Tomnote
Finally I am back and my god it's been a while since I have updated on here but I now have a new chapter out, let's hope you enjoy it and hopefully I can get more out soon for my other stories and this one aswell. Until then though guys and girls I hope you enjoy and as always I don't own Metro Universe but I do own Spartak. Also Tomnote is dark in Russian.
It was about three days before Levii and I had become well enough to make the expedition into the metro towards the enclave, Khan met us in our hospital ward at exactly seven in the morning he made his way into the room accompanied by a doctor who had been treating us for the last few days.
"You two boys are very lucky," the doctor first told us as he signed off some pieces of paper which on the back had the mark of the order, "Luckily I have the authority to release you, Khan here was just going to take you from here without my consent, that would have had m court-martialled, a date with Millar I'd rather not have."
"Well then its good I found you then," Khan grumped as he slumped a bag down on the floor which clanged as it hit the wooden floor. He then unzipped the bag unveiling a collage of silver and grey. "Well don't just sit there." He ordered to us as he picked up the kiparis which I had come to know so well when he had been my rescuer.
"Well you heard the man," Levii told me as he jumped out of the bed and picked up a bastard along with three magazines. I just sat there while he counted the rounds out of the bastard.
"Have you got it?" I asked him as I reached into the bag. After a couple of seconds of searching I felt it, the grip felt smooth in my hand and the metal of the slide. I pulled the clump of metal and wood out of the bag, when it broke into the light the weapon behaved like a black hole absorbing all light that passed by it just leaving the outline of the black handgun. I pulled back the slide on my Makarov and looked into the breach only seeing the silvery top of the magazine. "Any rounds?" I asked Khan as he smiled at us as I looked around in the bag and found two further magazines. "Where the fuck did you find these?" I asked him as I looked in wonder at the silver magazines.
"There is an old trader who came through who traded me his magazines for a shipment of food for a station along the Filyovskaya Line," Khan laughed as I pulled out a bag fully of 9mm rounds and started to load them individually into the magazines of the Makarov.
"What else did you acquired?" I asked him as I continued searching the bag for weapons.
"One collapsed AN-94," He replied as I pulled the metal and polymer frame from the bag looking at the weapon, I pressed the receiver release on the back of the rifle and popped it off exposing the recoil spring.
"It's clean," I said sounding surprised, it was rare to come across a gun this clean in the metro.
"The man it came from was a ranger he kept it in the best condition," Khan told me as I popped it back on the rifle and pulled out a set of three magazines.
"So where are we going now then?" Levii asked Khan as he finished putting the rounds into the bastard's magazines.
"We're going to Medeleyevskaya, along the Serpukhovsko-Timiryazevskaya Line, it only three stations from here," Khan told us as I loaded the AN magazines. Each round clipped into place above the last I kept my head down thinking about the face of the creature which attacked me, their skin completely fallen off and bare flesh showing.
"Okay we need to move soon then," Levii told Khan as he climbed up from his bed and clicked his bastard onto safe. I climbed up and felt the pressure and pulling on my stiches which caused me to wince as I lifted my rifle up. I clicked it onto safe aswell and made sure the breach was clear.
"Are you ready Spartak?" Khan asked me.
I regained my composure from my twinge and straightened up, "Yeah let's do this," I told him as I simply placed my rifle over my shoulder.
I started to walk out towards the door but Khan placed his hand on my chest, "What is bothering you?" His voice sounded soothing almost fatherly.
"It's just I'm feeling apprehensive about facing my demons with the cult."
"What do you mean?" He implored.
"I don't really want to face the thing that attacked me again," I explained as I looked at Levii who was sat in the corner with his Bastard just sat on his lap.
"You will not face your demons with them," He reassured me.
"How can you be sure?" Levii butted in from the corner of the room.
Khan did not respond but he did just wink and held his kiparis on his hip. "What kind of reassurance is that?" Levii asked as he scrambled up onto his feet whilst I followed Khan closely.
"Shut up Levii," I told him as I moved into the corridor, the nurse came up to us and held her hand out to Khan.
"I cannot allow you to take these men from the ward," She told him with a glare of death, however Khan pushed her hand down and whispered something in her ear as he passed her without resistance. The nurse stumbled backwards in a daze allowing Levii and I an open to walk straight past.
"What did you do to her?" I asked Khan as he continued to walk forward towards the exit to the hospital.
"Nothing, child," He told me reassuringly but I didn't believe him.
"But I heard you whisper," I replied confused.
"Then you should have heard what was said," He simply said to me as I just sucked it up and shut up until we reached the large blast door which marked the outer perimeter of the station. The door barely had the remnants of the black and yellow trim it also had a few bullet scrapes from when Polis was founded and the war of foundation ended. Originally the station the hospital was in, Aleksandrovsky Sad, was overrun by large gorilla like creatures. However the creatures were eventually kept under control and people managed to cultivated by men once again, around this time the Nazi's attempted to seize the station due to its close proximity to the library where they confiscated may books and burned them infront of the people. This caused a selected group of men to rise up forming a secret resistance known only as the Order, over time these men had their legendary feats speak for them from the shadows of the metro.
They became known as the Spartans by their old nemesis, they were gaining ground on the front from the river at Borovitskaya. After a month of fighting they had secured Arbatskaya and Biblioteka Imena Lenina leaving only Aleksandrovsky Sad left to seize from the Nazi's.
It took a week for the Order to gather their Spartans and prepare for an offensive, as the Spartans began their offensive the Nazi's didn't even put up a fight, all that remained from their existence were the charred remains of the final books which faced the Nazi's wrath. These chars and embers that remained were pasted onto the door which we now stood against.
Khan moved closer to the door which had deep scars running across it, he ran his hand through one grove as he made his way to the left of the door, when he reached it he turned to Levii and I telling us simply, "Put your masks on, this tunnel is dangerous for the misinformed."
Levii and I both gave each other a blank stare, we had both been taught by the rangers that the tunnels out this way contained the most twisted mutants. We both gulped as the rubberised straps on the back of the gas masks were pulled back and the rubber fronts pulled over our faces like a shroud of darkness. Whilst we did this Khan did the same, his bear like hands pulled the mask over his face obscuring his greying beard leaving only his sunken blue eyes visible above the filter of his mask. "Get ready," He told us as he grabbed hold of the manual override for the huge blast door.
As the door creaked and groaned I readied my rifle folding out the stock and chambered a round, Levii swiftly did the same with his Bastard. As I peered through the iron sights, I could see a faint light, as the door made its slow opening more apparent. I could feel the cold air rush in as it did the Geiger counter Khan had on went crazy.
"Should we be worried?" I asked Khan as he checked the counter.
"1.676 Roentgens per hour, that's a pretty high level," Khan started.
"Pretty high?" Levii butted in sounding shocked as Khan stepped into the tunnel, I followed swiftly after him, "That's about ten times the safe level."
"Maybe," Khan simply finished his rebellion. I just smirked under my mask I heard Khan place his Kiparis in a small zipped dump bag on his left hip.
"Won't there be Nosalises down here?" I asked as I tentatively kept my AN-94 up to my shoulder.
"They won't come through here they fear the shadows," Khan told us calmly as he released the door locking mechanism causing the door to slam shut with one hell of a crash.
"So the big scary creatures fear the dark?" I laughed as I watched Khan check that the door. The tunnel was well lit at this point of the journey, I looked up to see where the light was coming from but all I could see was a crack in the ceiling which was flooding the area with light.
"No they fear more than shadows," Khan also looked up at the crack in the ceiling, "A gateway to the heavens."
"Yeah or to the surface hell," I added to Khan's sentence.
I looked around the tunnel, there was rubble piled up at the edges along with the moss and grasses which had been growing over the twenty years since the bombs fell. Underneath one pile of grass and moss I spotted the white outer rim of a gas mask filter.
Khan spotted it too and we both crouched down over the heap of moss, "Poor bastard," I said as Khan pulled the moss from the mask exposing a partially decayed face hidden behind a huge gas mask.
"You see that?" Khan asked me as he pointed at the edge of the mask where the visor met the rubber. I looked directly where he was pointing but I couldn't see anything, "The seal on his visor had split, so he suffocated down here."
"I say again, poor bastard," Levii had already walked about ten metres further down the tunnel, he had almost reached the edge of the light and was looking into the shroud of darkness. I walked up next to him and shined my flashlight attached to my helmet, I could see the creatures, which had become accustomed to the darkness, scurry into their hiding spots underneath debris which had fallen from the ceiling.
"Disgusting creatures," Levii said as we took a step into the darkness.
"Hold right there," Khan ordered calmly as came to join us. "Don't move in the shadows without light," He then added as he pulled a small red stick from his back pack, the stick had a small cap on the end which he snapped off causing a bright red light to emanate from the end which had the cap on. He then gently threw the stick into the tunnel, as it rolled you could see the shadows cast by the flare.
When the flare finally settled, you could see things moving in the light, not creatures but shadows. "What the fuck are they?" Levii shouted as he raised his weapon to point at the shadows.
"They mean us no harm, to them we are but ghosts," Khan said as he kept his flashlight pointed at the closest shadow.
"That didn't answer my question," Levii said as he tip toed behind Khan, I was walking closely behind them.
"They are souls who have been stuck in between this world and the next," Khan echoed peacefully as he avoided the shadows perfectly.
"So can they see us?" I asked as I looked at a shadow which was following my path as if it was watching me.
"No they are forced to live their last moments over and over, the most painful experience of their lives, they are alone and afraid," He whispered as the ghost continued to look at me. I could see their outline but no facial features, they were female they had shoulder length hair but couldn't be too old maybe in their late twenties.
"Why here? Why not somewhere else in the Metro?" I asked him as I walked on but the shadows suddenly snapped to the doorway which we came through. "What's happening?" I asked as the shadows started to look up in the air above the door, all of them in unison.
"Their last moments," Khan said as he stood and watched. After a few seconds of staring at the shadows one by one they dropped to the floor some tried to run but were cut down by something.
"What the fuck is happening?" I shouted to Khan panicking by what was happening I felt for them as I saw the bodies hit the floor.
"Stop!" Khan demanded as he, "There is nothing we can do, you remember the stories of the Nazi's, this was their first attempt at the final solution, these people were massacred by their hand."
"And that's what we just witnessed," Levii solemnly said as the shadows littered the floor around us. I looked down at their corpses as if it was so real, I could hear their screams, they pierced my ears. I was frozen by the scene that bore my existence.
I trudged one foot first as I looked across to Levii who was looking up at the door where we had come from, up above were the dilapidated remains of an old catwalk, 'that's where the shooting came from,' I thought to myself as I walked the insects and moss which now inhabited the area where the shooting had come from.
"We should get moving now I think, there's nothing we can do from here now," Khan calmly exhaled.
"Da, v tomnote," I expressed as the flare faded and our flashlights illuminated the now empty tunnel.
I hope you people enjoyed this chapter as I said at the start hopefully I can update at some point soon but until then please review and tell me what you thought for better or worse I do appreciate the feedback but until next time….PEACE!