Metro 2034

CHAPTER 18 Salvation

The group was a few dozen meters long. They were the best fighters of the Sevastopolskaya, Denis Michailovitsch had choosen every single one of them carefully. Their small helmet lamps flickered in the darkness of the tunnel and suddenly the commander thought that the whole formation looked like giant swarm of glowworms that was flying through the night. A warm and good smelling summer night at the Krim, over the cypress and near the soft sounding ocean. This place to where the colonel hoped he would go after his death…

A pleasant shiver went over him but at the same time he shook himself, put on his dark look and yelled at himself. Yes, even he had started to get weak. It was his age! He let the last soldier pass him, opened his steel cigarette box and took one of his last self made cigarette out of it, smelled at it and lit his lighter.

It was a good day. He still had luck, everything happened as planned. They had passed the Nagornaya without any casualties. One single soldier had disappeared for a moment but he had returned to the column. All were happy: To go to war was easier then to wait for eternity and not knowing what was going on. Also Denis Michailovitsch had allowed them to get a good night sleep before the fight. Just he himself hadn’t been able to close one eye.

Fate had always just been a chain of coincidental events for him so the old fighter couldn’t understand why someone could trust himself to it. Since he had gone to the small expedition to the Kachovskaya there had been no message from them. It was possible that even Hunter wasn’t immortal. What had he been thinking when he had sent the half crazy brigadier and the old story telling old man?

He couldn’t wait anymore.

The plan was that the main part of their fighters would go through the Nachimovski prospect, Nagornaya and the Nagatinskaya to the southern gate of the Tulskaya and take the station by surprise. He had men on the surface as well. Their orders were to get into the tunnels through the vents and eliminate the guards if there were still some. Finally they would open the gate for the main force. It was all about a question of military strategy, it didn’t matter who was occupying the station.

They had needed three days to locate the vents and excavate them. Now some stalkers were with them to go down and let them in. They would only need a few more hours.

A few more hours, then it would all be decided and Denis Michailovitsch’s thoughts were his own again. He would be able to sleep and eat again. The plan was easy, carefully planned and without any gaps. Still, the colonel had a strange feeling in his stomach and his heart was racing like eighteen years ago when he had went to his first fight at the village in the mountains…

The hot air of his self made cigarette calmed him down a bit. Finally he threw away the rest, put his mask on and ran behind the brigade with hastily steps.

A short while after that they were standing in front of the steel door. Now they could catch their breath. Denis Michailovitsch would use the time before the storm to go through different strategies with his commanders. With one thing the old man had been right thought the colonel and smiled: Why run at a fortress head on when you could open it from the inside? That was the story with the Trojan horse, from whom was that story again?

Denis Michailovitsch took a look at the geiger counter, radiation was low and he put off his gasmask. The officers followed his example and then the rest of the fighters. They had earned a last breather!

There had always been gaffers at polis. Most were poor people that fought themselves through the dark stations and struggled for their daily meal. Now wandered with wide open eyes and open mouths through the galleries and halls.

And so almost no one paid attention to Homer while he made his rounds at the Borovizkaya, went with his hands over the narrow pillars of the Alexandrovski sad, torn from one side to the other and had even fallen in love with the chandeliers of the Arbatskaya.

Premonition had griped his heart and didn’t let him go: This was his stay at Polis. What happened in a few hours at the Tulskaya would shake his entire life. Yes, it may even marked his end. But he had decided: He would do what he had to do. He would allow Hunter to massacre the station and burn it down… But then he would try and kill him. He knew that if the brigadier would suspect anything he would just break his neck immediately. But maybe he already died at the storm of the Tulskaya and that would mean that everything would already be over at that point. But everything would go after his plan; Homer would return to his lonely nest and fill the last white papers of his book, from the intrigue to the finally. The last would be that he shot Hunter his back…

Was he able to do it? Would he have the courage? Even thinking about it made Homers hands shiver. Calm down, calm down. Everything would be solved by itself, now wasn’t the right time for those thoughts…

But that didn’t make him any less nervous. It had been his luck that the girl had disappeared!

Homer didn’t know where her adventure had lead her. How had he been able to drive her into this lion’s cage? His over exaggerated ambition of an author had been the cause of that and apparently he had forgotten that she wasn’t a creature of his fantasy. Homer’s novel had turned out differently from what he had thought. He had loaded to much on himself. How would he even be able to get it to the people? He didn’t even have space for the crowd of people who was passing the old man. Also his novel shouldn’t have become a big mass grave with meter long lists of names in front of his eyes. Writing made off bronze letters which didn’t tell you anything about the faces of the dead.

No it was impossible! His already with holes riddled memory wouldn’t be able to take all this people on board. The sweaty face of the merchant who was selling candy nor the pointy face of the girl who was giving him a bullet. The smile of her mother, bright as a Madonna or the sticky smile of the soldier who had just passed her. The deep wrinkles in the faces of the beggars or the wrinkles of the smile of the thirty year old woman…

Who of them was violent, who was a scrooge, a thief, a traitor, a lively one, a prophet, a righteous one, who didn’t care and who hadn’t decided about it yet?

All of that Homer would never know. He didn’t know what the merchant was really thinking while he looked at the girl, how to interpret the smile of the mother that had been lit by the look of the soldiers. Nor what job the old man had had before his legs had stopped working. It wasn’t in Homers power to decide how had the right to be in his story and who didn’t deserve it. Six milliards of people annihilated, six milliards of people!

Was it a coincidence that only a few thousands had been able to rescue themselves?

Train operator Serov which place Nikolai had taken over had looked at life like a at a soccer game. Humanity had lost, he used to tell Nikolai but both of us are still running around. Why do you think is that? Because it is still nil-nil in our life, that’s why! The referee had given us more time. Till the final whistle we have to find out why we are here and finish our last things, get everything out of ourselves, then we make the last pass and flew towards the shining goal… He had been a mystery, old Serov. Homer had never asked the soccer fan if he had already shot his goal. But he had been reassured that he, Nikolay Ivanovitsch Nikolayev was still able to settle his score. And from Serov he had been convinced that nobody was in the metro out of pure coincidence.

But it was completely impossible to write about all of them! Was it even worth a try? In this moment Homer saw one face in the thousands of unknown ones. Exactly the one he had expected the least.

Leonid threw away his coat, pulled his pullover over his head and finally his white t-shirt. He moved the shirt like a flag from one side to the other; not caring for the bullets that rushed through the air all around them. Something strange had happened: The diesel powered railcar started to fall behind and the fortress in front of them didn’t open fire like they had thought.

“My father would kill me now!” Said Leonid after he had stopped the railcar in front of the tank stoppers. The brakes were howling.

“What are you doing? What are we doing?” Asked Sasha, still out of breath. She didn’t know how they had been able to stay out of harm’s way at this race.

“We surrender!” He laughed. “That is the tunnel to the Bibliotek imeni Lenina, it’s the border to polis. We are now deserters.”

Guards ran to them and ordered them to get down from the railcar. Then when they opened Leonid’s passport they exchanged a few looks, put the handcuffs back and lead them to the station.

There they brought them to the hall of the guards. The soldiers were whispering to each other and looked at them respectful, they left the room to inform the leaders of the station.

Leonid got comfortable in one of the scratched armchairs. Soon after he jumped up, looked through the open door and waved at Sasha. “They are even sloppier then at the red line.” He said.

“Nobody is guarding us”

They slipped out of the guard room, walked slowly along the corridor but got faster and faster until they finally started running. Hand in hand, so they wouldn’t get lost in the crowd of people. A little bit later they heard the first whistles in behind their backs but to disappear in this giant station was easy, here even more people were around them than at the Pavelezkaya. Not even in her visions off the surface she could have imagines such a crowd! And it was so bright here. Just like on the surface. Sasha put her hand in front of her eyes and looked only through a small gap between her fingers.

Wherever she looked, she saw wonderful things, faces of stone, pillars and if not for Leonid she would have let go of his fingers, stumbled and got lost. Some day she would return to here she promised herself. Some day…

“Sasha?”

She turned around and looked at Homer, he was looking at her afraid, angry and surprised. She smiled: Yes, she had missed the old man!

“What are you doing here?” He didn’t have to ask the two young people that stupidest question out of all.

“We want to the Dobryninskaya!” She answered out of breath. They now ran slower so the old man could keep up with them.

“That’s madness! You can’t go there… I won’t allow it!”

But none of Homer’s arguments he told them while he was gasping for air could convince them.

When they had reached the entrance of the defense line at the Borovizkaya it seemed that nobody had informed the border guards of their escape.

“I am here on orders of Melnik. Let me through immediately.” Said Homer to the officer on duty.

He wanted to open his mouth but found no words, saluted the old man and moved out of the way.

When the post had sunken into darkness, Leonid asked politely: “You did lie, or not?”

“And?” growled Homer.

“The important part is that you do it convincingly” said Leonid. “Then only pros realize it”

“Stay away with your teachings!” Homer’s forehead got wrinkles and he switched his lamp on and off a few times because its rays had gotten weaker.

“We’re going to the Serpuchovskaya, but I won’t let you go any further!”

“That’s not the important thing.” Said Sasha.

“There is a cure!”

“What?” Homer stopped, had to cough and looked at Sasha almost afraid. “Really?”

“Yes! Radiation!”

“The virus can be neutralized through radiaton.” Said Leonid.

“But a virus is like a hundredth, no a thousand times more resistant to radiation than a human!

And you’re immune system is weakened by radiation too.” Homer lost his control and turned to Leonid:

“What did you tell her? Why did you drag her here? Don’t you know what is going to happen there! Nobody, not I or you can stop it! Take her with you and hide at a secure place! And you…” He turned to Sasha. “How could you believe him… That pro!” He spat out his last words full of contempt.

“Don’t fear for me.” Answered the girl silently. “I know how I can stop Hunter. He has two sides… And I’ve witnessed both of them. The one wants to see blood and the other wants to save lives.”

Homer put his hands over his head. “What are you talking about? There are no more sides, just one single monster in human form. Maybe a year ago…”

Hastily the old man told him off the conversation between Melnik and Hunter but Sasha couldn’t be convinced.

The longer she listened to Homer the surer she got that she had been right. She searched for words to explain it to the others: “It’s like that. The killer inside of him betrays the other. He tells the other one that he doesn’t have a choice.

The other on is thirsty for blood and the other one by his longing to save people… That’s why Hunter wants to get to the Tulskaya so badly, because both of his half’s drag him there! And I have to separate them from each other. As soon as he has the choice to safe without killing…”

“My god! He won’t even listen to you! What is it that still drives you?”

“Your book” Sasha smiled at him. “I know that it’s not over yet. The end isn’t written yet”

“Have you lost your mind? What foolish talk”

Mumbled Homer desperately. “Just why did I tell you of it?”

He grabbed Leonid’s arm. “Young man, at least you… I beg of you, I know that you’re not a bad man and you didn’t lie with bad intentions. Take her with you. That’s what you want isn’t it? You’re both young and beautiful. You should live! She can’t go there, you understand? And you too. There… Is going to be a terrible massacre. And none of your lies are going to stop anyone from…”

“It wasn’t a lie.” Answered the musician polite.

“Should I give you my word?”

Homer stopped. “Well I would like to believe you.

But Hunter… You’ve only seen him for a short time.

Leonid cleared his throat. “But heard more than enough about him.”

“But with what do you want to stop him? With your flute? Or do you think that he’s going to listen to the girl? Something controls him… Something that no longer listens to anything else”

Leonid turned to Hunter and said: “Actually I fully agree with you. But she asked me for it. And as a gentleman…” He winked to Sasha.

“Don’t you understand? this isn’t a game!” Homer looked at the girl pleading, and then at Leonid.

“I know.” said Sasha, seriously.

And the musician added calmly: “Everything is a game.”

If Leonid was really Moskwin’s offspring it was possible that he knew something about the epidemic that Hunter didn’t know, or didn’t want to tell them. Homer thought Leonid was a liar, but what if the fever could be fought with radiation? Against his strong will and common sense the old man tried to find proof tor this theory. Hadn’t he wished exactly for this a few days ago? Was at the end of the day the blood in his mouth and nausea just the symptoms of radiation sickness? The dose which he had gotten from the march over the Kachovskaya line must have been high enough to get rid of any infection.

How easily he had let himself be lead astray!

If it was right, what did that mean for the Tulskaya?

What did that mean for Hunter? Sasha hoped that she could make him stop. And she really seemed to have a strange power of the brigadier. But inside of him were two antagonists: The one may have thought about the chain the girl had tried to put him on that it felt like soft silk and for the other it had burnt like glowing iron. Who of the two would be in command of Hunter’s body in the all deciding moment?

This time the Polyanka had no pictures ready for them, whether for him nor for Sasha or Leonid.

The station seemed empty and dead. Was that a good or a bad sign?

Maybe it was just the movement of the air that blew through the tunnel. Blowing away all hallucinogenic gasses.

Maybe Homer had made a grave mistake and there was no more future the Polyanka could show him.

“What does emerald mean?” asked Sasha suddenly.

“An emerald is a green shimmering diamond.” Said Homer confused. “Emerald just means green.”

“Strange.” said the girl sunken in thoughts. “That means that the emerald city really exists…”

“What are you talking about?” said Leonid.

“Oh just… You know.” She looked at the musician again. “I am going to search for it now, your city. And some day I am going to find it.”

Homer shook his head; he didn’t believe Leonid when he had said that he was sorry.

Sasha had been sunken in thoughts the whole time and again and again she had whispered to herself and a few times she had sighed. Then she looked at Homer searching: “Have you written down what happened with me?”

“I… Am working on that.”

She nodded her head. “Good.”

At the Dobryninskaya something was cooking.

Hanza had doubled their guards and the silent and dark soldiers at the entrance held their ground and refused to let Homer and the others through. The notes of the musician nor simple reasoning could impress them. Finally he had an epiphany: he ordered them to connect him to Andrey Andreyevitsch.

After a long half hour finally the radio operator stumbled to them rolling a thick cable behind him.

Homer talked into the apparatus threatening; he said they were the first of the troop of the order. This halfway true statement was enough that they were lead through the station right away.

In the middle hallway it was hot as if somebody had pumped all the air out of the station. Even that it was late didn’t seem to bother anyone because everybody was on their legs.

Finally they stood in the greeting room of the commander of the Dobryninskaya.

He welcomed them, sweating and run down, with dark eyes and an unpleasant smell. The adjutant was nowhere to be seen. Andrey Andreyevitsch looked around nervous when he didn’t see Hunter and he grunted: “When are they going to arrive?”

“Soon.” promised Homer.

“At the Serpuchovskaya a riot is in progress.” The commander wiped over his face and walked from one end of the greeting room to the other. “Somebody told them about the epidemic. Nobody knows for what they should be afraid of and now they are saying that gasmask don’t help”

“That’s true.” Said Leonid.

“At one of the southern tunnels that lead to the Tulskaya a complete set of guards have left their posts.

Cowardly pigs! In the second tunnel that leads to the train with the people from the sect, they are still standing even thought these fanatics have started a siege and are screaming something of a judgment day. And at my own stations hell can rise up at any moment. Where are they? They are our last hope!”

Suddenly you didn’t hear the loud cursing in the station anymore. Somebody yelled and the barking sounds of the guards joined in. After nobody answered Andrey Andreyevitsch he pressed himself back into his office, a little bit later they heard how the bottle neck clanged against the drinking glass. As if he had just waited till the commander would leave the station the red lamp of the telephone on top of the desk of the adjutant started to blink. It was the apparatus with the name of the Tulskaya on it.

Homer hesitated one, two seconds then he stepped to the desk, licked his dry lips and took a deep breath.

“Dobryninskaya here!”

“What am I supposed to say?” Artyom looked confusedly at the commander.

But he was still unconscious. The fainting eyes were like behind a curtain and rolled upwards again and again without a goal. From time to time he had to cough cramped.

The bayonet had penetrated his lung.

“Are you still alive?” He yelled into the receiver.

“The infected broke free!”

Then in this moment he realized that there nobody knew what was going on at the Tulskaya. He had to tell them from the start and explain.

From the train platform he heard the scream of a woman and then machine gun fire. The sounds slipped through the door slit, you couldn’t escape it. Somebody on the other end of the line asked him something but he couldn’t really understand him.

“You have to barricade the exit!” said Artyom hastily. “Shoot them down. And keep your distance!”

But they didn’t even know how the sick looked like. How should he describe them: As swollen, exploded and stinking creatures? Those who had just been infected looked totally normal.

“Shoot them all down!” he said mechanically.

But what when he tried to leave the station himself? Would they fire at him too? Had he spoken his own death sentence? No he wouldn’t get away anymore.

There were no more healthy here. Artyom suddenly felt terribly alone.

“Don’t hang up.” He pleaded.

Artyom didn’t know about what he should talk with the unknown man at the end of the other line.

He started with his in desperate tries to contact them and told him that he had feared that no station in the metro was still alive. He had thought it could have been that he had spoken with a future where nobody had survived. Even that he told the stranger.

He wasn’t afraid to embarrass himself anymore. He didn’t have to be afraid of anything anymore.

The main thing was that he could talk to somebody.

“Popov!” Suddenly he could hear the husky voice of the commander behind him. “Did you reach the northern post? Is… The gate closed?”

Artyom turned around and shook his head.

“Idiot!” The commander spat blood. “Not useful for anything… Listen up. Above us is an underground river. I’ve placed something there… When we blow it up this whole fucking station is going to be filled. The button is here, in the room of the radio operator. But you have to close the northern gate and look if the southern is still standing. The station has to be without a single leak, you understand? I am not drowning the entire metro. And when everything is done you tell me… The connection to the guard post is still working?”

“Yes.” Artyom nodded his head.

“And see to it that you get out in time.” The commander tried to make a tortured smile and then he had to cough again. “It wouldn’t be fair otherwise…”

“And what’s with you? You’ll stay here?”

The commander’s forehead got wrinkles. “Pull yourself together, popov!{I think it means something like boy} Everybody is born to do something. Mine is to drown those pigs. Yours to close the hatch and die from old age. Understood!?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Then be quick about it.”

The telephone was silent now.

The gods of the telephone had to be thanked that Homer had understood most of the words of the soldier at the Tulskaya. He didn’t hear his last sentences but most he had understood before the connection had stopped working.

The old man looked up. Above him was Andrey Andreyevitsch’s heavy stomach. Under the arm pits of his blue uniform he could see dark spots and his fat hands were shivering. “What is going on there?”

He said toneless.

“The situation is out of control.” Homer swallowed. “Sent every available men to the Serpuchovskaya”

“I can’t do that.” Andrey Andreyevitsch pulled his Makarov out of his pocket. “They’re in panic here. The few people I can rely on have gathered around the post of the ring line so that nobody of them runs away”

“You can calm them down. We have… You can cure the fever. Through radiation. Tell them that…”

“Radiation?” The commander made a grimace.

“And you believe that? Of course. You have my permission!” He saluted jokingly and closed the door loudly behind him and locked his office.

What now? Now Homer, Leonid and Sasha couldn’t even run away from here anymore. By the way, where were they? Apparently they ran away!

Homer ran out to the corridor with one hand pressed on his racing heart. He ran onto the train platform and yelled their names. They had disappeared.

At the Dobryninskaya chaos reigned. Women, children and men with big sacks blocked the exits.

Behind thrown down tents some kind of riffraff ran around, but nobody paid attention to them. Homer had seen something like that before: It would start with the soldier kicking all who stepped on their feet and in the end they would shoot at the unarmed people.

Suddenly a moaning went through the tunnel.

The noise and screaming got silent; instead you could hear surprised yells. Again this powerful sound sounded, like hundredths of horns of the roman legion that had wandered around for centuries and finally marched to the Dobryninskaya…

Hastily the soldier pushed away the barricades out of the tunnel because something massive approached. An armored battalion. In front of the heavy skulls were mounted steel plates with only a small slit in them. On their backs where heavy machine guns.

Not even Homer had ever seen such a monster.

Faceless idols were on their armor which black as ravens.

They were wearing full-body suits out of Kevlar, gasmasks of an unknown kind and special military backpacks.

They didn’t seem to belong to this time or to this world. The battalion stopped. The heavy armed arrivers from the train platform, not caring for the crowd of people and formed three rows next to each other. Then they turned like one man, likeone machine with thundering steps to the tunnel of the Serpuchovskaya. Their powerful steps sounded over the conversations of the adults and the screaming of the children.

Homer ran behind them and tried to identify Hunter under the dozens of fighters. But all were built strong and the overalls sat on their shoulders as if they had only been made for them.

Everybody had the same, terrible weapons: Flamethrowers and Wintores—rifles with suppressors. No insignias, no badges.

Maybe he was one of the first three in the line?

Homer passed the group, waved his hands and looked into the windows of the gasmasks. But he only got the same stiff look that didn’t care for him. None of the arrivers reacted, nobody knew Homer.

Was Hunter even under them?

He had to be. He just had to appear!

Homer couldn’t see Sasha or Leonid on his way to the tunnel. Should their common sense have won and had the musician had taken the girl at a safe place?

Yes, hopefully they were waiting for this bloodbath to pass. Later Homer would try to barter with Andrey Andreyvitsch to get a solution, if he hadn’t put a bullet between his eyes by then.

Like a thrown hammer the formation made its way through the crowd and marched with surprising speed.

Nobody dared to get into their way and even the border of Hanza stepped away silent. Homer decided to follow the battalion; he had to make sure that Sasha wasn’t going to try something.

Nobody of the soldiers chased him away. For them he was a dog that ran after a railcar. When they entered the tunnel the three rows in front of them switched on their search lights and burned away the darkness in front of them. Their lights were as bright as a thousand candles. Homer couldn’t stop

thinking that the bodies of those humans were like iron but that their souls had died long ago. He had a prefect killing machine in front of him; its single parts were without a will of their own. Only one of them who you couldn’t separate from the rest knew what would happen: When he gave the command: “Fire” the rest would burn down all on their way to the Tulskaya and the other stations.

At least they didn’t go through the tunnel with the train and the sect. Those unlucky people could still wait until the eternal flame got to them. First the Tulskaya and then they…

Suddenly, like they reacted to an invisible signal the group slowed down. One minute later Homer understood why: They were at the station where you could hear screams in the distance.

Then something surprising came to the ears of the old man which made him question his own sanity: A wonderful melody.

Homer listened like under a spell. He didn’t hear anything put the voice that sounded out of the receiver and suddenly Sasha knew that now was the best time to leave.

She slipped out of the greeting room waited for Leonid and dragged him with her. At first to the tunnel to the Serpuchovskaya, then the tunnel that lead where they needed their help. Where they could save lives.

Also the tunnel lead to him, Hunter.

“Aren’t you afraid?” Sasha asked Leonid.

He smiled. “Yes. But I have the slight feeling that I am finally doing something important”

“You don’t have to come with me. It could be that death is waiting for us. We could also just stay here and go somewhere”

“Nobody knows what the future brings.”

Answered Leonid with his finger raised.

“And I was thinking that you decided it yourself?”

“Ah, stop it already” Leonid smiled ironic. “We are all just rats in a labyrinth. There are small doors which are opened and closed by those who research us. When the door to the Sportivnaya is closed you can scratch at it as much as you want, it is not going to be opened for nothing in the world. And if behind the next door is a trap you still fall into it, even though you were already expecting it. Because there is no other way. You only have one choice: You keep running or die out of protest.”

Sasha’s forehead got wrinkles. “Aren’t you angry at all that you have to live?”

“No I am angry at my spine. I can’t put my head that far back to look into the face of who is doing the experiment.”

“There is no experiment. If necessary rats can bite through concrete.”

Leonid started laughing. “You’re a rebel. I am an opportunist.”

Sasha shook her head. “That’s not true. You think that you can change people as well.”

“I would like to believe in it.”

Sasha passed the post that apparently had been abandoned in all haste: Some pieces of wood were still smoking, next to them old, almost fallen apart magazine with pictures of naked women were laying around. On the wall was an abandoned and half shredded standard. Around ten minutes later they found the first body.

It was hard to recognize it as a human being. Arms and legs were spread and swollen so much so that its clothes had fallen off. Its face was more monstrous then everything Sasha had ever seen at any monster.

“Be careful!” Leonid pulled away the corpse.

“That one is contagious.”

“And? There is a cure. There were we’re going everyone is contagious.”

Suddenly they heard shots and distant screams.

“We made it just in time.” Said Leonid. “It seems that they no longer want to wait for your friend…”

Sasha looked at him scared, but then she said: “Doesn’t matter! We just have to tell him. They think that all are sentenced to death. We just have to give them hope!”

The security gate of the station was completely open. Another corpse was laying there, face down but at least it still looked human. Next to him was a metal box that hissed in, as if the radio was trying to wake up the dead guard.

At the end of the tunnel a few men had bunkered down hastily behind a few sandbags. One heavy machine gunner and a few soldiers with assault rifles. That was the entire barricade. In front of them were the narrow tunnel walls ended and the platform of the Tulskaya started a terrible crowd was cooking and enclosed the besieged. It were infected and healthy, hideous monsters and human silhouettes, some had flashlights in front of them and others didn’t need light anymore.

The soldiers who were in front of them defended the tunnel. Their bullets were going to an end and the shots sounded sparsely and even more sparsely. The crowd got closer and closer.

One of the Soldiers turned to Sasha. “Are you the reserves? Boys, they’ve reached the Dobryninskaya! The reserves are here!”

The monster with its many heads reacted as well and moved forward worried.

“People!” Yelled Sasha. “There is a cure! We found it! You won’t die! Patience! Just have a little patience!”

But the crowd swallowed up her words, yelled unsatisfied and moved on. The machine gunner shot angry another salve at them so that some fell to the ground moaning, while others answered with a few gunshots. Not stopping the mass moved forward, ready to trample anything in their path, defenders and Sasha and Leonid alike.

Then something happened.

At first hesitating, but then more and more self-confident the sound of the flute sounded through the tunnel.

Nothing seemed more unfitting, yes even stupider, but the crowd growled surprised at first and then moved forward laughing.

But Leonid didn’t mind. Probably he didn’t play for them but for himself. It was the same melody that had put a spell over Sasha and attracted dozens of listeners.

It was an unfitting method to stop the riot when you thought about it. Maybe it was just the touching naivety of this desperate step and not the magic of the flute that slowed down the march of the crowd. Or had the musician been able to remind those who were around them and already ready to tear them to shreds of something. Something that…

The shots stopped and Leonid stepped forward without taking the flute from his lips. It acted like this was his usual audience who would applaud every second now and threw bullets at him.

For a fracture of a second Sasha thought that under the listeners was her father who was smiling softly. He had waited for her… She thought about what Leonid had said:

This melody was able to take away the pain.

Behind the hermetic door it started to rumble all of a sudden. Actually too soon. Had the search party gotten through faster than expected? So the situation at the Tulskaya wasn’t as complicated? Yes, maybe the occupants had left the station already without opening the doors?

The troop spread out and the soldiers took cover behind the tunnel segments. Only four men remained next to Denis Michailovitsch directly next to the gate. All readied their rifles. It was time. Soon the door would open and after a few minutes the forty heavy armed men from the Sevastopolskaya would get into the Tulskaya, break down any resistance and occupy the station in a few moments. It had been easier then the colonel had thought.

Denis Michailovitsch took a deep breath to order his man to put on his gasmask.

He didn’t get any further.

The group formed again, spread out so that six men created one row and filled the entire width of the tunnel. The front line held the flamethrowers in front of them and the second row their automatic rifles. Like black lava it crawled forward, gradually and unstoppable.

Homer looked past the broad backs of the men. In the white rays of their search lights they could see the entire scenario: The handful of soldiers who were still manning their station and two small silhouettes, Sasha and Leonid and the horde of terrible creatures that enclosed on them. He starred at them horrified.

Leonid was still playing. Wonderful.

Unbelievable. Encouraged as never before. The terrible horde swallowed up the music and the defenders of the tunnel had risen to get a better look at him. His melody divided the two enemy factions as if an invisible wall was erected between them. It was the only thing, the melody, that stopped them from running at each other in a final and deadly fight.

“Ready!”

The order had come from one in the black group.

But from whom? The first row went to their knees immediately and the second row aimed over them.

“Sasha!” screamed Homer.

The girl turned around, closed her eyes a bit and put her hand in front of them because she was fighting against an ocean of light.

The crowd growled and moaned under the burning rays. They walked closer and closer.

The fighters remained still.

Sasha was standing almost in front of the black formation. “Where are you?” She yelled. “I need to talk to you. Please!”

Nobody answered.

“We found a cure! You can cure the disease! You don’t have to kill anybody!”

The dark phalanx remained silent.

“I beg you! I know that you don’t want to do this. You’re just trying to save them… and yourself—”

Suddenly out of one of the rows of fighters you could hear the husky voice: “Go away. I don’t want to kill you.”

“You don’t have to kill anyone! There is a cure!”

Repeated Sasha desperate and walked from one side of the masked humans to the other.

Searching for the one who would listen.

“There is no cure.”

“Radiation! Radiation helps against it!”

“I don’t believe you!”

“Please!”

“The station has to be cleaned.”

“Don’t you want that something to change? Why are you repeating what you’ve done already? Back then with the dark ones! Why aren’t you searching for salvation?”

The fighters remained silent. The masses moved closer and closer.

“Sasha!” yelled Homer pleading, but she didn’t hear him.

Finally the words dropped: “Nothing will ever change. There is nobody left to forgive me. I’ve raised my hand against… against… I’ve been punished.”

“It’s all inside of you! You can free yourself! You can prove it! Don’t you see? It’s a mirror! A reflection of what you’ve done, one year ago! But now you can do it differently… you can listen… give them a chance and earn your own!”

“I have to eliminate the monster,” said the formation.

“You can’t do that! It is in me, it sleeps in all of us! It’s a part of the body, a part of the soul. And when it awakes you can’t kill it, can’t cut it out! You can only bring it to rest and sing it back to sleep…”

In that moment a dirty and young soldier (this is Metro 2033’s Artyom) stepped through the crowd, pressed himself past the still black rows, grabbed the radio on an iron construction and started speaking. Immediately a suppressor made a clicking sound and he fell to the ground. The crowd smelled blood and howled angrily.

Again the musician started to play his instrument but in the next moment the magic disappeared. A shot erupted, and the flute fell out of his hands as he was shot.

The ends of the flamethrowers spat flames.

Sasha stormed to Leonid and didn’t care for the crowd. The phalanx was now only made out of the barrels of an uncountable amount of guns. They made a step forward.

“No!” she screamed. She stood alone against hundreds of terrible creatures… against a legion of killers: against the whole world. “I want a miracle!”

Suddenly distant thunder sounded. The tomb shook itself; the crowd shivered and even the formation of fighters made one step back. Thin streams started to flow over the ground, from the ceiling the first drops fell, louder and louder the river rushed towards the people…

“A leak!” screamed a voice.

The fighters retreated hastily out of the station and to the hermetic gate. Homer ran with them but again and again he turned to see Sasha who stood still.

She put her hands and face under the water which fell onto her and laughed. “That’s rain,” she yelled .“It’s going to wash everything clean! We can start again!”

The black battalion was already standing behind the gate. Homer had barely made it in time as some of the fighters pressed themselves against the gate to close the Tulskaya and hold back the water—

The door started to give in slowly. Realization broke as Homer started running to get Sasha who was still standing in the middle of the station, but somebody held him back and threw him to the ground.

Then one of the fighters jumped to the door, put his hand through the slit as it grew narrower and narrower as he yelled at the girl: “Here! I need you!”

The water was already at their knees. Sasha’s blond hair disappeared under the water.

The fighter retracted his hand and the door closed.

The door didn’t open. The tunnel was shaking and on the other side the echo of an explosion barraged against the steel plate. Then it distanced itself again.

Denis Michailovitsch put his ear against the door, listened for a while and looked warily at the wet ceiling.

“We turn back!” he ordered. “Everything is done here.”