A Dying Man

The request was humble, yet it carried a final dignity.

The officer clearly had not expected Webber to make such a request. He froze for a moment, narrowed his eyes, and sized up Webber and the battered soldiers behind him, their eyes hollow. The corner of his mouth tugged into an unreadable curve, as if he found the request both ridiculous and... convenient.

He could not be bothered to waste any more words on this group of men about to die. Impatiently, he waved at the soldiers behind him. "Give it to them! Pick out a few pieces of junk and send them off!"

Several soldiers hesitated, then casually rummaged through a nearby pile of confiscated gear—or equipment stripped from the fallen—filthy with blood and mud. They picked out a few rust-spotted, even cracked fragments of Chain Mail, along with several badly worn pieces of hardened leather armor that had almost lost all protective value, and tossed them at Webber's feet like trash.

"Put them on, then get back where you belong!" a soldier barked.

Webber did not look at the officer again. Silently, he bent down and picked up the heap of "armor" reeking of mildew and blood, then silently handed it out to Tom, Juan, and Jenny, whose injuries were somewhat lighter.

No one spoke. The atmosphere was so oppressive it suffocated. Each of them mechanically accepted the cold "gift" that symbolized the countdown to death, and haphazardly pulled it over their tattered uniforms.

At last, Webber took one deep look at the checkpoint that divided life from death, and at the officer's cold back. Then he resolutely turned around, helped Juan up, and said in a low voice, "Let's go."

The group left the noisy, despairing checkpoint in silence, staggering as they merged once more into the