The Inguri River forms a natural border dividing Georgia from Abkhazia. One of the spring floods has created a little island in the middle of the river, as if made for the cultivation of corn. At least, this is the belief of an old peasant, whose sunburned face resembles the landscape he has trodden for dozens of years.
The Great Silk Road is the name for a mountain trade route now identifiable only by train tracks; it is on these tracks that our film finds four children at play, not far from their Kirghizstan village. A train meanders down the mountain and, following an argument, an artist is unceremoniously thrown-off a carriage and (so) eventually encounters the children.
Young guys from different social strata, some of whom have a criminal past, are called up to the airborne troops. Sergeant Alexey Burov (Alexey Serebryakov) was appointed commander of a platoon of recruits. It is he who instills in inexperienced "sons" the skills of hand-to-hand combat, mutual assistance and army savvy in the ongoing exercises. And now the day of baptism of fire has come. A unit of paratroopers receives an order to help border guards neutralize a large gang of drug traffickers trying to illegally cross the border...
