Writer and newspaper editor Bachana Bregvadze is hospitalized with a diagnosis of myocardial infarction. A writer on the edge of life and death recalls and analyzes his past life.

Second World War. The fascists attack Svaneti. Old Betkili, whose son was killed in the war, lives far from the village. The old man comes across a Soviet soldier, Lasha, and shelters him in the mountains, but soon finds the soldier’s behavior suspicious.