It's Always Sunny At The Legion

This short story was written by StukaGoggles. It's essentially the prelude to the events of Slapping Peeled Tanks While Leopards Eat My Face.

The sun had already set behind the rolling hills surrounding the base of Unit 21-13 about an hour ago. To the east the darkness of the nightfall was only disturbed by the landing lights of an approaching plane.
<< I’m coming in, would the T-34 and the Stuart please clear the runway? Thanks. >>
From up above Ruth The Fw190 A-6/R-11 could watch the two tanks hastily leaving the makeshift airstrip. They were carrying a bunch of shovels with which they had tried to fill up a gaping hole in the ground, along with a furrow of torn-open earth leading from it. Ouch. Looked like someone has had a rough landing today.
If the two tanks hadn’t been so kind to interrupt their gardening work immediately, Ruth would have been the second one to crash that day. Her engine was merely running on fumes and the faint smoke trail she was leaving behind was a telltale sign that she desperately needed a break. Still, she managed to stick the landing without much hassle. The eighth day of recon missions was over. Time for her well-earned day off.
She reported back to her commanding officer and then picked up her daily ration of fuel. As per usual only half of what she’d get for a regular workday. It was sufficient for what she had planned to do tomorrow: work on some mission reports to send to The Legion’s radio station, sit around and take at least two 3-hour-naps. With the loot from the fuel storage she drove back to her hangar.
The doors were closed. How unusual. She set down a few jerry cans and knocked on the gate.
There was a short moment of silence before a voice came from behind the hangar gate: “Come in, Sir. The door is open.” By the tone of it, someone in there was desperately trying to hide that he’s terrified. But failing on so many levels.
Ruth slid the gate open carefully and peeked inside. “Stub? Is everything- oh fuck,” she gasped when she saw her room mate. 
In the hangar there stood Stub - a Spitfire Mk XII with clipped wings, who he got his name from - propped up with the help of some wooden boxes. His left landing gear was missing entirely. The boxes under his wing which kept him standing shifted and creaked as he changed his posture from on-edge to relieved. 
“Thank the Gods, I thought you were the chief,” the Spitfire said and gestured for Ruth to come in and close the gate. “Don’t look at me like that, my pride is more hurt than anything. I’m fine until he comes around and gives me a lecture.”
Ruth took her usual place in the hangar and set down her fuel cans. It was a tight squeeze, that hangar was not exactly made for two planes staying in there. Usually, Stub and Ruth would take turns resting there alone but now it looked like they had to share the space until the Spitfire’s gear had been fixed. 
“I told you to look out for that pothole,” Ruth scolded him in a pitying voice. She reached over to him to pull a tuft of grass that had been lodged at the edge of his air intake. “How’s the propeller?” It didn’t look like he had tipped over. Otherwise his canopy would’ve been done for. It was already sporting various cracks from an unknown incident. At this point, the only thing holding the glass dome together was an unholy amount of duct tape.
“Save it,” Stub hissed back but immediately slumped back down on his remaining gear and the boxes. “Sorry, I’m just not in the mood to make fun of myself right now. The propeller’s fine, though. Miraculously. Can we maybe talk about something else?” His optics wandered back to the closed hangar gate. It was only a matter of time he’d get called out by the unit’s Command Tank for ruining the runway and making the TRV work overtime. And all he could do was sit and wait for it.
Ruth, who was in the process of refueling, gave him a sympathetic look and a pat on the nose with a free hand. “Do you want to hear how today’s mission went? It’s not the most exciting, so be warned.” She was worn out from working practically nonstop for the last eight days but she’d be damned if that would keep her from putting the Spitfire’s mind off of his current problem.
“You can make everything sound exciting,” Stub said with a half-hearted chuckle. “Go on.”

* * *

Earlier that same evening... 

Ruth had been sent out to run a recon flight on yet another town. Unlike her other missions before the goal wasn’t to scout areas where The Legion hadn’t gone yet, though. The Command had ordered her to check on a settlement which had already been overrun some time ago: Ruindom. The news had told about the excellent victory of The Legion over the team that had made the town their base.
“People won’t come back to this place that fast,” the Fw190 thought as she looked down on the forest-covered hills. “Nobody is that stupid.” 
At least there was no way for her to miss the town: the recent battle had caused pillars of smoke and ashes to rise from the ruins. They could be seen from miles away. So Ruth could at least enjoy the flight without having to keep her optics glued on the map laid out in her cockpit. 
Ten minutes later Ruindom came into sight. That town really lived up to its name. Ruth slowly descended into the valley and scanned the area for anything else that wasn’t rubble or smoke. 
And indeed, she spotted movement at the city’s outskirts. There was a tank which - according to the fresh tracks surrounding the whole town - must’ve run in circles for quite some time now. They probably had the same objective as Ruth: scouting. The distance between The Focke-Wulf and the unknown tank was still too big for a shot from the ground. So Ruth looked around for more vehicles in the immediate vicinity. Nothing so far. Her radar didn’t pick up any planes, either. Of course it didn’t. She could barely recall the last time she had seen any plane who wasn’t part of The Legion.
Down on the ground, the tank must’ve noticed Ruth’s arrival. They had started to run off over a field, obviously in a panic. “Look at you go, little buddy! So fast,” she cheered them on, knowing full well that they couldn’t hear her. 
Still, Ruth was catching up on them pretty fast. Now she could make out what tank was zooming over the fields down there: A Chaffee! And they were barreling towards a bunker just outside of town. That must’ve been where the rest of the team was hiding. The plane had seen enough.
“See you soon, little Chaffee! I like your camo!,” she addressed the tank below, again without hoping for an answer. If she ever saw them again in the ranks of The Legion, she’d have to properly compliment them on the zick-zack pattern. Personally, she preferred muted colors for her own camo but loved to see what other people did with their appearance. 
With a wide loop, the plane broke off and set course to her base. She wouldn’t have expected to find anything but wasteland at Ruindom. That again proved that her unit’s commander knew what he was doing. A quick cleanup should suffice to handle the team sitting in that bunker. 
But for now Ruth had to fly back home, report her findings and then call it a day… Her engine was getting a little bit too hot for her liking and her fuel tank had not much more than a swig left in it. Time for the weekend!