The jungle was too quiet.
Oberstleutnant Erich von Zehntner felt it in his teeth before he heard it in his ears, the kind of silence that swallowed machinery.
His convoy crawled along the narrow provincial road, a column of twelve vehicles: two infantry fighting vehicles, six armored personnel carriers, a pair of light scout tanks, and two logistics trucks heavy with ammunition and fuel.
The morning heat was thick and wet, and the scent of burning palm oil drifted from the east. His men sat rigid in their seats, rifles between their knees, eyes fixed on the trees.
They had been told San Pablo was pacified by other battalions in the division. The airfields secured, the villages cooperative.
Yet every kilometer felt heavier than the one before. The dirt shoulders were scored with blast craters, old ones, they'd said.
Erich didn't believe in old craters. Not in this war.
"Advance at forty," he ordered over the intercom. "Maintain spacing. Eyes open, safeties off."
