The way there was prohibited for mortals. The only things that were meant for them were around 150 polished marble pillars and tight wagons that were covered with colorful advertising. Even though they spent between two or three hours in the rocking trains of the metro, millions of people weren’t aware that they only saw a tenth of this unimaginable big underground kingdom face to face. And so that they wouldn’t start to think about its real extent or about where the inconspicuous doors and iron blockades, the dark side tunnels and the over passing that had been closed for months because of reparations lead, they turned their attention away with conspicuous posters, lead them with provocative but dumb slogans into nowhere and even chased them on the escalators with wooden advertising announcements from the loudspeaker.
It seemed like this to Kolya after he began to deal with secrets of this state within a state.
The colorful plan of the metro should convince curious minds that they dealt with a civilian object here. But in reality these lines in those happy colors were crossed by invisible lines of military tunnels that lead into government bunkers and military depots. Even some lanes were connected by a labyrinth of catacombs, out of the hidden times of the city.
When Kolya was very young and his country was too poor to compete with the ambitions of others, the bunkers and air raid shelters that had been build for judgment day collected dust. But with money people returned with bad intentions. Rusted, weighting tons, doors opened creaking, food and medicament supplies were renewed and air and water filters were brought back on the newest level.
Just in time.
The job in the metro was like a welcome into the society of the freemasons. He felt like that because he came from a small town. Once an unemployed loner, now a member of one of the most powerful organizations that rewarded his humble service generously and brought him insight into the deepest secrets of the world order. He also liked the pay of his job; they didn’t request much from future service men.
It took him some time to realize through his colleges hesitant explanations why the metro organization had to lure their employees with high wages and extra money for dangerous work. No it wasn’t even for tight work shifts and the voluntary sacrifice of daylight. It was about totally different dangers.
Homer, a skeptical man, never paid much attention to the never dying rumors or even darker tells of the devils work in the tunnel. But one day one of his colleges didn’t return from his site inspection of the service tunnels. Like the man all documents vanished that he had ever worked in the metro.
Only Kolya, still young and naïve didn’t want to settle with the disappearance of his friends. Until one of the older employees took him to the side and whispered, looking around hastily, that they had “taken” his friend. Kolya realized just too well that something sinister was going on in the Moscow underground and that long before Armageddon broke over the huge city and destroyed all life with its flaming breath.
The loss of his friend and the initiation into this forbidden knowledge should have scared Kolya.
He should have left his work and found a different one. But his arranged marriage with the metro had progressed into a passionate affair. When he was feed up with endless wandering through tunnels he let himself be trained as a substitute train driver and secured himself a firm place in the complex metro hierarchy.
The closer he got to know this ignored world wonder, the more nostalgic he turned as he looked at the antic labyrinth, this master less, cyclonic city, a upside down reflection of the surface of Moscow, and fell in love with it. This from human hand created tartarus was worthy of a real Homer, at least the feather of a swift bird and it would have impressed him more than the island Laputa… But it was only Kolya that honored the metro in secret and sang clumsy of its greatness. Nikolai Ivanovitsch Nikolayev.
Ridiculous.
It was possible to love the mistress of the cooper mountain, but the cooper mountain in particular?{Russian fable.}
But this relationship was based on love on both sides and envy. It would rob Kolya of his family and save his life.
Hunter suddenly stopped and Homer wasn’t able to get up from his soft bed of memories fast enough so he ran straight into the brigadiers back without slowing down. Without saying a word he pushed the old man back and stopped again, he lowered his head and held the distorted ear into the tunnel.
Like blind bats made its picture from their surrounding room it seemed that he perceived invisible sound waves as well.
Homer on the other hand felt something different: The smell of the Nachimovski prospect, a smell that you couldn’t mistake for anything else. How fast they had gotten through the tunnel…
Hopefully they didn’t have to pay for being allowed to pass so freely…
As if he had heard Homer’s thoughts, Achmed took his assault rifle from his back and switched the safety off.
“Who is there?” whispered Homer to Hunter.
Homer smiled in secret: Who knew what the devil had brought them? Through the wide open doors of the Nachimovski prospect horrible creatures feel through the ceiling like through a funnel. But there were also permanent residents in this station. Even though they were seen as not dangerous Homer felt about them in a special way: A sticky mixture of fear and disgust.
“Small… hairless”, the brigadier tried to describe them.
That was enough for Homer: There they were. “Corpse-eaters”, he said silently.
Between the Sevastopolskaya and the Tulskaya, maybe in different regions of the metro, this curse had achieved a new literally meaning in the last years.
“They feed on flesh?” asked Hunter.
“More on dead flesh,” answered the old one, unsure.
These disgusting creatures – spiderlike primates – didn’t attack humans; they fed on dead flesh that they had dragged down from the surface. And a big clan had made their nest at the Nachimovski prospect. The reason you could smell the disgusting-sweet smell rotting flesh in the neighboring tunnels, in the station, it was so heavy that it could make your head spin, was that they gathered dead bodies as food. Some wore their gasmasks before entering so that they could tolerate the smell.
Homer who remembered the special feature of the Nachimovski very vividly, reached hastily for his gasmask and put it over his mouth and nose.
Achmed that didn’t have enough time to pack looked at it with envy and covered his nose with his arm. The miasma that grew in this station covered them, surrounded them and chased them forwards.
Hunter didn’t seem to experience anything like them. “Is that toxic? Spores?” asked Hunter.
“The smell,” said Homer under his mask.
The brigadier looked at Homer as if he wanted to make sure that he wasn’t trying to make a joke at his expense.
Than the shrugged his broad shoulders and said: “So just the usual”. He held his assault rifle more comfortably and made clear that they should follow him and continued with soft steps.
After maybe fifty meters an almost unnoticeable whispering joined the horrendous smell. Homer wiped the warm sweat from his head and tried to keep his galloping heart at bay. They were close.
Finally the shine of the lamp illuminated something, the broken lights of a train that tried so hard to fight against the rust, its headlights starring blindly into the dark; a shattered windshield… in front of them was the first wagon of a train that blocked the tunnel like a giant cork.
The train laid hopelessly dead for a long time, but every time he saw it he had the childish wish to climb into the dusty driver cabin, touch the buttons of the panel and to imagine with his eyes closed that he was rushing through the tunnel, behind him a garland of bright lit wagons, full of people, that read, slept, stared at the advertising and tried to hold a conversation over the sound of the rushing train.