During the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s, an Iraqi journalist is given a tour of a military prison. He is informed by the major in charge about what is expected of him: he is to write a fabricated report about a murder that has occurred in the camp, in order to demoralise the enemy soldiers. The journalist is unwilling to write this story. In a long night of intense discussion at his home, he speaks to the major of a historic conflict between the two countries and tells him that he is writing a novel about a group of soldiers trapped on a hill, dying of thirst as they compete for a water tank with a group of enemy soldiers on the opposite hill. So far the water tank has remained undamaged at the bottom of a rift between the hills, but neither group has a hope of reaching it without being shot by the other. Delirious, the soldiers await their end: either being saved by a fabled female lion who feeds her milk to all who are thirsty, or morphing into doves once they are martyred. At the