diff --git a/manager.h b/manager.h
index 8d46323e0e6..a361748374a 100644
--- a/manager.h
+++ b/manager.h
@@ -82,6 +82,7 @@ struct Watch {
 #define SPECIAL_REMOTE_FS_TARGET "remote-fs.target"
 #define SPECIAL_SYSLOG_TARGET "syslog.target"             /* Should pull in syslog.socket or syslog.service */
 #define SPECIAL_RTC_SET_TARGET "rtc-set.target"           /* LSB's $time */
+#define SPECIAL_SYSINIT_SERVICE "sysinit.service"
 
 /* For SysV compatibility. Usually an alias for a saner target. On
  * SysV-free systems this doesn't exist. */
diff --git a/service.c b/service.c
index be23b57c497..53d5505c2ea 100644
--- a/service.c
+++ b/service.c
@@ -481,6 +481,10 @@ static int service_load_sysv_path(Service *s, const char *path) {
         if ((r = sysv_exec_commands(s)) < 0)
                 goto finish;
 
+        if ((r = unit_add_dependency_by_name(u, UNIT_REQUIRES, SPECIAL_SYSINIT_SERVICE)) < 0 ||
+            (r = unit_add_dependency_by_name(u, UNIT_AFTER, SPECIAL_SYSINIT_SERVICE)) < 0)
+                goto finish;
+
         r = 1;
 
 finish: