They drove along the river, past the Kremlin.
The Kremlin was undamaged, but it was pretending to be dead too.
He remembered how the overseers at Schiller Station smashed dead people’s heads with metal reinforcing rods, just to make sure, so they wouldn’t bury anyone alive. Don’t take anything on trust.
So was Miller right? So was all this worth it?
Yes, they lied to people, but in order to save them. Right?
Was there a way to live with this? For two weeks at least?
He’d ask Miller about that.
* * *
At Borovitskaya Station they all went through decontamination. Lyokha and SaveliI were taken off somewhere, with promises to treat them nicely. Letyaga led Artyom through the dark connecting passages towards Arbat, to Miller. Artyom didn’t talk: as if his teeth had been glued together with tar. Letyaga whistled excruciatingly.
“What happened back there in the Reich? How did you get out?” he asked after all, when the start of the tune came round for the third time.
“It was bad” said Artyom. “I thought I was going to croak. The letter was taken off me. By Dietmar.”
“We know.”
“See,” Artyom joked, without looking at Letyaga. “You all know everything. It seems like I’m the only one who knows fuck all.”
“I’m sorry, little brother,” said Letyaga. “I really wanted to get you out of there. But this real achtung situation blew up. With the Reds and the Reich.”
“That’s what I thought.” Artyom nodded.
“I reported to the old man. He said we’d deal with it. Don’t be angry with him.”
“I’m not angry.”
“Everything’s being sorted out right now. There aren’t enough men. I’ll just park you here, and then I’m off on different business. The Reds have been hit by famine. All the mushrooms have rotted. And now this war is the last way they have to placate the hungry people. It could spread to Hansa. And everywhere else as well. They have to be restrained. And yet again there isn’t anyone but us to do it. The final, decisive battle is brewing.”
“See, the mushrooms … They’ve turned out to be really important,” said Artyom.
“They have,” Letyaga agreed; he whistled a bit more.
“What does Miller say?”
“I was told to deliver you safe and sound and indulge your every whim,” Letyaga replied.
“I see.”
“I’m a little man, brother. I don’t even want to peep anywhere I haven’t been told to look. Everyone should get on with his own job, I reckon. And not interfere with anyone else’s. Who am I to decide anything? Do you understand me?”
Artyom finally looked at him. Carefully—in order to really understand.
“You’re not really all that little,” he told him.
* * *
“Artyom!” The colonel drove out from behind his desk to greet him.
Artyom stood there mutely: All his prepared speeches had soured in his mouth, like pig’s milk, curdled; he’d spat them out before he walked into the office, but the taste of bitter whey was still there on his tongue.
“Listen,” Miller told him.
Artyom listened. And rolled his eyes round the office. A desk swamped with papers. Maps on the walls. Were the jammers on them? And Moscow’s lines of defense? The wall-mounted list of the boys who were killed when the Reds stormed the bunker. Where had their souls gone to—Number Ten’s, Ullman’s, the whole crew’s? Maybe they were sitting in that sheet of paper, breathing alcohol fumes from the half-drunk shot glass? Totally plastered, probably, on half a shot, both platoons: A soul doesn’t need that much.
“We’ll keep this business quiet,” said Miller. “I’ll arrange things. It’s my fault. I didn’t warn you.”
“So it really isn’t the Reds?” Artyom asked. “In the trucks? At the radio center?”
“No.”
“But they’re not our men, are they? I didn’t kill our men?”
“No, Artyom.”
“Who are they? Whose men were they?”
Miller hesitated for a moment, as if asking whether the boy needed the truth: What could he do with it?
“Have you got a radiation overdose?” He rolled a bit closer to Artyom and stopped so that he wouldn’t be in his own light.
“Whose soldiers were they?”
“Hansa’s. They were Hansa’s men.”
“Hansa? But the wind towers … Who built the wind towers? I heard something about political prisoners that the Red Line sent … Banished … From Rokossovsky Boulevard … From the Lubyanka … For construction work.”
“Artyom …” The colonel clicked a lighter and lit up with one hand. “Would you like one?’
“Yes.”
Artyom helped himself. And lit up. He started breathing full and deep. It sharpened up the contrast a bit. He didn’t interrupt his superior or try to help him.
“Artyom, I understand that it will be hard for you to accept everything on trust. Now. But think about it—would the Red Line ever build anything for Hansa? For its own sworn enemy?”
“No.”
“Correct. It wouldn’t. They did everything themselves. They have enough … workers and equipment.”
“And the bodies in the pit … There’s a huge pit dug out there. Crammed right up to the top. Then who are they?”
Miller nodded. He knew about the pit. And did he know about the dogs?
“Spies. Saboteurs. Potential spies and potential saboteurs.”
“Hansa’s been doing this without us knowing … Without anyone knowing … All these years? Hiding everything from us? Blotting it out, deleting it? The whole planet?”
“In order to save Moscow.”
“But why don’t they … The West, the Americans … Why don’t they bomb the other cities? Look, I heard them myself! Petersburg! Vladivostok! Ekaterinburg! They’re all out there … Babbling away … On peaceful subjects. In Russian! They’re all there! The country’s out there! Are we the only ones who aren’t? What about the war out there? Is it still going on?”
“Out there … What do you know about ‘out there’? You listened to the broadcasts for half an hour. It’s all a radio game, Artyom. How can you tell which are our side and which are paid mercenaries? Where their saboteurs are? What’s really ours now, apart from the Metro? Nothing. The Metro is all we have left! Where is there any real, live life out there? They’ve planted provocateurs everywhere, like spiders sitting in their webs. ‘This is Vladivostok, come and join us. This is Petersburg, come to us!’ And everyone drawn in to them from the villages is finished off on the spot. A bullet in the forehead. There isn’t any Russia! Everything happened just as we feared it would. They blitzed us, crushed us, and occupied us. If we don’t hold out here—if we let them know that we’ve survived—then we’ll be next. We have only one way to save ourselves, Artyom. Pretend to be dead men. And build up our strength. So that we can go back.”
“But what if people simply come to us? Our people? Like that, from the villages? Not saboteurs, but our people? Russians? The genuine article?”
“There’s a war on, Artyom. It’s not possible to check everyone out. They’re enemies, full stop.”
“What if they don’t come from the east, but the west?”
“All the main directions are covered.”
“And the jammers?”
“That’s not the only station.”
“So I wouldn’t have … I wouldn’t have achieved anything anyway?”
“You wouldn’t have had time, Artyom. It’s a good thing Letyaga got you out of there. If you’d wrecked just one more pylon, I wouldn’t have been able to strike a deal with them. Their orders were to take no prisoners.”
Artyom drew in smoke, caught the unraveling words and lined them up.
“Were you watching me? When I climbed up to the top of the Tricolor building? The high-rise?”
The colonel’s mouth twitched: Letyaga had blabbed.
“We knew.”
“Why didn’t you shut me up?”
“Because you’re one of us. Even though … I said those things to you.”
“But you, yourself—when did you find out? How?”
“I was put in the picture. Some time ago.”
Artyom took a drag. He sat down on the floor with his back to the wall: There wasn’t any chair. Now Miller in his wheelchair was actually taller than him. He ought to be taller than Artyom in any case. He used to be taller, when he had legs instead of wheels.
“You know, Svyatoslav Konstantinovich … In our last conversation, you demonstrated conclusively that I was schizo.”
“I did that to protect you. So you wouldn’t do … Everything that you have done.”
“But why couldn’t you simply explain? Or am I schizo after all? Eh?”
“Artyom.”
“You tell me. Am I schizo or not? Just tell me.”
“Listen. Your story about the Dark Ones. This certainty of yours that you could have saved the world. That you were chosen by them. That mankind will perish because of you. How can I tell you … How can I say something like that simply?”
All that story of his about the Dark Ones. All that story of his. All of it.
“None of it was important, right? The way we hit them with missiles … It didn’t change anything, right? We never were the last people on Earth, here in Moscow. And the Dark Ones were never our only hope. I didn’t save them, because … just because—but nothing terrible happened. The world’s still living the way it was before. But if I had saved them—well, there would have been someone to show in the zoo. Whether they were angels or not would be totally fucking irrelevant. Not a miracle, just a curiosity. Even I think it’s funny. Funny what a stupid wanker I am, right, Svyatoslav Konstantinovich?”
“No.”
“It’s fun-ny,” Artyom protested.
It was hard to sing, hard to pronounce the vowels: as if a goiter was getting in the way.
“I did try to explain to you. I told you that you were too hung up on them. But in view of your condition, I didn’t have any right to break secrecy about the shield.”
“My condition,” Artyom echoed. “Yes. Definitely schizo. First I thought I was saving the world, then I thought I’d doomed it. Delusions of grandeur.”
“You simply weren’t sufficiently informed. You had to invent all the rest. But talking to you now, I’m convinced that you’re reasoning perfectly soundly. It’s not your fault.”
But whose was it? Artyom looked into the glowing ash on his cigarette as if it was gun barrel. It looked like a pocket-sized roll-up hell. Always there with him.
“I had to invent a lot of things for myself,” he agreed.
“If you think it was all easy for me …”
“I don’t think that. I was simply an idiot. What did I do it all for anyway? I thought I could take you … Anya, before … And you … The boys … My stepfather … up onto the surface. So we could live … in a city. Together. In houses. I thought. I pictured it. Even in that monastery … All together. Or set out … on the railway. To take a look at the country and the earth. It was a dream. If only the world was still there; that’s what I thought. Then I’d … But everybody knew. Do you think you need to lie to people? Why not tell them? Let them choose for themselves … If they want to go, let them go!”
“You’re starting to talk like a fool again.” Miller frowned. “They’ll leave Moscow. And then what? They’ll be picked off out there, one by one! All of them! We’re still together here. The Metro is our fortress. A fortress besieged by the enemy. We’re all part of the garrison, not just the Order, but everybody. And we’re not here forever. We’re building up our strength to strike. For a counterattack. Is that clear? We’ll leave this place. But not to surrender! Not with a white flag! We won’t run for it. We’ll leave this place to take back what’s ours! We have to win back our land! Is that clear or not? But right now there isn’t anyone waiting for you out there!”
“There isn’t anyone waiting for me here.”
“That’s not true. I didn’t summon you here to snivel. And that’s not what I got you out of there for either.”
“What for, then?”
Miller trundled back to his bunker-desk, pulled out a drawer, rummaged in it for a while with a frown, and took something out.
“There.”
He rolled over to Artyom himself and held out his fist. He opened it slowly. Not theatrically, but as if he was struggling with himself. There was a name tag lying on his palm. Engraved on one side was: “If not we, then who?” Artyom took it. He licked his dry lips and turned it over. “Artyom Dark”: the first name his mother gave him and the surname he invented himself. His name tag. The same one that Miller had confiscated from him a year ago.
“Take it.”
“What … is this?”
“I want you to come back, Artyom. I’ve thought everything over, and I want you to come back into the Order.”
Artyom examined his surname obtusely: It was meaningless; it didn’t signify anything anymore. It used to be his penitence; it was a burning cross, a reminder to him about himself. But now what was it? He wasn’t to blame. That was over and done with. He ran his finger over the black niello inlay of the letters. Something was hammering in his ears.
“What for? Because I exposed Moscow’s cover?”
“I won’t let them have you,” Miller replied. “You’re one of us. Let them choke on that.”
Artyom finished his cigarette: He stopped at the point there the tobacco singed his fingers. Them.
“What do you need me for?”
“Right now every man counts. We have to stop the Reds. At any price. And sort out the fascists. It’s the last chance to stop the war, Artyom. Otherwise there won’t be any more radio signals here, and not because of the jammers … But because of us. We’re doing the West’s work for them. They won’t even get a chance to be surprised. Do you understand?”
“I understand.”
“Well? Are you with us or not? I’d just like to patch you up a bit and you can join the ranks!”
“And what about my men? SaveliI and Lyokha? What will you do with them?”
“We’ll take them on for training. Since you’ve already cleared them for access to a state secret.”
“Into the Order?”
“Into the Order. As far as I understand it, the three of you took the radio center. That’s a good recommendation.”
Was that all? Artyom ran his hand over his scalp. Sashenka had shaved it.
“You got too much radiation,” Miller said definitively. “Let’s put you in hospital. Stay there for a while, and we’ll see what’s what. And then …”
“Svyatoslav Konstantinovich. Permission to ask a question? What was in the envelope?”
“In the envelope?”
“In the envelope we were supposed to deliver to the Reich.”
“Ah.” Miller frowned, trying to recall. “An ultimatum. An ultimatum from the Order. A demand to halt the operation immediately and withdraw all forces.”
“And that’s all?”
The colonel spun round on the spot. The fuming roll-up in his teeth described a circle, deploying a smokescreen. He squeezed the words out.
“An ultimatum from the Order and Hansa. From both of us. Jointly. Full stop. They’re waiting for you, Artyom.”
Artyom straightened out the cord, stuck his head in the noose, lowered the name tag, and hid it under his shirt.
“Thanks for having confidence in me.”
And to himself he wondered why he hadn’t been killed in the bunker. Was Letyaga to blame? If they’d stitched a red line in Artyom then, would he have been better off or worse off? Did he feel good now that he knew? What would he die of radiation sickness for now? He could have been here in Miller’s office with the boys. He could have been letters on that sheet of paper, always drunk and always jolly.
“Our fighting days
aren’t over yet!” the colonel promised. “Only we have to get you …”
“No need to put me anywhere. I know all about myself already. Do the boys have something on today?”
“Something on?”
“Letyaga told me. An operation. Against the Reds. Not enough men, he said.”
Miller shook his head.
“You can’t even stay on your feet, Artyom! What can you do? Go with that man there, take a rest … There’s someone out there … To socialize with.”
“I’ll go with them. When is it?”
“Why the hell?” Miller tossed his butt on the floor. “Why can’t you just sit still on your backside?”
“I really want to do something,” Artyom said, although it should have been “one last thing.” “Not just lie there, but finally do something meaningful.”
* * *
“It looks like a room for conjugal prison visits.”
“Would you like to go for a walk?”
“Yes.”
She pushed the door and walked out first; Artyom followed.
Arbat Station was like the chambers of a royal palace, like the Russia of a dream: grandiose, white and gold and endless. There was somewhere to go here—follow the perspective all the way to its vanishing point.
“What happened to you?”
“Nothing. I picked up a dose of radiation. If you mean the hairstyle.”
“I mean in general.”
“In general? In general … Did you know? About the radio?”
“No.”
“Didn’t he ever tell you before?”
“No, Artyom. Never. He didn’t tell me anything about it until now.”
“I see. Well then, that’s it. There’s nothing to add.”
“You’ve got nothing to add?”
“What else is there to say about it? I found what I was looking for. That’s all.”
People looked round at them. At her. All those General HQ fossils and desk warriors at Arbat cracked their calcified joints, twisting their entire torsos if their crimson, creased necks couldn’t turn. After all, she was beautiful, Anya. Tall, light, haughty. With a boyish hairstyle. Dashingly penciled-in eyebrows. Angled upwards and outwards. And all of a sudden, here she was wearing a dress too.
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