I step into the cold, cramped storage room that I call home, where plumes of dust splash up and cover my vision the moment I open the door. The surrounding space is quiet, too quiet. The only sounds are the rustling of my clothes and the water flowing from a pipe attached to the ceiling, running over my head.

If only I were a passerby, appreciating the beauty of this calmness and not an exhausted soldier looking for a livable place to stay.

I place the unconscious man lying next to a gigantic mountain of junk, one of many that take up about half the room. In such piles are heaters, incompatible rifle parts, a rundown sofa in the corner, empty crates, and all sorts of crap lumped together. So much trash, so few uses. There isn’t even a bed—at least not one that isn’t broken into twenty pieces.

Not enough to survive the winter. The niveous, everlasting, subzero Russian winter.

In our little fort, isolated in the middle of Western Russia, there’s not enough space for all two hundred of us to sleep. The most fortunate gets actual sleeping quarters inside the complex. The least fortunate spends the night in underground bunkers deep beneath the trench, and after about a week, they rotate sleeping space with the reserves above ground. And then there’s me, a designated sniper, transferred over to a storage room. Still way better than moldy air and worms under your bed.

I only have seven days left.

I let out a sigh as the thoughts flash into my mind. Ah shit, here we go again. Another inner countdown challenges my will. No notice. No warning. It just shows up and occupies a piece of my brain. I’ve tried, and dear Great Tsar of Russia, how hard I’ve tried to break the habit, but I can’t help but count the days whenever something monumental is expected to happen.

I grab piece of bread on the passably sanitary bookshelf, take out a cigarette from my jacket, and light it up as I stare at deep circular dents on the wall. Sobranie Classic—the highest quality crap this pit hole can supply. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve risen from the dead out there just to acquire this disgusting piece of portable lung cancer. That alone speaks volumes to how valuable this little shit is. Lung cancer? Fuck lung cancer. If we are going to die anyway, at least I’m going out puffing and swinging.

I would share it with my first and only buddy here, Roman, but unfortunately, he isn’t here today. The guy isn’t here at all anymore.

He died this morning. A bullet lodged straight into his neck, and Roman collapsed within seconds. His blood sprayed out like a geyser, etching onto the snow, a patchy, crimson red.

Poor guy. He was an unwavering optimist who always cracked up at the worst jokes possible. And, for some reason, he could not stop talking about how all of us would miraculously walk away from this mess in one piece.

Then he died.

I’m a sniper. I have no business under the trenches. The only reason I was there was to keep him alive. And I’ve failed.

Fuck. I should’ve never gotten close to him. Or anyone. We are going to be buried in grenades and bullets, anyway. If I ever happen to be in the middle of a bombardment, I’ll just think of it as a light shower, since my senses will be numb in no time. But with friends, things aren’t so straightforward. The problem is when I start to care about someone, I’ll spend time submerging myself in memories of them when they die. And they will.

I never asked to be produced, but I was produced anyway. I’ve murdered enough people to understand there’s no prize for the survivor.

I don’t want to keep caring. I’m a glitch; a faulty clone, one with a messed up emotional gene sequence. I should’ve just done what I was designed to do—turn off my brain and slaughter. I don’t know if our creators take pleasure out of our suffering. Why make me a killing machine and curse me with grief at the same time?

We soldiers are nothing but pawns, professionally-trained, emotionally bereaved pieces of scrap with guns strapped to our hands, running around like headless chickens and opening fire on those similar to us on the other side of the frontline. Oh, dear Great Russia, I can’t understand the young guns. They’ll barge out like their lives are nothing but garbage, they will shout “For the Supreme Leader!” from the bottom of their lungs, and they will clasp their hands onto yours as they fall, begging you to win the war for us.

The man’s still lying with his legs sprawling over the lacy straps on the sides of his peculiar clothing. I had the pleasure to meet a couple of people from Tiksi a few years back. The Northern Russians are quite a bunch—tough heads, huge muscles, thick skins. They take baths in ice cubes for fun. But that’s beside the point. Most of them skinned polar bears and made cloaks out of them, so when the wind glided through, their cloaks would look both furry and puffy at the same time. And I thought that was the most stunning of outfits. But this is just. . . on another level. It’s probably made of that delicate silk the Chinese smuggle over for the V.I.Ps or Camp C entertainers.

He’s still breathing the last time I checked. Should I wake him up?

Why did I even bring him back here? I’m so damn screwed if Dzyuba finds out about this. It’s like a little voice in the back of my head pushed me to do so. Maybe the spirit of Roman crept inside my brain.

That seems like something he would do. Maybe Roman would have a better shot at dealing with this intruder when he eventually wakes up. At least the guy knows how to make someone talk without scaring them to death.

Fuck, Roman. What would you do in this situation?

I take a puff from my cigarette before coughing. Stifling my cough, I lean on the cement wall and breathe with a grimace. “Shit, fucking cig clogging my windpipe,” I gurgle, then take another puff.

I used to quit smoking once the scent of cigarettes got too heavy, but that was way back. You realize you’ve smoked too much when tobacco smells like the scented-freaking-candle in the corner of General Kuznetsov’s office.

But I’m not stopping. Not today.

I bury a cigarette under my feet. Then another five minutes later. Then another five minutes. Then I fucking cough again.

Nothing is going right today.

“Damn it. Damn it, damn it, DAMN IT!”

Before I know it, I’ve already thrown a punch at the wall, leaving another dent the size of my fist. Normally, I’d watch out to not leave too big a hole. But nobody’s in here, anyway.

I make another dent. Then another. Then another. But it’s not enough. It’s nowhere near enough. I’m so angry. Why, oh why, am I so angry? I throw the cigarette butt onto the ground, stomping on it repeatedly until the image of Roman collapsing onto the snow is temporarily buried under the soles of my shoes.

But it’ll return soon, and when it does, he will haunt me for the rest of time.

I slap on my own cheek to flush the puddle of memories out of my head. I don’t know why I can remember every single word he said. My memory is one of particular sparsity. I’m used to suddenly recalling trivial matters in vivid detail, but try as I may, I can’t remember anything happening to me from four years ago and back. My brain is like a reformatted computer in that sense: you have to delete old data to make room.

It makes sense. Why would a clone like me need memories anyway? They serve as nothing but hindrances, dragging us back into their puddle of frailty.

Roman’s voice resurfaces; his words replay inside my head like a voice recorder without a pause button.

“What ya gonna do when we see the Supreme Leader? I bet he’s gonna give us those shiny gold medals! I’d love to have one hanging on the walls of my room! Oh wait, then I gotta get myself into my own room first . . . You reckon when we’re gonna be granted our accommodations, Alexei? About time we got something, ‘ya think? We’ve been fighting for years now.”

I knew he would die. I knew he would die! Then, why did I let those words get to me again? Alexei, foolish Alexei . . . No way he could’ve escaped death. I could’ve done nothing, anyway. Damn you, Roman, you chirpy bastard! Why didn’t you just shut the hell up and talk a little less?

I stiffen with regret and bury my face in my palms. Enough is enough. I can’t mourn him. Mourning is for the weak. I can’t be weak.

I could’ve saved him . . . No, I couldn’t have! He was bound to die . . . But . . . but what if . . .

“GET OUT OF MY HEAD!” I bang my fists against my temples, barking out the words. Where’s that book? Where’s that damned book?

I ransack my bookshelf for it. The book’s tattered beyond saving, and perhaps the only thing keeping it from being ravaged by termites is the unnerving chill of this storage room.

The book is called Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. From what I understand, it’s some sort of love story between a man and a ‘woman.’

The upside of being a hitman. The majority of books I brought with me are from looting from public libraries or private studies of high-class targets from my previous missions. No lowlife should be literate, let alone have access to reading materials. I’ve risked blowing my cover smuggling so many books inside the fort, but keeping myself sane was worth the risk.

But I only had so much material to chew through.

Just when I thought I had nothing else to do besides smoking and waiting for the sun to come up again, I found Tolstoy’s creation clamped between two bigger books. Since then, I’ve used every second I could afford to lie down on the book. I’ve never been anything close to an avid reader, so the thought that one day an assortment of senseless letters was the only thing holding my soul alive was beyond my wildest imaginations.

Nevertheless, it happened. I’ve held on to my will to live by clinging to the idea of entities I’m not sure even existed.

Women.

Gentle creatures in mythologies with smooth, high-pitched voices, and protruding meat sacks on their chest called breasts that are somewhat like saggy nipples on obese dudes. Some were fond of growing their hair out and flapping their dragon-like wings. Some were warlike, cascading destruction upon ancient kingdoms with their fiery breath. But most were good-natured. They dwelled in sadness; they shed tears losing their loved ones. Soft as hell, as I’d like to call it.

One book described women with humps behind their backs, so they’d always have to bend down while walking like chimpanzees. There were ones saying that when men dared to trigger their anger, women would grow both wings and beaks similar to those of falcons. There were heaps more. X-ray vision, scrawny paws, hissing voices resembling snakes, metallic skin . . . And every book has its own version, so I don’t know what to believe.

The mythology I read that day claims that these creatures were responsible for producing men and women for our next generations, but I find that unbelievable. We’ve been producing men asexually for as long as I can remember. From ‘artificial embryos made from human stem cells’ to be exact, whatever that means. Assuming women are real, I suspect whoever created men could’ve been able to create them as well if they tried. But then where are the women? Where did they go? Have they gone extinct like dinosaurs, or have they migrated somewhere? Why do I know absolutely nothing about a species responsible for the recreation of mankind?

But the proof is here, right in my hands. There are far too many ancient texts involving women for it to be a coincidence.

Anna Karenina rattles on my shaky fingers. I was supposed to show Roman this book tomorrow. He was supposed to give me his opinion about it, and I was supposed to mock him for his ridiculous hypotheses.

None of that can happen anymore.

Who needs him? Who needs him, right? I was surviving just fine before I met him, and I will survive fine without him! I’ll read this book myself! I’ll read every single word of it today! Who needs him? Who needs him . . .

I flip over the pages like my life depends on it, trying to find where I’ve read up to.

I’ve only read a little bit. It’s about women. It’s about romance. Things I don’t understand. Things no one understands. Love is like some sort of circumspectly encrypted code, after all.

But I still keep on. The best thing about the unfathomable has always been the process of figuring it out, anyway. Maybe it is because of human curiosity, or maybe it is the satisfaction you gain when you think you actually understand something. Whatever the reason, I read. I ponder. I have questions. I need answers.

Why did Anna Karenina have to catch the earliest train to get away from Alexei Vronsky? Why did she feel guilty because she ‘fell in love’ with him? While it was true Anna had a ‘husband’ already when she met Alexei, why did it matter? Wasn’t it that if there was ‘love,’ nothing else would have mattered?

My conclusion is that love is bullshit. It’s bullshit, but it’s all that matters. I have no clue why Anna had to run if she was ‘in love’ with the guy, and that is why I must keep this book. That is why I must continue reading. Right now.

But just as I turn the pages, soft, clattering sounds ring out from the corner of the room. I put the book down and turn around and see a cylindrical canister rolling away from the trash pile and towards me. Then comes swift and subdued noises from another corner.

“Like that diversion is gonna work.” I sigh. “Don’t sneak away.”