Only the Red Star

The rain drizzled down over the plains like a dense haze. Grasses and trees sang a soft song as the whirling wind whisked them whichever way its whim willed. As they danced, their leaves and blades fell onto the partisans, giving them a damp and uncomfortable sort of cover. The water trickled down into the ditch they sat in, slowly accumulating in a pool at their feet. Their socks, cold and wet, gripped their feet in a frozen embrace and stuck to the insides of their boots.

At least, that was Josip's experience. Truth be told, he couldn't see his comrade across the road from him through the darkness and rain. As the drizzle continued and the pool below slowly filled, he only hoped that she had chosen a more comfortable position. Fuck's sake, he mentally mused, of all nights to have such miserable weather, did it have to be the one where I was on duty?

Josip reached up to his right breast pocket. He could feel the damp box of cigarettes crumple at his touch. God damn it, he bemoaned, it'll be at least another month until I get rationed more. Lowering his hand, he tried to raise his spirits. Well, maybe I'll finally be able to kick the habit.

To pass the time, Josip began to examine his rifle. It wasn't sophisticated hardware by any means, a simple German rifle taken off a convoy about eight months ago, and it was rudimentary enough that he could disassemble the piece in under thirty seconds. Whilst tempting, he chose not to do this. As bored as he was, disassembling the rifle would only leave him vulnerable, not to mention running the risk of getting water in places where it ought not to be or losing a vital component in the dark.

Instead, Josip decided to clean the gun. Whilst he did a superb job of keeping the weapon clean, the rain and mud from that day's work had undone his meticulous efforts. He retrieved a faded green handkerchief from his left breast pocket and began to wipe it down. Josip started with the barrel, his least favourite part. He had been told from a young age to treat any firearm as though it were loaded, and having to clean both the outside and inside of the barrel always sparked a twinge of anxiety as a result. Especially now when the weapon was indubitably loaded and primed, he wanted to get the process done with as soon as possible.

Once he was satisfied with the state of the barrel, he moved his way down the rifle, wiping away as much dirt and grime as he could in his conditions. Josip appreciated the process. It was dull, monotonous, and repetitive, and this helped him stay occupied when bored, yet also helped slow him down when things were moving too fast. The process also allowed him to think, which was sometimes good, sometimes bad. He did his best to stick to the pleasantries, the hopes of what would come once the occupiers were gone, and the rosey memories of times gone by. Of course, it wasn't easy to stick to the positive. It was equally common that his mind would wander into what he had seen, what he had heard, and whether that future, free of agony and oppression, would ever really come. In those times he'd revert back to the messaging of the commissars and pamphlets, where liberation was not a matter of "how" or "if," but rather one of "when?" Even if his confidence wasn't absolute in its inevitability, he could tell himself it was, and that was usually enough.

Josip continued to wipe away the filth. As his mind wandered, a face flickered in his mind. At first the visage was intimately familiar yet unknown, lingering in the liminal space between recognition and the lack thereof. It was a fair two decades older than him, as evidenced by the wrinkled forehead and crow's feet. His eyes were blue, nearly white, his hair short and curled. He had a jet black moustache and a lopsided grin that reminded Josip of the sorts of people he met in the metallurgy. His head was slim yet tall, much like his nose and general figure. As well, his eyebrows were impeccably defined despite, to everyone's knowledge, him putting in no effort to maintain them. The face belonged to Slavoj Sablin, Josip's former commissar.