METRO 2033 (4 page)

But as unsuccessful as the Reds’ attempts were to take Revolution Square, the efforts of the coalition to squeeze them out of Lenin Library were equally fruitless. Meanwhile, people were tiring of the fight. Desertion was already rife, and there were incidents of fraternization when soldiers from both sides laid down their arms upon confrontation . . . But, unlike the First World War, the Reds didn’t gain an advantage. Their revolutionary fuse fizzled out quietly. The coalition didn’t fare much better: dissatisfied with the fact that they had to constantly tremble for their lives, people picked themselves up and went off in whole family groups from the central stations to the outer stations. The Hansa emptied and weakened. The war had badly affected trade; traders found other ways around the system, and the important trading routes because empty and quiet . . .

The politicians, who were supported by fewer and fewer soldiers, had to urgently find a way to end the war, before the guns turned against them. So, under the strictest of secret conditions and at a necessarily neutral station, the leaders from enemy sides met: the Hansa president, Loginov, and the head of the Arbat Confederation, Kolpakov.

They quickly signed a peace agreement. The parties exchanged stations. The Red Line received the dilapidated Revolution Square but conceded the Lenin Library to the Arbat Confederation. It wasn’t an easy step for either to make. The confederation lost one of its parts along with its influence over the north-west. The Red Line became punctuated since there was now a station in the middle of it that didn’t belong to it and cut it in half. Despite the fact that both parties guaranteed each other the right to free transit through their former territories, that sort of situation couldn’t help but upset the Reds . . . But what the coalition was proposing was too tempting. And the Red Line didn’t resist. The Hansa gained more of an advantage from the agreement, of course, because they could now close the Ring, removing the final obstacles to their prosperity.

They agreed to observe the status quo, and an interdiction about conducting propaganda and subversive activities in the territory of their former opponent. Everyone was satisfied. And now, when the cannons and the politicians had gone silent, it was the turn of the propagandists to explain to the masses that their own side had managed an outstanding diplomatic feat and, in essence, had won the war.

Years have passed since that memorable day when the peace agreement was signed. It was observed by both parties too - the Hansa found in the Red Line a favourable economic partner and the latter left behind its aggressive intentions: comrade Moskvin, the secretary general of Communist party of the Moscow Underground in the name of V.I.Lenin, dialectically proved the possibility of constructing communism in one separate metro line. The old enmity was forgotten.

Artyom remembered this lesson in recent history well, just as he strived to remember everything his stepfather told him.

‘It’s good that the slaughter came to an end,’ Pyotr Andreevich said. ‘It was impossible to go anywhere near the Ring for a year and a half: there were cordons everywhere, and they would check your documents a hundred times. I had dealings there at the time and there was no way to get through apart from past the Hansa. And they stopped me right at Prospect Mir. They almost put me up against a wall.’

‘And? You’ve never told us about this, Pyotr . . . How did it work out?’ Andrey was interested.

Artyom slouched slightly, seeing that the story-teller’s flashlight had been passed from his hands. But this promised to be interested so he didn’t bother to butt in.

‘Well . . . It was very simple. They took me for a Red spy. So, I’m coming out of the tunnel at Prospect Mir, on our line. And Prospect is also under the Hansa. It’s an annexe, so to speak. Well, things aren’t so strict there yet - they’ve got a market there, a trading zone. As you know, it’s the same everywhere with the Hansa: the stations on the Ring itself form something like their home territory. And the transfer passages from the Ring stations are like radials - and they’ve put customs and passport controls there . . .’

‘Come on, we all know that, what are you lecturing us for . . . Tell us instead what happened to you there!’ Andrey interrupted him.

‘Passport controls,’ repeated Pyotr Andreevich, sternly drawing his eyebrows together, determined to make a point. ‘At the radial stations, they have markets, bazaars . . . Foreigners are allowed there. But you can’t cross the border - no way. I got out at Prospect Mir, I had half a kilo of tea with me . . . I needed some ammunition for my rifle. I thought I’d make a trade. Well, turns out they’re under martial law. They won’t let go of any military supplies. I ask one person, then another - they all make excuses, and sidle away from me. Only one whispered to me: “What ammunition, you moron . . . Get the hell out of here, and quick - they’ve probably already informed on you.” I thanked him and headed quietly back into the tunnel. And right at the exit, a patrol stops me, and whistles ring out from the station, and still another detachment is running towards us. They ask for my documents. I give them my passport, with our station’s stamp. They look at it carefully and ask, “And where’s your pass?” I answer, surprised, “What pass?” It turns out that to get to the station, you’re obliged to get a pass: near the tunnel exit there’s a little table, and they have an office there. They check identification and issue a pass when necessary. They’re up to their ears in bureaucracy, the rats . . .

‘How I made it past that table, I don’t know . . . Why didn’t the blockheads stop me? And now I’m the one who has to explain myself to the patrol. So this muscle-head stands there with his shaved skull and his camouflage and says, “He slipped past! He snuck past! He crept past!” He flips further through my passport, and sees the Sokol stamp there. I lived there earlier, at Sokol . . . He sees this stamp, and his eyes all but filled with blood. Like a bull seeing red. He jerked his gun from his shoulder and roars, “Hands above your head, you scum!” His level of training was immediately apparent. He grabs me by the scruff of my neck and drags me across the entire station, to the pass point in the transfer passage, to his superior. And he says, threateningly, “Just you wait, all I need is to get permission from command - and you’ll be against the wall, spy.” I was about to be sick. So I try to justify myself, I say, “What kind of a spy am I? I’m a businessman! I brought some tea from
VDNKh.”
And he replies that he’ll stuff my mouth full of tea and ram it in with the barrel of his gun. I can see that I’m not very convincing, and that, if his brass gives their approval, he’ll lead me off to the two-hundredth metre, put my face to the pipes, and shoot me full of holes, in accordance with the laws of war. Things weren’t turning out too well, I thought . . . We approached the pass point, and this muscle-head of mine went to discuss the best place to shoot me. I looked at his boss, and it was as if a burden fell from my shoulders: it was Pashka Fedotov, my former classmate - we’d remained friends even after school, and then we’d lost track of each other . . .’

‘Well fuck! You scared the hell out of me! And I already thought you were done for, that they’d killed you,’ inserted Andrey venomously, and all of the men who were gathered tightly around the campfire at the four hundred and fiftieth metre burst into friendly laughter.

Even Pyotr Andreevich himself, first glancing angrily at Andrey, couldn’t restrain himself and smiled. Laughter sounded along the tunnel, giving birth, somewhere in its depths, to a distorted echo, a sinister screech that sounded unlike anything . . . And everyone gradually fell silent upon hearing it.

From the depths of the tunnel, form the north, the suspicious sounds were rather distinct now: there were rustlings and light rhythmic steps.

Andrey, of course, was the first to hear them. He went silent instantly and waved a hand to signal the others to be quiet too, and he picked up his machine gun from the ground and jumped up from where he was sitting.

Slowly undoing his safety catch and loading a cartridge, his back to the wall, he silently moved from the fireside into the tunnel. Artyom got up too - he was curious to see who he had missed the last time but Andrey turned back and frowned at him angrily. He stopped at the border of the darkness, put his gun to his shoulder and lay down flat shouting, ‘Give me some light!’

One of his guys, holding a powerful accumulator flashlight, which had been assembled from old car headlights, turned it on, and the bright beam ripped through the darkness. Snatched from the darkness, a fuzzy silhouette appeared on the floor for a second. It was something small, something not really scary looking, something which rushed back to the north.

Artyom couldn’t restrain himself and he cried out:

‘Shoot! It’s getting away!’

But for some reason Andrey did not shoot. Pyotr Andreevich got up too, keeping his machine gun at the ready, and shouted:

‘Andryukha! You still alive?’

The guys sitting at the fire whispered in agitation, hearing the lock of Andrey’s gun slide back. Finally Andrey appeared in the light of the flashlight, dusting off his jacket.

‘Yes, I’m alive, I’m alive!’ he said, laughing.

‘Why you snorting?’ Pyotr Andreevich asked him suspiciously.

‘It had three feet! And two heads. Mutants! The dark ones are here! They’ll cut our throats! Shoot, or they’ll get away! Must have been a lot of them! Must have!’ Andrey continued to laugh.

‘Why didn’t you shoot? Fine, my young man might not have but he’s young, didn’t get it. But why did you mess it up? You’re not new to this, after all. You know what happened at
Polezhaevskaya?’
asked Pyotr Andreevich angrily when Andrey had returned to the fire.

‘Yes I’ve heard about Polezhaevskaya a dozen times!’ Andrey waved him away. - ‘It was a dog! A puppy, not even a dog . . . It’s already the second time it’s tried to get close to the fire, towards the heat and the light. And you almost took him out and now you’re asking me why I’m being too considerate. Knackers!’

‘How was I supposed to know it was a dog?’ Artyom had taken offence. ‘It gave out such sounds . . . And then, a week ago they were talking about seeing a rat the size of a pig.’

‘You believe in fairy tales! Wait a second and I’ll bring you your rat!’ Andrey said, throwing his machine gun over his shoulder and walking off into the darkness.

A minute later, they heard a fine whistle from the darkness. And then a voice called out, affectionately, coaxingly:

‘Come here, come here little one, don’t be afraid!’

He spent a long time convincing it, about ten minutes, calling it and whistling to it and then finally his figure appeared again in the twilight.

He returned to the fire and smiled triumphantly as he opened his jacket. A puppy fell out onto the ground, shivering, piteous, wet and intolerably dirty, with matted fur of an indistinct colour, and black eyes full of horror, and flattened ears.

Once on the ground, he immediately tried to get away but Andrey’s firm hand grabbed it and held it in place. Petting it on its head, he removed his jacket and covered the little dog.

‘The puppy needs to be warmed up,’ he explained.

‘Come on, Andrey, it’s a fleabag!’ Pyotr Andreevich tried to bring Andrey to his senses. ‘And he might even have worms. And generally you might pick up an infection and spread it through the station . . .’

‘OK, Pyotr, that’s enough, stop whining. Just look at it!’ And he pulled back the flaps of his jacket showing Pyotr the muzzle of the puppy that was still shivering either out of fear or cold. ‘Look at its eyes - those eyes could never lie!’

Pyotr Andreevich looked at the puppy sceptically. They were frightened eyes but they were undoubtedly honest. Pyotr Andreevich thawed a bit.

‘All right . . . You nature-lover . . . Wait, I’ll find something for him to chew on,’ he muttered and started to look in his rucksack.

‘Have a look, have a look. You never know, maybe something useful will grow from it - a German Shepherd for example,’ Andrey said and moved the jacket containing the puppy closer to the fire.

‘But where could a puppy come from to get here? There aren’t any people in that direction. Only dark ones. Do the dark ones keep dogs?’ one of Andrey’s men, a thin man with tousled hair who hadn’t said anything until now asked as he looked suspiciously at the puppy who had dozed off in the heat.

‘You’re right, of course, Kirill,’ Andrey answered seriously. ‘The dark ones don’t keep pets as far as I know.’

‘Well how do they live then? What do they eat, anyway?’ asked another man, scratching his unshaven jaw with a light, electric crackling sound.

He was tall and obviously battle-hardened, broad-shouldered and thickset, with a completely shaven head. He was dressed in a long and well-sewn leather cloak, which, in this day and age, was a rarity.

‘What do they eat? They say they eat all kinds of junk. They eat carrion. They eat rats. They eat humans. They’re not picky, you know,’ answered Andrey, contorting his face in disgust.

‘Cannibals?’ asked the man with the shaved head, without a shadow of surprise - and it sounded as though he’d come across cannibals before.

‘Cannibals . . . They’re not even human. They’re undead. Who knows what the hell they are! It’s good they don’t have weapons, so we’re able to fend them off. For the time being. Pyotr! Remember, six months ago we managed to take one of them captive?’

‘I remember,’ spoke up Pyotr Andreevich. ‘He sat in our lock-up for two weeks, wouldn’t drink our water, didn’t touch our food, and then croaked.’

‘You didn’t interrogate him?’ asked the man.

‘He didn’t understand a word we said, in our language. They’d speak plain Russian to him, and he’d keep quiet. He kept quiet the entire time. Like his mouth was full of water. They’d beat him too, and he said nothing. And they’d give him something to eat, and he’d say nothing. He’d just growl every once in a while. And he howled so loudly just before he died that the whole station woke up . . .’