The work continued, despite the annoying fly’s buzzing around me. The guys were finalizing the required lists, and I was proceeding with putting the last pieces of tushonka into the porridge.

In a few moments the entire camp was filled with the yummy smell, making the tired soldiers wander in, like wasps drawn to freshly grilled meat.

“Aga? Kak rabotat’ – tak h* vam, a kak zhrat’ – vi tut kak tut.” [Yeah? When it comes to work, then f* you, and when it comes to eating, then here you are.]

“Have some conscience! We didn’t eat proper tushonka since… Well, as for me – since the Second Chechen [campaign].” (O)

“Fine, I’ll show some lenience. But only this once, and only because that boy only ate canned soy meat.”

“Thanks for the food!” (J)

The entire crew sat together to savor some good food. But after those two finished the first portion, the hands that stretched towards the pot got an expected hit with a spoon.

“No seconds until I get the reports. And you better hurry, or it will cool down.” When they started limping back to the tank, I heard something coming from their direction.

‘We are lucky she has a small stomach…’

“I may have a small stomach, but should you fail to hurry – be sure your food will disappear!”

Jester’s POV

The last thing I needed to do was to check the concentricity of the gun sight. I already cranked the gun to 0° elevation, so it would only be the sight that could’ve been knocked out.

Those pieces of s* poked every single thing that was not made of metal, and sometimes I couldn’t tell at the first glance whether a device was damaged or not, making me check everything first from the outside, and then climb back in to check everything from inside.

This ungrateful work was already done and I already knew that the sight is cracked. It was 100% sure to be replaced, but I needed to first make sure its mount was not affected in any way. Like, due to some dumb luck a sword managed to sooomehow misalign the sight.

After confirming that at least this much was fine, I was done with my report.

“Fuuuh…! Sitting in there the entire day is one thing, but crawling around the entire day…!” I lied down on the turret roof and stared at Old man checking the tension of the tracks.

“Terpi kazak – atamanom stanesh.” ["Endure it Cossack and you will become an Ataman." Meaning, to become someone great you need to endure everything] (O)

“I’m bearing with it, dude! It’s just me getting tired of all the f*ing around with the gun.” I knocked the roof, and rested my head on the arms.

“My boy, are you sure YOU enlisted yourself for contract service in TANK troops?” (O)

“Ha-ha… Well, tanks are cool. Were cool.”

“Lyubish katatsya… [lyubi I sanochki vozit’.]” [If you love to ride sled, then love to drag it] (O)

“I like it, can’t you see?” Especially that part when we had an hour of fun every week, costing us 6 days 23 hours of suffering for it. I liked the most having to clean the tank after Old man drives through mud, all while I was sitting in the tank only to occasionally hit metal parts with my head.

Old man chuckled and we returned to wrapping everything up.

When I got out of the turret completely and closed the hatch, I started hearing a noise from behind the forest.

“The hell is this?” The noise was growing louder, as if it was approaching.

“A helicopter?” (O)

What appeared to be a distant rumbling soon became the distinct sound of a helicopter flying.

It didn’t take long for the helicopter to arrive. I identified it from the first glance. It was another Mi-26.

It landed nearby, surely to Captain’s great displeasure.

By the time we arrived to the helicopter, she was already there, opening the cargo doors with the Makarov in her hands.

“What happened…?” I stopped myself from saying ‘now’ in the end. Her face was already distorted, meaning that the last thing we’d want is standing close to an ape with a handgun.

“That f*ing w*son welded the side doors. I have a very bad feeling that this one is mutilated too.” Her little fists clenched, making the plastic parts of the grip creak.

“You’ve got quite a strength in hands.” I chuckled.

“Jester.” But she just had to glare.

“You better hope I won’t find anything for you to grab on. You too need to train your grip…” I gulped. But before she could proceed with the execution, the doors finished opening and we saw what was inside.

The next moment after she glanced there, her head robotically turned towards us and she pointed inside with a shaking hand.