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

‘We aren’t in a city, we’re in the forest. It’s a hallucination. Wake up!’ They shake you. While you saw the city, your eyes weren’t closed, you are absolutely sure of this. But now the city vanishes and in its place appears a winter forest. You are distressed at losing it, but you have to keep moving so as not to be left here. The city will appear before you often, very often, enticing you again and again. And often you will ask about it. This heavenly city will never leave your memory. Later you will ask all those who survived the trek about their visions, hoping to find at least someone who saw your city. You will search subconsciously for a witness with whom you can talk about the city. You will search for a friend among the living and you will find none. You will turn out to be the only person who saw this strange and beautiful city.

The fourth, last and most trying day of the trek through the mountain forests. You are enfeebled not by hunger; war has taught you to endure hunger. You are enfeebled by lack of sleep. And you are still eating plenty of snow. This saps your energy more than the hunger and physical exhaustion. The bland, distilled snow water goes straight through your body, washing away any minerals that remain. As a result, you become dehydrated and lose energy more rapidly. But a weakened body is no reason to give up the struggle for life. And so you obstinately walk on ahead. Sometimes shots from grenade launchers and assault rifles are heard: these are the men firing at the enemy seen in their hallucinations. You are on the mountain pass. The nearest water is a fair way off. You see a fighter lying in the snow; he is raving.

‘Brothers, let me have a sip of water… I will make it, I’m alive…’ he murmurs. Some of his comrades are motionless nearby. You lean over him with your flask.

‘It won’t help – we’ve given him water. He’s frozen. He doesn’t need water. Well, he doesn’t need anything now,’ they say.

‘Do you know him? Can you inform his family?’ you ask.

‘Yes, if we survive ourselves. He’s from our unit. Thank you.’ The strangers show you gratitude, although it is unclear what for. And the fighter, a mere kid, dies before your eyes.

Your comrade, having spotted more passes beyond this one, has given up. He sits down in the snow and says, ‘That’s it! I can’t go any further. I’m staying here. I don’t have the energy to move – you go on ahead.’ You look at his face; it is as white as a corpse. From experience you know a face like that tells of extreme wasting of the body. You read in his eyes a strange remoteness. As though he is no longer here, but not yet there… On his face is the stamp of a person on the path to eternity. You cannot allow him to die so easily. He is your close and loyal friend, who time after time has rescued you from certain death. You look him in the eyes. You hold his gaze so that he cannot glance at eternity: ‘Look at my eyes! Can you see me and hear me?’ Receiving an affirmative answer, you continue: ‘You know I don’t have the strength to carry you. I’m on my last legs myself…’ He nods. ‘I cannot stay here and die with you. I am a warrior, not a suicide case.’ In vain you try to provoke a reaction with this taunt. ‘I won’t leave you to die here. I’ve left behind more than a lifetime’s worth of fatally wounded men. The only way I’m leaving is if I’m certain of your death. I will only leave here if I’m sure that I’m leaving behind my friend’s corpse, not a man who’s alive and will slowly die while watching me walk away. So if you cannot walk on right now by yourself, I’ll kill you and go. At least you’ll have fallen as a warrior. I won’t allow you to die like some starving dog. If I know that you’ve fallen as a warrior, even if by my own hands, I’ll leave at peace with myself. If you get up and walk on, have no doubt we’ll make it out of here alive, even if it is against your will. I give you my word I’ll keep one of these promises, whichever you decide on.’ With this you load a cartridge into the chamber and point the barrel of your assault rifle at him. He knows you would never say anything like this unless you meant it. You have known each other for too long. Looking you in the eye intently for several moments, he gets up silently and walks ahead. And you will not leave his side until you arrive, alive, at your destination.

You wearily drag yourself along an old road leading towards a village. You see a fire. It is your comrades: they have lit a campfire under cover. To warm themselves and boil some water. Hot water warms your insides so well. They invite you to the fire and offer some boiled water. You reach into the pocket of your jacket for something and come across a little sachet. It is a seasoning sachet from a packet of instant noodles which served as your ration on the night you broke out of the encirclement. At the time you put two sachets (one with oil and one with spices) in your pocket and forgot about them. The sachet with the oil burst but the one with the seasoning has survived. You pour the contents into the mug and stir. Never in your life, neither before nor afterwards, have you ever drunk anything more delicious. Even the same drink specially prepared by you later will not possess a fraction of the flavour.

Your commanders do all they can to get you out of there alive. They deliberately spread information that you are awaited ahead by people who have come to your aid with food, dry socks and so on. This instils hope and the desperate desire to make it in the hearts of men who are by now ready to give up. Who are tired of battling against death and ready to submit to it. Due to the ‘honourable lie’ of the commanders and these elite warriors’ personal qualities, you emerge from the forest with far fewer losses than might have been expected. Especially considering that for the first two days you had to exchange fire with enemy forces on the commanding heights. Finally you come to a small mountain village where you are awaited by fighters and locals who have driven from many villages with food and transport.

It is deep, dark night. Or you think it’s dark. You can no longer trust your eyes. Transport is here, and men who aren’t from your column. These people smell different. The smell of food. You are put in a minibus. Your comrades are sitting there. Someone runs up to the car and calls out to you. Having assured himself that you are in the vehicle, he walks off. The minibus is moving. You are offered some cold boiled meat brought by the people who met you. You take it and try to eat. But you cannot swallow it. You have eaten too much snow, and when you try to swallow you get a terrible pain in your throat. The hard, grainy snow, swallowed without waiting for it to thaw, has grated your throat like sandpaper. You give up your vain attempts to swallow the piece of meat and fall asleep.

You are woken by someone calling to you. You get off the minibus. A pale dawn is breaking and you recognize the house of your aunt and your cousin who came to meet you. It was he who called out to you in the minibus. They do not recognize you straightaway. Neither your relatives nor your comrades. It seems your appearance has changed dramatically. You must have lost weight. You take off your sodden boots and slip your feet straight into icy water. Your toes have gone dead and this is what you must do to restore them to life. The toenails are black, whereas the toes are very white. Later these nails will fall off and new ones will grow. But you have been lucky. After a while the sensitivity returns to your toes. They start hurting horribly. But you welcome this pain. No, you have not gone crazy; it’s just this pain is a good sign. It means your attempts to preserve your toes (throughout the entire journey you kept trying to wriggle your toes, whether walking or resting) have been successful. Strangely, now you do not feel hungry. Even sleep does not come. You must have slept your fill in the minibus. You tried falling asleep, but you dreamed your comrades were walking across a minefield, you began calling to them and then awoke.