Sarge put a hand on Westcotts back. The kid's lip shook slightly, and he was sniffling again. You'd have thought that damn droid had been his best friend.

"You did well." Sarge indicated, not unkindly. "Thomas served his purpose, better he made the sacrifice than one of us."

Westcott looked up at Sarge through tearful eyes, "We're all going to die, aren't we?"

"Here he goes again." Robinson said with an exaggerated yawn, "I had my fill of this earlier. You two deal with him, I'm on sentry duty." He settled down near the doorway, his gun lying across his lap.

"It's my job to see that doesn't happen," Sarge replied evenly to Westcott, the man had the patience of a saint. I noticed that he didn't reprimand Robinson, though, apparently, Sarge accepted that the kid was bloody irritating.

"What are we going to do?" Westcott mumbled out between sniffles.

"We assess the situation and come up with another plan. One which allows us to complete our mission with minimal risk." He jerked a thumb in my direction. "Brains here will come up with something. You trust Peters, don't you?"

Westcott looked down at his feet and didn't reply. Thanks for the vote of confidence, kid. Although I have to admit, it wasn't like my last plan had worked out all that well.

Sarge continued, "Keep watch with Robinson while Peters and I iron out the details." He motioned the kid away and sat down beside me.

Sarge spoke in lower tones now, obviously not wanting our conversation to be overheard. "Peters? We can always rig up some more trolleys and send them out as a distraction."

"Yeah," I said, somewhat unenthusiastically. "That didn't work out so well last time."

Sarge bristled, then his shoulders sank slightly. "Well, we're in a bad spot here. That's all I've got on the table at the moment. If you've got better ideas, I'm open to suggestions." He looked me directly in the eye, "We all need a little hope to cling onto."

Great, no pressure then? That's the bloody military for you. Never volunteer for anything, and that goes doubly for doing things unasked. You do that sort of thing one time, and then everyone looks to you for the initiative.

"I need a little time to think. Give me a few minutes to mull things over, and then we can brainstorm together?"

Sarge looked at me, dubiously. I'm not sure he'd even heard the term 'brainstorm' before. The old man was probably envisioning a migraine, but he nodded reluctantly, and I sank back into my seat.

In all honesty, I wasn't sure what we should do. I wasn't expecting to craft a master plan. This was just good old fashioned procrastination. A few additional minutes where we could pretend that we weren't all going to die. Perhaps Westcott wasn't so useless? He was the only one of us who was actually facing reality.

Our previous plan had seemed sensible. It had felt 'right' when we'd assembled the little robot. That was the sort of thing that movie heroes do in a montage.

Only it hadn't turned out like the movies. You don't see the leading man draw up a plan, only for it to burn to ash before the opening credits have even finished rolling. This wasn't how things were meant to end.

Just another example of how life really does suck donkey balls.

Heck, I still wasn't certain how I'd acquired the role of planner. I sure as hell didn't remember a ceremony happening when I got that promotion.

I racked my brain. Like it or not, this was how things stood, and it was my problem to solve.

The robot was toast. What resources did we have left?

There were the four of us - Sarge, myself, Robinson, and Westcott. Not that Westcott was good for much at present, apart from burning oxygen.

We had our weapons, and thanks to Robinson, also possessed a healthy collection of mines and other potential war crimes in the making. There was also the spare cart which we'd left here when we sent 'Thomas' out.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

I knew there must be something obvious I was missing. I felt like I was doing a crossword puzzle, and the answer was on the tip of my tongue. I just couldn't quite get it out.

We had full access to the armory and could rig up more armored trolleys to send out, but even with a squadron of them, I wasn't convinced they'd survive long enough to do anything against the cunning Orcs. They'd always seemed to be one step ahead of us, almost as if they knew exactly what we had been planning.

Sarge coughed politely, bringing me back out of my thoughts. I supposed the best thing to do was to speak them out loud as apparently giving me time and space wasn't happening.

I stretched before I began, as much to give myself a few extra seconds thinking time as anything.

"Alright, until now they've been calling the shots, and we've been reacting. They ambushed us last night, and we were lucky to survive that. This morning, we sent Thomas out to scout the area, and the Orcs had been ready and waiting for us. That has to change, we can't do what they're expecting, or they're going to beat us."

I was stating the obvious, but now I'd said it out loud, it was helping guide my thoughts and directing them. If the enemy knew what your plan was ahead of time, then you'd already lost the battle.

Sarge nodded. "True enough. The problem is we have a non-negotiable target. We secure that hill, or the Imperial Numeri will ensure we die for not doing so. It doesn't matter to the Orcs if we come out of here guns blazing and get mowed down or huddle up here until our mission is failed."

"Alright, so we do something else entirely then, something no one will expect" Then it came to me. "Tell everyone to get their gear together; we're moving out."

Sarge lifted an eyebrow, "Care to share, son?"

I breathed deeply before replying and looked Sarge straight in the eye. "We're going to take a different route to the objective."

Sarge blinked twice, then nodded towards the door. "That there is the only route that I know of."

"That's not true, Sarge. The Orcs are out there too, right?"

"Yeah, that's the problem." He indicated, his voice became a little tetchy. "You're on my last raw nerve now, if you've got a point, make it make it quickly."

"The Orcs are trainees just like us, which means they have a room somewhere on this ship. With a door just like that. All we need to do is locate their room and then enter the area through their doorway."

The old man's breathing slowly and his muscles unknotted as he took in my words and relaxed slightly. Then he nodded, "Alright, say I buy into this. How do we find that room?"

I picked up the control tablet, "If they're eating, then they'll be in here somewhere, just a matter of finding them."

I started tapping on the display, programming in a new delivery for the remaining bot we had.

Delivery Time: Immediate

Location:

A flashing cursor showed beside the location when I clicked it, the familiar map of the ship displayed. I tapped quickly through rooms within the combat candidate's area.

Arachnia (Assigned Creatures: 200, Current Occupancy: 0)

A reminder that we'd left no survivors amongst the scorched earth when we'd met them.

Humans (Assigned Creatures: 6, Current Occupancy: 4)

This was our home base. The assigned count was a sobering reminder that we'd already lost two members of our squad. May Schmidt and Hodges rest in peace.

Reptilia (Assigned Creatures: 12, Occupancy 8)

I had no idea what these were, and I didn't bother to interrogate my nanobots to find out. If the time came when we had to kill them, then I'd investigate then.

Orcs (Capacity 20, Occupancy 0)

This could be them. I clicked a few more rooms and discovered Argonians, Cabal, Drell and Kebals but found no more that contained Orcs.

Sarge nodded in approval. "Time to pack up. We're moving out in five," he stated as he took Robinson's place watching the doorway. "Robinson, before we go, I want you to leave a little surprise for our Orcish friends."

Robinsons face lit up like a kid given a candy jar, and he set to booby-trapping the door with an enthusiasm I'd never seen in the man before.

A few minutes later, we emerged from the room. I rode atop the cart, sitting cross-legged astride it like a bad yoga instructor. The others trooped behind it, following my lead.

The clinical white corridors all looked the same, metallic walls and ceilings with piping running erratically along their lengths. Television screens marked our slow progress through the ship, showing our current position within its bowels.

As we walked, our group's footsteps echoed loudly ahead of us. Announcing our position to anyone listening. Fortunately, it seemed no one was, or if they were, they didn't care what a bunch of grunts got up to.

We arrived outside the Orc quarters inside of fifteen minutes.

"Are you sure this is it?" Sarge asked.

I swallowed hard. Thinking carefully before I replied. How the fuck did I know this was the right door? - I was largely making this up as I went along. Based on my plans' track record so far, we were probably all going to die when that door opened.

"Yeah, I'm pretty confident," I lied.