Chapter 5: Endless Sky

Ilia – Day 1 – 14:35

The crowd slowly began to dissipate. Some remained in their groups to discuss the events that had just taken place, but most went back to their various commitments about the station. I stood and stared at the door that I had to get through. There were no unguarded side-routes, no open vents, and seemingly no other way through. There was nothing else for it, I had to find a way to the surface. I'd never been to the surface since the bombs dropped and I'd heard stories of the horrors that awaited even the most prepared the surface travellers, but I couldn't do anything else; I wasn't going to leave Alex to die.

Getting to the surface wasn't going to be easy either, but I felt that I could talk my way past any guards there significantly easier than those guarding the tunnel that led to the Red Line. My first issue would be finding a filter for my newly acquired gas mask. I knew that, whatever I did, I had to be quick. I didn't want to risk my earlier attacker waking up or being discovered. It wouldn't be hard to spot the outsider during a manhunt.

I looked at the group of three guards stationed next to the door to the tunnel. The well-equipped soldiers seemed to have settled into their usual routine of sitting in a vague circle in the middle of their boxes of supplies and idly talking about nothing in particular. Once the officers had left, they stopped taking their jobs quite so seriously and began to simply talk and joke amongst themselves. I noticed that each of them had a gas mask strapped to their waists but no visible filters on their bodies. After trying to nonchalantly walk by the small guard post and glance at their supplies, I saw a filter lying on top of a box beside one of the guards.

One of the guards glanced at me as they noticed my efforts. I had two options, walk off and pretend as if nothing happened or walk up to them and own it. Having to think quickly, I chose the latter and confidently strolled up to the group. They all had stone-faced expressions as they glared at me.

"You guys been on shift for long?" I asked as I began to lean on the waist-high box with the filter on top.

One of them nodded and said, "Yeah. Coming up to six hours now."

"Shit, man. That's rough." I inched my hand towards to the filter as I drew attention away by dramatically reaching into my pocket with the other one. "In the spirit of sending those subhumans off to die, how about I buy you each a drink?" I pretended to struggle to route around in my pocket so that I could stealthily put my hand over the filter. I pulled out six bullets from my pocket and showed them to the guards. "I know you can't have one right now, but have one on me after your shifts." I held the bullets out into the centre of the group as I pulled the filter off the top and held it behind the box, out of their view.

Their expressions changed from mild indifference to a flicker of joy. The same soldier said, "Hey, thanks. Appreciate it." He took two of the bullets from my hand as the other two split the rest.

"Don't mention it. You guys are doing the hard work. Have a good watch." They nodded to me as I quickly walked off, making sure to not let them see the filter. I moved behind a nearby wall to the central section of the station and put the filter into my bag before leaning against the wall and heavily breathing to calm my nerves. A passer-by glanced at me so I quickly composed myself and moved away before I aroused too much suspicion.

I tried to wander around the station but look as though I was walking with purpose as I tried to find a way up to the surface. I spotted the blast door that led to the largest exit to the surface but there were four guards posted at the bottom that were all on attention and glaring at me as I walked by. I decided to walk on and try to find a smaller exit.

Across one of the station's tracks, a set of wooden boards flanked by large boxes led to a discrete door in the station's wall. I recognised the placement as being similar to a maintenance corridor in my home station that led to a ladder to the surface. With any luck, this one would be the same.

I checked around me to make sure that no one was looking before I stepped quietly over the boards towards the door. The boards weren't securely placed so they wobbled and created a lot of noise as I stepped over them. I opened the door, to the soundtrack of the skin-crawling screech caused by its hinges, before quickly darting inside and shutting it behind me. The dull corridor inside was well-maintained, as was much of the station, with just enough lights to allow for good visibility as well as very little loose rubble and debris that normally littered the Metro. A set of three small pipes ran across the wall of the narrow concrete passageway. Knowing that I was likely in something of a restricted area, I pulled out the revolver that I had retrieved from my attacker earlier and held it at the ready. The passageway was claustrophobic as it turned at right angles and split off into several dead ends that were often used for storage of old and decaying equipment.

I came to a heavy iron door with a large wheel lock in its centre, a good sign. The wheel was stiff from lack of use, but after much squeaking and groaning, it finally gave way and began to turn to loosen the door. When I was about halfway through the turning, I heard the door at the entrance to this area slam open.

"The spy could have gone in here!" Someone shouted as they barged in. I'd run out of time, the man I'd left unconscious had been discovered one way or another. I panicked and quickly turned the wheel the rest of the way as several loud footsteps began to move towards me. Once the door was finally loose, I shoulder-barged it open and slammed it shut, spinning the wheel back as quickly as I could. Once it locked in place, I jammed it with one of a few thick planks of wood that was next to the door and turned to find what I was looking for. The ladder to the outside world sat in a tiny room that hadn't been visited in a long time. The walls were collapsing, the rubble hadn't been cleaned, water dripped from melting ice above, and mould covered many of the surfaces. The ladder itself was rusty but looked strong enough to support my weight. Realising that I was essentially outside, I held my breath so that I didn't have to fit the filter to my gas mask just yet and began to climb the ladder as quickly as I could. It was a long ladder that took just under a minute to climb. When I was near the top, the wheel on the door jerked slightly but was stopped by the plank, quickly accompanied by the frustrated shouting of my pursuers.

Above me was a heavy metal grate that led to whatever terrifying things awaited me outside. I tried to push the grate up and it stuck briefly before I broke it free with a loud grunt. It loudly creaked as I flung it open with all of my strength and the cold air rushed in immediately, sending a shiver down my bones. I clambered out, not paying attention to anything around me, slammed the grate shut, and desperately looked around for anything heavy to weigh it down. The grate was surrounded by concrete and discarded cinder blocks, so I quickly took one of the surprisingly heavy cinder blocks and dropped it on the grate. Feeling the desperate urge to take a breath growing, I stretched my gas mask's straps over my head, having to adjust them to fit my head, before throwing my bag on the floor to find my filter within. I panicked when I couldn't find it and I knew that I would have to take a breath soon. As the wooden plank broke at the bottom of the ladder, I found the filter at the bottom of the bag and desperately screwed it into its position on the mask. I took the deepest breath I'd ever taken and fell to the floor, exhausted and relieved.

"Gas masks, now!" One of the voices down below shouted as they rushed into the small room below. I caught my breath, threw on my backpack and rushed away from the grate before actually looking at the surroundings.

I immediately saw the opening to the main entrance of Pushkinskaya station not far from where I was. It was simply a set of stairs in a hole in the main road's pathway surrounded by cracked and broken pavement. The slightly raised concrete that surrounded off the hole was topped with frozen snow with ice forming spears off the side. Behind the entrance was a large, open square. A square plinth stood in the centre that once housed a statue of an apparently famous figure, but the statue had collapsed, broken, and frozen over on the ground below it. It was ruined to such a degree that I had absolutely no idea who it represented.

Surrounding the square were several completely destroyed buildings, all of them once being at least six storeys high. Only their grey, decaying husks remained. None of the square-based buildings had roofs, simply walls of varying height that had frozen over. Building materials from them were scattered; bricks, concrete, cinder blocks, and general miscellaneous rubble had been spread across the landscape. The road that I was in the centre of was cracked and broken all over with ice covering most of the larger cracks where water had gathered and frozen over. Rusting and frozen cars lay across the streets, on the pavements, and dozens in the middle of the road. The biting wind howled through the ruined buildings and my relatively thin shirt, but nothing moved. The overcast sky matched the grey-white landscape and combined to form a miserable scene. It was magical to see it, though. I'd never been somewhere so wide open before. It felt like there was no limit to what I could see.

The grate that I had just come out of jerked slightly as my pursuers tried to open it but were stopped by the weight I'd put on it. Remembering which way that the main tunnel to Lubyanka was heading, I began to weave through the cars to run down the road that I was on as it followed the same general direction.

The road I followed was huge. It was wider than most of the tunnels and had an incredible number of routes that stemmed from it. I passed by a ridiculous number of ruined buildings as I ran through the street. How many people could have lived here? I thought. There must have been more people living on this street alone than in the whole Metro.

After half a minute of running, I heard the cinder block fly off the grate as my pursuers finally forced it open. I hid from view behind one of the many car husks as the two figures emerged. I stayed silent and listened deeply.

"Where the fuck did he go?"

"I don't know. Maybe he didn't come through here."

"And both the door and the grate were blocked, how?"

"I don't know. I just think we're not going to find him."

"He broke Nik's nose and stole Viktor's filter on top of making a mockery of our security. He deserves to die, we need to keep looking."

"I get that, but I don't have the bullets to buy another filter. I can't stay here for long."

"Let's just think about this. Where would a piece of Hansa filth go?"

"Back to the ring? North?"

"Exactly, let's check north. If he's not there, we've lost him."

Fortunately for me, my destination was in the opposite direction to the nearest Hansa station as I was heading for the Red Line. Once I was sure that they were heading away from me, I moved back down the road.

In the distance, I could hear the roars of various creatures, sounds that I had never heard previously. It was a terrifying experience. In the sky, I saw something move; I'd heard about these things before. The flesh-coloured creature flapped its huge wings to support its massive body. It had two more arms and legs, each with sharp claws as well as a large mouth full of sharp teeth. Its small eyes and large nostrils were also very distinctive; it was definitely a Demon. I knew that it would be best to avoid them, especially since I had nothing more powerful than a simple revolver to fight it with. I ducked into a much smaller but still wide side road on my left and hid behind a grey building's decaying wall before the creature could notice me. The sound of its heavy wings beating permeated through the landscape as it scanned its surroundings for prey.

After not hearing it for a few moments, I made sure that my revolver was fully loaded and looked around the corner. It was on top of a building on the other side of the street and looking straight at me. It remained perfectly still, however, so I did the same as I was unsure whether it had actually spotted me or not. After a few seconds of tense staring, it flew up into the air and let out a booming, guttural roar as it flew in my direction. I swore to myself and backed up into the side road before turning around and running as fast as I could. It roared again as it approached and the sound of the air being displaced by its wings as it beat them echoed across the landscape. I looked behind me and found that it was quickly bearing down on me. Seeing no way out, I turned and aimed my pistol at it. Its green eyes with slit pupils stared me down as I aimed and quickly fired three successive shots. I heard the blast echo throughout the city as the first two shots flew straight past the demon, but the third hit it in the chest. It remained seemingly unaffected as the blood spattered across its front and it flew ever-closer.

Realising that this wasn't working, I started to run again and spotted an open apartment block on my right with an arrow hastily carved into the brick next to the doorway. I bolted for it and prayed that I would make it as the beast menacingly roared at me again. As I approached the door, I glanced behind me and found it stretching its legs out towards me, its huge talons aiming straight for me. I ran into the doorway as it clamped down on my side, carving its knife-like claws into me. I screamed out in pain as I was launched into the doorframe from the force of the attack and the sudden impact made me slip through its grasp and deepen the wound. My head collided with the wooden frame and I fell to the broken tiled floor on my back. The demon hit the floor causing an enormous rumble that shook the snow and ice off the surrounding scenery. I crawled back as I fought through the pain so that I could get away from the claws that were frantically trying to reach me through the small doorway. The demon scratched at the floor, completely ripping up the tiles, and desperately tried to fit through the doorway. I saw the wooden doorframe snap as it forced its way through further while roaring and growling in anger. After a few tense seconds of frustrated roaring and reaching for me, the demon beat its wings again and slowly flew off in defeat, leaving me to bleed on the floor of this apartment block.

I groaned as I held my side and could feel the blood seeping out into my clothes and onto the floor. As the adrenaline faded, the intense pain started to kick in and pulse from my side and through the rest of my body. I had nothing to help myself with, I simply lay there and made a futile effort to hold the blood in as it oozed out of the three distinct claw marks. The agony clouded my thoughts and I lost focus on everything but the pain. I peeled the shirt off my lacerations, quietly whimpering as I did, to examine the damage. The demon had left three deep gashes in my side that had covered everything around them in sanguine blood. The open flesh squelched quietly as I took deep breaths. Sweat started to form across my face despite the freezing temperature as I started to overheat.

. . .

I couldn't stay there forever, I had to do something. I was in an apartment block, people used to live there; if there were clothes available, I could temporarily bandage the wound at least. I holstered my revolver and crawled to the wall to plant my hand on it and stand myself up. The pain was intense as the muscles in the wound stretched and pushed more blood out. I stumbled through the decrepit hallway, one hand holding my wound and the other using the wall for support, before reaching its T-junction. Only a few feet to the right-hand side of the junction, the building was completely destroyed. The hall was full of rubble and the sky could be seen through the tiny gaps, absolutely nothing was that way. The left was fairly intact, however. I could see several wooden doors on both sides of the equally narrow corridor that led to old apartments. The first one I tried led to a completely destroyed apartment that had clearly been caught in the same destruction as the entire right side of the building. The second one, however, had an arrow outside the door that was similar to the one at the entrance of the building. I tried to open the door, but it seemed stuck from disuse; possibly from age or the ice-cold temperature. A small amount of shaking it knocked it off its hinges, however, and it fell down with the crash of the wood hitting the tiled floor echoing through the building.

Immediately inside was a living area. A sofa and a television were the centrepieces that were accompanied by faded paintings on the walls as well as small table and chairs next to the walls. The kitchen was through another door but most of the cupboard doors had fallen off and it was generally in a poor condition. Another door led to a bathroom, complete with a broken toilet, a frozen over sink and bath that had been destroyed by a nearby collapsing wall. The final door led to the bedroom that consisted of a wardrobe, a chest of drawers with a faded family photograph placed neatly on it, and a double bed.

The bed was the biggest surprise of the place, however, as it was covered in high-end equipment. There was an AK-74M complete with two full magazines (with thirty rounds in each) as well as two clips of military grade bullets (ten bullets total), a small first aid kit, a small water canteen, and a large and warm olive-green coat. I felt like I had hit the jackpot in this godforsaken place. Alongside all of this was a clean white piece of paper with a note written on it. I sat on the bed, pulled the note towards me, and began to open the first aid kit to tend to my extensive wound.

V

I have left this equipment in the hopes that you come here as arranged. We've wanted to abandon the Reich for so long and I'm so happy that we're finally doing it. I desperately hope that you remember our arrangements. You will find this stash and then we will meet in the predetermined place. From there, we will escape to Polis and be free. That filter I left for you back in the station is brand new and was not easy to come by, I hope it serves you well. Good luck.

I love you, Brother

If anyone else finds this equipment, I beg you to leave it for my brother. He needs it.

I glanced over the note as I performed my procedure. I peeled my clothes away from my wound and began to painfully wash it with the water and clean it up with the disinfectant and wipes in the kit. The kit's small roll of gauze didn't look like it would be sufficient to cover my large wounds but I managed to just about cover my midriff with it regardless. I fixed the gauze in place with the kit's bandage and pulled my ruined clothes over the wound. It was still pulsing with pain, but I'd at least eased it and it wasn't about to get infected anytime soon. Unfortunately, I'd used all of the water to clean my wound, but I kept the canteen in my bag regardless.

I thought twice about taking the equipment after reading the message, but I figured that I needed it more, so I donned the coat, put what remained of the first aid kit in my bag, pocketed the bullets and one rifle magazine, loaded the rifle with the other, and examined the large weapon. It was in surprisingly good condition, like those given to the highest-ranking soldiers in the Reich, Red or Hansa armies. The wooden grip showed little wear and even the metal had only a few scratches. I checked that the safety worked before pulling the bolt with ease. It even came with a carrying strap. How this person had gotten hold of a weapon such as this was beyond me.

I replaced the rounds that I had fired from the revolver, leaving me with three spare, slung the AK over my shoulder, and moved off. Standing up proved painful as it stretched the wound, but I pressed on, stabilising myself with doorframes and walls to make it through. As I exited the apartment, I realised that I would have to suck up the pain if I was going to survive in this place, especially if that demon came back. I carried on down the corridor, not bothering to check the other apartments as I wasn't sure how much longer I had left on the filter that I had stolen from the door guard.

The apartment block's corridor was long, dreary and deteriorating; several walls had collapsed, most of the doors were off their hinges, and none of the glass in the windows remained. I thought that the Metro tunnels were poorly maintained, but this was on another level. I rounded a sharp corner and found that the building had completely collapsed, leaving only the main four walls standing around a mound of rubble and revealing the ruined and frozen city through the glassless windows. I could see several of the building's floors that had collapsed and broken on the bottom next to me and each wall was topped by a layer of icy snow.

Cautiously looking around for any hostile creatures, I stepped onto the rubble, briefly slipping on a loose rock before finding my footing and slowly climbing up it, trying not to put too much stress on my wound, and began to move towards the outer wall in the direction I believed to be towards Lubyanka. I reached one of the windows that I planned to exit out of and onto the street beyond. In the distance, I heard dozens of creatures howl in unison. The howls were nowhere near the sound of the roars of the demon earlier so I had no idea what to look out for. I stayed behind the wall and listened out for anything. Nothing happened, however. The air was completely still in the dead city. I readied my AK and looked outside but saw no movement whatsoever. Tentatively, I stepped outside and clambered ungracefully down the building's rubble to the path below. I frantically checked my surroundings – any side roads, inside buildings, on top of buildings, in the sky – but found nothing.

Holding my weapon tight, I crossed the street and entered into a narrow road that was in the vague direction that I wanted to go. The building at the end stood relatively proud and defiant of its surroundings. It was damaged and deteriorating, but it wasn't nearly as bad as everything that surrounded it.

As I approached it, I glanced behind me and spotted a creature in a window of a building at the end of the road I had just come from. The slightly furry creature was just a bit larger than me as it stood on its hind legs and stared at me with its small, dark eyes. Its sunken mouth was bearing its misaligned teeth as it tracked my movements. It didn't do anything but watch me and only move its head to follow my movements. I backed off towards the end of the road but kept my eye on it until I rounded the corner. The creature remained completely unmoved, so I began to jog around the intact building towards its front. As I walked along the side, I realised what the building was. I'd seen pictures of it back home since it was once was a proud feature of Moscow; The Bolshoi Theatre. The Reds had even created their own version of it in the nearby Teatral'naya Station that I wanted to visit someday, but I had to keep moving.

I looked to my right, in the direction that I wanted to be going, but found another of the creatures in the ground floor window of one of the buildings opposite the theatre. Looking back from where I came from, the previous creature inched around the corner and stopped to stare at me. Neither of them moved, so I moved up the street in the opposite direction, my nerves starting the get the better of me. My heart was pounding as I briskly moved away from them and hoped to find safety somewhere. I longed for the relative safety of the tunnels, where the sky wasn't an endless danger and I understood where the threats would come from.

I reached an intersection and saw more creatures in the buildings surrounding me. Starting to believe that they weren't a threat, I moved to the right-hand street and kept an eye out for any exits. Looking back, I saw upwards of ten of the creatures gathering in the road behind me. Getting nervous again, I jogged into a nearby shop front just to break line-of-sight. It looked as though it was once a clothes shop as mannequins were scattered on the floor and frozen in place with clothes spread across the destroyed tables and the half-standing front desk. I slipped and briefly lost my balance on an iced-over T-shirt on the floor before barging through the back door into the shop's storage room. Several lines of clothes racks were scattered across the large room which would have been in complete darkness had it not been lit up by the complete lack of a roof on the large building.

The same howls echoed through the landscape, but closer this time. They sounded like they were right outside. Footsteps came charging towards my position. I panicked and looked for anywhere to hide before running back into the shopfront and diving behind the counter, causing my side severe pain, and crawling under its countertop. I put my AK to the side as it was too large to be useful here and pulled out my revolver to aim it towards the side of the counter.

The numerous footsteps thundered towards me. Some of them ran straight past the shop but an unfortunately large proportion bolted into it. A couple of them slid clumsily into the front of the counter, dislodging much of the ice on top which fell down onto me and shattered. They ungracefully bolted through the door, some pushing the others into the doorframe to do so first. One by one, they all went through the door, apart from the last. It slid to a stop just in front of the doorway and sniffed the air around it as its brethren ran off. I aimed my revolver but stayed perfectly still and stared as it glanced around the room and rested its gaze on me. It slowly approached with its heavy footsteps and seemed to be unsure as to whether I was alive or not. I tried to keep my breathing to a minimum as it stared me down and advanced. I noticed its eyes widen, it began to move to stand on its hind legs and it opened its mouth to howl. It knew I was alive.

I fired two shots at its head, the first hitting it in its large open mouth and the second hitting its neck as its head jolted back. The shots echoed across the city and I bolted upright to run. The creature slumped down and died in a growing pool of its own dark blood as I slung my AK over my shoulder, scrambled over the counter and ran through the glassless window of the shopfront. I heard howls coming from the area that the horde had run to so I upped my pace and ran as fast as I could down the road outside and sprinted for the next side road. I saw the horde exiting the shop as I looked behind me. They took a small amount of time to catch their footing as they collided with each other and fought to be first, but they were quickly bearing down on me.

I turned into the side road to break line-of-sight and find a place to hide. I was terrified when I saw no potential spots, but I came across a building that contained the entrance to a Metro station. Perfect! I couldn't tell where it led but I didn't care.

The entrance was two archways that were mostly blocked with rubble. One of them had a roughly human-sized gap though, so I charged ahead and just about fit through as the horde came to the side road behind me. I holstered my revolver and ran for the escalators, quickly running down them as I yelled for help to the blast door at the bottom. I used the decaying rubber handholds of the escalator to help me jump over a gap in the steps and nearly lost my footing but managed to balance myself and keep going as the creatures entered the building. I made it to the bottom and collapsed on the floor next to the door, knocking my AK off my shoulder and onto the floor, and slammed the door with my fist as hard as possible while yelling, "Help! Please!" as loud as I could. The door started to creak as the mechanism within moved but it wasn't happening nearly fast enough.

I grabbed my rifle, flicked the safety off and fired up at the creatures halfway down the elevator. The power of this weapon was immense as the recoil forced it upwards, but a single burst killed a couple of them as they collapsed and tripped up another one that came tumbling down. The door began to open towards me, so I had to get up and rush forwards out of the way while firing at the approaching army and continuing to yell for help. The creatures were fearless. I finished off the tumbling one and moved over to another group where I missed most of my shots but landed a few decent hits. One of them leapt at me, but I just managed to dodge out of the way as it collided with the door. I quickly turned my sights on it and executed it as it tried to stand back up.

I kept firing my weapon in bursts, flooring a surprising number of these creatures, until I heard the multiple terrifying clicks of the empty magazine. I panicked and glanced between the weapon and the horde, having no idea what to do and freezing completely under the pressure. One of them leapt from near the bottom of the escalator straight at me as it stretched its arms and claws out to me, roaring as it went. It collided with my chest and took the breath out of me as it launched me towards the wall next to the slowly opening door. I hit the solid wall and cried out in pain as it put all of its weight into my chest, trapping me against the hard wall. It reared for another attack, but its head was suddenly blown back as the room flashed yellow and its blood sprayed across the wall by its side. An armoured man rushed out of the small gap in the opening door and fired his shotgun multiple times at the horde, dropping a few of them. He was quickly followed by another with an AK and together they kept the creatures at bay as a third person grabbed me by my collar and pulled my dazed body through the door and into safety. The ensuing action was a blur as the person pulled me in and sat me up against the nearby wall before rushing out to help their friends.

It didn't take long for them to finish the job. The gunfire stopped in an instant and, after checking that the area was clear, they walked through before the slow door had even fully opened. The three of them all wore similar armour despite it looking homemade. It tended to consist of simple metal fashioned into a chest piece with a rudimentary combat helmet and a small amount of leg protection over their normal clothes.

One of them, a man slightly older than me in his mid-twenties, crouched down in front of me with a concerned expression as the others began the process of closing the doors. He took my gas mask off my head and asked with a soft and calming voice, "Those watchers are nasty. Are you ok?" I was still in shock from the whole encounter but, as I started to gather my thoughts, I could feel my side begin to hurt again as well as the cuts and bruises that had now formed on my chest and back from the encounter. I realised that I was still gripping onto my rifle and had pulled it through the door with me. I finally let go of it to open my coat up a bit and saw a small amount of blood seeping through the clothes underneath. "Wow, you're lucky we got to you."

I nodded and managed to eke out a, "Thank you," as I tried to suck up the pain.

"Listen, we can get you to someone that can help, but you don't want to stay here for long." I looked back up at him and quietly asked why; they seemed friendly enough to me. "Do you know where you are?" I shook my head. "Kuznetsky Most, or The Armoury as people like to call it. Technically, we're a free station, but the Reds have a lot of power. You don't have papers here; they could arrest you."

I'd made it to Armoury. This was oddly good news. The Armoury was joined to Lubyanka Station, if Alex had managed to escape, he would surely end up here. And, while I didn't fancy making the trip to the gulag that was Lubyanka station, it wasn't impossible to go there and look for him. It struck me that I didn't think to head straight for Kuznetsky Most in the first place, it would always have been much easier to get into than Lubyanka. I had heard of the troubles that Armoury faced, though. It housed a large number of engineers that manufactured a lot of the weapons in the Metro for many of the factions. It was technically a free station, but since it was linked with Lubyanka, a Red controlled station, it was kept under a watchful Red gaze.

The man before me glanced back up at his colleagues. "Should we get him to The Blacksmith? He can keep him safe for a while." One of them simply nodded and moved over to me. They hauled me up and placed my arms around their shoulders to help me walk with them. Exhaustion was slowly getting the better of me and I drifted off multiple times during the journey.

. . .

As I was becoming conscious again, I heard someone different say, "Get him inside, I've got him." I felt myself being gently lowered onto a small bed. I opened my bleary eyes and found the two people from the door standing over me.

I quietly said, "Thank you."

"Don't worry about it. We brought your AK too." The younger man smiled and rested it up against the flimsy bedside table and stepped back.

I involuntarily closed my eyes again and opened them later to find only one man looking at a map on the wall just above me. He wore a hood that covered his short, greying hair with a brown leather coat and a grey undershirt. He was clearly well-to-do since he had glasses that were actually functional and a neatly trimmed beard around his mouth.

He saw me stirring and looked down at me to say, "Ah, you're awake. You've been out for a while."

My throat was completely dry and it was hard to speak, but I managed to croak out, "How long?"

"A few hours." A few hours? Alex could be anywhere by now, maybe even dead. "Your friends cleaned up your chest wounds and had a look at that nasty set of claw marks on your side. Everything seemed as fine as they could be. Your chest is painful but shouldn't have any lasting effects. Your side will definitely have lasting effects, but you managed to get it wrapped pretty well."

"Christ. Thanks for taking me in." I glanced around and found myself in a tiny dirty room. It only contained the small bed that I was lying on, a rickety wooden bedside table with a small clock and my AK leant against it, a small shelf with a couple of books weighing down my coat hanging from it as well as a small water canteen, next to a currently closed sliding door.

"It's fine. Wouldn't want you being arrested by the Reds and sent off to Lubyanka. I'm Andrew by the way."

"Ilia," I replied as I began to sit up on the bed.

Andrew held his arms out and protested, "Whoa, you don't want to move too quickly now. You've been through a lot."

"You don't understand," I said as I eventually sat on the side of the bed, feeling the pain throb through my body from my multiple wounds. "I'm looking for a friend. He could be dead if I wait for too long."

"Did he come through here?"

"Last I saw he was being sent to die at Lubyanka by the Nazis." He gave me a concerned look. "I know that he'd be insanely lucky to make it, but I have to keep looking until I know for sure. I can't just leave him." I felt myself sadden as I spoke about him. As much as Alex irritated me, I missed him deeply. He was always better at coming up with the ideas than me, he probably would have found a much better way through the tunnels than using the surface. I looked at the floor and continued. "I've known him for so many years. I don't want to lose him."

He thought for a moment. "I usually don't disclose information about people that I help but…" He looked away as he thought to himself. "What was your friend's name?"

"Alex." I quickly remembered that he wouldn't be as familiar with him as I was. "Alexandr."

"Alexandr Stepanov?" My eyes widened as I quickly nodded up at him and felt the first glimmer of hope since Alex and I had left our station. "He came through while you were unconscious, asking for a way out of the station."

I sat forward but winced as my wounds flared up. "Where did he go?"

"I got him heading for Taganskaya station since he said he's from Hansa. There's a maintenance tunnel that goes around the Red-controlled door to the tunnel to Kitay-Gorod. From there, he's going to make his way through the tunnel to Taganskaya. I gave him some of my equipment before he left."

"Holy shit. I need to follow him. Can you show me where he went?"

"In a while, young man. You need to stay where you are for now." I pushed myself up to get off the bed but stopped halfway when I made a small, high-pitched moan as my demon wound pulsed and forced me to sit back down. "Look, you're safe here for now. You need to get your energy back and get yourself to a point where you can walk without howling like one of your watchers." He reached for the metal water canteen on the nearby shelf and handed it to me. "Have a drink, eat some food, and rest. Alex is ok and on his way to Hansa, don't worry."

I obliged and drank out of the canteen. "But what if something happens to him?"

"Something will happen to you if you go now. He can take care of himself."