“Now march.”
Someone inserted red markers into the darkness up ahead: little human figures. They heard voices superimposed on the racket made by the ventilation. Warmth lived and flowed along in the pipes on the ceiling—the extraction system?—and in the drainage gratings under their feet. Apparently there were large rooms nearby—where stoves were lit, light shone, and people whispered to each other about something—but Artyom and the other members of the Order were being kept in the dark.
“Halt.”
They stopped under the grating of a brazier in the wall. Several crimson figures loomed up ahead. One, more like a bull than a man, was blazing furiously, consumed in flames, and two were blurred and indistinct, as if their blood was cold.
A conversation trickled out through the brazier. The words stuck together and fused, nibbled round the edges, and the pipe echo reduced the tone of all the voices to one—tinny—so it was impossible to understand who was talking to whom, as if someone with a metal funnel in his larynx was reciting a monologue.
“Are they all here? Yes, they’re all here. How many? Exactly as agreed. Twenty thousand. Twenty thousand, four hundred units to be precise. I hope this will solve our problem. Our joint problem. It should solve it. It always has solved it. So, shall we shake on it? Thank you for your flexibility. Oh, no. And of course we would like to avoid similar excesses in the future. You know perfectly well that the situation simply got out of control. It’s not our fault. An initiative from below. A matter of control. Our agreements always remain in force. Will you do something to restore the balance? We have already. Well, and I’d like to talk separately about these rumors. You know, brother against brother. Malicious tongues are wagging; there could have been a leak. No, I assure you. That’s not in our interest. We’re sticking with our relationship. All right, then. May I take this? Yes, we’ll issue instructions. Thank you, Maxim Petrovich. Thank you, AlexeI Felixovich.”
“This way!”
“Forward march!” Letyaga commanded. “Towards those three.”
AlexeI Felixovich, Felixovich, Felixovich. Thank you, AlexeI Felixovich. Yes sir, AlexeI Felixovich. Accepted. Artyom’s forearm started itching. There were already scabs there instead of tattoos.
“Right you monster moles, over here quick,” someone growled out of the darkness. “Hand over that scrap metal!”
A hoarse voice. Low and chesty.
A small torch lit up. The beam started skipping about close to the ground, over the green boxes and the stenciled inscriptions, counting the zinc containers.
“One. Two. Dismissed, what are you standing there for? Circulate. Three. Four. That’s it. You’ve delivered. Take a stroll. Five six.”
Artyom’s turn was coming soon. His heart was pounding now, after he’d recognized the other man; his head was blazing hot already, but he kept waiting for his turn, to see from close up, to know for certain …
“Seven, eight. Put them over here, over here. Next. Nine, ten. That’s it, now you’re free.”
They were handing over these cartridges to someone. All twenty zinc boxes—they hadn’t brought them here so that the members of the Order could hold the line. All that was required of them was to deliver twenty thousand cartridges and hand them over to someone. That was the entire assignment.
“Eleven, twelve.”
Artyom heard that. His turn was approaching. They’re rabbits! Docile rabbits! They not going to run anywhere! Twelve. But down below here you’ll croak. Thirteen, docile rabbits, fourteen.
He put his two boxes down on the floor. He groped with an uncertain hand at the pockets of his tactical assault vest. He pulled it out and missed the button.
“Next! What are you doing stuck here?”
The little torch’s beam jabbed into Artyom’s eyes, leaving the stenciled letters—the same way as the barrel of the revolver had jabbed into his ear.
Then Artyom raised his own torch against it—long and weighty, a million candle power. And he clicked the button.
In the harsh million-candle beam he could see the man had shriveled a bit and turned pale and wrinkled while he was on his way back from the next world—but here he was, standing confidently, with his fat legs straddled wide, clutching the green zinc boxes presented to him with one possessive hand and protecting himself against the light with other. Shot recklessly by Artyom, and not killed at all by his snot-nose little bullets. In a new Red Army uniform, sewn to order to fit his bullish torso.
Gleb Ivanovich Svinolup.
CHAPTER 18
— ACTIVE SERVICE —
“What the fuck are you doing?”
Letyaga smacked the torch hard, and the thick beam somersaulted, lashing across other, superfluous faces, revealing the walls, the floor, the ceiling—so they were all there after all. A corridor, a door, men. The men screwing up their eyes and swearing. Two images emerged side by side, looking familiar to Artyom. One fat-lipped and balding, his silvery temples sheared with electric clippers, wearing an officer’s pea jacket. The other one sharp-nosed, with bags under his eyes and neatly trimmed hair; where could Artyom know him from? It was as if they’d met in a dream …
While the torch was tumbling into the corner, Artyom had time to grab hold of his automatic, but not to aim it at Svinolup—they grabbed hold of his arms and the gun and tore them apart; the light went out; in the pitch-black darkness various strangers threw themselves on the two familiar-looking red silhouettes, shielding them against bullets.
“They’re Reds!” Artyom wheezed. “Let go of me! We brought the cartridges for the Reds! They’re Reds!”
“Easy now. Easy, easy …”
“Now what kind of shit have you got shouting his head off here? Eh?”
A hand in a fingerless leather glove—Letyaga’s—shut Artyom’s mouth—the taste was like gun oil, diesel, gunpowder, and old blood. Artyom sank his teeth into it, tugged, and shouted God only knew what with his mouth full. Chewing on it didn’t help—Letyaga had no nerves. The device was torn off his forehead, and his night vision went blind.
“Don’t touch him!” Lyokha’s voice, and the clatter of Lyokha’s automatic rifle. “Sava, they’re battering our man!”
“Let go! Let him go!” That was Savelii. “Or I’ll drop everyone right now!”
“Damir … Omega …”
There was a grunt in the blackness, the gurgle of a strangled throat, the flash of a burst of fire—into the ceiling—and someone wheezed, tried to break free, and howled frenziedly.
“Do we finish them?” someone asked in the darkness, breathing fitfully.
“So you specials have a few problems of your own,” the invisible Svinolup chuckled. “Right, guys?”
“No. Not now. Bring them this way, follow me.” Letyaga’s deep bass.
“The colonel said if they pulled anything flaky …”
“I know what the colonel said. Bring them and follow me!”
“What happened?” A familiar voice, not Svinolup’s, but different—weary and lordly; at the sound of it a vision of a brothel rose up in front of Artyom’s unseeing eyes, with curtains lit from the inside …
“That’s it. Sorry about the little hitch. Let’s take them and leave!” Letyaga.
Hands of steel dragged Artyom along the floor, behind him his comrades started jerking their legs about—but the soldiers of the Order were well-trained; you couldn’t break their grip.
“Bring them over here. Put them there. Right, that’s all; I’ll sort this out myself. You go up. And you keep your ugly mugs to the floor!”
“The colonel said to waste them all if anything started up.”
“Waste us! Are you totally berserk?” SaveliI shouted, coming round.
“Damirchik, I remember. I’ll handle this. Have you searched them? Are they clean?”
“They’re clean.”
“Right then. Move on. I’ll be quick.”
“Okay, guys …” They drawled their agreement dubiously. “Let Letyaga do it. It�
��s his sidekick.”
Heels clattered, seemingly moving away—but also dubiously, dissembling. Apparently going up, but as if they were just moving aside. The oil-soaked leather released Artyom’s mouth.
“That’s Svinolup! The Reds’ KGB! We gave the Reds cartridges! The Reds—we gave them—cartridges! Have you got any clue you’re doing?”
“I have my orders, brother,” Letyaga replied gently. “Deliver. What I deliver to who is none of my business.”
“The Reds! The Reds! Cartridges! The two of us! Fought them! In the bunker! Our boys died there! Number Ten! Ullman! Shlyapa! The Reds killed them! Do you remember that? They almost killed you! And me! How could we? How could you all help them?”
“We were told to collect the stuff from the depot and bring it here. And hand it over.”
“You’re lying!” Artyom yelled, blowing his top. “You’re fucking lying, you bastard! You scumbag! You’re a traitor! To them! And me! All of them who were killed! Our boys! Both of you! You and that old rat! You’ve betrayed everybody! What was it for? What did they croak for? So we! Could give? The Reds! Weapons? Cartridges?”
“Easy now, easy. It’s aid! It’s not cartridges. They’ve got a famine. They’re going to buy mushrooms with those cartridges. From Hansa. From Hansa. All of their own harvest has rotted.”
“I don’t believe you! Any of you!”
“What a load of crap,” Lyokha said into the stone floor.
“What about you? Do you believe it? You?”
“My job …”
“What is that—your job? Do you think I didn’t hear? You were told to waste me. If I didn’t swallow this, right? What does flaky mean? Was I supposed to swallow this! You and me—the two of us!—giving the Reds cartridges?”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’ll never forgive you. Not you! One blood, you bastard. Uh-huh! You! How do you feel right now? How can you believe now, Letyaga? What in? Now? What’s it all for? For the rations?”
“You … Don’t you …”
“Come on! You know, right? I couldn’t give a shit about anything. I’m going to croak anyway. Shoot, you shit. Carry out your orders. Group A fucking minus. Only let my guys go. These two. What do you want with them? The old man doesn’t owe them anything. There’s nothing to get even for!”
Letyaga said nothing, breathing loudly through his nose. Something metallic hovered tensely close beside Artyom, but he didn’t feel the death that was all ready and waiting to happen.
“Well?”
The stinking leather shoved all the sounds back into Artyom again.
“Get up, you two,” Letyaga ordered in a whisper. “I’m sorry, Artyom.”
A pistol cracked into his ear.
Once. Twice. Three times.
Nothing changed.
In pitch darkness, how can you distinguish life from death?
That was how—from the taste of blood and diesel, gunpowder and oil in his mouth. He was alive.
“Hold hands!” Letyaga whispered. “If anyone comes adrift, I’ll waste him on the spot.”
They didn’t try to run from him blindly; they put their trust in Letyaga one last time. Letyaga’s palm led Artyom, silenced now, hurrying along, and the others followed him in a chain.
“Hey, how are you doing down there? All done?” someone called to them from the escalator.
“Now at a run,” said Letyaga. “If they catch us, they’ll snuff me with you.”
They ran, not looking and not seeing. Holding each other’s cold fingers, slippery with the sweat of imminent death.
“Where are you going?” someone roared from above them. “Halt!”
Letyaga didn’t seem to know where—he was simply running, anywhere. After thirty seconds something started whistling around them and boots started clattering behind. They turned off somewhere, stumbling and crashing into each other, getting in each other’s way.
“Who is he, this Felixovich?” Artyom demanded from Letyaga as he ran. “Bessolov! Who is this Bessolov? Who has our old man sold us to? Eh?”
A pillar of light shot down from the sky. The four of them shied away from it like cockroaches.
They poked their noses into a dead end and turned back. The running feet moved away, then started moving closer again. And again that indistinct, chesty droning oozed out of the cracks in the blackness. Like at the very beginning, when they were just coming down into Komsomol Station.
And again mute bullets zipped past close by, bounced against the walls and flew off at random, sparing them reluctantly.
“Bessolov, who is he?” Artyom persisted. “Who is he? You know, Letyaga! You know! Tell me!”
Letyaga stopped, confused: Maybe because everywhere here was equally black, everywhere was equally far from warm, red life, and there was no way to find any direction?
Letyaga switched on his torch.
“There they are! That way! Over there!”
They were standing by a welded grille. Letyaga took aim and shot off the padlock, three of them jerked the bars outwards, and they squeezed in and crawled, crawled away from death on all fours. Maybe the others wouldn’t bother to chase after them?
“Ooooooooo …”
The groaning was growing louder as the choir warmed up; it blew into their faces like a wind from the pipe they were crawling along. Artyom’s eardrums, heart, and spleen were already vibrating in tune with it. And the men behind were keeping up, trying to carry out their orders, tickling the back of his head with their torch beams, trying to choose a target.
Letyaga came across something: some kind of iron cover. The droning on the other side of it was as loud as if the cover was screwed onto a pressure cooker on the stove and about to be blown off by an explosion of steam at any moment.
He pressed down hard on the cover—no use. The rust had already put down roots; the salt had grafted the bolt to the frame. A bullet zipped through the air and bit the last one in line—Savelii.
“Get against the wall!”
Letyaga stretched out his hand and turned his torch on their pursuers, dazzling them; zap, zap, zap, he replied in lead and Artyom thought he wounded someone. In the sealed-off pipe it was hard to miss.
And from behind they replied generously in kind.
“Give me some fucking help, with you?”
Two of them stamped hard, then three, the iron in their path hesitated and then slumped down. SaveliI caught another bullet and squealed, and they dragged his limp body after them through the hole that had burst open. They tumbled straight out of the ceiling of the tunnel, into a thousand screaming people. They fell on their heads and didn’t get hurt.
Now it was clear what the groaning was.
“FOOOOOOD!”
* * *
Artyom had never seen so many people at once anywhere. It was an unusual tunnel, immensely wide, to take two sets of tracks at once, with right-angle vaults; and it was completely flooded with people for as far as the eye could see.
There was a whole sea of people here. And the sea was raging.
The four of them had fallen out about fifty meters from the station, and they started sculling through the living bodies in that direction, towards the light. They pulled SaveliI behind them, not looking to see where the bullets had hit him. SaveliI caught hold of Artyom’s collar, pulled himself up from his low tank-driver’s height, and shouted into Artyom’s ear in a whisper. Artyom shrugged it off: Come on, what is all this? You’ve still got years and years of life ahead of you! They couldn’t just stop and stand still—the huge crowd was swaying, and it could crush them against the wall or trample them underfoot. And they had to keep going to get lost in the crush: Their pursuers could follow them out any second now.
The bodies here were gaunt and exhausted, with the skin hanging loose on them. Forcing a way through them they felt it: The fleshless bones snagged on them as they moved past, like the ribs of a kitchen grater, seeming to plane a little bit of something off each one of them—for themselves.
It was the famine that had gathered them together and herded them here from all over the Red Line, Artyom realized. But why here?
“MUSHROOOOOOMS!”
It was strange that the people could even stay on their feet. There couldn’t be any strength in those emaciated stick-legs. But not all of them could stay up—every now and then Artyom stumbled over something that had given in, his boots trod in something soft—stomachs, maybe?—and slithered off something hard and round. But the living could no longer weep for anything except mushrooms.
It was easy to guess the right direction: All the heads in the tunnel were turned the same way. And in between their roaring the people quietly hummed the word “Komsomol”.
They moved along with all the others and through them—towards Komsomol Station, with just the backs of people’s heads turned towards them. Short-cropped or with hair hanging loose, shaved, gray or white. As if people here got by without faces.
Artyom looked back—and saw one black figure in an Order balaclava dive out of the ceiling like a little toy soldier, followed by another one. Letyaga hadn’t carried out his orders, but the others couldn’t disobey. The heaving surf swallowed up the divers; now they would start swimming to find Artyom and drown him.
He redoubled his efforts and walked on with his knees bent, so that his black uniform would be hidden behind other people’s brownish shoulders, and he tugged the others down too.
They couldn’t talk to each other: The weeping and roaring of the human sea drowned everything out, so all they were doing was opening and closing their mouths without making a sound. Everything they tried to say something about turned into mushrooms.
METRO 2035. English language edition.: The finale of the Metro 2033 trilogy. (METRO by Dmitry Glukhovsky) Page 41