“I’ve got some stories of my own to tell, if you wouldn’t mind listening to them.” chuckled Vasily after downing two shots down his throat.

“We’re all ears old timer!” exclaimed Petya welcoming the initiative. Vasily’s face grew darker and much more somber despite the alcohol’s effects. His experienced eyes, seemed to shine like bright stars, reflecting the dancing tongues of flame, in  contrast to the rest of his rough, leathery face. Vasily took off his old military beret that had become a staple of the man’s day to day appearance years ago. The faded black insignia sewn in by hand onto the light blue material signified a badge of honor that few these days could fully appreciate. It was like any rusting tank, overgrown bunker and shot down jet, so common in the Grey, a symbol of the immense power of what had been the Red Army.

Vasily grimaced, with all the folds of his skin which came with the man’s age rippling for a second like waves on a stormy sea. He opened his mouth, first taking a deep breath and then began.

“It was in the summer of 2005 when NATO forces had pushed us back to the ground just north of Stavropol. We were exhausted, just ten of us had survived out of our whole brigade. I’ve heard rumors all up and down the line that day that they were going to use some new weapon to try and beat them back. I didn’t believe a word of the bullshit, that was of course, until they sent in the choppers to bring us out. At that point the clouds above us, broke with several gunships thundering towards the general direction of the enemy, additionally a number of retrofitted Mi-17s were used to get us out there. Our commander seemed scared out of his mind, he yelled at us to abandon most of our belongings in the trenches, take only the bare bones of our usual kit and some personal belongings and that was it. He wanted us to get out of there fast and rightfully so.”

“As we strapped ourselves into the worn faux leather seats of the chopper, I could see over the shoulders of my comrades the gunships in the distance, Hinds most likely for I cannot remember exactly, rain liquid fire on NATO positions. A single fiery ploom rose out of the ground there, a guided rocket and struck on of the choppers directly in the cockpit, a fireball erupting and vaporizing the flesh of the men inside, ripping through the whole craft. The last thing I saw of those brave boys were them holding them back so we can escape was just several little specs out there on the horizon. Then they slammed the door shut and we were off.”

“We broke the cloud cover and suddenly the sun was shining brightly again, we flew solidly for two hours or so but evidently that wasn’t enough to escape the effective radius of whatever they had used that day. There was a terrible pain in my whole body, I couldn’t hold onto my rifle anymore, and I realized I lost control over my whole body. I couldn’t feel anything anymore, the pain was gone, but there was blood streaming out of my mouth and ears, dripping onto my vest and sleeve. My consciousness fading I looked up to see the man beside me covering his eye sockets with his gloved hands, blood streaming out between his fingers. None were faring any better, some lucky ones were slumped over, being held up just by their straps like scarecrows, dead or unconscious I didn’t yet know.”

“The helicopter then tipped and pitched, finally rolling over, I blacked out.” Vasily stopped, looking deep into the fire, as if looking for something, in the dim glow Scar saw a single tear roll down the veteran’s usually jolly face.

“ I lost many good friends that day. He continued. It was just three of us now, including myself, a youngster, just twenty years old pulled me out of the seat I was still strapped to. Luckily for me, I was sitting in my back to a wall which was torn open as the Mi-17 was going down, leaving me tangled up in some branches feet above the ground. I don’t know how long I would’ve stayed there if it hadn’t been for him. And then it was just the three of us and silence, we were surrounded by woods and fields as far as the eye could see, with the only recognizable landmark being the burnt out wreckage of the chopper and the bodies of the pilot and our seven buddies in there like in some cursed oven.”

“Alone, we began going mad, days passed, we were running out of any sort of food or water. Whatever they unleashed there outside of Stavoropl was beginning to get to us. It came in the form of a rolling fog, of a thick ashen nature and like a tidal wave it came over the land like the flood in Noah’s time. Our makeshift camp that we had time to make amidst a small grove of birches was overtaken by it early in the morning, the last embers of last nights fire snuffed out. I knew what that shit was and I knew it wasn’t any fog, that was the fallout of the the weapon, I pulled my GP-5 over my face and yelled for the others to do the same, I thought they’d do it in time, I hoped. I couldn’t see anything from outside my little lean-to. Like a wall of solid grey manifested by some fairy tail witch from the children’s tales. I lay there in my shelter, still drowsy from the night’s sleep, and I was tired, here I was safe from the overbearing humidity and negative visibility outside, rendering any productive activity useless. I stayed in my shelter  for hours on end. It felt Like I was cut off from the outside world completely, in an isolation chamber or whatever they used to call those things. Here his voice began to get heavy welling up with dread.”

And then the fog, it began to pass, sometime in the early evening and by five it had all cleared out, that’s when I heard it. The noises. They were coming from the shelters of the other two. I went over to see what the commotion was about, and… Vasily visibly shuddered and took a long drink of the brew and then he continued with finality.

“The other man, he’d been second lieutenant Gordyn, he, he was crouched over the body of the youngster, eating him. But he wasn’t even a man anymore, no, he’d changed! Mutated! His face was stretched like a mask and there were things growing out of his back, piercing his torn up uniform leaving bloody patches on his skin, they were like miniature legs of a crustacean, and they were growing right in front of my eyes. The thing that was once the second lieutenant turned its face towards me, looking away from the kids stomach, splayed out, intestines spilling out. When the mist had hit he wasn’t able to slip his mask on in time and now the GP-5 hung lifelessly on his face, leaving exposed both the nose and the bloody mouth. I screamed and fell to the ground as the thing jumped, missing me and tumbling over my head and impacting a tree just behind me. I took the chance to grab my AK-74 and make sure it was loaded. The thing recovered and snarled at me, snot, saliva and partially digested guts mixing together, streaming down the chin. I racked it and just pulled the trigger and kept pressing it down until the magazine was completely empty, watching the cases fly in the warm afternoon. I stood there looking at the thing that had once been by friend, on the ground riddled with bullets, I was shaking, I didn’t know what to do, and I just burned both their bodies, content that the flames should consume them whole in an attempt to erase their existence from the world but also from my young mind.”

“I don’t remember the next two days in anything but a haze as I managed to find my way to nearby road and from there I was picked up by a rogue T-90 and it’s crew. I remember asking them where I was to which they replied we were on the roads between Samara and Ufa. I asked them what they were doing this far east, has the enemy reached this deep into the motherland? Grimly I was told that there wasn’t an enemy anymore, nor much of the motherland left, the war was over, just not in the way we expected it to be. I fell back into a comatose like state, a body’s automatic response to severe trauma and a lack of food. I relived that moment, pumping bullet after bullet into that monster, and waking up sweating in the middle of the night. The tankmen, they saved my life, we had managed to loot enough fuel and supplies for us to cross the Urals, but that’s a different story.”

Vasily remained quiet for some time after, and so did Scar and Petya, each mulling over the words of the veteran in their mind, fostering immense newfound respect and empathy for the man. He let several more tears flow down his cheeks but then wiped them down and gulped down some more brew. 

“Well then, let’s not dwell on such things too long. You, there, stalker.” Vasily pointed at Scar with an expression mimicking that of drunk but Scar could see it was nothing but a mask used to hide the painful memories which had been awoken from a deep part of the veteran’s mind and refused to settle back down. Tell us some of your tales we don’t get your kind around these parts often.”

“If you insist,” came Scar’s gravelly voice. “But I doubt that it’ll get any more cheerful.”