Based on real events. November 1943. The Nazis bring a new batch of Soviet orphans to Vyritsa, where a so-called "children's shelter" is set up in a former pioneer camp. The conditions here are unbearable: cold, hunger, forced labor, a punishment cell for disobedience, and execution for attempting to escape. But the worst thing is that children are used as blood donors for wounded Germans. Despite all the horror and inconceivability of what is happening, having united, the young heroes find the strength and courage to resist and decide to escape.

In 1939, Major Ivan Rosly, at the behest of ill-wishers, finds himself in the thick of the Soviet-Finnish War. But it is his unit that breaks through the impregnable Mannerheim Line, which becomes the most important stage of the future victory. In spite of everyone, Rosly returns from that war as a Hero of the Soviet Union with the rank of colonel. At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, he is surrounded, but leads thousands of Soviet soldiers to their own.

Aleksey Temnikov is a renowned ballet dancer and an acknowledged genius whose career was abruptly cut short after sustaining an injury in the 1990s. Twenty years later, Aleksey discovers that his condition is degenerative and that he will soon lose the ability to walk. Aleksey sets out to choreograph a ballet he envisaged long before but never staged for fear of failure. “What will I leave behind after I am gone?” is a question Aleksey feels he must contend with. However, returning to the world of ballet will not be easy for a man who has made so many enemies over the course of his life.