Elena is a student in Minsk. She is having an intense but self-destructive love affair with Viktor. When Elena's father goes to prison she has to take charge of his business dealings to help him. She drives repeatedly into the restricted zone at Chernobyl, behind the wheel of a truck, in order to smuggle contaminated steel. The conflicts with Viktor escalate, and Elena is increasingly captivated by the zone's deceptive beauty...
West Belarus, October 1944. The German command is trying to prevent Soviet troops from entering East Prussia. In order to exclude the leakage of information about their plans, the Nazis use a new code, which is to be solved by Soviet radio operators. This is the task that Major-General Zharov and his subordinates receive. To protect the scouts ordered to a group of Captain Belov, which has already once saved the general from the attack of the German landing force.
The location is the Belarusian forests, close to the Polish border, during Operation Bagration in the summer of 1944. The Red Army is preparing to advance, but on one segment of the front there are two serious obstacles: an unnamed hill, and a highly skilled German sniper. The local commander, Major Inozemtsev, suspects that the hill is a trap.
