They carried flowers, Ukrainian flags and soft toys into St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Cathedral on Wednesday. They came in vyshyvankas and military uniforms. There were family members and friends, soldiers and medics, and people who simply understood that an extraordinary young Ukrainian had been lost.
She was a young woman whose short life tells us something important about the generation Ukraine has been forced to sacrifice in this war.
They came to say goodbye to combat medic Eva Reuter.
Eva lost her life while rescuing victims of a Russian strike when the Russians carried out a “double tap,” striking the scene again after rescue workers had arrived.
She was 25 years old. One friend explained that “Eva managed to live a hundred lives in one.”
Born on Oct. 4, 2000, Eva was known as the woman who set aside brushes for tourniquets, paint for blood.
She became an artist and an art historian, earning her bachelor’s degree from Ukraine’s National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture. She worked in video-game development and as a tattoo artist. She cared about human rights and the environment.
Russia’s invasion gave her another calling.
In November 2022, Eva joined the Hospitallers, Ukraine’s volunteer medical battalion. Her fellow Hospitallers knew her by the call signs “Alice” and “Planochka.”
But Eva was best known for a track record of courage. She evacuated wounded men and women from combat zones, worked at stabilization points, and provided medical support to Ukrainian forces. Describing her simply as a paramedic, however, understates the astonishing range of what she learned to do.
She mastered first-person-view (FPV) systems and 3D printing. Beginning in 2024, she helped develop the engineering branch of an unmanned aerial systems unit in Ukraine’s 25th Airborne Brigade. She worked on recruitment, international communications, logistics and documentation. She helped recruit foreign volunteers into Ukraine’s defense forces and served as an English-language link between recruits and Ukrainian commanders. Not surprisingly, she also used her artistry to help develop a unit’s visual identity and emblem.
After the funeral service beneath the golden domes of St. Michael’s, the mourners emerged into the Kyiv afternoon and formed a procession. Together, they walked toward Maidan Nezalezhnosti – the square that has become inseparable from Ukraine’s modern struggle for freedom.
There, in the center of the capital, they stopped.
Kyiv fell silent for Eva.
Eva’s fiancée, an American serviceman known by the call sign “Exile,” delivered a passionate tribute to her life in Ukrainian and English.
“Eva was the bravest person I ever knew. I have been fighting my whole life, and I never knew one so brave. She was fearless in everything that she did. She died to save others. She spent her life and gave the best years of her life to protect and save other people.”
Reflecting on her final moments, Exile recalled:
“Where we were that night, there were many people that needed her help, and she knew that.”
Then the soldier spoke not as a fellow defender, but as a grieving partner.
“My life will never be the same. A part of me died in that car with her.”
“But as much as I don’t want to go on, the work that she gave her life and her death for still needs to be done. … So I will go back and fight for what she believed in. To protect you and your children and grandchildren.”
Then Exile turned to the soldiers who had served alongside Eva.
“Brothers, you all knew her. Nothing we did in Pokrovsk would have happened without her. You all know that. So stand with me and salute our leader.”
And finally:
“I loved her with all my heart.”
Exile ended his tribute with shouts of “Slava Ukraini!”
And from the crowd came the answer:
“Heroiam slava!”
Glory to the heroes.
An artist who became a medic. A woman who cared for 11 cats and learned to repair drones. A woman known for beauty, tenacity and intelligence who repeatedly walked toward wounded strangers when instinct would have told most people to run the other way.
And, finally, a rescuer who answered one last call.
People had been wounded by a Russian strike.
Eva knew they needed her.
So she went.
The Russians struck again.
On Wednesday, Kyiv carried her to the Maidan.
It was Eva Reuter’s last walk through the city she had given her life to defend.
She was 25 years old.
And when Ukraine needed one more act of courage from her, Eva gave it.