Beggarman

by Steve Matthew Benner

Part 2

  Cobb walked the whole next day without incident. The monotony of the terrain of waist-high grass, broken periodically by stands of trees, was stultifying. He found himself studying the animals that scurried underfoot and flew overhead. He tried to tell how many types of animals there were around him and would take mental note of any plants that seemed different from the majority of vegetation. It helped the time pass. Cobb remembered that he had been interested in fauna when he was young and had had several pets of which he was very fond; he had even considered becoming a veterinarian. But he had been drafted at sixteen and, after a few years in the service, he gave up on the idea of going to college. He remembered the inchworm that had broken his concentration during the battle. Cobb had totally forgotten that he had once had a love of nature.

  It took Cobb two days to reach the next village, and once there, he repeated the same begging routine with similar results. There were more Kirrian soldiers in this village than the first one. Even though he was even less visible to soldiers than civilians, this made him edgy and expedited his exit from the village. After another two days’ walk, he came to another village and quickly moved to the village center. This village was slightly smaller than the previous ones and did not have a central square, so Cobb had to locate a suitable begging site at the corner of a building. He slumped onto the ground, resting his back against the mud and wood wall of the building, and slipped into his now familiar routine. He had become accustomed to the role and, for all intents and purposes, was a beggar with almost all aspects of the soldier suppressed. But not entirely.

  A number of troops moved through the village, and Cobb knew this higher concentration of military forces was due to his proximity to the front between Kirrian and Alliance forces. It dawned on him that crossing the border would be very difficult, and he had not really given it much thought—mainly because he hadn’t thought he would make it this far. Even so, he couldn’t formulate a plan until he actually studied the situation at the front. Instead, he mentally recorded the deployment, tactics, and equipment of the Kirrian troops. He was impressed by the sophistication of the weapons carried by the soldiers. The arms were only about a generation behind what the Alliance soldiers carried, and he recognized some types that he had used and some that were manufactured by other Alliance-member planets. He knew the blockade around the planet was porous, but it galled him that their so-called allies were supplying weapons to those that were killing his comrades. He was thinking that he would have to report this when he got back to his own line, until he remembered that his superiors were more likely to kill him than debrief him.

  Deep in these ruminations, Cobb had become almost oblivious to the Kirrians occasionally dropping a coin in his bowl, and his grunts of thanks were automated. His attention was snapped back to this primary task when he saw a small Kirrian girl standing next to his bowl. She was only about 2 or 3 Earth years old and wore a miniature version of a Kirrian female’s typical attire, a long shirt that reached down to her knees covering a pair of short pants. The outfit was bright red, and light brown hair bracketed her skull ridge, all of which made her very striking for such a small package. In spite of himself, Cobb found her adorable. She smiled at him, and he involuntarily reciprocated though it wasn’t visible under his bandages. She held out her hand to reveal a solitary coin that she dropped into his bowl with a flourish; then, then with a great sense of accomplishment, she said a number of Kirrian words in an excited, high-pitched voice. Cobb could tell they were meant to be kind, and reflexively began to say “thank you” in Alliance but stopped short and grunted a gentle appreciative. She then turned away and ran to take the hand of a female standing near by. As they walked away, she turned to look back at him, and he raised his hand to wave. She returned the wave and disappeared into the crowd.

  The presence of so many soldiers still made Cobb nervous, so, when he had sufficient coinage, he bought enough supplies to last several days and headed out by early afternoon. He had passed the outer edge of the village and was about two or three kilometers past that when he heard the low-resonance sound of approaching aircraft coming from straight ahead. He reflexively hit the dirt and vainly tried to cover himself with the tall, dead grass around him. He watched anxiously as six dark dots, just above tree level, quickly grew into six Alliance landers. Without thinking, Cobb leapt to his feet and frantically began shouting and waving his arms at the craft, but the landers were traveling fast and were past him before they possibly could have seen him. As they passed over heading due east, Cobb realized that if they had seen him in his present state, they would have shot him. His exultation disappeared as quickly as it had come. He continued to watch the landers recede into the distance, but as he watched, they appeared to circle and then dropped out of sight. Cobb realized that they must have landed back at the village he had just left, and he began moving back the way he had come as fast as he could. If he could reach the Alliance troops while they were still on the ground and find a way to make his identity known, he could possibly get out of this nightmare.

  As he got closer he saw clouds of black smoke rising into the air and heard popping sounds that he recognized as munitions going off. Panting profusely, he climbed a small rise overlooking the village and saw the orange flames shooting out of the windows and roofs of most of the houses. He could smell the odor of wood smoke laced with that of burning flesh. Suddenly he caught movement to his right and turned to see five landers about 100 meters away, taking off. Half a dozen Alliance troops ran toward the last lander. Again, without much thought, Cobb started to simultaneously shout, wave, and run at the soldiers. The last Alliance soldier in line saw him and turned in his direction; Cobb felt that his ordeal may finally be over, and his hopes soared. But the soldier was not able to make out what he was saying from that distance and over the roar of the lander’s engines. As the man leveled his laser rifle, Cobb realized his mistake and threw himself down hard to the right and rolled. He knew that even if the shot passed directly over him, he would become a burning pile of rags. The red glow of a laser burst passed to his left and created a burning swath of dried grass in its wake. Cobb remained prone in the grass for a few more seconds before risking a peek to see if the soldier was coming toward him. When he did look, he saw that the soldier had joined his buddies in the last lander, which quickly followed the other five aloft.

  Cobb lay in the grass, alternately feeling sorry for himself and mad at himself. He hadn’t had time to take off his disguise, and it probably wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Any shape running up screaming to a soldier in the midst of combat would have been shot, especially one that looked like an apparition from a bad horror video. He knew this on an intellectual level, but the disappointment was still there.

  When he had finally satiated his need for self-pity, Cobb rose to his feet and dusted himself off. He turned his attention to the village. Smoke and flames rose from a majority of the buildings within his field of view. He decided to poke around in the hopes of finding more supplies. As he approached the edge of the village, he began to see bodies, all Kirrian, mostly soldiers with a sprinkling of civilians. But as he proceeded into the streets of the village and the number of bodies increased, the proportion of civilians began to increase. Cobb recognized the pattern. The Kirrian soldiers advanced to meet the attack and, after they were wiped out, the Alliance soldiers moved into the village killing anything that moved and throwing grenades into the buildings.

  Civilians now came out of the few houses that were not burning and began checking the wreckage for individuals that were trapped or wounded. Cobb could see that the wounds were mostly from laser rifles, which would essentially burn through anything they hit, so the smoking, bloodless wounds were blackened like charred meat. The ghastly sights, when combined with the smell, were almost overwhelming, and Cobb felt physically ill. He decided that anything he might find here was not worth it and headed west, back out of the village.
As he walked, he thought of the little Kirrian child and of the Kirrians who had given him money. He felt a momentary pang, but then pushed the thoughts from his mind and concentrated on his walking.

  That night Cobb settled down near a small brook and reflected on what he’d seen that day. He knew that the Alliance attack was one of its usual hit and run raids, meant to hurt enemy morale and disrupt their lines of communication. Cobb had participated in many of these raids during the time he’d been stationed on Kirria, but he’d never really thought about what they did to the Kirrians, especially the civilians. Today Cobb had seen as many women and children among the dead and wounded as he’d seen soldiers. In retrospect, he knew that he himself hadn’t really drawn much of a distinction between the two. The enemy was any Kirrian, of any age, sex, or military value. His officers had always tried to keep down the civilian casualties, but they rarely punished you if you just happened to burn the head off a Kirrian civilian. The actions of Alliance soldiers spoke more clearly than