"Welcome, we are waiting for you!" - a beautiful thin woman hugs people entering the courtyard of the new school.
We are in the gymnasium of the city of Beslan named after the Heroes of the Special Forces of Russia, and Elena Ganieva, who is meeting the guests, is its director.
Winter is mild, but there are no leaves on the trees, so that old school behind the railway looks at us with black eye sockets of windows. Special forces fighters threw children out of them. Thrown into life from death.
Now the relatives of the soldiers who died during the rescue of children during the 2004 terrorist attack are entering a new gymnasium. The blue and gray eyes of the guests meet with the brown eyes of the owners. Hugs, laughter and smiles: "We have been waiting for you as we are pleased."
- © Ekaterina Vinokurova / RT
Festive red stand “Glory to Russia 2019”. Children’s drawings look from him. On one, a young strong man, Mikhail Kuznetsov, smiles from under his mustache. On September 3, a major of the FSB Vympel special forces covered up children. Terrorists shot at children. They are usually called simply in Beslan - "animals". Kuznetsov was mortally wounded and died on the way to the hospital.
“Watch how your Misha smiles,” the teacher shows the portrait to a stately lady with brown hair. Tatyana Kuznetsova nods. She rarely smiles, says little. Answers questions about her husband briefly, in a military way: "He was reliable, kind."
Unarmed men begin the lineup. The girl commands, minting every word: "To bow to the memory of the fallen". Children take off their berets and kneel.
“We are of the same blood, as they say here. It so happened, such is the life that you and I have become one family. We are grateful to you that you came to Beslan, we understand how difficult it is for you to come here, where your loved ones have stayed forever, ”Ganieva says not on a piece of paper, sometimes her voice trembles.
Elena Ganieva - she was then held hostage. In old school, she was a head teacher and opened a line of first-graders. That line was interrupted by automatic bursts. Ganieva left school on September 3 with her son and surviving students.
“Her whole family was then poisoned”
Those present are smiling and laughing, then wiping away tears. Those who did not leave school that day are also nearby - here is a granite board with the names of the dead students and teachers, broken down by class.
“Most of all, you see, children from the middle classes perished. High school students managed to escape, and many were late for the lineup. And the guys from high school went there with joy, and now - you see, ”says Nadezhda Tsaloeva-Gurieva.
She was held hostage with her three children and 11 “B” class. Her son Boris and daughter Vera died.
“I drove one of my students off the line. He came in red socks, I told him to run home and not appear until this ugliness changes. And then after all we met, I told him: “You now always wear these socks with you like a talisman, they saved you,” the gray-haired Nadezhda says slowly, without a strain, only wipes her eyes.
She gives us a tour of the school museum. One of the halls, of course, is dedicated to the terrorist attack.
“You know, when they say that, they say, we all behaved heroically ... It wasn’t like that,” Nadezhda continues. - Children - yes. You see, boy? (shows in the photo). Such a bully was, and how he supported everyone in the gym. But this boy is still in a dream to me ... But, look, Darima Alikova, a teacher. She was persecuted, some publication wrote that she, the Buryat, brought the terrorists to school, and she escaped. She didn’t run away anywhere, she died at school, until the last time with the children. “Gossip was picked up by other sites, then her whole family was then poisoned, although they wrote a lie about her.”
At some point, several former hostages - teachers and mothers - even forget about the guests and begin to argue among themselves, recalling those events. On the threshold of the hall stands a mannequin in uniform, high, under two meters. The uniform is the same as it was on the dead special forces.
“I could not leave my comrades”
Other halls of the museum are devoted to the history of the school and local history.
“Look, what a Soviet inkstand,“ spill ”- if it is toppled over on its side, ink will not spill out. I myself came to such a first school in Beslan when we moved here. Other children already had ballpoint pens, and I came with an inkwell. Did you also have those in your bags? ” - asks Tsaloeva-Gurieva from guests.
The gray-haired man with a perfect posture nods. This is Evgeny Anatolyevich Pudovkin, the father of the deceased warrant officer of the Vympel Directorate of the FSB Special Purpose Center. Denis Pudovkin was 28 years old. He, along with commander Oleg Ilyin, covered hostages with fire, both were wounded, but decided not to leave the battle. Pudovkin and Ilyin ran to the second floor, where the terrorists, already knowing that they were finished, covered themselves with children, trying to take as many small lives as possible with them. Pudovkin shot one of the militants, but he was mortally wounded.
We all - guests of Beslan and our mother - approach another school, the "old" one. Evgeny Anatolyevich stops at the boarded up doorway: “For some reason, I turned on the program about the assault on the record. And imagine, the recording stopped at the frame where my Denis is standing here against this wall. He was wounded, but he ran, he could not leave his comrades. ”
Denis Pudovkin went to the FSB special forces all his life - he studied at the military-patriotic club, served in the Airborne Forces, worked in the police, then went to the special forces of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the SOBR and finally broke into the elite from the elites.
While the relatives of the dead commandos stand and think about their own, the mothers of the dead children, like 15 years ago, are all trying to understand: how it all happened, who is still most to blame, and most importantly - was it possible to avoid, was it possible reverse the tragedy. They recall that a few days before the terrorist attack in the city, they saw aliens that non-native men in camouflage uniforms and beards smoked on the steps of the school, that they saw green Lada in the streets of the city. They show us the windows of their former apartments: many families of former hostages left to live in Vladikavkaz.
Vaccination against terrorism
We go to the gym - a witness to a three-day hell on earth. They say to me in a whisper that at the place of death of each commando they want to install more memorable signs describing the feat in order to once again show respect for the dead heroes of Beslan. And “Mothers of Beslan” will conduct lectures on the prevention of terrorism here. However, one glance at the brick gym with countless portraits of kids and adults on the walls, with bottles of water, soft toys in the window openings and gaping holes in the walls and floor is enough to feel how the vaccine against terrorism is injected directly into your vein.
Sometimes they begin to recall: “I sat there. Then they threw us away with an explosion, and then we ran. ” They remember their children: either retelling stories from their lives, then recalling their favorite dresses, hairstyles, hairpins, broken knees, first cars, and then telling how they recognized the children. In the morgue. As until the last they hoped that "they identified the girl with a white bow, but mine already had a haircut." As relatives recognized by a piece of boot, by sock. And repeating again and again: "Our children burned alive." Sometimes mothers switch to Ossetian, but a translator is not needed here. You just need to hug, take by the hand. And again, sad brown eyes, and sad blue.
In parting, we are offered to take a soft toy as a keepsake.
“I always, when the children come here, I say: do not be afraid, take the toy from here. They have been lying here for years, we erase them and it hurts to throw them out. After all, people carry it with a pure heart, and toys need to be played. For the children to play in them, ”says the tall and very beautiful Rita Sidakova. Her Alla also died here in the gym. And Rita often comes here to stay with her.
Children from portraits
The Church of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia near the school is almost ready. Over the six months that have passed since the time I came to Beslan with the film crew RT, the work was clearly moving by leaps and bounds. The temple is ready. Golden domes support a low gray sky - today is cloudy.
Inside the temple, work is still underway: the walls are being painted, and in a very unusual manner. In this, despite the very small size, there is a lot of light and air, and all the colors are pastel, delicate. The faces of the Virgin, Jesus Christ, saints are as if they are talking now. And according to the concept of the temple, the walls will be decorated with Beslan versions of ancient icon-painting plots where there are children. One of the murals depicting the path of the righteous to paradise has already been completed. On it, one hand from Christ to paradise goes children with their mothers. And the faces of the children are recognizable - these are children from portraits in the gym. On the other hand from Christ, men go to heaven. Mikhail Kuznetsov with his mustache - in the front row, he is recognizable.
- © Ekaterina Vinokurova / RT
“May I take a psalter from you?” Here, just the letters are large, I have, but with small letters. I read it, opening from anywhere. Where I opened, I read there, ”Rita Sidakova asks the icon painters. They nod: for that, here the books lie.
The last event today takes place in Beslan school number 8 and is called "Not sparing life for children." Both children and adults are present at it, and relatives of special forces are honored guests. The event is held on a presidential grant. Participants take turns talking about what it means to be a defender of the Fatherland. And, of course, about your loved ones.
“Our task now is to help all of us who need treatment, financial assistance, and find work. And to preserve the memory of what happened, about our children, ”says Susanna Dudieva, strict and majestic, then smiling and quick. Like everyone else, she calls the spetsnaz relatives a family.
“Some people may tell you that we blame your loved ones and their comrades for the death of our children. It is not true. Your relatives died saving our children. We have questions for the leaders ... And the guys are heroes. For us, they are all the heroes of Beslan and the Heroes of Russia, ”says Aneta Gadieva. Aneta has incredible eyes, sparkling, then, on the contrary, darkening.
And here is the sister of Oleg Loskov, an employee of the Alpha Directorate of the FSB special forces. Loskov died fighting four “beasts” trying to escape from school, hiding behind hostages. He died, like his comrades, covering himself with children.
“He always wanted to be a military man. I wanted to go to a police school, then I got into the special forces of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. But everything wanted more and more. And, finally, he got into Alpha, recalls the blond-haired Natalya.
Like everyone else, Natalia speaks a bit abruptly, avoiding high-flown words. Just says.
Defenders of the Fatherland Day in Beslan is not at all like similar festive events, where much more pathosful declarations of love for the Motherland are heard, where an orchestra plays, where they shine with gold and diamonds, expensive accessories walk on red carpet. Everything is at home here. You dream of putting pompous events in the player in your head on accelerated mode, because they are unbearably boring, and here a small life passes.
In addition to the families of the dead military, there are also families of the dead civilians: when the assault began, the Beslan men ran to the gym to get the children out of hell, and some remained there forever. They say "thank you" to those who provided medical care, and helped all these years.
Between performances show a video with photos of the dead. The hall rises without reminders or requests. Everyone wipes away tears that they don’t even try to hide.
In one of the breaks, students of the eighth school should read a poem, but one girl stumbles. They tell her, but this does not help: tears interfere with speaking. No one laughs, no one swears. Finally, the little artist speaks her quatrains and passes the word to another student. The voices tremble with everyone, but in the end, these brittle, angry voices are remembered more strongly than if they were read in a complex and with a proper stage expression.
At the very end, the floor is given to the former hostages. They are already twenty-five.
“Please excuse us that your loved ones died protecting us,” the girls just say.
Lump in the throat. The answer "there is nothing to apologize for, you are not to blame for anything" does not make sense to say out loud, and it already sounds loud in the ensuing silence.
After the event - again, smiles and laughter, news exchange, then tears and memories. And yet - again, love for departed children and loved ones.
“When was the first anniversary of the death of Denis, I was even discouraged from going to Beslan. They said: “They hate you there,” recalls Yevgeny Pudovkin. - And now I go here every year. And not just because I can’t refuse them. I see how they love us here, how they respect us. ”
One blood. One family. So it happened.