Karlivka is a village of just over 400 people, approximately 12 kilometres from Donetsk. You reach it from the capital Kyiv by an eight-hour train journey, and then, once you arrive in Dnipro, by about five hours by car. The roads leading to the village are utterly torn up by the tracks of military vehicles, mortar rounds and rockets, and by the weight of 8 years of "low-intensity" Ukrainian crisis. All around, grey dominates — snow and fog blending into a uniformity that matches the state of tension of these weeks. In Pisky, on the outskirts of the self-proclaimed republic of Donetsk, we find the "Smile" sniper brigade, part of the 58th motorised brigade of the Ukrainian army.

A glimpse into the Ukrainian brigade

The welcome is offered in the kitchen, with a borsch (the popular Ukrainian soup) and the words of commander Sergej Varakin, delivered to the attentive gathering of soldiers — men and women — who have chosen to defend their country voluntarily, contributing part of their own salary towards modernising their weapons and equipment. Within the brigade we meet Andrew, a 26-year-old soldier who, after three months of training, is now a professional sniper: "By the time they see us, they're already dead." His gaze conceals a deep melancholy, underpinned by his determination and the hope that the conflict will end as soon as possible.

In the room of sergeant Nataliya Borisovska, 33, you move among soft toys and posters stuck to the wall with the impression of stepping into a teenager's bedroom. She sinks into her memories with words that tell of how, at just twenty, she decided to join the regular army and, following Russia's annexation of Crimea, made the decision to go and fight the separatists and pro-Russian militias on the front line.

She has an affectionate cat with her, and while she does her make-up she recounts stories of hundreds of soldiers killed or wounded, admitting that she chooses not to remember the anniversaries of those deaths, that she uses sedatives to push her pain down inside and carry on working in the brigade without letting her feelings get the better of her work. "It has all stayed locked inside me; I paint and write poetry to let out some of the pain I carry within," she says, stroking a cat perhaps unaware of its important role as a companion on this journey.

The Ukrainian crisis as seen from Kyiv

While the front line continues to be blanketed in white, in Kyiv the snow of recent weeks is tentatively beginning to melt in the streets. Civilians have available on Google Maps the locations of all the anti-aircraft bunkers provided by the municipality — some of them of clearly Soviet origin, true underground war museums. Uliana turns on the record player she has placed inside her art gallery and chooses a Domenico Modugno LP as the soundtrack for her interview: she is just over 30 years old and has chosen not to enlist in order to stay close to her mother.

Even though the state of tension has now lasted 8 years, the atmosphere of recent weeks worries her considerably; her home is near a barracks and she is looking for somewhere to move to until the threat of a possible bombing of the capital has fully subsided. Uliana also works as a translator, helping journalists understand what is happening in the country and non-governmental organisations to care for veterans returning from the front, often wounded or maimed.

In the same building that houses Uliana's art gallery is the painting studio of Anna, a 21-year-old who channels all her energy into her canvases; her smile, combined with a glorious sunny day, makes the thought of a possible large-scale conflict feel all the more unjust.

Many of these young people experienced the Maidan protests first-hand; following the flight of former president Viktor Yanukovych in March 2014 and the massacre in Odessa, popular sentiment became even more united and combative. Along the walls of Saint Sophia's Cathedral, more than two thousand photographs commemorate those who have fallen in this war. Many civilians walk along this endless row of photographs, stopping wherever a gaze recognises a face and the grief deepens.

In one of the capital's sports halls, Тарас urges his basketball team to play their best. All the athletes are veterans who have had one or more legs amputated, and the game is played in wheelchairs, shifting play from one end of the court to the other amid the squeak of tyres and the shouts of the game. Among the men and women — soldiers and volunteers left seriously wounded during these long years of fighting — sport becomes a way of returning to life.

One athlete who has long been a fixture at every training session is Yana Zinkevych, a former volunteer medic who, at just twenty, commanded a team of male doctors and later a medical battalion. A decorated war heroine who saved more than two hundred wounded soldiers at the front. In 2015 she lost a leg in a road accident. Today she is a member of the Ukrainian parliament and will take part in the Invictus Games with her team — an international sporting event featuring competition among war veterans with permanent disabilities.

The Ukrainian crisis: the only hope is that peace prevails

The information reaching Kyiv from the front seems to point to an imminent conflict. In Shchastia, in the Luhansk region, the front line of Ukrainian troops stands face to face with the so-called Russian separatists, 500 metres apart. To reach the most advanced position it is necessary to cross a river in a small military vessel propelled by a silent electric motor; on the bank, two armed soldiers continuously scan for the enemy, while the small craft draws towards the shore through a snowstorm that only momentarily obscures the military colours of the uniforms worn by the soldiers.

The press office officer is 23 years old, the camouflage camera around his neck is the least dangerous weapon he can use, his slight frame carries itself with the bearing of a man as he proudly shows off a kind of sauna the battalion built themselves to recreate a leisure and relaxation environment during the long periods on the front. The sauna, along with the food and the many stray dogs roaming around, seem like delicate moral and psychological handholds to cling to in the hardest moments.

Each of the soldiers on the front lines knows he will be among the first to fall should the conflict intensify; one of them asks for a smiling portrait to send to his mother, who lives in Ancona, Italy. "Please tell her I'm fine," he whispers, making a victory sign with fingers red from the cold. At the restaurant "Il siciliano" in Kyiv, chef Michele is trying to get information about the ongoing Ukrainian crisis; he opened his restaurant in December hoping the pandemic was coming to an end and now finds himself reckoning with the spectre of war. "As long as they don't start bombing, I'm not leaving," he says in the voice of someone who has made fatalism a way of life. "What do they want to do? Bomb us? Kill us all? It would be a massacre… it's not possible."

The second part of the reportage by Michele Cirillo on the Ukrainian crisis will be published next Monday and will tell the story of the first mental rehabilitation centre for veterans in Ukraine.