In the Crosshairs

Chapter 1: Warfare Returns

September 15, 1942.

Alexander sat in the back of the truck, his ice-cold fingertips clutching his Mosin-Nagant M91/30 sniper rifle. He removed the clip from his ammo pouch, turning it over in his left hand repeatedly to distract himself from the dread he felt in his stomach.

Everyone else in the back of the truck—10 soldiers total—looked frightened and unready for the known horrors of war. Solemn whispers escaped their mouths as each of the soldiers pondered over their condemned fates.

The Germans have conquered 70% of the city.

Uncle Joe is sending us off to die. We're just numbers to him.

Unlike the rest of his comrades, Alexander remained quiet and expressionless, tuning out any noise that would worsen the anxiety already consuming him. He put the ammo clip back into his rifle's pouch, then looked up outside of the truck's overhead caravan. He stared aimlessly at the sky until his eyes fixated upon a huge propaganda billboard slowly emerging from behind the forest of trees. Plastered on the billboard was a picture of Stalin looking bravely into the distance, with a firm, yet optimistic grin on his face. Next to his face, was text exemplifying the battlecry for the Soviets.

For the Motherland and for Stalingrad! Never fall, never surrender!

Alexander knew that there wasn't much time left. Soon, he'd be fending off the Motherland from the invading Germans. Luckily for him, Stalingrad was an environment he knew like the back of his hand.

------------------------------------------------

Steady. Focus. Breathe. Aim.

Those four words comprise Alexander's strongest memory as a child. He had listened to his father, Alexei, murmur those exact words to himself over and over before shooting his prey. For most of his childhood, Alexander lived under the tutelage of his father. From the age of 5, he would walk with his dad out of the backdoor of their wooden cottage, and venture deep into the Ural mountains. It was there that Alexander would begin his training to become one of the greatest sniper's the Soviet Union had ever seen.

Before Alexei and his wife, Natalia, had ever had Alexander, Alexei promised himself he would make his child the best sniper in Russia. He had every intention of doing so, and when he was called up to serve in World War 1 on the Eastern Front, he rejoiced at the prospect of returning home to a young kid and teaching him all the real-life combat techniques he had learned. 

Natalia recalled the glimmer of romanticism in her husband's eyes as Alexei grabbed his rifle, his backpack, and left out the door. It was barely a month after Alexander was born, and Alexei felt the strong desire to protect his new family from any aggressor who would threaten the Russian motherland. It was a long trek from the Ural mountains, and the Russian army had already secured numerous advances against the Austrians. 

It was nothing short of glorious and honorable to receive the call to serve. The village went into a frenzy as the conscription letters arrived. All the mothers in the village would walk their sons to the backs of the deployment trucks. They would cheer, celerbate, and cry tears of joy, knowing they'd soon be welcoming war heroes home with copious dinners and endless comfort.

Natalia somehow knew better. She knew what the Tsar doing, using their sons and husbands as cannon fodder. In the midst of the village's cheers, her distant cry could be heard at the end of the street.

"I don't think they're coming back," she would whisper to Alexander, every night. She knew she'd be attacked and criticized severely for questioning the war efforts, so she only confided in her baby.

As the feverish war excitement slowly resided, Natalia watched Alexander grow into a toddler. She would visit the bulletin board in the middle of the village almost every day. She would see good news from the Tsar's agents—news that, with each passing day, the village knew to be false. Horrifying rumors about Germans wiping out entire Russian infantry divisions circulated slowly through the Russian land like a venomous poison.