Chapter 8 - The Celestial Procession
The wound on Vadim’s thigh had vanished, healed as if it had never existed. The searing pain that had been gnawing at his flesh only moments ago was gone, leaving behind nothing but a strange, hollow void. The orb held by the NK soldier was a thing Vadim had never encountered in all his years. It looked like neither metal nor stone; though it appeared solid, it possessed a subtle, rhythmic quality—as if it were breathing. Yet, Vadim felt no shock. There was no terror, no gasping breath. He was simply so overwhelmed by the sheer impossibility of the moment that his emotions seemed to have frozen in place.
It was only then that the realization struck him: the man standing before him was no ordinary soldier.
As the treatment concluded, the scattered fragments of the orb pulled back together, merging into a perfect sphere once more before settling quietly in the soldier’s palm. The man extended a hand toward him.
"Get up," he said.
Vadim hesitated for a heartbeat before taking the hand. With almost no effort on the man’s part, Vadim felt his body pulled effortlessly to his feet.
In that instant, another detail surfaced: the man spoke Vadim’s native tongue with unsettling fluency, too perfect to be coincidence.
"Vadim. The R-Army is nearby. Your wound is healed now," the soldier continued calmly.
"Ah... yes. But..." Vadim stammered, his voice trailing off before he forced the question out. "Who... who are you?"
The NK soldier tilted his head slightly, as if pondering the question, and a faint, cryptic smile played on his lips.
"Well... I wonder," he said enigmatically. "What you should be curious about isn't who I am, but rather what I have to say."
A question burned in Vadim’s mind:
Before he could even part his lips, the soldier spoke. "Vadim, who I am doesn't matter. And the answer to how such healing is possible? You’ll come to understand that soon enough, quite naturally."
The man took a step closer, his voice dropping to a low, resonant tone. "However, this is what I want to tell you: This 'God' you claim guides you—perhaps you should try experiencing such a being in the flesh for once."
Vadim caught his breath.
“The God who leads the revolutionaries in Block’s poem ‘12’, the one you’re so fond of,” the soldier said, his gaze piercing through Vadim. "Have you ever actually seen that God? Most gods are abstract, aren't they? Merely symbols."
He leaned in slightly. "But tell me. If you were to come face-to-face with something divine, something so vast it overwhelmed your very existence... what choice would you make?"
A heavy silence fell between them.
"Would you become humble? Or... would you become even more arrogant?"
The soldier turned his head away, adding nonchalantly, "Vadim, it’s nearly noon. You’ll experience it soon enough. Oh, and go on outside. There won't be any more fighting. You can relax."
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
Vadim couldn't make sense of any of it. The claim that the "fighting was over" felt particularly absurd. In the end, only one sentence managed to escape his throat.
"Thank you... for healing me."
With a faint, lingering smile in his eyes, the NK soldier turned and stepped out of the shop first.
—--------------------------
Vadim gathered his rifle and jammer, slinging his rucksack over his shoulders before stepping out into the open air. Time had slipped away; the day was already drifting toward noon.
The city sky was impossibly clear. Every trace of cloud had vanished, replaced by a gentle winter sun that bathed the ruins in soft light. Unlike the biting chill of the morning, the air now carried a subtle, lingering warmth.
His feet moved instinctively toward the shopping mall—the site where the drone had spiraled down. He had to recover Maksim’s body.
The soldier's words echoed in his mind. It made no sense, yet a strange, unbidden sense of peace had begun to settle in a corner of his heart.
"Hey, Vadim! Are you alright?" A familiar voice drifted from the distance. It was Andrey and Sergey, part of the squad that had been sweeping the other sectors of the city.
"Andrey…"
When they reached him, Vadim offered only a sparse, clipped explanation of what had just transpired. Without many words, the three of them began the grim task of recovering Maksim’s remains. There was sorrow, yes, but it remained buried beneath their skin. On the battlefield, this was a fate that could belong to any of them.
The armored vehicle eventually crawled out of the city, heading back toward the encampment in silence.
Once inside the barracks, Vadim collapsed onto his cot. He didn’t even bother to pull off his boots or shed his uniform. As his eyes closed, the tension finally broke, escaping his lungs in a long, ragged sigh. Enveloped by a delayed wave of grief, he succumbed to a heavy, dreamless sleep.
"Vadim! Vadim! Hey!"
Andrey’s voice struck his eardrums like a physical blow. He was hovering over the cot, shaking Vadim’s shoulder with frantic energy.
"Kerensky just announced the deployment of mercenaries!"
A mobile phone screen was shoved unceremoniously in front of Vadim’s face.
"Andrey… just leave me alone…"
Vadim’s voice was thick with irritation. Andrey paused, a sheepish look flickering across his face.
"Okay, okay. I got it."
With that, he turned and retreated from the barracks.
—-------------------------------
Vadim drifted into a feverish dream.
In the nightmare, the drone wasn’t diving for Maksim; it was screaming toward him. The explosion tore his world apart, shattering his body into a thousand fragments. Through the haze of the blast, images flickered like a broken film strip: the open-pit mine, Natasha’s face, and then his mother’s. Finally, the cold, inscrutable face of the NK soldier emerged from the dark.
A wet, cold sensation against his cheek snapped him awake.
He bolted upright, eyes wide, only to find Rex—the barracks' mascot—licking his face.
"Ugh... Rex. Get off... I'm exhausted..."
Rex only wagged his tail harder, nudging him persistently. Vadim knew the routine; it was the dog's way of signaling he was hungry or his water bowl was dry.
"Hey, get up! Time for chow!" the canine handler shouted with a chuckle.
The men had gathered for lunch, the atmosphere thick with the usual weary cynicism. Andrey let out a mocking laugh as he ladled food.
"So, Kerensky says he’s deploying the mercenaries at noon today. Can you believe this guy? Haha!"
It was a story they’d heard a hundred times before. No one flinched. No one cared. But in the back of Vadim’s mind, the NK soldier’s voice resonated with chilling clarity:
"Andrey," Vadim asked, his voice tight. "What time is it?"
"Now? Uh... 11:55."
Vadim stepped outside and instinctively looked up. The sky was a flawless, piercing blue, stripped of every cloud. There was no wind—the air felt unnervingly warm for mid-winter, as if the world had skipped straight into the heart of a perfect spring day.
And then—precisely at noon.
A collective gasp rippled through the camp, growing into a frantic roar of confusion.
Vadim stared upward, the breath dying in his throat. Across the vast, endless expanse of the blue, massive crafts held their positions. They were too grand to be called planes, too alien to be mere military hardware. Like celestial monoliths, these starship-like entities were aligned in a perfect, infinite procession across the heavens.
"My God... what is that...?"
As the whispered exclamation escaped him, the NK soldier's words pierced through his consciousness like an arrow:
The question struck home, sharp and undeniable.