Winter in Stalingrad

"You want to go home?"

Gennasi straightened himself up, and at the end of his hospital bed, Bach was putting on his shoes.

"Hmm..." Bach replied, he tied his shoelaces, and then sat up.

Even though he was prepared, he still felt very sad to see Gennaxi's sad and hurt face.

"I've got Victor's consent, and you know it. The Soviet Union is now winning, and they will fight all the way back from Ukraine. I'm not like other German soldiers. I'm not a prisoner of war, but a rebel , whether I stay in the Soviet Union or send me back to China by the Red Army, it will not be safe for me. I have to leave the Soviet Union and go to other countries. Victor is only responsible for sending me to China, but how to return to Germany, It's my own business, he won't take care of it."

Gennasi knew all this, he bit his lip.Of course he understands that Bach cannot stay in the Soviet Union forever, he is a German.

The boy buried his face in his hands, and through his fingers he could see the deformity of his left foot.For a while, he regretted cutting off the foot. If his legs were intact, could he follow Bach?

No, that can't be...

The faces of his mother and sister appeared in Gennasi's mind.He can't go, can't go... Is he going to leave the mother and daughter to starve to death in the snowy countryside of Siberia?

The patriotic young man who left home to join the army before suddenly felt that the burden on him was very heavy.He saw his mother and Dunisa again in the hospital, saw their haggardness, and their sadness and reluctance when they looked at him.Only then did I realize how impulsive my original decision was.

But he won't regret it... It's just that after going through all this, it's even more difficult for him to make any decisions.

Shall we see you again?

Will we never see each other again?

Is it that after this walk, there is no news from now on?

These words came to my lips, but I couldn't ask them all.

Because these are real possibilities, too great.

He seemed to be able to see himself dragging such a useless leg, living until the day he had to die, and there was still no way to see him again.

Looking at the silent Soviets, Bach knew what was on his mind.The same thing is also a thorn in his heart. Even when he just met Gennaxi, before the two of them had a relationship, when they just had a good impression, he was ready to separate at any time in the future and never see each other...

But now, the Germans understand that they cannot face that future.If he just gave up like this, then the haze on the boy's face will accompany him for the rest of his life.

Bach took out a pen and a notebook from his coat pocket and handed them to Gennasi.

The boy took it silently, then raised his head with confusion on his face.

"Write down all the ways you can think of to reach you." Bach said: "When the war is over, I will find a way to get in touch with you."

Gennasi put the paper down, his hands clutching the sheet at hand.

"What's the matter?" Seeing that he didn't start writing, Bach was unavoidably a little uneasy.

The boy covered his face, shook his head, and signaled Bach not to worry about him.He took the German by the hand and made him sit closer to him.

"I'm sorry." Gennasi apologized with a wry smile, "I won't be afraid anymore. I'll wait for you, Felix."

Bach could see that the young man was a little bit reluctant, because he was trembling while holding his own hand.

You know what that means to someone under 20?

Bach couldn't bear to let Gennaxi make such a decision.Maybe he should persuade him to forget himself, and then be an ordinary person. He is very young, and he has a lot of opportunities to meet another person again.Instead of wasting time, spending his only ten years of youth waiting for someone he has only known for a few days.

Giving him hope is totally killing him.The rationality in Bach's heart that he himself hates said.He's the older one, and he shouldn't be following this kid's impulses, and if one of them has to be cruel, it should be himself as an adult.

While Bach was hesitating how to say this, Gennasi picked up the pen and paper again, carefully wrote the address of his hometown in a small notebook, folded it and returned it to Bach.

This time, it was Bach who did not pick up the notebook.

"Listen, Gennasi, maybe..."

"I know, maybe we have to put in a lot of hard work, and in the end we will be disappointed in the two places, and we will never see each other again in our whole life."

The German's mouth tightened all of a sudden.

"I said, I won't be afraid anymore." Gennasi put the small book with his contact information back into Bach's clothes:

"How do we know what the future will hold. If it really turns out to be the worst outcome, that's fine."

He hugged the man who was once on the same battlefield as him but was in the opposite camp. Through the fabric on his chest, they could feel each other's heartbeat.

"I'd rather spend my whole life in miss. It's better than lying to myself and pretending to forget about it, and then fabricating a seemingly happy life. Living like that is meaningless.

I'm going to look forward to, we can have a drink and chat again. "

1945, early May, Berlin.

The flags of the Red Army of the Soviet Union were hung all over the city.

Just a month ago, it was an ultra-modern city where people even took the subway to work and to the movies.They believed in the head of state who hadn't committed suicide at that time, and believed in every word he said.I believe that the peaceful and stable days now can last until the day they grow old.

Just as those Soviet citizens in Ukraine, Leningrad, Stalingrad believed for many years.

They would never have imagined that the houses they live in and the streets in front of them are so fragile that they can be destroyed so completely in an instant.Nor would they have imagined that rape, robbery, and death can be rampant in full view, and no one can stop them or question them.

The artillery fire of the Ukrainian Front destroyed the city first, and these Soviet soldiers fought all the way to the enemy's headquarters.

Along the way along their own motherland and hometown, they really saw too much.

The common people were locked in warehouses, men, women and children were burned alive.

Women were taken into the woods, raped until they became insane, and then stabbed to death.

These Soviets see the same hell again and again, and anger has taken the place of all conscience.There is no more reconciliation, no more so-called preferential treatment of prisoners.

They are not just soldiers, but a group of Avengers.

The Soviets conquered Berlin and turned it into a brothel.

Inside a primary school classroom in an ordinary village in the suburbs of Berlin.

Several Soviet soldiers pulled out a little girl hidden under the desk, dragged her hair, and dragged her to the podium.

This is their trophy today.

The men held the girl's hands, tore every piece of fabric from her body, and pulled her slender, pale legs apart.Every scream and call for help from her will only get cheers from the men.

The classroom door was kicked open.A tall man strode in, pulled the closest laughing Russian over, and punched him hard without hesitation.

The Soviet soldier who didn't even put on his trousers fell to the ground. He covered his swollen face and cursed a lot.He raised his head, but what he saw was a man dressed in common people's clothes.

"Let go of that child!" the man yelled in Russian.

The gang of soldiers who were being violent just stopped for a second, looked at the unarmed man with unshakable eyes, and then continued to torture the girl under them.

Only the Soviet soldier he beat up was distracted by him.He stood up again, pulled out the pistol stuck in his waist, and pointed it directly between the eyebrows of the man in front of him.

"Who the hell are you?" the Soviet soldier asked, looking the man up and down: "You don't look like a Soviet."

He pulled the insurance, with a vicious smile on his lips: "Hey, are you a German?"

The man clenched his hands into fists, neither denied nor admitted, nor did he take half a step back because of the cold touch on his forehead.

Compared with the imminent death, what he saw more was the girl crying.

He is not afraid of death, but it is a pity that he is powerless against the beast in front of him.

"boom--"

Gunshots sounded.

The man closed his eyes at that moment, then opened them again randomly.

One of his ears hurt from severe tinnitus, but he was not shot.

He stood on the spot, with his head down, looking down with cold eyes on the screaming man covering his shoulders, who was pointing a gun at him just now.

The other Soviets finally stopped, this time.The person who entered this room and shot and wounded the Soviet soldiers was their commander.

"Let her go." The person who came pointed his gun at the perpetrator of this round: "This is an order. If any of you are not allowed to observe military discipline, I will execute him on the spot."

No one let go of the girl, but it didn't go any further.Some of them looked at each other.

Did their chief see a ghost?

They raped and massacred Germans in front of him several times before, and they didn't see him stand up to stop them. Why did they start acting like a good person today?

"Three kilometers along the east exit of the village is a concentration camp where the Jews are held. I order you to rescue those people now."

The Soviet officer ordered, and at the same time fired a blank shot at the ceiling:

"Execute the mission immediately! Are you still the Soviet Union's Liberation Army?!"

These Soviet soldiers stood up, put on their clothes again, and walked out of the classroom one by one.

When the last rapist left, the tall blond German immediately took off his coat to cover the poor girl.

"Don't! No—" the little girl yelled crazily when she saw a man approaching her again.

"Shhh - don't be afraid, it's all right. I won't hurt you, I'm German. Don't be afraid, I'll just dress you..."

The man spoke softly in German, coaxed the girl into getting dressed, and carefully picked her up.

The girl's lower body was still bleeding because of the laceration, which dyed the man's jacket red.

The cry of the little girl in his arms began to fade, and was replaced by a gradually pale face.

The German understood that he had to treat the child as soon as possible.

The infirmary at this school should have medicine and tourniquets...

"Bach."

The Soviet officer called the German as he approached the door of the classroom.

This man in military uniform had a pair of glasses hanging on the bridge of his nose. Behind the two pieces of glass was a pair of blue eyes covered with bloodshot eyes and dark circles. The justice and light in these eyes had dimmed.

Bach stood still, but didn't look back.

"I'm sorry...sorry, thank you."

He had a lump on one side of his face, where Bach had punched him while cursing him a few minutes ago, and it was this pain that wounded his cheekbones that awakened the conscience hidden deep in the Soviet political commissar's mind.

Victor bent down until Bach left with the injured girl in his arms, but he didn't straighten up right away.

It was he who turned a blind eye to so many atrocities happening before his eyes.

He allowed his men, his countrymen, to do evil.

He has seen many girls like today, raped and brutally tortured to death.

Many, many...and this is just one of the countless crimes the Soviets committed against Berlin.

He has a ridiculous mentality, thinking that he can save himself wisely by not participating in it.

If I hadn't met Bach, if I hadn't seen him saving the child regardless of life and death...

Bach walked out of the classroom, hugging the girl.

After he walked a few steps.

He heard a muffled gunshot behind him.

At that moment, he froze there, the world he lived in began to be shrouded in darkness even the sunlight.

At this time, sadness begins to replace anger.Tears blurred his vision, and the not-so-long corridor in the elementary school became twisted and twisted.

"Victor..."

The man who had spent days with him, saving his own rations to give to the Stalingrad refugees, had...

The little girl in her arms let out a soft cry because of the pain.

Bach didn't dare to stop to delay time, he wept, and took another step to do the only thing he could do right now.