A Russian Soldier — Un soldado ruso

A Russian soldier

They had been carried the night before, protected by shadows, to the war zone. Exhausted, he had fallen asleep with his hands resting on the weapon, a proton ejector capable of destroying everything in its path. He missed Moscow, and in that dream, images of his grandfather were superimposed on scenes of war. His grandfather, a young Ukrainian soldier who fought against the special military operation in 2022, met his death in the Donbas, in the same area where he was now. The consequences of that war had been devastating. The intervention of NATO internationalized the conflict and as a consequence, Russia had lost more than half of its territory and the diaspora of the Russian people had turned their cities into ghostly specters. Now, fifty years later, Russia was once again expanding its borders with aggressive attacks that reduced the buildings that had been left standing years before to rubble.

He was startled awake by the explosion of what he thought might be some shell near the old trenches where they protected themselves from enemy fire. None of his companions had heard anything. In fact, they were very quiet. Nor did they hear a voice announcing an imminent attack, and ordering them to leave that trench. His companions remained in it and he climbed to the surface in time to see how a huge ball of fire fell on the trench.

Many years have passed and he still remembers with emotion that voice that saved his life. Maybe his grandfather took care of him and saved his…