The Droidware body armor had saved my life. The scrapper wasn’t so lucky. Either he wasn’t wearing any, or what he had was too thin. The outcome was the same. My slugs picked the man up, threw him backwards, and bounced him off a wall. He was still in the process of falling when Norris blasted my ears. “Hey, Lurch! Where the hell are you, anyway? We could use some help up here.”

I felt like telling her to kiss my ass, but old military habits kicked in, and I did what I was told. I lumbered up the hall, aiming my weapon at every shadow I encountered, half expecting to catch one between the eyes. Any hint of radio discipline had disappeared, and my plugs were filled with garbage.

“Watch it…watch it…the little one has a gun.” “Cover my back, damn it…” “Come to poppa, little robot…daddy has a present for you.” “…Not a god-damned scrapper in sight…” “Whoa, momma! Check those buns!”

It was about then that I caught up with the rear guard, a scrawny little weasel with the rather appropriate call sign of “Snotface.” He motioned me forward, and I had just pulled up alongside him when the fecal matter hit the fan.

The scrappers seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at once. They poured out of the shadows, dropped from overhead accessways, and popped out of doorways like so many jack-in-the-boxes. And every friggin’ one of them had a little kid strapped across their chests, leaving their hands free to do other things. Like blow our heads off.

The kids screamed, the scrappers opened fire, and Snotface took one through his open mouth. I sensed more people fall and heard Norris give the only order she could. “Ignore the kids! Shoot the bastards!”

She was right, I knew that, but couldn’t bring myself to do it. The rest of the shooters opened fire while I stood there with a gun in my hand, unable to pull the trigger. The children came apart like so many cheap dolls as a hail of bullets hit them and were stopped by the body armor between them and the scrappers.