In Grozny itself, a very funny episode occurred—I was arrested.

"Go on, head to the dairy factory, the headquarters is there. And I'm going to 'Severny'," Yura Proshchelygin told me.

I ran (yes, that's exactly what happened, because there was gunfire all around) to another car — a repair van, in which I drove, unnoticed by the guards, onto the territory of the dairy factory.

It was dark and muddy.

"What are you doing here? How did you get here?" asked an unshaven man from whom I tried to find out how to get to headquarters.

I stated who I was and where I was from.

"I recognize you," he said angrily. "I'm asking you, how did you get here?"

I began to explain that I came with Proshchelygin, that he had gone to "Severny," and sent me here, that he could be contacted and would explain everything.

"I don't know any Proshchelygin. How did you end up on military base territory? God knows what's going on!" grumbled the unshaven man, who turned out to be the deputy chief of staff.

I was handed over—for identity verification and to see if I was a Dudayev spy—to the custody of a guy from the Moscow RUBOР.

We chatted peacefully to the crackling of logs in the stove (just like in some childhood movie), recalling mutual acquaintances. It was then that he told me he didn't understand why he had been sent there: what kind of criminals could be caught when there was gunfire all around?

About two hours later, everything finally cleared up, and through several flights of stairs down, illuminating the steps with a flashlight, I was led into a deep basement.

Beds in two rows, a long table, a map on the wall...

The ascetic dinner struck me—not a drop of vodka. "Wow," I thought, "these guys are something! That's what war means!"

(How, two months later, I laughed at myself and the situation I found myself in. Colonel Lesha Pokrovsky—the very one who arrested me—came to the editorial office and recounted how they all wished I would finally leave. "The general told us then: 'Just try to drink! He'll write about it!'" Poor guys!)

I was given (a guest, after all) a separate room to sleep in. Legendary Vityaz commander Hero of Russia Lysyuk and three others slept there.

In the middle of the night, the radio crackled: an observer reported that suspicious Zhigulis were circling near the dairy factory.

"Go on... Just be careful..." Lysyuk told his deputy.

He dressed like an astronaut: helmet, body armor, and some other various, incomprehensible SOBR gear.

"If anything happens, tell the SOBR guys to hit him," Lysyuk instructed him.

He returned half an hour later. No one slept until he returned.

In the morning, I met Colonel Yuri Zaitsev, commander of the West Siberian SOBR, and his men.

When I persuaded him to let them take me with them in their APC, they offered me camouflage and a "sphere," that is, a helmet. I refused: no, I'm a civilian. I did, however, put on a bulletproof vest.

Naturally, I also refused to take a rifle: if, God forbid, something happened, a person found killed with a rifle, not a dictaphone, could no longer be considered a journalist. Even posthumously.

Well, and then there was that predicament I wrote about in the article.

When we returned, the guys asked to take a picture together.

I was surprised when, some time later, I received a package of photographs from Novosibirsk. On one, I found a touching inscription:

"To Yuri Shchekochikhin, in remembrance, as a token of appreciation for his contribution to building a rule-of-law state. SOBR West Siberian RUOP."

Generally, I'm glad that life brought me together with the SOBR guys. Probably because life constantly put them in dangerous situations, and life itself constantly showed them its dark and dirty side, they exuded a strength—not ostentatious, loud, and arrogant, but calm, genuine—that binds our fragile existence and instills a sense of reliability.