Surface

I have a just finished this chapter so it's fresh off the press, I hope you enjoy it although I don't know how long it will be to the next chapter but I hope you enjoy it anyway . So as always I don't own Metro but I do own my characters.

Khan made sure that Svetlana and I had attached our filters to our masks correctly, he seemed weary of taking us up on the surface. As he scuttled around us, he started to make us nervous as we had never really been up on the surface we had been at the gate of Novokuznetskaya but we had never actually stood on the surface. I looked up the vent, which led to the surface, the light refracted off the visor on the gas mask, my eyes took a few seconds to adjust but as soon as they did I could see the algae and plants attached to the rim of the pipe.

I looked around to Svetlana who had tears in her eyes; she really didn't want to go. I walked over to her and put my hand over her shoulder, "Hey, why are you crying?" I asked her.

"What are we doing?" She replied as she looked up at me.

"Surviving," I told her as I walked over to Khan.

"We're becoming animals!" She shouted at me.

I just kept moving up towards Khan, "When are we moving?" I asked him.

"Whenever you're ready," He replied as he pointed his Kiparis up the stair well to the surface.

"Well I'm ready," I told him.

"Are you little one?" He said in a calm voice to Svetlana.

"Yeah, what the hell we have to move might as well go now," She told him as the tears dried.

"Are you sure?" He then asked her.

"Yes, now can we move?" She said sternly as she tried to move past Khan.

"Wait child, take this," He told her as he rummaged around in his back pockets and he passed her a Tokarev pistol.

"I've never fired a gun before," She said as she backed away from the dull grey hand gun.

"It's simple," He told her as he chambered a round, "Point, pull, repeat if needed." She reached out to grab the gun but Khan pulled it away, "Only for emergencies," She nodded in response so he lowered the gun and she took it and placed it in her left pocket, in her trousers.

Khan started to move up the stairs while Svetlana kept in his shadow, I walked a few steps behind them. "Khan, how far do we have to move on the surface to reach Christye Prudy?" I asked him as the light from the consumed him.

"Only around three hundred metres but this area is a no entry zone," he told me as I moved up behind him.

"Why a no entry zone?" I asked him.

"Because this zone is notorious for mutant attack and banditry," He told him with a slight chuckle in his voice.

"Why are you laughing about that?" Svetlana asked as she ducked behind the entrance to the station.

"We shouldn't have any trouble," He told her as he moved out into the outside world. As I stepped outside I looked around and spotted something in the sky.

"What is that?" I asked.

"Der'mo!" Khan replied as he shoved Svetlana and I under a metal frame which had an array of broken glass inside, I landed on a pain of glass causing it to crack. Svetlana came in on top of me causing more glass to break. I heard distance flapping that sounded like it was coming closer and closer. I peeked my head out from under the metal but Khan nudged it back with his ankle. The creature had huge wings and massive talons, an airborne death dealer; its head was kept on a swivel praying for its next meal. It circled over our heads for a few minutes but it started to move off. Khan crawled out from underneath the metal and looked around trying to spot where the creature was.

"It's clear," He told us as he pulled us from under the metal.

"What the hell was that?" I asked him as I pulled out my Makarov and chambered a round.

"We call them demons, you must have heard of them?" He told us.

"No we were… we were kept fairly sheltered from the outside world," I replied as we moved on.

"Really? Why is that boy?" He asked in curiosity as we entered a house which had blood everywhere, he put his finger up to the hole in the mask where the mouth is. He then went around the corner with his Kiparis drawn, I heard growling followed by the sound of a scuffle. I drew my pistol and knelt down with Svetlana behind me. I heard claws moving on the floor in the nest room but as I turned the corner I spotted two dark hairy creatures, one turned and looked me straight in the face, it charged across towards me. I fired two shots from my Makarov; the creature hit the floor but the second creature who was on top of Khan looked at me. I tore it off Khan and put three rounds in the creature's chest. I then knocked on Khan's visor waking him up. As he got up Svetlana came through the door, she had the Tokarev gripped tightly in her hands but as she saw that no one was hurt she lowered it as put it back in her trousers.

"What the hell happened?" Khan asked as he regained his bearings with the dead creatures in the room.

"You got knocked out and Spartak killed these two things," Svetlana told him as she looked at the dead things on the floor.

"These are called watchmen," Khan told us, "They move in packs like wolves."

"What the hell is a wolf?" I asked Khan in confusion.

"They are wild dogs, they roamed the countryside before the war," Khan told me looking at me strangely, "You really have led a sheltered life, children."

"Yeah well, we know now," I told him as I put my pistol away. As I raised my hand back up I saw it was covered with blood, after I saw it I felt a shooting pain go through my stomach. I had to collapse to the floor. Khan scooped me up and passed his Kiparis to Svetlana.

"Keep me covered we're going to have to run to Chistye Prudy from here," He told Svetlana, I felt myself continually slipping out of consciousness but when I felt the floor hit my back I felt safe. I could feel someone put something around my stomach and then an injection into my right forearm. I felt the blood rush around my body like I was back in the fight.

The pain faded away as I sat upright. I looked around wondering where the hell I was but there was nothing just a lot of rubble and glass, I didn't know where the hell we were.

"Khan where are we?" I asked.

"This was the ticket office to Christye Prudy, until the snow on the roof caused it to cave in," He told me as I started to get to my feet with the help of Svetlana, "Now we are left without the roof and what was the nest of the watchmen, but I think the demon scared them off."

"That fills me with joy," I told him as I walked around the room.

"So how do we get to the station?" Svetlana asked.

"Through that hole in the floor," He told her as he walked over to a gaping hole in the floor, he then lowered me then Svetlana into the hole; he then jumped down to join us in the dark.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter and are enjoying the story so far, I don't know how long it will take to churn out the next chapter but anyway please review and tell me how I can improve the story and where you think I should go with it until next time….. PEACE!