“Lower your weapons,” Tarasov tells his companions, and reaches out towards the ghost-like figure. “We mean no harm. Who are you?”
“Nash… our column.”
“If we stumbled upon a Soviet guy from that war, I’ll piss myself,” Ilchenko murmurs.
“Sovietskiy? Da! Da!” The figure steps forward and grabs Ilchenko’s arm. “Nashi, ti nashoi sinok!”
Before the soldier can do anything, the old man kisses the hand holding the machine gun. Then he touches the Ukrainian army patch on Ilchenko’s arm, his eyes open wide in bewilderment.
“Yes, we’re Ukrainians, Papa,” Ilchenko says. “We always were, actually.”
Squirrel takes a bottle from his rucksack and offers it to the old man. “Vipyi, Papa. You look like you could use a little vodka.”
“Me too,” Tarasov says.
“Count me in,” adds Ilchenko.
Holy Mother of God, Tarasov thinks, looking at the old man as if he were a creature from another planet. Then he realizes that he actually is — a living time capsule that has turned every abstract memory of the past into reality, even if it is a hardly conceivable one.
“All right… come, sit down. Are you hungry?” He asks, pointing to his mouth and making a chewing gesture. To his surprise, the man shakes his head. “Let’s get out of this cave. Come, Ilchenko, help him walk. Squirrel, get that bottle back from him. He’s confused enough. Look around, maybe you find something useful that helps us know who he is… or was.”
“I’ll be damned,” Ilchenko says offering his hand to the old man. “Come, Papa, grab my hand. Otherwise I’ll think you’re a ghost.”
The old man might be worn out, but he is not helpless. He takes a heavy wooden staff and, laughing, pats Ilchenko on the back as he walks with them into the light outside.
“Ours… you are ours… you have arrived,” he says. His words sound like those from someone who hasn’t talked for a very long time.
Ilchenko watches Tarasov pensively. He seems to be at a loss over what to do and say. Tarasov doesn’t feel much smarter than his soldier.
“I am Major Tarasov from the Ukrainian Armed Forces. This is Private Ilchenko. And the other guy is… well, call him Squirrel. He is our guide.”
“Ukrainian? How?”
Ilchenko is about to launch into a long explanation when the major signals for him to hold his tongue and turns to the old man.
“Who are you?”
“Who… I am. Now I am. Again. I am this.” The man reaches into his duster and gives Tarasov a barely readable ID card, issued by the Soviet Army. The major holds it in his hands as if it were an artifact that he had never believed existed.
“Captain Igor Vasilyevich Ivanov? 276th logistics division?”
“The column.”
“What column, Captain?”
“My column. Ours.”
“This gibberish makes no sense,” Ilchenko says.
Tarasov tries to tackle the situation by sticking to their basic needs. “We must get through to the factory on the plateau. We can’t get through. Do you know a way to the factory?”
“My column is lost.”
“We are the new column. And we must get through. Captain Ivanov, you must lead us through.”
“I hoped… that the war ended. Did it end?”
“Not exactly,” Tarasov says with a sigh. “We are here to settle unfinished business with the dushmans. Getting to the factory is part of that. Do you know a way or not?”
“I do… I know. Old kravasos is hiding there. Me, I’m hiding here. I don’t like leaving my hiding place. What news?”
“Captain… please give me a moment.”
Tarasov flags Ilchenko to follow him a few steps away.
“Things have taken a turn for the surreal, Private. What’s your view on this?”
“Sir, with all due respect, it’s 2014 now. Do you really believe that one man could have survived here for almost thirty years, all alone? Look at him — he’s more a walking skeleton than human being!”
“His ID card seems genuine. Look.” Tarasov gives the weathered card to Ilchenko. “Plus he claims to know a way to that damned factory. This means we need him, and need to play along. Let’s assume that what he says is true and he was left behind somehow by the Soviet army. What do we tell him? That his country, the mighty USSR, was humiliated and ran like a whipped dog?”
“I don’t know, sir… I don’t know.”
“And then that his country doesn’t exist anymore? And all that has happened ever since? The CIS, the putsch, Yeltsin, Putin, all that shit? Damn, maybe this guy never heard about Chernobyl either! As far as he’s concerned, his commander in chief is still Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev!”
“If we tell him, he will probably have a heart attack and we won’t get to that bloody place. And telling him all that would take so long that we would be sitting here till doomsday. I can’t see any option other than lying to him, Major.”
“Well, Ilchenko, one thing is sure — we can’t leave him here.”
“It’s your call, sir.”
“Yo, Major! Look what I’ve found.”
Squirrel emerges from the cave and gives Tarasov a battered note book.
“What the hell is this?” Tarasov says looking at the cover.
“Uhm… that’s a Homer Simpson sticker, sir.”
“I realize that, Ilchenko, it’s not me who’s been living in a cave for decades. But how did the old man obtain this? Anyway… let’s not waste more time.”
“So what shall we do with him, sir?”
“Put him out of his misery.”
“What?”
Seeing Ilchenko’s scowl, the major smiles.
“Out of the time capsule, I mean. Let’s hope it will not be too painful on him.”
Tarasov steps back to the old man. He is sitting on the ground, staring into the distance, repeatedly murmuring only two words: the column, the column.
“Captain… Igor Vasilyevich, listen up.” Tarasov squats in front of the old man and looks deep into his eyes, slowly, clearly repeating his name once more. “Igor Vasilyevich Ivanov. Listen to me: it is now the year 2014. The war ended twenty-five years ago. The Soviet army does not exist anymore. The USSR is no more.”
“What? Brezhnev is dead?”
“He is.”
“And no more USSR?”
“It’s gone.”
“Thanks to God Almighty! Oh, God has worked wonders, wonders!”
“You don’t know half of it. Now we will bring you home. Home… to Russia.”
“Russia?”
“Wherever your home is, it is time to return now.”
“Did we win the war?”
“Well… some of us were victorious. You will be among them, if you carry out a last order — from me.”
“But…” The old man touches Tarasov’s Ukrainian arm patch. “You are not from my army.”
“I am a major. Ranks did not change. You will follow my orders and guide us to the factory. We will finish our mission. Then we’ll take you to a safe place. You will be transferred home from there.”
“You speak differently… everything is different about you,” the old man says, touching Tarasov’s bulky body armor. “Your uniform is different also… so much better than ours. Oh no! You are not of my army. You are of no use to me.”
“Komandir!” Ilchenko speaks in a forced whisper, but Tarasov feels that his soldier can barely suppress his anger. “Let’s leave him to his fate or just drag him with us. This makes no sense!”
“But he has a point, Ilch,” Squirrel says. “You are not from his army.”
“That’s fucking right, Stalker! How in the hell could we be?”
“Ilchenko, cut it!” Suddenly, an idea comes to Tarasov’s mind. “You are a genius, you know that?”