Mikail Eldin - The Sky Wept Fire - My Life as a Chechen Freedom Fighter

Looking him straight in the eyes, you answer: ‘No.’

Then he fires a single round into your right foot. The bullet goes straight through. Leaning slightly forward, you look silently at your foot, then look into his eyes. You do not feel intense pain yet. Just a smarting in your foot. You are still detached and contemplative: ‘Have you had a good think?’ you hear the officer’s voice. ‘Oh, I can shoot higher, you know… Do you have any idea of the agony?’

You notice the assault rifle is pointed at your groin and you shrug your shoulders. ‘Well, that’s it. I’ve lost,’ you say, merely for the sake of replying. You are worried about the state of your guide and friend. He is still blindfolded, and he needs to hear your voice, otherwise he might think they’ve killed you and do something stupid.

‘Want to die a hero, you bastard?’ the colonel continues. His voice is creepily quiet. ‘I can kill you and there’ll be nothing to pay! “Attempted escape”…’

You notice the hand holding the assault rifle is trembling from barely constrained rage. For some reason you take in the fact that he is left-handed. ‘Yes I know,’ you say. ‘But do I look like a hero to you?’

A brief silence fills the air. ‘No. It would be too kind to kill you here. Your death will take place somewhere else. And it’ll be a slow and painful death. Dress his wound and tie him to the post!’ the colonel ends his monologue. They blindfold you and, striking you with their rifle butts, they lead you away. To be bandaged, as it turns out. After dressing your wound, they slip your hands, which are bound behind your back, over a post and leave you waiting in the hot summer sun for a helicopter. You have no shirt on – they stripped you of it upon arrival – plus your wound is bleeding, and as a result you are unbearably thirsty. Someone approaches and whispers quietly in your ear, ‘If you want to avoid problems, keep quiet about some of the weapons you were caught with.’

This offer suits you fine, so you say, ‘Agreed. What shouldn’t I mention?’

‘Don’t mention anything except the RPG-18 and the hand grenades.’

‘OK. Only don’t blab,’ you say, knowing full well it is one of the original thirteen who has decided to conceal some weapons and sell them back to your comrades. He leaves in silence. Hearing somebody’s voice nearby, you ask for water. The reply comes: ‘Want some water? Here!’ And you’re punched in the solar plexus.

Almost at once you hear the sound of a blow and a voice: ‘You bastard! Beating a guy when he’s tied up! If you’re a real man, untie his hands; he’ll rip your eyes out! Look pal’ – addressing me – ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t shield you from the colonel, but that scumbag will leave you alone now.’

It is the voice of your unknown ally who hid the paper with the codes from his commander. You say, ‘Thank you! For everything.’

‘I’m afraid there’s no water. If they bring any before the helicopters arrive, I’ll make sure you get a drink,’ he promises, walking away.

You realize that what’s happening to you now is just a gentle limbering-up for what is to come. You know that you will die. And you’ll die slowly and painfully. Nobody will be compassionate enough to release you with a blessed bullet. Everything you’ve done up till now ostensibly to save your skin – denying that you were a combatant, agreeing to keep quiet about the weapons – was done in pursuit of the one goal that matters to you: bringing closer the moment of death, so the torture will end quicker. Yet you also know the torture you’ll undergo will purify you of all sins and you’ll stand before God with a shining face. Perhaps the torture will even purify your torturers of their sins. You are a fatalist. You will have to travel through hell for an eternity in order to reach your paradise, your peace, that is so near at hand. That’s what you are hoping. You are so tired. God is merciful, after all. He does not sentence people to serve their time in hell twice. So what now? Now there’s nothing for it but to wait. Wait for the helicopters to come for you, bringing… Not just your death. No, something more horrible still. So you wait. And standing in the fierce summer sun you quietly recite the verses from the holy Quran which you are capable of recalling. You recite mechanically, not really reflecting on the content. Here is the drone of the helicopter… It is time. So they didn’t bring you any water. They say that a dying man gets terribly thirsty. And how badly you’ll yearn for that sip of water.

Come on now, remember. Remember everything you can. Everything you know about interrogation techniques: torture methods, psychological pressure designed to humiliate you and break your will. You don’t know how it might help, but you desperately try to remember. In reality, you are simply fighting your fear. Yes, that’s it. But what is there to be frightened of? After all, you’ve already realized your time left on earth will be brief. At least in the human dimension of time… Although it will stretch on endlessly in another dimension. And it is this other dimension that frightens you. Its inevitability frightens you. There is no alternative path. Perhaps you could have improved your lot by telling them everything. And perhaps that’s what you’d have done, if you were an optimist. But you were never one to build castles in the air. Someone in your blood far stronger and wiser, some ancient, mighty voice in your blood begins to speak: You are a warrior. And a warrior is dead from birth. His death is never seeking him: it is always there with him on his shoulders. So why did you get so frightened when you looked into the face of death? You knew you couldn’t live for ever. Soon your ordeal will be over. No matter how eternal it may seem, it will not last long in time. You should know how to die in combat. If there’s nothing left to fight for, then fight for your death. You’re still at war. But now you face the most challenging battle of all on the warrior’s path. This ancient voice stirs some feeling in you… Is it pride, perhaps?

You may be lying wounded and beaten, face down on the dirty floor of a helicopter, but never in all your brief life has anybody shown you such honour as this. And what counts most of all: it is your oldest mortal foe showing you this honour. The Russians consider this tiny person so dangerous to their vast country that they have brought two helicopters especially for you. The reality is that helicopters always fly in pairs, but that does not matter, for this is the last mark of respect you will get in your life. So you cling to this false belief. In just twenty minutes or so, perhaps sooner, you will have to answer before God for all the sins of your ancestors. Meanwhile, you try to remember anything that might be of help in the battle to come. You feel the helicopter descending – it is over. You’ve arrived. This is your final stop. From here on you will start on a different journey, known but unknown, and thus terrifying. From here you will depart for eternity. This is a journey you’ll have to make, one way or another. But how you make it is up to you.

The helicopter lands and you tumble out. They catch you below and slam your head against the tracks of an infantry fighting vehicle. Despite the blood gushing, you do not pass out. You hear them flinging your guide along with you on to the vehicle. All this time your eyes are blindfolded and your hands are tied, so you can only hear and feel. You feel not with your fingers but with the entire surface of your soon-to-be-tortured body. Before long you are thrown off the IFV and led away under further beatings. You are worried about your friend, he is not guilty of anything. They interrogate him first. You cannot hear the questions or his answers. Meanwhile, you’re lying face down in the sun, and they are slowly and expertly beating you. You pray to God that your stories will match. And God hears your plea: they will match more or less. They lead you away to be interrogated. You are set in front of an unseen officer who asks you questions. You answer them. The story emerging from their questions and your answers goes more or less as follows.