Winter of 1942. A partisan unit lost in the Belarusian forests desperately needs food, warm clothes, and medicines for the wounded. Senior NCO Rybak and former schoolteacher Sothnikov are sent to the nearby village to search for supplies. On the way back, the soldiers run into a police patrol; Sothnikov suffers a severe leg wound, and the friends are captured by the Germans, where the police—after a brief interrogation—must decide their fate.