An operation was performed – fingers were cut off. I was conscious. They probably operated without anesthesia, I felt my fingers being cut with a crunch. I was losing a lot of blood, and the doctors were afraid that I would not survive anesthesia.
The analgesic injection didn't really work, and when they pressed something hard on my bone, I couldn't stand it and started swearing at the top of my voice in Uzbek. "My son, my son, calm down", – someone said. It just spurred me on. Why calm down now. Silence and complacency have already done their job, brought them to the last line!
Probably, blindness from birth is not as terrible for a person as for a sighted person who went blind in an instant. I want to tear to pieces all those who invented, created these mines, grenades, shells, everything—everything that cripples, kills. May they be cursed forever…
I do not remember much of it. I remember drinking compote through a hose, my mouth probably wouldn't open. My heart ached when I thought about my parents. Mom would have the hardest time of all… After getting a little stronger, I got out of bed and groped in the direction from which the cold air was blowing. I was told that our ward is on the third floor.
"Don't mention it with a vengeance", – I whispered to my family. I mentally hugged and kissed my mother. I groped for the window and put my foot on something. I found out that it was a bedside table. It fell. Someone grabbed my hands tightly:
– What are you doing, everything is still ahead, – he said, trying to calm me down.
– What is ahead? – I shouted desperately. Almost crying, he said, pleading in his voice: "Please, let me put you in your place".
From the tension, blood rushed to my head, and everything around me began to spin. I have lost consciousness. For the next two weeks, I was only put to sleep with injections.
Once, I asked the nurse who gave me an injection:
– Do I have eyes?
– Yes, yes, there is one, but we don't know about the second one yet, – she replied.
It says that it's not customary for doctors to say that. But she, at least to calm me down, did not even say that everything would be fine. I felt very hurt. Out of frustration, I started kicking. Together, they gave me an injection. I fell asleep…
I was having a dream. And every time I try to squeeze something tightly with my wounded hand. Then I wake up and remember that I have no fingers. I want to take a look and try to open my eyelids. I don't know if my eyes are open or not. I cry out. People come running to the cry. But no one can help me.
Two months have passed. It seemed as if it was morning, the doctor dropped medicine in my eyes. Suddenly, the total darkness turned into a white fog. Then the outlines of someone's face appeared. Afraid to frighten this vision, I was silent. Then, trying to figure out whether it was in a dream or in reality, I stretched out my surviving hand, touched it. A hand slid over the warm cheek.
After a while, my attending physician flew into the room, hugged me:
"Things will come right now, things will come right" – he kept repeating.
It was my second birthday. I wanted to live again.
My company commander came and said that he had received a letter from my father. "Why don't you make sure that your soldiers send letters home, – my father wrote. – If our son forgot about the house, remind him properly, punish him". I asked him not to write letters to my father.
Gradually, I began to see better, but with one eye. The face, because of gunpowder and shrapnel, has changed beyond recognition.
I will tell you that in these two months, it seemed I had lived for twenty years. I felt much older than my age.
Shortly, after I was admitted to the hospital, my friend Muhammad was also brought there. Neither of us knew that we were lying next to each other. But we were blown up at the same time. We were namesakes. Doctors cut off one of his hands, and he could not see well because of a fragment that got into his eye. Then Muhammad became my closest friend…
At the end of February, I was discharged from the hospital and bought a train ticket. A patrol detained me at the train station. They checked the documents, fooling their heads. It made me laugh. After all, what a state I was in, and they gave me the "charter".
On a crowded train, I got into conversation with a man returning from prison. When he found out what had happened to me, he chose a good place for me in the common car and took care of me all the way to Tashkent. He was a thousand times better than those patrolling the military from the train station… And now I remember him with warmth.
"CHEWED HIS EARS AND SPAT OUT…"
Usli Sagindinov, born in 1969. From Gulistan, Uzbekistan.
He served near Kandahar.
– For two months, we studied at Termez. We were trained to handle military equipment and weapons. Every day the commanders uttered high words about the honor of bearing the name "defender of the motherland." We became sappers. Our first assignment in Kandahar was mining the road the Afghans used to walk on. I could not understand why they are called dushmans, basmachs. After all, they are fighting on their own land. And we are… You won't understand anything. However, why should I bother with politics, there are big people for this.
The senior lieutenant, in addition to four of his experienced guys, took us, two young men who had just started service. It was after midnight when we reached the place. We dug holes, and "the old men" mined.
When we finished, the commander ordered my friend and me to carry the equipment to the car. We walked about 30–40 meters and heard an explosion behind us, rushed to help. But when they ran up, they saw that there was no one to help, only scattered arms, heads, and legs remained. We collected everything, as it was necessary to send them to their homeland.
After this "baptism of fire" we walked around as if distraught, and could not come to ourselves.
Bloody hair, heads, legs with hanging threads of meat, and fingers gathered into a fist for a long time still dreamed and did not give me peace. The commander's head was split in two, and the eye on one side was clear. He haunted me at night. Seemed alive…
Their summers are hot. Therefore, we began the pursuit of the Afghan detachment at dawn. They retreated to the mountains. The first group turned to the village at the foot of the mountain. In pursuit of the detachment, we climbed quite high into the mountains. Finally, the commander gave the order to turn back. But it was too late, it was impossible to do, because we were surrounded. I had to climb higher into the mountains. For five days we held the defense. The helicopter that was sent to our rescue was shot down. There was very little food and ammunition, four out of twenty fighters were killed, and five were seriously wounded. All attempts to save them were in vain. On the sixth day, the Afghans captured five of us. They blindfolded us and drove us somewhere.
We were lying in a corner of a large courtyard. About twenty Afghans, high on hash, got high. Occasionally, we heard the words "bacho, bacho". The healthiest one stood out from their circle, came up to us, and, playing with a knife in his hand, smiling, bent down to a soldier a little away from me. "Bacho, kofur, bacho, kofur," he repeated, and our eyes were riveted on the knife in his hand. The lower he bent, the wider the soldier's blue eyes opened. His head seemed to be pressed into the ground. Suddenly, the big man grabbed his ear with one hand, and, like a petal, cut it off with a knife. A faint groan escaped the soldier's lips, but he did not utter another sound. The big man tossed the ear into the air, caught it and put it in his mouth. I closed my eyes, but somehow I heard this guy chewing with a crunch. When I opened my eyes, I couldn't take my eyes off this terrible sight. There's bloody foam on his lips. It looks like a wolf with a bloody mouth. Red saliva flowed down his chin, and he wrinkled up, as if he had eaten a sour apple and spat it out. Pieces of chewed ear were scattered on the ground. He squeezed his eyes shut and, as if enjoying human blood, stretched sweetly. Then he turned back to the soldier and, like a butcher throwing a bone to a dog, cut off both hands and threw them aside. The severed arms twitched on the ground like fish washed ashore. A stream of scarlet blood sprayed the face of the soldier lying next to him. He squeezed his eyes shut, causing the folds of his eyelids to fill with blood. Blood was still gushing from the executioner's first victim, and he approached the second. For some reason, the soldier lay still. He didn't even move. And the severed ear twitched again in the hands of this vampire. Then he started kicking the soldier. Not a sound in response. Realizing that the soldier was dead, he threw his ear in my direction. Tumbling in the air, the ear hit my lips. It was cold, but I was afraid to even take a deep breath. My eyes followed his every move intently, like a cat watching a mouse.
