Stephan Collishaw - Amber

‘What are we going to do?’ Vassily said.

‘Cover this fucking mess.’

Sasha ran a hand through his hair. He scratched the palm of his hand against the stiff bristles of his new beard. ‘We’ll be in deep shit if this is discovered.’

I squatted down by the wall and closed my eyes. I heard their grunts as they lifted the bodies from the room and dragged them out into the courtyard. The first splashed, far down, and so did the second. But after that they landed with hollow thuds that echoed slowly up from the depths. Sasha tossed a grenade down after the last body and its dull thud shook the earth. I helped them to pour rubble from the buildings into the hole.

We discovered Kolya sitting at the corner of a street. In the light of a candle he had wound his belt around his upper arm and was preparing a syringe. He looked up and grinned.

‘They found a whole stash of arms. Swiss Stinger missiles, English T-6.1 mines, heavy-calibre Degterev-Shpagin machine guns, the lot,’ Kolya said, tightening the belt around his arm.

The syringe he was using was a Soviet-issue ‘Rekord’. They were notoriously blunt and unpredictable and the medics preferred to use the Japanese disposable syringes we were sometimes able to capture from the Afghans. In the medical stores on base we had a store of Western syringes as well as plasma bags and bandages seized in a couple of successful raids on mountain hideouts. Kolya must have stolen the syringe from the helicopter. He winced as he plunged the needle into an engorged vein.

‘Bring him back to the chopper,’ Vassily said to Sasha.

Leaving him with Kolya, we worked our way back through the narrow dirt lanes of the kishlak. Dull explosions rippled across the rooftops and, turning a corner, we walked into a hail of bullets as a lone insurgent, caught behind a crumbling wall, defended his position. Ducking down, we plunged for cover in a family compound.

The room we stumbled into was dark. Leaning back against the wall, listening to the rattle and whine of machine-gun fire as the insurgent was flushed out, we became aware that the room was not empty. A dark shape moved in the gloom. A pair of shadowed figures struggled in the corner. We heard a grunt of amusement and the frightened whimper of a girl. Vassily raised his gun.

‘Who’s that?’

Kirov rose from the darkness, hauling his trousers up from around his knees. He grinned. Visible behind him then, slumped across a table, was a girl of no more than twelve. She seemed to have fainted for she lay dead still.

‘You want her?’ Kirov asked, companionably.

Mutely I shook my head.

‘No?’

Kirov removed his Makarov pistol and, turning, casually fired a single shot. The girl’s body bucked slightly then lay still once more upon the table.

Vassily put his arm around me and we walked out through the narrow streets to the edge of the village. In the back of the helicopter the boy we had picked up was lying quietly. Vassily raised his eyebrows questioningly.

‘He’s gone,’ the young medic said. He was sitting beside the boy, smoking a cigarette.

‘I want you to leave,’ Zena said, not turning. ‘I want you to go now.’

I went to her, tried to touch her shoulders, but she turned and the look on her face was ferocious. She brandished the brush before her, keeping me back.

‘Go.’

Kolya stumbled on to the helicopter, his Kalashnikov slung carelessly from his shoulder, a small, private smile playing on his thick lips. Slumping beside me, his hand clutched my knee, squeezed it. I turned to look at him. His eyelids were closed. They opened slowly, revealing tiny pupils, bloodshot whites. He grinned, catlike.

‘You ever read Malraux?’ he said. ‘You know what he said? Opium teaches one thing only◦– aside from physical suffering, there is nothing real.’

The lids of his eyes slowly slid back down.

Squatted down in the corner of our room, back on the base, I accepted a bottle from Sasha. It was not the Stolichnaya we had got from Hashim, it was samogonas ; moonshine. Water mixed with sugar and left for a week, then boiled. We drank and smoked hashish. My darkness came just before dawn. It was deep and dreamless. When I woke later the next day, Vassily placed a bottle of good vodka by my side. My fingers were not strong enough to crack open the bottle, so he did it for me.

Technically, in the medical station, where I was referred the next day, I was not allowed to drink any more. The medic preferred, however, to have me drinking something good, rather than sneaking the surgical spirits. He provided me with a bottle.

‘Enough,’ Vassily said, two days later. He bent down over the low, uncomfortable bunk and grabbed the front of my vest, pulling me up sharply. I gasped, woken from a stupor.

‘That’s enough now.’

Dragging me from the bed, Vassily pushed me, stumbling, towards the door. When my legs gave way and I crumpled in a heap, he pulled me up roughly. The young medic, who had raced out of his office, hearing the commotion, mounted a feeble protest. A look from Vassily quietened him; he stood back against the wall and let Vassily take me.

The brightness of the light split my skull. I begged Vassily, but he did not listen. Hauling me across the dusty parade square, he threw me to the ground close to the latrines. Turning on a hosepipe, he doused me with water. I lay on the earth, my knees pulled close to my chest, hugging them tight, burying my face in the sodden cloth of my trousers. He left me there for a while and I lay still, feeling the heat of the sun slowly warm me, feeling the cloth dry against my skin. I smelt the burnt scent of the Afghan soil, the fresh odour of wet earth, the sharp stink of my body, the heavy stench of the latrines hanging in the air like a sour cloud of gas.

‘Get up,’ Vassily said.

When I did not respond he kicked me hard in the ribs. Involuntarily I let out a whimper.

‘Get the fuck up,’ he snarled. ‘It’s enough. Now it is time you got on with things.’

Lifting me to my feet, he put his large hands on either side of my face to steady me and drew me close.

‘Antanas, comrade, it is time to get on with life. Come on, my little brother, it’s enough.’

I staggered around after him. He pushed me, prodded me, kept me working. He boiled tea and mixed large spoons of raspberry jam into it. Forced the metal cup to my lips and made me drink the sweet infusion while it was hot. I sweated hard. He sent me to shower, dressed me in clean clothes, threw my sweat-stained uniform at one of the recruits to wash. He woke me early in the morning and took me to the parade ground and forced me through exercises with the new recruits. Slowly, hour by hour, I began to improve. I threw myself into the routines of the base. Up before reveille, I exercised hard. I volunteered for extra duties. I worked and did not think.

‘Our soul is cut out bit by bit,’ Kolya said, smoking his pipe. ‘And soon we will have none left.’

‘It is better not to think about it,’ Vassily said, smoking, watching one of the recruits polish our boots.

‘Malraux again,’ Kolya said. ‘“Don’t think with your mind◦– but with opium”.’

‘Where did you get that fucking book?’ Vassily snapped, picking up the dog-eared paperback that lay at Kolya’s feet.

‘The bazaar in Jalalabad.’

After Zena had told me to leave, I went angrily.

‘Fuck you,’ I said, as I left. ‘What do you know? What do you understand?’

Almost as soon as I reached the street, though, I regretted having shouted at her. I waited in front of her apartment for her to come out. When, after half an hour, she still had not emerged, I trudged back up the crumbling concrete stairs and knocked on her door. Nadia answered.