The Village

"Our mission was simple. Get in. Get out. Go home. Of course nothing is ever easy in this country. Our destination was a nameless postage stamp of a village squatting in a thicket of palm and date trees.

The road leading into the village was a stinking morass of oil and dirt that resembled an airline crash site more then a driveable path. Apparently someone thought poisoning the ground with hundreds of gallons of crude oil was preferable to vehicles kicking dust into the air. As we approached children started sprinting back to the village, the fleetest of foot serving as a tiny phalanx around our armored HMMWVs. Long before we even reached the village we had to dismount to ensure the giddy children didn't accidentally run in the path of our overladen vehicles."
365 and a Wakeup