Read Online METRO 2033 by Dmitry Glukhovsky - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Dmitry Glukhovsky
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rational man, refined and civilised Homo sapiens chooses to capitulate - then I refuse to be called one and would rather become a beast. And I will, like a beast, sink my teeth into life and gnaw on the throats of others in order to survive. And I will survive. Got it?! I will survive!’
He sat down and quietly asked Artyom for another splash of tea. Sukhoi stood up himself and went to fill and heat the kettle, gloomily and silently. Artyom stayed in the tent alone with Hunter. His last words were ringing with contempt; his malicious confidence that he would survive lit a fire in Artyom. For a long time he was trying to decide whether to say something. And then Hunter turned to him and said: ‘And what do you think my friend? Tell me, don’t be shy . . . You want to turn into vegetation too? Like a dinosaur? To sit on your things and wait until someone comes for you? Do you know the parable about the frog in the cream? Two frogs landed in a pail of cream. One, thinking rationally, understood straight away that there was no point in resistance and that you can’t deceive destiny. But then what if there’s an afterlife - why bother jumping around, entertaining false hopes in vain? He crossed his legs and sank to the bottom. The second, the fool, was probably an atheist. And she started to flop around. It would seem that she had no reason to flail about if everything was predestined. But she flopped around and flopped around anyway . . . Meanwhile, the cream turned to butter. And she crawled out. We honour the memory of this second frog’s friend, eternally damned for the sake of progress and rational thought.’
‘Who are you?’ Artyom ventured at last.
‘Who am I? You already know who I am. The one who hunts.’
‘But what does that mean - the one who hunts? What do you do? Hunt?’
‘How can I explain it to you? You know how the human body is built? It’s made up of millions of tiny cells - some emit electrical signals, others store information, others still soak up nutrients, transfer oxygen. But all of them - even the most important among them - would be dead in less than a day, and the whole organism would die, if it wasn’t for cells responsible for immunity. They’re called macrophages. They work methodically and regularly like a clock, a metronome. When an infection gets into an organism, they find it, track it down, wherever it’s hiding, and sooner or later, they get to it and . . .’ He made a gesture as though he was wringing someone’s neck and let out an unpleasant crunching sound. ‘Liquidate it.’
‘But what relevance does that have to your job?’ Artyom insisted.
‘Imagine that the whole metro was a human organism. A complex organism, made up of about forty thousand cells. I am the macrophage. The hunter. This is my job. Any danger that is sufficiently serious as to threaten the whole organism must be liquidated. That’s what I do.’
Sukhoi finally came back with the kettle and poured the boiling brew into the mugs. He had obviously gathered his thoughts in the meantime, and he said to Hunter, ‘So you’re going to take on the liquidation of the source of danger, cowboy? You’re going to go hunting and shoot down all the dark ones? It’s hardly possible that anything will come of it. There’s nothing to be done, Hunter. Nothing.’
‘There is always one last option - the last resort. To blow your northern tunnel to pieces. Collapse it completely. To cut off that new species of yours. Let them procreate from above and leave us moles alone. The underground is now our natural habitat.’
‘I’ll tell you something interesting. Only a few people know about this at the station. They’ve already blown up one tunnel. But above us, above the northern tunnel, there is a stream of ground water. And, when they blew up the second northern tunnel, we were almost flooded. If the explosion had been just a bit stronger - goodbye my dear VDNKh. So, if we now blow up the remaining
He sat down and quietly asked Artyom for another splash of tea. Sukhoi stood up himself and went to fill and heat the kettle, gloomily and silently. Artyom stayed in the tent alone with Hunter. His last words were ringing with contempt; his malicious confidence that he would survive lit a fire in Artyom. For a long time he was trying to decide whether to say something. And then Hunter turned to him and said: ‘And what do you think my friend? Tell me, don’t be shy . . . You want to turn into vegetation too? Like a dinosaur? To sit on your things and wait until someone comes for you? Do you know the parable about the frog in the cream? Two frogs landed in a pail of cream. One, thinking rationally, understood straight away that there was no point in resistance and that you can’t deceive destiny. But then what if there’s an afterlife - why bother jumping around, entertaining false hopes in vain? He crossed his legs and sank to the bottom. The second, the fool, was probably an atheist. And she started to flop around. It would seem that she had no reason to flail about if everything was predestined. But she flopped around and flopped around anyway . . . Meanwhile, the cream turned to butter. And she crawled out. We honour the memory of this second frog’s friend, eternally damned for the sake of progress and rational thought.’
‘Who are you?’ Artyom ventured at last.
‘Who am I? You already know who I am. The one who hunts.’
‘But what does that mean - the one who hunts? What do you do? Hunt?’
‘How can I explain it to you? You know how the human body is built? It’s made up of millions of tiny cells - some emit electrical signals, others store information, others still soak up nutrients, transfer oxygen. But all of them - even the most important among them - would be dead in less than a day, and the whole organism would die, if it wasn’t for cells responsible for immunity. They’re called macrophages. They work methodically and regularly like a clock, a metronome. When an infection gets into an organism, they find it, track it down, wherever it’s hiding, and sooner or later, they get to it and . . .’ He made a gesture as though he was wringing someone’s neck and let out an unpleasant crunching sound. ‘Liquidate it.’
‘But what relevance does that have to your job?’ Artyom insisted.
‘Imagine that the whole metro was a human organism. A complex organism, made up of about forty thousand cells. I am the macrophage. The hunter. This is my job. Any danger that is sufficiently serious as to threaten the whole organism must be liquidated. That’s what I do.’
Sukhoi finally came back with the kettle and poured the boiling brew into the mugs. He had obviously gathered his thoughts in the meantime, and he said to Hunter, ‘So you’re going to take on the liquidation of the source of danger, cowboy? You’re going to go hunting and shoot down all the dark ones? It’s hardly possible that anything will come of it. There’s nothing to be done, Hunter. Nothing.’
‘There is always one last option - the last resort. To blow your northern tunnel to pieces. Collapse it completely. To cut off that new species of yours. Let them procreate from above and leave us moles alone. The underground is now our natural habitat.’
‘I’ll tell you something interesting. Only a few people know about this at the station. They’ve already blown up one tunnel. But above us, above the northern tunnel, there is a stream of ground water. And, when they blew up the second northern tunnel, we were almost flooded. If the explosion had been just a bit stronger - goodbye my dear VDNKh. So, if we now blow up the remaining
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