On Sunday, 22 June 1941, Anna and Niki woke to shouting in the building. "The Germans have attacked! The Germans have attacked!" The radio reported the attack and said that the Red Army was fighting valiantly but with no more details.
On Tuesday all the workers gathered in the main factory building to hear Comrade Biebler, Elena's father, give a speech. At the end of the speech, he asked for volunteers from all men under forty. They would leave immediately for the front. They couldn't even go home. Anna was lucky to have five minutes with Niki before he left.
***
By the following Thursday German tanks were driving through the main square. The Red Army had abandoned the city so there was no fighting which was a blessing. The next morning everyone went to work as usual.
About mid-afternoon on Friday the workers were again gathered for a speech. This time it was given by a German. He explained how the workers were free now to follow their hopes. There would be no more diktats from Moscow. At the end of the speech six of the local Party commissars were brought on to the platform with the speaker. Comrade Biebler was one of the six. The speaker drew his pistol and walked behind the commissars. Then he shot each one in the back of the head.
Anna couldn't go back to work. She told her supervisor that she was feeling ill. The Germans were so cruel. Where was Niki? Had they shot him, too? She was crying by the time she got back to their apartment. Would it ever be their apartment again? When she opened the door, she jumped back and screamed. A strange, dirty, bedraggled man was on her couch.
"Anna, don't you recognize me?"
Anna looked closer. She screamed again. This time in joy. "Niki!" She flung her body across his. Anna cried for several minutes, her body shaking as all the pent up fear flowed out. Finally, she calmed down. She noticed that Niki's legs were bandaged. She could see bloody splotches on the white gauze.
"My god, you're hurt! What happened? Who did this? How did you get back here?"
"Slow down. I'm alright," he replied soothingly. "Let me tell you what happened."
***
Niki and the others had been loaded on to trucks at the factory gate. Slowly the trucks had driven about four hours west before stopping and unloading the workers. Niki and four others were taken about fifty meters into the woods and handed shovels. A sergeant told them where and how to dig trenches and went off to another group. It was hard work, but everyone worked together. Niki even remarked how he hoped they'd get some rifles to fight the Germans. He jumped to the top of the trench and pretended his shovel was a rifle.
By early evening they had finished digging about thirty meters of trench. They were beginning to work on what the sergeant called fire steps and machine gun emplacements when troops began to arrive. The troops were bedraggled and several of them were wounded. Niki particularly noticed a young boy who couldn't have been more than 17 or 18. He had a bandage around his left forearm and looked very scared.
"We don't have any chow and we won't have trucks to take you to the next position until tomorrow morning," the sergeant told them. "If a comrade needs your help, do what you can. Otherwise, find a soft piece of ground and bed down for the night. We'll get you off in the morning."
The soldiers began organizing in the trench. Setting up two machine guns and spacing themselves along the length of the earthworks, they acted like they expected the Germans any minute, but nothing happened.
Niki didn't sleep well. The ground was hard and despite it being summer it was cool in the woods. No food showed up for breakfast, nor trucks either. About half an hour after sunrise, Niki heard vehicles on the road.
"Get into the trench," the sergeant yelled at the factory workers.
They jumped down into the bottom while the soldiers lay against the mounds of earth that had been thrown up from the digging. Niki was at one end so by leaning out a little he was able to see what was happening.
A truck drove down the road. "Hold steady, comrades," the sergeant said. Don't fire yet."
But one of the machine guns opened up and immediately everyone else joined in. The racket was terrific. It was ten times worse than being in the factory's machine shop at mid-morning. Niki saw the Germans jumping out of the truck. A couple fell down, but most of them got into the roadside ditch and returned fire. The German bullets made a peculiar crack as they passed overhead. Niki heard some hit the trees nearby, but none of the Russian soldiers seemed affected. The German truck started to burn.
The firing died down to an occasional shot from either side. Then suddenly the tanks showed up. They were squat, ugly things moving slowly, but they turned directly toward the trench. Niki could clearly see the flashes from the machine gun in one turret and then the other one fired its gun. The shell exploded way up in the tree tops and splinters and light debris fell on them.
Even though no one had been hurt, Niki saw the young boy jump out of the trench. The sergeant saw him, too, and went after him. In four or five strides he caught him by the collar. Pulling him around he began to push him back to the trench. Suddenly a flash of light was followed by a loud boom and clods of earth were thrown over everyone. When Niki looked back up, he couldn't tell that two people had once been where the smoke was. Then he saw four boots scattered about a pile of white-red flesh. Although he hadn't eaten in almost a day, he leaned over in the trench with dry heaves.
When his stomach quit flopping around, he looked out again. The tanks were halfway to the trees. Their machine guns were flashing brighter. A shell from a tank hit the other end of the trench and destroyed one of the Russian machine guns while killing several soldiers. A bright flash hit Niki's eyes and then darkness.
When Niki came to he was lying on his stomach. He could hear voices nearby, but couldn't make out anything. A soldier moaned in the trench. Niki looked around and saw a uniform moving. He started to rise to go to the man, but pain shot through his legs.
Rolling to his back, Niki looked down. He saw several pieces of metal sticking out of his thighs and shins. There were splinters of wood piercing his trousers. His head hurt also. He probed gently and felt his hair matted with blood. He heard the soldier moan once more. Using his heels to push, he slid on his back toward the sound.
When he got to the man, he could see that he had a large gash in his side although the bleeding was mostly stopped. "You doing okay?" Niki asked.
The man moaned again, and then his eyes fluttered open. "Side hurts like hell," he replied.
"I guess so. You got a bandage?"
"Look in the pouch on my back."
Niki reached in and pulled out a wad of gauze and cotton. The voices began to move closer. Niki could tell now that they were German and he caught a few words from his four years instruction in school.
"I'll get those fascist bastards," the soldier growled and reached for a rifle lying beside him.
