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1943 | Part 1

Natasha was drafted into the Red Army in 1943. She was deployed with a rifle company in the south, near Surovikinskaya.

The battle for the city had just started. She is equipped with a PPSH-41 submachine gun, a Tokarev T-33 pistol, ten grenades, 150 bullets for the PPSH, 100 for the Tokarev.

All weapons are in pristine condition. A map of the area is included. It shows a river and some towns nearby.

Natasha helplessly looks at her comrades.

They are all so experienced..and i'm just a woman thrown here in the army with absolutely no experience. Great.

Everyone around her has a different look in their face. Nervousness is common, but she does see a veteran soldier eating some bread. She wonders how he even dares to eat now.

There is a mortar squad setting up their tube nearby. An officer is yelling commands to a pair of soldiers hauling a box of mortar shells. The shells have been painted in red to signify they contain mustard gas.

She looks at her veteran comrade.

"Hey, can i ask you something?" - Natasha asks.

The veteran soldier looks at her.

"A private talking to a sergeant, huh? Go right ahead. This ain't the first time I've had to deal with this".

He takes a sip from his own flask.

"But watch your tone, private" - finishes the sergeant.

"I'm sorry. I'm just curious, where did you fight before? You seem really experienced.. " - she asked.

"I fought in the battles between Stalingrad and the Volga. I'm one of the lucky few who managed to escape from it before the encirclement closed.

I would tell you about how I got there but that's a story for another time, private. You shouldn't be asking questions like these anyways, they can be risky if the wrong people hear you". - he warned Natasha.

"I understand."

She puts her head down, looking down at her dirty shoes, remembering that she haven't showered in weeks.

"A piece of advice, private. If you're going to do something dumb in this war, do it loud, do it fast and do it so the other side cannot respond to your actions.

The key to being a soldier is to make sure you're never put in a position where the enemy has a way to shoot at you." - said the sergeant.

Natasha hears someone calling the sergeant. He has to go.
His last words to her are "Good luck, private".

He walks off and the line gets quieter.

"Thank you comrade!" She yells after him, and sighs.

Natasha looks around and notices that nobody really knows what to do.

Some soldiers are talking, others are sleeping while others are smoking.

Troops can be seen everywhere around the camp. Some of them have a missing leg or an arm, some of them look like zombies. They clearly didn't have the chance to sleep in the past few weeks or months.

It feels like the calm before the storm.

Her heart races and her head feels light. She doesn't know much about war, but she does know this feeling. She is scared.