Fighter pilot Andrei Lyamin should have been shot as a coward and deserter. In a difficult battle, he was forced to retreat, and the commander of the army witnessed this retreat. However, the sentence was not carried out... The former lieutenant receives the right to die in battle... Few people know that during the Great Patriotic War, a unique unit fought as part of the Red Army Air Force - a penal fighter air group. Stalin decided that, given the absolute dominance of German aviation in the front-line skies, it was useless to use qualified pilots in infantry penal battalions. So a special team appeared at the front, consisting of “air hooligans” who were put on trial. Only one person in the Soviet Air Force could lead an “air penal battalion” and successfully manage it. It is not without reason that for his “exploits” the main character of the book earned the nickname Anarchist while still in flight school.