Salt on the Tongue

The shattered remains of the farmhouse offered scant shelter, but it was shelter nonetheless. Dusk bled across the bruised sky, painting the skeletal trees in hues of violet and burnt sienna. Inside, the air was a thick tapestry of forgotten lives – dust motes dancing in the fading light, the faint, metallic tang of old blood, and the pervasive, earthy aroma of decay. Anya moved with a practiced quiet, her boots crunching softly on fallen plaster and splintered wood. Her gaze swept over the wreckage, a flicker of something – perhaps recognition, perhaps just a hollow ache – passing through her eyes.

Mykhailo, meanwhile, was already engrossed in the remnants of domesticity. He ran a gloved hand over a water-stained wooden table, the veneer peeling like sunburnt skin. His focus, however, was drawn to a corner, where a hulking shadow lurked beneath a shroud of cobwebs. With deliberate movements, he pulled away the tattered cloth. It was a radio, an antique beast of Bakelite and tarnished brass, its chassis dented, a few tubes missing from their sockets like lost teeth. A hand-crank generator was still attached, a hopeful flourish of metal.

"Look," he said, his voice a low rumble, devoid of his usual clipped precision, tinged instead with a quiet wonder. He knelt, brushing away years of accumulated grime with a reverence that surprised even himself. He traced the etched lettering on a dial: “Marconi.”

Anya approached, the seed pouch clutched protectively within her worn jacket. The radio was a relic, a tangible link to a world that felt impossibly distant. “A shortwave?” she murmured, her voice husky.

“Precisely,” Mykhailo confirmed, already pulling a small, multi-tool from his satchel. “And with a hand-crank. If the core components are intact, we might have a chance.” His fingers, usually so adept at manipulating the delicate nuances of language, now moved with a different kind of focus. He began to meticulously clean the contacts, his brow furrowed in concentration. Each turn of a tiny screwdriver, each careful wipe of a lint-free cloth, felt like an act of resurrection. The rust flaked away, revealing gleaming metal beneath. He peered into the dark recesses, his gaze sharp, analytical.

“The wiring,” he muttered, more to himself than to Anya, “looks… surprisingly sound. Some insulation is brittle, of course, but the conductive elements seem to have survived the damp.” He retrieved a small vial of contact cleaner from his kit, its sharp, chemical scent cutting through the mustiness. He applied it sparingly, then began to gently work the hand crank. A faint, almost imperceptible whine emanated from the speaker, a ghost of sound.

Anya watched him, a strange mix of apprehension and fierce hope blooming in her chest. This wasn't a theoretical exercise; this was survival. The silence of the occupied territories was a suffocating blanket, and the need for a voice, any voice, was a gnawing hunger. She imagined the crackle of static, the distant murmur of voices, a connection to something beyond the immediate, crushing reality.

Mykhailo extracted a small, magnifying glass, its metal frame cool against his skin. He examined a capacitor, then a series of resistors, his lips moving silently as he cross-referenced some internal catalog of knowledge. The precise, almost academic way he approached the task was grounding. It was a familiar rhythm, a pattern of problem-solving that bypassed the fog of his fractured memories.

“If we can bypass the standard receiver frequencies,” he mused aloud, his voice gaining a subtle confidence, “and tune directly to a narrow band… it’s inefficient, but potentially more secure. Less likely to be monitored by broad-spectrum sweeps.” He tapped a finger against the Bakelite casing. “The trick will be the antenna. We’ll need to improvise something robust, something that won’t draw too much attention during deployment.”

Anya’s eyes scanned the room, her mind already cataloging potential materials. A length of salvaged wire, perhaps, or a section of metal shelving. The desperate need for communication, for a lifeline, had solidified into a tangible goal, and in the dimming light of the ruined farmhouse, this hulking, archaic machine represented their first real chance. A fragile flicker of opportunity in the encroaching darkness.

The air in the farmhouse had cooled considerably as night deepened. The only light came from a single, sputtering candle Mykhailo had placed on a salvaged crate, casting dancing shadows that exaggerated the skeletal remains of furniture and the cobweb-draped rafters overhead. Anya sat on an overturned bucket, the seed pouch clutched tight in her hands, its familiar weight a small comfort. Beside her, Mykhailo hunched over the radio, his movements precise and deliberate.

He’d managed to fashion a makeshift antenna from a length of rusted wire and a broken broom handle, now propped precariously against the shattered window frame. The shortwave radio itself sat on the crate, its Bakelite casing cool and smooth under his questing fingertips. He adjusted a dial with infinite care, the faint whine of static a constant, unnerving whisper.

“The frequency,” he murmured, his voice low and tight, barely audible above the crackle. He glanced at a folded, brittle piece of paper, a relic of his previous life, marked with precise columns of numbers and letters. “According to the cipher, the target channel for… designated contact… is… here.” He twisted another knob. The static shifted, momentarily coalescing into a faint, rhythmic pulse, like a distant, stuttering heartbeat.

Anya leaned closer, her breath catching. The air thrummed with a nervous energy. Every shadow seemed to hold a lurking threat, every creak of the old farmhouse a potential footstep. She could almost taste the paranoia.

“Are you sure about this, Mykhailo?” she whispered, her voice raspy. Her gaze drifted to the pouch she held. “It’s so… exposed.”

He didn't look up. His brow was furrowed, a line of concentration etched between his eyes. “The academic cipher is robust. Designed for precisely this kind of… secure exchange. The risk is in the transmission itself, not the content.” He tapped a finger against a series of toggle switches, each click a tiny explosion in the suffocating quiet. “We have to trust the protocol.”

He began to speak into the repurposed microphone, his voice measured, each syllable carefully enunciated. It was a stilted, clipped delivery, stripped of the easy cadence of his former lectures. “*Alpha-Niner-Echo. This is… Delta-Seven-Tango. Requesting acknowledgment of receipt of… Package Theta.*” The words were a ritual, a pre-arranged sequence intended to convey urgency and specific meaning without revealing anything concrete to an unauthorized listener.

Anya watched his lips move, his eyes fixed on the silent radio. She felt a profound sense of vulnerability radiating from him, and from herself. They were two fragile entities, reaching out into an indifferent, hostile void. She tightened her grip on the seeds, murmuring their names under her breath, a litany of hope and remembrance. “For the mountain… for the plains… for Yevhen…” The whispered words were a prayer, a desperate plea to the universe to protect these tiny vessels of the future.

Mykhailo’s hand hovered over the transmit button. He hesitated for a fraction of a second, his gaze flicking to the dark, gaping doorway. The wind outside moaned like a lost soul. He took a shallow breath and pressed down. A small red light flickered to life on the radio’s panel, a tiny beacon of their attempt. He held it there, the words echoing in his mind, a phantom conversation in the void. The seconds stretched, agonizingly long, each tick of an unseen clock amplified in the oppressive silence. He released the button.

The red light died. The static returned, a blank canvas of noise. Mykhailo remained still, his shoulders tensed, his eyes staring into the emptiness. Anya held her breath, waiting for a response that might never come, or worse, a response that indicated they had been heard by the wrong ears. The meticulously crafted message hung in the air, an unanswered question, a gamble laid bare against the encroaching dark.

The silence that followed Mykhailo’s transmission was a physical weight, pressing in on them in the dim farmhouse. Anya’s knuckles were white where she gripped the pouch of seeds, her breath caught in her throat. The static from the radio, once a mere background hiss, now seemed to thrum with unspoken threats, a constant reminder of their vulnerability. Mykhailo hadn’t moved. His gaze was fixed on the small, dark grille of the speaker, his face a mask of strain in the faint spill of moonlight from a cracked windowpane. The red transmit light had died moments ago, leaving the panel a collection of inert knobs and dials.

Anya finally exhaled, a soft, ragged sound. “Anything?” she breathed, her voice barely audible.

Mykhailo shook his head, a minute, almost imperceptible movement. He reached out, his fingers tracing the cool metal casing of the radio, as if seeking a tangible connection to the unseen recipient. His academic precision, the practiced deliberation of a scholar, seemed to fray at the edges. The meticulous care he’d shown in repairing the device now warred with a raw, primal impatience.

The minutes crawled by, each one an eternity. The wind outside picked up, rattling the loose shutters with a percussive rhythm that grated on Anya’s nerves. She strained to hear over the noise, over the frantic hammering of her own heart. She thought of Yevhen, of the hushed desperation that had led her here, of the hope she was clinging to like a drowning woman to driftwood.

Then, it happened.

Not a voice, not a clear signal, but a faint, intermittent pulse. *Click… click… click.* It was buried deep within the static, a tiny, hesitant heartbeat from the void. Anya flinched, her eyes snapping to Mykhailo.

His head snapped up. His gaze met hers, wide and suddenly alive, not with understanding, but with a desperate, questioning intensity. “Did you hear that?” he whispered, his voice rough.

Anya nodded, her own throat tight. “Yes. A click.”

*Click… click…* The sound repeated, faint but distinct. It wasn’t a message, not a confirmation of his coded words, but an acknowledgment. A fragile, almost accidental reply. It was enough. Enough to know the transmission had reached *someone*. Enough to know they hadn’t shouted into a vacuum.

A wave of relief washed over Anya, so potent it made her knees weak. She sagged slightly, the tension in her shoulders easing just a fraction. Mykhailo let out a shaky breath, the rigid set of his jaw loosening. He managed a small, tight smile, a flicker of something akin to triumph in his eyes.

But then, as quickly as it came, the relief curdled. The clicks stopped, swallowed by the indifferent roar of static once more. The signal was gone. What had it meant? Had his carefully constructed academic cipher been understood? Or had the faint pulse been an accidental byproduct of something else entirely, something far more dangerous? The ambiguity was a cold dread spreading through Anya’s chest, a counterpoint to the fragile relief. They had made contact, yes. But with whom? And at what cost? The question hung heavy in the air, as tangible as the dust motes dancing in the moonlight.