““Somewhere nearby, artillery thundered. Vast fields — flat as a table, without a single tree — turned any moving figure into an easy target against the monotonous landscape, drawing German pilots toward whatever appeared below. Twice already, the exhausted and terrified prisoners were strafed by Junkers aircraft returning from their missions, deciding to use up their remaining ammunition. At the command of the group leader — a State Security lieutenant — everyone scattered in all directions. Yet despite this, nearly twenty people, including soldiers, were killed by the bullets of the German vultures. Roughly the same number were executed by the guards themselves. Anyone seriously wounded, anyone unable to keep walking, was shot on the spot. — Volodymyr Shablia, Stone. Book One Context note: During the first weeks of the German–Soviet War in 1941, prisoners and soldiers are driven across the open steppe. Caught between German air attacks and Soviet security forces, the weak and wounded are systematically eliminated. The scene exposes the brutal logic of total war on the Eastern Front.””
