From our vantage point on the hillcrest, Kuwta and I had a good view of the devastation beneath us. This had been the biggest battle of the war so far. Unequaled in scale and violence by anything that had preceded it. Two immense forces had collided in the fields and woodlands of this valley.

The accounts that had led us here had indicated that the entire fight had lasted barely an hour, at this level of technology, conflicts were brief and deadly. There was no need for the sort of traditional infantry strategies where men huddled in trenches firing shots at each other.

Huge hulking machines, some the size of skyscrapers, were the cavalry in this war. Both tanks and mechs had played their part. Their enormous size and firepower had turned any supporting infantry into no more than insignificant speed bumps during the fighting. Yet, even those technological behemoths weren’t invincible and dozens of wrecks had turned the area into a scrapyard.

The fields of the valley were no longer full of life, just churned mud, dead flesh, and torn metal.

"SitRep," I requested from Kuwta. We had no binoculars, and the Orc's eyes were far superior to mine. Even wearing spectacles, my eyesight was shot to pieces.

"It's a bloody mess down there.” Kuwta paused in thought and then continued, “It looks like the Imperial Numeri won the battle."

I shrugged; it didn't matter to me who was winning the war. This wasn't a sporting event where you took sides and cheered your chosen uniforms onto victory. My only focus was on getting off this planet intact.

"Where's Buzz?" I asked.

Before Kuwta could reply Buzz’s clicking voice responded, "We are here,"

I whirled around and found the colossal insectoid hunched behind me. He continued speaking, totally oblivious to my surprise, "Are those the fleshlings you are looking for?"

"Where?" I asked dumbly, and Buzz pointed an armored hand at something in the distance. Even after cleaning my glasses, it took several seconds of squinting before I could make out movement, but I couldn't see any detail.

"We need to get closer," Kuwta confirmed, and without waiting for me to approve, she rose and started picking her way down the hillside.

We moved slowly through the remains of the battlefield. It was important to choose our routes cautiously, avoiding contact with the remains and placing our feet carefully as we moved. If Vietnam had taught me anything, it was that battlefields were always potentially dangerous, even after the fight was over.

The squad flowed silently from one piece of cover to the next. Only a single person moved at a time. The other two provided cover in case they were spotted.

It took fifteen long minutes to traverse the battlefield and get close enough to make out our quarry in detail. The scavengers were scurrying like ants over the surface of a hulking spider tank. Once terrifying, the enormous hulking war machine was just now a massive chunk of inert metal and wires.

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Through my smudged glasses, the scavengers were still tiny ants, ripping away at the machine's corpse. Unlike ants, they scurried around independently, each autonomous with no apparent teamwork coordinating them. The idiots didn’t even seem to be using tools to dismantle the tank, just pulling at wires with their hands.

Kuwta confirmed my suspicions, "Those are just kids looting battle trophies. We won't be hitching a lift off-world with them." She sounded as frustrated by this as I was.

"Let's go," I muttered in annoyance and turned away, planning to head back the way we'd come. This entire trip had been a waste of time. Perhaps I should resign myself to being stuck on this ball of mud.

I hadn't gone more than a couple of steps before an explosion rang out, followed inevitably by screaming.

We hit the dirt as soon as we heard the explosion. A survival reaction hardwired by months of survival in a combat zone. Lying flat on the ground, we scanned the battlefield intently, looking for signs of danger.

As the seconds slowly ticked by, my senses were ramped up to high alert. The beat of my heart pounded like a drum as my eyes flitted back and forth, trying to watch everything at once.

The tank the scavengers had been crawling over was missing a turret now. Smoke rose from the jagged hole where it had been. But there was no visible movement. Apart from the screaming kid, the battlefield seemed barren and empty.

After a couple of minutes I was convinced that only the dead and whatever surprises they had left remained here. This might be another planet, but the dirty tricks employed here were little different to those I’d seen in Vietnam. A bullet might have your name on it, but a booby-trap is addressed to whom it may concern and can arrive even after its creator has died.

Kuwta was the one who ultimately decided it was safe enough to move, she stretched to relieve tension and then cautiously stood to get a better look at the remains of the tank.

"Stupid bloody kids," she stated simply and turned back in the direction we'd come. The Orc warrior had no patience for the foolhardy, and it was obvious that she was happy to leave the unfortunate soul to their demise.

The screaming was quieter now. It was the sound of someone who knew help wasn't coming and was waiting to die. Unable to stand it anymore, I rose to my feet with a heavy sigh. No one was going to thank me for this, and it was likely to get us all killed. "I'm going to check for survivors," I muttered.

Kuwta stopped walking and turned to glare. "We need to go." She stated firmly, "That explosion will attract attention, and you know it. Do you have a death wish?"

"The longer he howls, the more likely that he'll attract attention. We should put him out of his misery." I didn’t mean the words and was just saying what I thought might influence the Orc. It troubled me that Kuwta didn’t care for anyone outside of her own squad. She was a true hardass, bred for war.

Kuwta's brow furrowed as she considered my argument. "I believe we could get clear of the area before anyone arrived." She concluded finally.

Damn the woman. She was probably right. This was a stupid risk. Regardless, it was one I felt we needed to take. I needed to do this. If only to prove that, despite everything, I was still a good person.

"We will check on the survivors," Buzz interjected. Kuwta and I had ignored the insectoid as we argued and both of us shut up instantly in surprise at his comment. "It is obvious to us that Peters will insist on helping on the survivors, and it makes no sense to split the hive. So we will all go and check on the survivors." Then as he registered our shocked faces, he tilted his head slightly to one side, "I've been studying you fleshlings. You're simple yet fascinating creatures; understanding you is hardly rocket surgery."

With that malformed metaphor, he started moving towards the explosion site, not even bothering to check if we were following.

Kuwta and I looked at each other, then shrugged and fell into step behind him.