Dmitry Glukhovsky - Metro 2034 English fan translation (v1.0) (docx) Read Online Free PDF Page B

would order the people to arm themselves soon, nobody would refuse his command. At the Sev astopolskay a the war for the destruction of mankind, which had lasted for two centuries, had never stopped for a minute. If you live long enough in the face of death, fear makes place for fatalism, talismans, believes and instincts.
    But who knew what waited for them between the Nachimov ski prospect and the Serpuchov skay a ? Who knew if you could break through this mysterious obstacle or if there was still something behind it that was worth fighting for?
    Istomin thought about his last trip to the Serpuchov skay a : Markets, homeless on benches and those
who still had something, sleeping behind curtains. This station didn’t produce anything; they didn’t have any animal farms or greenhouses. The residents of the Serpuchov skay a were thieves but they were smart. They lived from speculation, sold expired goods that they had bought from late caravans for almost nothing. They also offered the inhabitants of the ring line services that could have brought them in front of the courts at Hanza. This station was a parasite, a fungus, a growing tumor inside the powerful Hanza.
    It was the last union of rich trade stations, appropriately named after the medival German model, a stronghold for civilization in the Metro. Everything else sank into barbarism and poverty. There was a real army in Hanza, electrical light and even in at the poorest parts a piece of bread for everyone that had earned the much sought after stamp of citizenship.
    Even on the black market those cost a fortune and if the border patrol caught somebody with a fake passport it would have cost you your head.
    Hanza owed its wealth and power to its extraordinary place: The ring line united all other lines of the star shaped complex together and opened up the possibility to switch
from one line to any other line. Traveling merchants who brought Tea from the WDNCh , trolleys that brought ammunition from the weapons forges of Baumska y a – they all unloaded their cargo at the nearest toll station of Hanza and returned back home. It was always easier for them to sell their goods a little bit cheaper than to embark on a hunt for higher profits throughout the whole Metro. It could possibly be fatal.
    It sometimes happened that Hanza affiliated neighboring stations but mostly those were left to their own fate – a tolerated grey area, where deals were made by them which the leaders of Hanza didn’t want to get involved in. Of course those “Radial stations” where filled with Hanza’s spies and to be exact – the stations had been bought a long time from the business men of Hanza. But they remained, formally, independent. So was it was with the Serpuchov skay a .
    In one of the tunnels between this station and the Tulskay a a train had broken down on that day a long time ago. Istomin had marked the place with a catholic cross, because the wagon that stood in the midst of the tunnel was inhabited by members of a sect. They had transformed this lifeless part of the tunnel into an oasis in a black desert.
    Istomin had nothing against the sect. Truly their missionaries lingered in the neighboring stations, trying to save fallen souls but these shepherds never came to the Sev astopolskay a nor did they hinder passing travelers – maybe with their missionary talk. The clean and empty tunnel between Tulskay a and Serpuchov skay a were preferred by the caravans.
    Once again Istomin looked along the line. The Tulskay a ? Their residents lived from what the bypassing convoys of the Sev astopolskay a and the smart merchants from Serpuchov skay a left behind. They repaired every possible technical piece of scrap metal and others searched for day jobs. For days they sat there and waited for one of the foremen offering slave labor. They were poor as well, but at least they didn’t have the greasy crook look in their eyes like the people from the Serpuchov skay a . And at this station