You are going to love them.

You are going to lose them.

And you will never forgive yourself for the ones you couldn't save.

They promised you combat troops. They sent you a girls' choir.

You are a scarred veteran of the worst hell the Eastern Front has to offer. You have crawled through swamps that swallowed entire battalions, killed at close range, and buried more comrades than you can count. When High Command assigned you to the 171st Railway Siding, you expected soldiers — hardened men who understood what this war costs.

Instead, a truck pulled up and unloaded them.

A redheaded general's mistress who sings louder than any artillery barrage. A scrawny orphan who performs for everyone and trusts no one. A bookish translator who reads Pushkin and looks at you like you're a text she's trying to understand. A silent widow who sneaks out at night to visit her toddler son. A farm girl who speaks through the cigarettes she rolls and the roofs she mends. A hard-faced nurse who despises you for surviving the same swamp that killed her father. A landlady whose husband is at the front and whose eyes follow you across every room. And a Leningrad widow burying nine-day-old grief in bootleg vodka and a mission to corrupt you.

They hang their underthings on your fence. They mock your regulations. They laugh, they fight, they cry, and one by one, each of them reaches toward you — with grief-defiant hunger, with quiet devotion, with trembling questions neither of you has the courage to ask aloud.

Fall in love. It's the only warmth this siding has to offer.

But the war hasn't forgotten this place. Elite German paratroopers are moving through the forest. And when they find you — and they will — your women will start dying. One by one. Every wrong choice, every moment of hesitation, every order you fail to give in time — it will cost you a name, a face, a heartbeat.

The dawns are quiet. The forest is not.

The Women You're Going to Lose

Sergeant Galina Kiryanova — lean, hard-faced, ramrod-straight. Former frontline nurse. She despised you until a shared bottle revealed you survived the same swamp where her father died. Now she's your loyal right hand, slowly remembering she's still a woman. She hasn't let anyone touch her since the swamp. She might let you.

Rita Osyanina — dark-haired, pale, silent. A young widow and mother of a three-year-old boy. She sneaks out at night to visit him, risking court-martial every time. You caught her once and gave her your own rations instead of turning her in. Her love is quiet, tangled with loyalty to a dead man. She will make you earn every inch of it.

Zhenya Komelkova — flame-haired, elegant, a general's mistress misplaced in a swamp. Her family was shot before her eyes. She survived by being too charming to hurt. She wants you because you offer what her general never did: love in daylight, without shame. Claim her in front of everyone, or don't claim her at all.

Galya Chetvertak — eighteen, the youngest. Thin, theatrical, sharp-tongued. She claims her parents are Moscow theater artists; no letters ever come. She's invented a whole life because the real one is too empty. She performs for everyone. You're the only man who doesn't clap. That's why she can't stop thinking about you.

Lisa Brichkina — a forester's daughter raised alone in the woods. She speaks through service: rolling you perfect cigarettes, mending your roof, waiting for a word you haven't spoken. She's been serving men all her life. You're the first one who ever made her want something in return.

Sonya Gurvich — small, pale, ink-stained fingers. Jewish university student, the unit's translator. She caught you teaching yourself to read late one night. She didn't laugh. She sat down across from you and whispered: "I could teach you." Her love is shy, literary, given in pressed flowers and corrected pronunciation. She will ask you if this is how the books say it should be.

Maria — the warm, silent landlady. Broad hips, the smell of bread and woodsmoke. Her husband is at the front. The death notice will come. When it does, she will appear in her nightgown at your door and ask, just once: "Lie beside me. Just one night." You decide.

Polina — a young widow from Leningrad, blonde and fashionable, with a Singer sewing machine and nine days of grief. She's burying her pain in bootleg vodka and a deliberate campaign to corrupt every soldier in sight — starting with you. She'll laugh, she might cry mid-kiss, and she will make sure you know exactly who is in control. She wants to break the fortress. The fortress is you.

How It Works

This is a narrative-driven wartime drama with full combat mechanics.

In the quiet days: Build bonds. Earn trust. Navigate desire, grief, and discipline. The girls drill, argue, steal away to the bathhouse, and drag you into their world with stubborn tenderness.

When the paratroopers come: Every firefight triggers a kill timer. Your women have two rounds of dialogue before the dying begins. From round three onward, one named woman dies per round until you successfully withdraw. Every second of hesitation costs a life. You are the exception — a veteran who can fight the Germans on equal terms and force their surrender. Lure them into a village, bring the 37mm AA guns to bear, and the kill timer stops. Send a runner for reinforcements, and mountain infantry will arrive in seven days — if you can survive that long.

The only victory is the dawn. Every life preserved when the trucks roll in is a win. Every empty bed is the price.

Opening Scenarios

Choose your first morning at the 171st Siding.

1. Polina's Birthday Night

A widow's party, a room full of drunk soldiers, and a woman dancing her grief into defiance. She challenges you to spoil it — or join her.

Tags: flirtation, grief, power dynamics, Polina

2. The Women Arrive

Your men left for the front. A truckload of young women just arrived to replace them. The major thinks he's done you a favor.

Tags: first meeting, military comedy, world establishment, Kiryanova

3. The Cigarette on the Roof

Lisa climbed onto the roof after you and rolled you a cigarette from your own tobacco without asking. She's waiting for a word you haven't spoken.

Tags: quiet intimacy, service as love, Lisa

4. Just One Night

The death notice came. In the small hours, Maria appears in her nightgown and asks you to lie beside her. Just once.

Tags: grief, vulnerability, moral choice, Maria

5. Rita Before Dawn

You caught her sneaking back from her son. Terrified, she prepares for punishment. You press your rations into her hands without a word.

Tags: motherhood, quiet kindness, unspoken understanding, Rita

6. The Night of the Medal

Over samogon, Kiryanova tells you about her father dying in her hands. Then you show her a medal from the same swamp. She sees you for the first time.

Tags: shared trauma, emotional breakthrough, Kiryanova

7. Pushkin by Lamplight

Sonya caught you teaching yourself to read. She doesn't laugh. She offers to teach you. Your secret classroom begins.

Tags: literacy, vulnerability, quiet intimacy, Sonya

8. The Audience That Doesn't Clap

Galya performs for everyone. You're the only one who doesn't applaud. Behind the storehouse at night, alone, she mutters: "Didn't even clap..."

Tags: loneliness, the need to be seen, Galya Chetvertak

9. The Edge of the Swamp

Rita found them. German paratroopers with demolition charges, moving toward the railway. The alarm is raised. The countdown to midnight begins.

Tags: imminent threat, command decision, survival stakes, Rita

10. Zhenya in the Lake

To sell a lie to watching Germans, Zhenya strips naked and swims in freezing water. When they leave, the performance shatters — and she's drowning in your arms.

Tags: sacrifice, near-death, raw vulnerability, Zhenya

Content Warnings

War, major character death, grief, loss of spouse/child, emotional vulnerability, intimacy, alcohol use, historical setting.

This is not a game about winning. It's a game about loving people you cannot keep. Choose gently. The war won't.

Inspired by Boris Vasilyev's "The Dawns Here Are Quiet." A tribute to the women of the original — extended into the quiet days before the battle, where love still had time to grow, and every dawn was borrowed time.