I haven-t seen him for a long time. He changed greatly since I met
him last time, three years ago. That time I came to him on the eve of the "Pitman day"
(in the Soviet Union there are many days dedicated to different occupations - day of
radio, day of doctors, day of railroad etc.) and found my friend outgrown that small
and neat town. He had changed. His appearance had changed but he was inside the same guy I
knew in Afghanistan. He had a big, kind heart beating inside his chest but his soul,
burned by the strange hot sun, went mad once and for all. I was sure everything would be
over in the long run.
I approached a door with the agitation and pushed a door bell button. I
heard loud, annoying sound of the bell behind the door. I imagined as the door would be
opened and I see him and we hug one another ...
The door swigged open and I saw him. Next moment he shook my hand as if
he could see me everyday and looking in my eyes asked: "Are you from the "Field of
fools"?" I could not manage with feelings gripping over me. Both my insult and
confusion splashed out. It was difficult to hide the emotions and he saw everything.
Taking the lead over my emotions he hugged me belatedly, clapping me on the back, said:
"Common, don-t be a small boy. I am very glad to see you old man. Just don-t stain
me with snivel". My anger to his poor gladness of the meeting, insult to his
condescension, everything went away, when I, not leaving shoes at the door (it is a
common custom in Russia to leave shoes near a door, inside of a flat), on my
artificial limbs went to his one room flat. On a conspicuous place, on a shelf of his
bookcase, a small model of BTR-60 (Russian armoured carrier) was located with an
identification number 345 on its side. The eyes of my friend, the owner of that flat, were
shining with genuine pride for that small parade of his victories: "I-ll show you
something else. I-ve planted a bush of real Indian hemp! ..." (Hemp was one of the
most prevalent drugs used by Russian soldiers in Afghanistan)
I was not listening to him already. Definitely his soul went mad and
time did not cure it. He remained there, with them, forever. I was afraid of it.
... The sun burned on a bald back of the head. "A glass" (a
slang name for soldiers- summer uniform) crackled on the back, covered with the salt
from perspiration. The draft of air, like a red-hot glass, moved above a ground,
distorting outlines of things beyond recognition.
The Bullet lay in a trench made by him and was looking at moving
mirages through an optical sight of his SVD (a Russian sniper rifle). "The
field of fools", where he imitated a sniper on a combat position, was a part of the
desert, starting from a battalion loo. That was a place, where all, deserving it, served
their sentences. The sentence was very simple and very unpleasant because of that. A
sentenced one was supposed to dig his own trench out in accordance with all requirements
of the military skills. Everybody had his own way of being there. But not a fact of
sentence itself was considered as a sentence. The fact of checking out of your trench and
your watchfulness was considered as disgrace.
The trust and independence were estimated. But somebody could come any
moment and to idle meant the only thing - to lose the trust and to be considered as a
"worm" (humiliating nickname for those who failed to follow unwritten rules of life
in the forces. Every military unit has its own, sometimes very different rules), who
showed "worm-s" flexibility in life. For two years, while boys of the Great country
had been arriving to the brigade the penalty became the ritual, became cluttered with more
cruel conditional characters. Accordingly the status of those who was "honoured" by
the full set of all conditional characters became higher. As the live memory about all,
attending the "Field of fools", the ground was dotted with many pock-trenches.
The Bullet was lying on the "Field of fools" and escaping the
boring view of the desert tuned to the brigade direction, studying it through the optic
sight of a sniper rifle. He tried not to think about Hun, the lieutenant who had donated
him with the jolly moments of contact with absolutely strange for him land.
All people at that war were separated for two types after being there
just for three months: those who saw only lucre in the war and those who were exciting by
the war itself as a game. The majority of all usually were in the intermediate group. The
lieutenant with nick Hun was a bright representative of that intermediate group. He was a
professional in trade with local citizens and much more skilled professional in setting
ambushes against the same local citizens. Not having burdening himself with compromises,
he found the easiest way to deliver himself from remorse - he did everything with full
feeling of responsibility. He was a professional whose intention was to deal with his job
as neat as possible under those circumstances. It was considered that Hun never had
proceeded anything before he made all necessary measures to protect himself "for the
case of dealing with Allah".
Not hiding his double higher education Hun added Shakespeare,
explaining his point of view to the surrounding reality: "The hole in the pocket leads
to the emptiness in the head. The emptiness in the head leads to the hole in the same
head. So, there is not any other choice for hundreds kilometres around, sons. All your
life here is brought to necessity and we are slowly turning into animals at this damned
war!". Before Hun noticed the Bullet he was an usual solider "just from a plane" (the
description for those who just arrived to Afghanistan and was absolutely zero as a
warrior). He even had a name. His mother called him Kesha, but she told him nothing
about the war and the Soviet Army.
Kesha lived together with his parents and a sister in a miner
"uranium" village, lost in steppe expanse. He just did not suppose about an exciting
student cadet, future lieutenant, who was eating apples somewhere in Ukraine. The war put
them together, passed their worlds through the optical sight, simplified life, made it
unbearable concrete...
... Having drunk a little bit and smoked all stock of dope we moved to
a balcony giving the Kesha-s family possibility to sleep well. The warm summer night
filled the flat with coolness. We were sitting at the balcony talking about the past. I
tried to switch the conversation to the present time. But he omitted my questions just
taking me back to the war. Having had a look inside the room, where his wife and a
daughter were sleeping covered with white bed-sheets on the only sofa, through an open
door of the balcony, he suddenly said shaking his head to the sofa direction: "Just
imagine we are in a morgue!". (In Russian morgues that time dead bodies usually were
covered by white bed-sheets).
I was shocked by such an allegory. Sure, there were two mattresses set
for us, covered with white bed-sheets on the floor of the room swimming in the silver Moon
light. The sleeping people, covered with white bed sheets, supplemented the picture of the
night silence. But what one has to think about, how one should see the world through the
eye-sockets-embrasure of this round, impenetrable, like a pillbox, skull, to compare this
silence filled with the calmness of sound, untroubled sleep with dead lifelessness of a
morgue?! "Do you understand, Kesha, what nonsense you are talking now?", - I asked
him. "Am I talking nonsense?" v he was really surprised. "That is you who is
talking nonsense! Do you think everything is over? It just begins? Just look around. Do
you forget while in hospital you could get down to the yard on your wheel-chair only after
giving a lift-guy a rouble, do you forget? They did not die. They have children, their
children, reared by them. They all are around us. They all are dead! And we are alone
again. Alone as that time when in the ambush! This is my war and I am not going to lose
it...", - he stopped talking staring at me.
"Kesha, I am in", - I tried to soothe him. "Do you remember what
Hun taught us?" v he could not stop...
"... You have to understand, that is absolutely stranger man for you.
Otherwise you will not be able to do it. You have to understand that is just a target, an
aim. That is a stranger life, alien to you. If you don-t do it he will not miss his
chance. If you donate him that chance, he will give you a leave warrant. But you will go
home, to your mother, in a "can" (a slang name for zinc coffins killed in action
officers and soldiers were sent home in). Then she will write letters to a brigade
asking why a lieutenant couldn-t save her child. Do you need it?", - Hun stood bending
forward to the Bullet, who lay with his legs in a position for a shooting in a lying
position.
The Bullet had a target in front of him. Hun personally brought it to
the "Field of fools ". It was an old clay pitcher, filled with kissel. A condom was
pulled on the pitcher, stained with some sticky shit; pieces of felt and some hairs were
glued to. All that construction was located five hundred metres away of the Bullet.
"So, son, there is a target in front of you. Just imagine my mood and
thus your future depends on your right shot. The shot, the result - we will go to have a
rest. No result - I will go to have a rest, you will go to work. Having hit the target you
would have a chance to go there and see what shit your head will look like after it have
been shot. That pitcher with a condom on it is the exact copy of your head. If you don-t
understand it now it will be easier to kill you right here rather than to take you with us
and then bring your body back under fire!
The rules are simple, so just remember them now I will not repeat it
again.
The first: your advantage over a gunner with damned Lee-Enfield the
model 1902 (!!!), throwing bullets to the sight distance up to one kilometre eight hundred
metres, is the speed of the shooting. If he is narcotised and a little nervous his first
shot is the result of about seven seconds of the work of his brain. Taking into
consideration that to hit a target with the first shot is unusual for a normal man he
would need about ten more seconds to reload his rifle. Do you understand that? The time of
preparing the second shot gives a target a chance to move for another thirty metres, in
case you have you pants pulled down to your knees. You should not have such a pause. You
"bride" v an automatic rifle, it saves you about five seconds, this is roughly
fifteen metres you will not allow your target to run. This is a dream to hit a target with
the first shot! It is not bad to have a dream the bad thing is not to have a dream. But
after you missed a target with the first shot it will duck down in the best case. Based on
the life experience and a kind of mentality, the stupor, you drove him into by you first
shot, lasts for about five-six seconds. That is your hour of triumph. Your automatic rifle
donates you that moment, appreciate it!
The second: a normal "dukh" (a slang name for mojakhetdin)
is about 50 cm. in width. All, that makes him alive and nimble, is located 15 - 20 cm. in
the depth of his body. A circle with the diameter of 10 cm. covers his chest without any
problem - that is much more than the dispersion of your rifle at the distance of 400
metres. Only the same sniper as you or a machine gunner can reach you at such a distance.
A bullet of your rifle weighs a little more than nine grams. It is
covered by steel "jacket" with coppery surface. When piercing into "dukh" it turns
90 degrees, then, in a thousandth of a second - 180 degrees and goes on back forward,
breaking flash a little bit. But on the depth of 15 - 20 cm. it loses its power,
transferring it to a body of already dead, towards that time, "dukh". Meanwhile his
entrails are bursting. Besides, a bullet, having run through his lungs or heart, destroys
them completely. Did you read it? So your only task is not to miss. The rest of it is not
your business. But the whole trick is not here.
A bullet, piercing into a body, forces it to pulsate as an air balloon
filled with water. Just imagine two - three your bullets find a "dukh" every two
seconds? They stir up his shit that it will blow up his body inside!
So, remember:
- The aim sight is usually shaking on a target - that is normal, but
oscillation should goes down at the final stage of sighting - few moments before a shot
itself.
- The steady position of a rifle, the possibility to move it to follow
a target and comfort of sighting can be provided with the right position of a marksman.
There is one problem - kick back. Hold it. Due to the proper position and consequently,
reducing the vibration, you are able to increase the accuracy of the aiming in six times
while lying on the ground or being in sitting position in comparison with the position
when you are lying on a beach or sitting on a lavatory pan with the fulcrum on your elbows
(if you will listen to me).
- There are some reasons which should force you to pay attention to all
I-ve been talking to you: you have the advantage in speed of shooting; you have good
optical sight for the distance of 400 metres to shoot in a circle with the radius of ten
centimetres three times, that will give you a hundred percent guaranty, even if you are
suffering by diarrhea while shooting!
You have all chances to go home as a hero, son! And now you have a
chance to make me surprised. First you shot once then two - three times as fast and
precisely as you can and we will go there to look at his brain in the pitcher. Get ready
and begin without my order.", - Hun stepped aside not to impede.
A bullet hit the neck of the pitcher, run through it and made a dusty
splash far away behind it. Two others, sent in three - four seconds each, hit the centre
of the pitcher, breaking it into big pieces and tearing a condom at income and outcome
points. The kissel leaked into sand through tears of the condom.
Hun picked up the pitcher, lying on its side, and having examined it
threw away the rest of the kissel with some pitcher fragments. "Nothing even for the
multiplication table", - he commented the rest of conditional brain. The Bullet was
standing by him and tried to look aside. "Get used to it, son. If you do not hit him
with you bullet during first ten seconds, you can fall in love with him. It means you will
not shoot at all. I want to believe you. Both of us are waited home", - Hun cheerfully
slapped the Bullet on his back.
"My God, he is absolutely mad!!!", - the Bullet thought...
Kesha was sitting with his thin, overworked hands on his lap: "When I
failed to pass through a math exam at Moscow Institute of Mines I came back home, to
Kazakhstan. I was employed at the mine to work at shaft sinking. We worked out Uranium
step by step. We have a lot of hobos living there. All of them knew me. It is easier for
me to live with them, according to their rules, rather than with those...
Once I went to an open party meeting of the mine. Before that I went up
to the hobos to get some dope to smoke. They said v we know you very well Kesha, you
will smoke it there then it would take time to get narcotised, then you would come back to
us and begin to instruct us. You-d better smoke now, with us and then go to your meeting
and instruct them. They know life very well.
So I smoked well and went to the meeting of communists. I was sitting
there, listening to the bullshit they were spoken about. It seemed fun. I asked for a
word. They gave me a chance to speak out, saying let-s listen to the young generation,
you know before the demobilisation I joined their party. You know half a year of the
combat length of service and you are automatically in. So I went up to a rostrum. Before
the meeting I read four pages of Gorbachev-s speech somewhere. So I splashed out all
I-d read plus I added the description of the way I would like to see all of that.
Everybody kept silence, all two hours I was speaking there. Then just another guy spoke
out a little bit and they stopped the meeting quickly. Everybody shook my hands at the
exit, a foreman, a chief of the shift, a brigadier. The funniest thing was with the party
leader. He came up to me saying pathetically: "Well done! But you did not prepare the
speech very well, next time pay attention to it please...". Can you imagine all of them
thought I had been sincere saying that bullshit. And now you are saying I am talking
nonsense. That is them who is talking nonsense and they even do not understand it!..."
Everything happened one moment, on 9th of May 1982 (This
day is celebrating in Russia as a day of the victory in the Second World War). In
spite of a holiday, a battalion had to provide the passing by a column. Two companies
darted off the brigade base, not even having had a rest after set up ambushes, not having
had the chance to taste mash, made by young soldiers for the sake of the holiday. The
groups were alighting off armoured carriers during the march, trying to block the possible
shooting sectors, passing ahead of enemies- ambushes in spots where the green area was
very close to the road. That one who was in time wins.
The shot sounded lonely and almost silent in the rhythm of movement of
the group along a vineyard. The bullet, sent by the skilled hand of a gunner, stopped
Khalilov. It hit the body exactly in a proper place, a little lower the left nipple; it
went out through his left shoulder blade, crushed the bone and abundantly moistened the
uniform on his back with blood. Khalimov-s face turned pale and he fell down from the
duval (a solid clay wall) he was caught by the dukh in the aperture of. He fell to
Sanya-s feet, who just before Khalimov squeezed through the hole. The sniper, preventing
others attempts to follow these guys, made few shots, demonstrating enviable skill of
shooting his "Boer".
The duval divided the patrol group for two parts. One of three of them,
that one whose body was cut by that invisible line, was dead already. The rest two left on
different sides of the wall. The shot of the sniper was followed by the gust of fire that
forced the group to snuggle up to the duval and deprived it the possibility to overcome
the wall which became the fire border.
First minute Kesha was sitting inclined to the dead body of his pal.
Khalilov died on his hands immediately as soon as Kesha turned him his face up. He died
quickly and silently, whispering by pale lips: "Mum, it hurts...". Trying to rid his
palms of the blood Kesha dipped hands into dust. Shyly wiping the dust, absorbing the
blood, he tried to look around attentively to get the shot direction they missed.
When the barrage fire from all "barrels" in the group, Hun and
three more people overcame the duval under cover of, splashed out to the vineyard Kesha
was already rushing about the vineyard thoughtlessly trying to define the position of the
marksman, who had began that little war. He intuitively moved in a maze of the vineyard.
Understanding he was loosing time Sanya moved to an edge of the
vineyard, trying to find the better position. Approximately determining the direction of
the shot he understood the gunner would escape the shooting sector and the most convenient
place for that was a breach in the opposite wall of the vineyard, about 80 metres of
Sasha-s position. Trying to keep his breath, he moved apart his legs, pulled out
branches of a vine by the barrel of his Kalashnikov machine gun, moved slowly the sight of
his machine gun along the duval, expecting appearance of the gunner. He was sure he would
find him.
Hun and two more soldiers in spite of the density of the fire could
pass the body through the aperture, where it was accepted by the Khalilov-s countrymen.
Looking around Hun decided to look for the second young, the only one out of three who
left there under the sniper fire. The density of the fire went down as suddenly as it
began. Accepting the delicate balance of the power the enemy carried on only preventive
fire, trying to keep the distance. This very moment the long choking machine gun burst of
fire meant only one thing v the young was still alive and thanks to God snapping.
The dukh appeared in the aperture unexpectedly. Kesha almost missed
him. Having been afraid to miss him Kesha pulled the trigger of his machine gun and went
on shooting until the cloud of dust, raised by his bullets covered the aperture together
with the dukh. His PK (Kalashnikov machine gun) obediently followed the wishes of
its master, sending its bullets, full of hate to the enemy, with only one wish v to
kill, to punish, to prove himself he could do it.
They did all they could that day. He hunted down and killed that gunner
and Hun brought a body of that "dukh" and his rifle under strangers-, furious fire.
Later on, in the evening while in brigade base the lieutenant not embarrassed his alcohol
exhaust, found the saucy young, having a wish to look at that clown.
"Do you like to carry out a war, son?", - Hun looked at a young
soldier, who was taken to a smoking place between tents based on his order. "No, I just
like shooting", - trying to look indifferent answered the young. Hun looked carefully at
that odd figure wearing a Panama hat, dirty boots with torn strings. "So you do like
shooting? - reasked Hun. - I thought that "dukhs" began to attack when you shoot you
machine gun. Quick thinking".
"As a bullet!" - the young smiled complacently. Hun went on
scrutinising that booby, who was slowly filling with the perception of his own
significance, not even suspecting about the real status of things.
There are some moments at the war, son, when it is necessary to act
pitilessly and brutally v these are moments of flare of your consciousness, when you
know you have to act fast and precisely, straight and directly. That moment you are
possessed to your body filled with instincts. The sooner you understand it the better for
yourself. If you grasp everything with the same speed in the future you father can be
proud of you. And now, - Hun was looking in the eyes of the young, checking out how far
could he go in his impudence, - behave yourself in a proper way, remove the perineum (the
fold made on a hat to emphasise the independence and coolness) from you Panama hat,
replace the wire on your boots with strings and try not to sink. Give up your manners v
all your problems in the life here relate to the difficulties of the war. Tomorrow with
the same impudence and a rifle you will go to the "Field of fools". We will make you a
real warrior.".
That way he became "The Bullet". Many of those who arrived with him
by the same plane were still called "stomachs", "skulls", "ghosts",
"worms" (humiliating nicknames for young solders. Stomach v because young
soldiers were always hungry. Skull v because young soldiers were closely cropped. Ghost
v young soldiers were wandering around trying to avoid contact with anybody. Worm v
because quite often young soldiers wriggled to avoid difficulties of soldiers life).
Many of them had lost their names not having gained new ones ...
Hun was killed by our own smoke mortar shell. The group got in trouble
in the green area. Dukhs began to nail us. Hun managed to lead a group along the
irrigation ditch to those surrounded. The density of fire from both sides was pretty high.
They had to evacuate wounded in the pauses between the volleys of our mortar battery,
which zeroed in the dried irrigation ditch bed and cut off, by mortar fire, dukhs trying
to infiltrate into that narrow way like flies on shit. Hun managed to lead three groups
already from there when a young soldier from the mortar battery accidentally pulled the
trigger of the mortar, it shot and mortars shell flew to the dried irrigation ditch bed,
along which Hun was leading the next group.
They were covered with that volley. Three of them were heavily wounded
with mortar shells- fragments. Two of them, following Hun, were burned by the smoke
shell, which hit exactly the neck of Hun. It heavily burned his body and tore off his
head. Hun was brought from there together with his head on hands. The young from the
mortar battery hardly escaped the mob low. That day divided lives of many people in
brigade in two parts: before that and after.
There was a note on the inner side of Hun-s beret, which was kept in
a company depot in the empty grenade box together with his other stuff: "I am REX of
VDV, but not a piece of tar!" (Rex means cool warrior in this contents. VDV v
abbreviation from Vozdushno Desantnie Voyska v paratroopers).
I very often, remembering Hun, thought about what I have seen at that
stupid war, what I saw and went through later, bedsorring my body on a hospital bed,
rubbing sore my stumps with miserable artificial limbs, drinking litres of vodka together
with contused soldiers, listening to the regrets from those who had not been there.
Hun put all of us together, making specialists and one of us was made
just an ace at that war. He taught us a lot, we got the rest of it ourselves. He deprived
us of faith in immortality and redeemed from the illusion of impunity of evil. We
understood that even an usual pencil could be a weapon, the blow of which could give you
ordinary peritonitis. And the only skills of local doctors would be a way to survive.
All of us understood the weapon gave us the real power over local
kishlaks (a village in Asia), you could destroy it by just one volley. In a
particular case you can easily meet the situation when you had the full right to execute
or pardon a dukh, captured by you. And nobody would be surprised if you go out the frames
one or two times just to be sure whether you can do it or not? And if you do it you will
always subconsciously try to expand the limit of your power, until you run against the
solid wall, the border, set by your destiny, which is the only thing able to stop you.
The fate is like a sniper bullet. You live while it flies. The moment
you are got on a sight - you are not possessed to yourself a hundred percent. As the mark
of warning you begin to get small troubles. Then, not having listened to the warnings you
run against the solid wall, which gives you the only choice v either to live inside the
set borders, hiding oneself from the bullet fated for you, or to overcome the wall and die
free. The main thing is to understand you have reached your own wall, came to know the
limit of permitted the limit of your power.
Eighty of a hundred, come to the brigade, reached that line and did not
cross it, just twice or three time stepped over it and coming back unable to deal with the
fair for the own courage. The rest twenty stepped over that line few times a day, getting
drunk of feeling of freedom, permissiveness and the constant threat of a punishment for
the shown impudence. The fact of their existence, their ability to intact themselves and
remain human beings v is the measure of a human-s luck, which is defined by the skill
of a sniper, measuring the permitted and punished us for the impudence in attempts to bite
more from the life, for higher price.
Hun said us: "The life is beautiful but it is not dearly-bought. The
most important thing is - it is us who has to quote a price for it! It is very important
not to quote a small price in your impudence...".
Having being there, behind the wall, those twenty out of a hundred,
remained to live in that world, where they were ready to pay any price for everything v
since everything was simple and clear there!
... "Do you often drive mad?", - I asked Kesha trying to understand
if he understood he was not understood by other people. "Last time when I drove mad I
got divorced with my wife. It is normal now, it seems to me. Nobody claims. But that time
I was doing everything very serious. That is them who thought I was fooling around. I
wasn-t!!!".
I was not surprised with his story.
"... I was dismissed from the Institute. I came back to the mine.
Nobody gave me a flat (according to a law those who served in Afghanistan were supposed
to get free of charge flats without being in a line as the privilege. But in majority of
cases that law was not observed). I was put in a line of those who was supposed to get
a flat and began to wait. I did not want to live with my parents. I moved out. I rented a
room at old Kazakh woman-s in the earth-house block, where the founders of the mine used
to live v prisoners and convicts.
The Kazakh woman was the old lady living in accordance with the old
rules v she was smoking "Belomor" (Russian strong cigarettes), had a tattoo
on her hand and sometimes used Russian foul language. The only condition she allowed me to
live there on was to respect her as a Muslim, I should not eat pork in her house. So we
agreed.
Everything was going on well. I became a friend with the old woman very
quickly. The Ukraine woman I was lived with, who I marriage because I was young and
stupid, did not do everything, as I wanted. But I did not care much about it. I did not
know what I wanted myself v I was working hard at the mine.
Once I came home. The Kazakh woman was sitting outdoors, smoking one
cigarette after another. I saw she was very angry. I came into the room and saw my Ukraine
wife frying cracklings; the smell of lard spread everywhere. I asked her why she-d done
it, why she-d insulted the old woman. She answered me the old Kazakh woman could endure,
because I did not carry out the war in Afghanistan to follow Moslem rules in native
country. Having heard all that I got mad. I did not kill her at once.
I came out of the house. I went up to Apa (a very polite name for
old women in Kazakh language) and said: "What am I supposed to do to improve the
fault of my wife?". "What am I supposed to do? How can I remove the disgrace from my
desecrated house? You will not kill her for that will you?", - she asked me. "Why
not?" v I answered her. v That is the serious business and we have to act
seriously".
I dragged out my wife by her hair, tore off a cord with bed sheets
being dried on it. Then I put a bed sheet above her head, the loop on her neck, the cord
on the column, a stool under her feet. Apa was standing aside, not interrupting me. My
wife was standing on the stool, the bed sheet on her head, the loop on her neck just
whining soundlessly. I saw many people running to watch the performance. There are
different kind of people living there some of them was born with tattoo already (in
Russia tattoo in majority cases means a person is a criminal).
Suddenly Apa cried out, saying she was ready to forgive her, she did
not want me to sin, saying I should be afraid of Allah v to hang is very big sin
according to their religion. Did she think I had not known it? I asked her what about the
desecrated with pig meat house, what was I supposed to do with faithless one? Everybody
was screaming around. I thought if it was them who suggested to kill her for the
desecrating of the house, they should do it themselves. But in this case I would kill one
of them, who would forgive me my weak-willed participation in the death of my wife. I
suggested them: I would kill my wife, they would kill one of them. Not to give them too
much time to think everything over I began to knock out the stool from under her feet...
When everything ended with general booze everybody perplexed how could
I do it? How could they do it? Who suggested me a decision nobody was going to be
responsible for?
I said v I did. What about them? OK, no insults I decided, and began
to form them up. If you can not do as I do v your number is 320, get behind my back and
do what I say!
The Kazakh woman turned out a merited old woman. She put all her orders
on and went to the local authorities. As the result of her march I got my own flat. My
Ukraine girl ran away the same day and I have not seen her since..."
I was listening to stories of Kesha-s life and was thinking about how
all of us were similar. We just go around the vicious circle, opening the same doors, not
finding reasonable, flexible decisions in simple situations. We just turn every situation
in our own small war, setting hopes upon own luck, not taking into consideration the price
and looses, stepping over own corpses.
The State, sending us there and being not ready to our return met the
strong reinforcement of the opposition, in persons of those who was there, went to its
normal role v to force, to watch the observance of social rules and private agreements,
to protect citizens from themselves and the State from the citizens, ridding itself of
engagements to them it used to take.
Hun was killed in action. The company commander was killed in action
near Kalat in the summer of 1982. The company ran into an ambush on the 22nd of
April of 1983 near Senzheray and many of our guys were killed there. The Bullet was just
contused v lucky him?
The life scattered all of us over the country. Each of us was there,
behind the wall and each of us made his own choice. I made mine, Hun his, the company
commander his own. Each of us knew what he wanted. Each of us knew what he could. We all
knew what would happen to us!!!
Kesha banged on the strings of raped by somebody else guitar. He was
embarrassed neither by the absence of the ear nor the elementary skill. Trying to express
somebody-s musical composition, the fruit of musical creation, we were singing in two
voices.
"... The wave of joy passed by
First meeting hugs cooled down.
The wall is rising up around
And you-re alone behind!!!..."