Words to Live By - A Countryhumans SovAme Story

Act II, Chapter II - First Taste of Blood

September 1941

Kyiv, Ukraine, USSR

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All my life has been defined by war. From the long, winding road to nowhere of the Seven Years War, the ringing bells in the church tower as I won my independence, to the grey uniforms and screaming rebels that marked some of my worst days and the dust-black Great War skies, I have been fighting for as long as I can remember. I have always followed the road of marksmanship at least once in every war, whether it be shooting British captains from the safety of a tall tree or watching through a rusty old ironsight as a grey-clad, bearded man fell from his horse at the click of my trigger, I have always looked through a scope of some sort, my ammunition always finding its target from brown rifles that had heartbeats in tune with mine. Though war has been my life forever, I had never seen, and suspect I will never again see, warfare like that I witnessed in 1941. Though it was '42 and '45 that showed me the complete brutality and utter brutality of this war, Kiev was my first taste of the blood to be shed in the name of a wolf whose teeth were ever hungry for Russian flesh.

The Germans were coming.

It seemed to start slowly, too slowly. We'd arrived in Kyiv late in July, and our forces had been lying in wait ever since. August had brought the news that Uman had fallen, a town near Kiev, and our morale took another hit. Months crept by while the men of the army I was beginning to call myself a part of got antsier and antsier. The morning of the 16th of September dawned blood-red, as though the sky had been splashed with red wine. I woke early that day, climbing to the roof of a nearby building to watch the bright light rise in the east, the direction of Moscow. I thought of the old sailors' proverb, one I had learned centuries before this.

Red sky at morning, sailors take warning.

Kyiv was nowhere near the coast, in fact very inland, but it unsettled me. Perhaps it was still a warning, a warning to watch for a storm of gunfire rather than raindrops.

"Lyudmila?"

I nearly jumped out of my skin at that. Soviet was standing behind me, having crept up completely silently as I was lost in my thoughts.

"Yes?" I replied once I had taken a moment to collect myself.

"What are you doing up here?"

"Just...watching the sun, I guess."

"Huh," she walked over to stand next to me, leaning against the concrete railing at the edge of the roof.

We were quiet for a time, as the sun slid into the sky behind rose-tinted clouds and on a blazing orange backdrop. Even so, I could feel her eyes on me.

"You look worried."

That surprised me, though I didn't jump in shock like I had minutes before.

"Of course. Are you not?"

"No, no. I am, absolutely. It's just, I don't know-"

"You assumed I wouldn't be?"

"...I guess."

I was immediately struck by the strangeness of the idea of her thinking of me so highly. In a situation like this, it was impossible to not worry about the impending battle unless you were insane. How could she think this of me, that I could somehow not be worried?

It was with the realization that she thought of me this way that eventually led to me understanding something important about the Soviet Union as a person, but in Kyiv I hadn't figured it out quite yet.

"Why?" I asked. She had been staring at the ground this entire time, but now she looked up at me, giving me a look I had become familiar with seeing on her face, that look of sorrow and indecipherable-ness.