As Bred’s group fanned out along the beach, they could dimly hear through their helmets a series of splashes behind them. Turning, they saw a row of Lithuwaan tanks emerging from the water and lumbering slowly up the beach, headed for the trees fifty meters away. Behind the tanks were rows of air–suited soldiers. The Lithuw were not about to stop their military operations merely because a bunch of humans were foolish enough to pick flowers in the middle of a battlefield.
Bred concentrated on looking for a Rose. He’d been told they grew mostly in cracks between rocks, and there were many boulders strewn around the beach; there ought to be plenty of Roses somewhere. The flower itself would probably not be visible; instead, he would have to look for the swarm of insects that were almost cert
