In 1973 Vietnam, gas bombs are dropped on villages, killing men, women, and children. Two downed American pilots, accused of the bombings, are captured and tortured.
Andreas, who is ten, has been brought up by his grandmother. When she dies, he removes a putto from the crucifix placed upon her, puts it in his mouth and does not speak again.
Lakshya finds a bottle, which has Gangaram trapped in it who is his lookalike. He promises to make everything possible with the sand in the bottle, but once the sand is over he will be free to go.
On a West German Autobahn, Robert plummets from a bridge and is hospitalized. As he recovers, he flashes back to a Bulgarian holiday where he met Jutta and her uncle Lothar, who’d ordered a West German passport to smuggle her out of the DDR.