had been gunned down.

            The crew and I thought that if we combined the entente gun with the Moscow Bullets, we could be unstoppable against the French and Japanese. But sadly, that day will have to wait, because now we are being positioned for our next battle called “The Romanov Charge”, our coal shoveler, Jacob, just sat there trying to take it all in, Jacob grew up in a pacifist household and would not have joined this war if given the chance, but it was mandatory for a Hissing Tread shoveler to be enlisted or face death. Jacob just looked with a blackened face up to me and asked how large the battle was going to be, I told him all I knew, we were going up against the French and the Japanese, from the look on Jacob’s face I couldn’t tell if he soiled himself or had a miniature panic attack.   

So here we are on the Romanov offensive, guns and bombs strategically placed, steam machinery waiting to be filled up with coal then belch out steam and soldiers trying to figure out if they will live to see another day. When the generals gave the order, all hell broke loose, bullets were flying and exploding, chemical gas clouds choked soldiers to death, Hissing treads and Meiji Wings filled up the battlefield and me, well I’m just in here with my crew trying to not get blown to smithereens. The battle lasted for about 4 hours when suddenly, everything got quiet, we just sat there trying to figure out what was going on, did we win? Lose? Did everyone kill each other? We have no idea, but what happened next was that a soldier from the Ottoman Empire told us to come out of the treads and go with them. I could not believe what happened! The Ottomans launched a surprise attack and wiped out all the other armies, but what will they do with us? They pointed their guns at us and took as prisoners, and that’s when I found out that Jacob really had soiled himself.