As the sky darkened, the captured town's activity grew. Worms exited houses and patrolled the border—their hard feet clanging on the rough ground.

Slacks finished the plan of attack, and then the group retreated further to the tunnel, staying just outside the mouth. Nighttime was a bad time to attack the base, and they figured getting enough rest for the morning was best.

They pulled the jeep off the road, hid it under dropped foliage, and then gathered in a circle to eat some cold rations.

“I hope there will be a fire tomorrow. Otherwise, I’ll be full of sorrow,” Bandana lamented. He poked with a stick at where they might have built a campfire.

“There will be lots of fire, depending on how you look at it,” Slacks replied as he twisted wires into C4.

“We’ll plan on catching something soon to fry up,” Helmet added.

“Hey, maybe we can use that barbeque sauce!” Glasses said.

“I told you that was expired! Don’t tell me you still have it?” Slacks groaned.

He set down the last of the prepared explosive and sighed. “I’m glad we finally have a use for this stuff, but I still hope it will work.”

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“You made the plan,” Glasses replied.

“I did, but I can’t say I made it without having a fifth person in mind… right now, Bandana’s all on his own as a distraction…. I just couldn’t see any other way. Never thought I wished the Reaper was still with us.”

“Don’t worry about me, man; you can trust your plan.”

Slacks shook his head and cleaned his rifle.

“I trust Bandana can hold his own,” Helmet added. “Besides, he will be on the far side of town, out in the open. You will have him covered while Glasses and I infiltrate the base.”

“The Worms always seem to have a surprise or two; I am a failure of a tactician if I can’t plan around that.”

“There’s no way to predict those things; if anything, you’re a genius for getting us this far!” Glasses protested.

Slacks shook his head and continued to clean his gun.

“You should eat before your food gets colder,” Helmet told the sniper. He slid his hand into his pocket and let his shoulders loosen while looking at each of the group, finally ending on Slacks.

“The temperature is the same as when it started,” Slacks replied.

“It would be nice to have a way to warm it up,” Glasses sighed as he let a pile of ration slop fall from his fork to the tray.

“I second. Eating all this cold food can’t be that good for you, I’d reckon.”

“That rhyme was weak,” Slacks grumbled.

Helmet laughed a hearty laugh. He motioned to the others that they should finish soon and put his own empty container to the side. As the others scarfed down their meals, Helmet crawled into the camouflaged jeep from the beginning in the case of Slacks and drifted to sleep. The others joined after, and soon they all slept in peace.