We were following the road when I spotted something.

“Stop! Something is going on.” I clearly saw a smoke in front. I would not be surprised, if that was within my expectations.

I returned to the commander’s seat and ordered to move there.

When we were close to the source of smoke I once again ordered to stop and grabbed AKMS.

“Jester, check the comms.” I tried using the portative radio.

“Works fine, what are you going to do?” (J)

I climbed down on the ground and reloaded weapon.

“Jester, follow my instructions! You will command the vehicle in my place!” I went to the smoke pillar on my own.

When I arrived to the edge of the forest we were in, I tried to look around and found that the smoke pillar is rising from behind another group of trees, we will need to cross the opening.

“Jester, do you read me?”

“Loud and clear, go ahead captain!” (J)

“Tell Old man to drive forward to the edge of the forest and wait there. I am crossing an opening, be ready to provide covering fire in case something happens!” After giving those orders, I started to make my way to the other grove.

With small dashes I was moving between bushes and tall grass. Soon I crossed the opening and made my way to its other side.

On the other side of it was a group of wooden houses, a village. Whatever was smoking, it came from there.

“Jester, you can continue moving, everything looks safe. I will meet you near the road.”

The rendezvous was successful and after I climbed onto the turret, we continued towards the village.

Its looks were weird, there are no electric lines, no antennas on the houses. And what is the most important, the village was surrounded by a palisade.

When we got close to a gate which blocked the road I ordered to stop and went there to talk with the locals.

I knocked the gate and shouted.

“Is anybody there? We have lost the other soldiers. Can you please tell us where to go to return to the administration center?”

There was no response but suddenly on top of the gate a male showed up.

“Who are you? We will not let the invaders take our homes! Go away!”

For an unknown reason he was speaking not Russian but… English? That made me surprised but luckily I have studied English in the academy.

“We are not invaders, we are from the Russian military!”

“From what military?! I never heard of such a country! And yet you claim not to be invaders!” He was angered by my response.

I don’t get what is happening. Why he speaks English? Why is this village expecting some invaders? Why he doesn’t know about Russian army? Where the hell are we?

“What is going on?!” Another male shouted from behind the gate.

“It’s just… there is a weird girl who claims to be from some ‘rusan’ army and a weird metal turtle.”

Another person climbed to the gate.

“What do you need, girl?” A very old man asked me with tender voice.

“We were following other soldiers when we got lost. I don’t know where the f* are we, and how we got here. Do you know where the town, Dobrinin is?”

“It is the first time I hear of such a place. Have you as well come to fight our people…?” The elder was very concerned and I hurried to calm them.

“No, we were just training in our homelands, when we got lost, we were following the road but somehow ended up here.” I was doing my best to convince them that we are not the bad guys.

“The let me ask you, child. Have you heard of Gulon?” I would not be surprised if Jester asked some random s*…

“Judging by your reaction you really never heard of them. Oi!!! Open the gate!” Suddenly elder told them to open their gate, just like that.

“Jester, you know what to do.” I waved at the tank and its diesel roared. The villagers were scared by that but didn’t start any aggressive actions.

“Slow and steady! Just do it slow and steady!” I was beckoning them to move towards me.

The villagers were scared of the tank’s metal screeching and clanging. Soon the tank was inside the village and they closed the gate, I asked the villagers to tell where we can park the machine.

They didn’t get what I mean so it took a while to explain.

They immediately understood that even though we are strange people, we are actual soldiers. They were trying their best to not provoke us. We were doing our best not to get in their way. Because we really don’t understand what is happening, we were trying to gather as much information as we can.

While Old man and Jester were watching after the tank, I followed the village’s elder to his house.