The Seeds Will Grow

To the Last Man

Rykov searched through the rubble of the gun emplacement looking for his fellow soldiers. He knew the final assault would begin soon.

He yelled for his comrades, calling them by name. Only bodies remained beneath the chunks of concrete and dust.

"Over here," he heard a voice call out weakly. He scrambled over a pile of debris and found a small arm waving frantically. Its owner was pinned beneath a large timber.

"Sasha!" Rykov called. "I'll get you out!"

The soldier heaved mightily at the wood, budging it from its spot enough for the boy to wriggle free. Sasha tried to throw him arms around Rykov in joy at being rescued, but wobbled and toppled to the ground, screaming in pain.

"Don't walk on it!" Rykov scolded the child. "Your leg was shattered by the wood."

Sasha was scared, but glad to see Rykov, or anyone for that matter. He had been sleeping when the shelling began earlier, his screams for help went unnoticed during the commotion. The pain had gotten the better of the child and he passed out, only to awake to the sound of Rykov's voice echoing through the destroyed bunker.

"Where is Dmitri?" Sasha asked, looking for his best friend among the soldiers who had taken in the young boy after the town had been surrounded by the Germans. Rykov looked away, refusing to answer.

"Oh," the boy said, understanding Rykov's response. Sasha wanted to cry, but not in front of Rykov. The soldiers often talked up the boy as brave and tough, he did not want to disappoint them. There was a long pause before the soldier finally spoke.

"The Germans will be here soon," Rykov said, still looking away from the boy. "The shelling. Ones like that always come before a big assault."

He turned and looked at Sasha, his face sober and hardened, black with dirt and grime. He had rarely interacted with him, but was glad someone was there, even if it was a nine-year-old boy.

"Only us two remain," the soldier continued. "We have to leave."

Sasha was taken by surprise at the final remark, the Soviets had talked in the preceding weeks about never giving up the fight, and had taken pride that they had held out for so long against the Nazis.

"Leave?" Sasha said. "But the orders..."

"To hell with the orders," Rykov said. "They will kill us both and still take the bunker. Perhaps if we..."

He stopped, at once realizing that there was nowhere to escape to, the position was surrounded.

"Perhaps if we surrendered," he said, bringing the level of his voice down to a much calmer tone, "they might spare us. You are only a boy."

"The Germans eat Bolshevik children," Sasha joked, repeating a line from the gruff Captain Krukov, who had barely tolerated the boy's presence in his bunker. Dmitri had insisted the boy had nowhere else to go, and would be killed by the Germans. Krukov assented, but assigned the child duties within the bunker, telling him that if he wanted to stay among the soldiers, he would become one.

Rykov did not appreciate the humor, scowling at the child.

"Everyone is gone but us," he grumbled. "There is no point in continuing to fight."

"But Comrade Stalin..." the boy responded, but was cut off by Rykov angrily kicking a piece of concrete.

"To hell with Stalin!" Rykov thundered. "Where is Stalin? Is he here, with a rifle? Perhaps he is buried under a cement slab next to Dmitri!? No, he sits in an office and orders us to die!"