‘There’s no way I can get used to the damned darkness, I have to use this trash,’ the old man lamented, covering his eyes. ‘Well, why have you come here? Aren’t there enough places on that side or something?’

‘Listen,’ Artyom didn’t allow him to finish speaking. ‘You are free… You can let us out! Before these cannibals return! You’re a normal man…’

‘Of course I can,’ he answered, ‘but of course, I will not. We make no deals with the enemies of the Great Worm.’

‘What the hell is the Great Worm? And what are you talking about? I’ve never even heard of it, so I can’t be its enemy…’

‘It’s not important whether you have heard of him or not. You came from that side, from where his enemies live, and that means you must be spies.’ The derisive rasping in the old man’s voice had changed to a steely clacking. ‘You have firearms and flashlights! Damned mechanical toys! Machines for killing! What more evidence do you need to understand that you, the infidels, that you are the enemies of life, the enemies of the Great Worm?’ He jumped up from his chair and approached the bars. ‘It is you and those, who like you, are guilty of everything!’ The old man put out the overheated lighter, and in the encroaching darkness he was heard blowing on his burning fingers. Then a new voice called out. This one hissed and chilled the blood. Artyom grew frightened. He remembered Tretyak, killed by a poisoned needle.

‘Please!’ he began to whisper fervently. ‘Before it’s not too late! Why are you doing this?’

The old man said nothing and a minute later the place was filled with sounds: slaps of unshod feet on concrete, hoarse breathing, the whistling of air drawn through nostrils. Although Artyom didn’t see any of those entering, he felt that all of them were studying him closely, looking, sniffing, listening to how loudly Artyom’s heart beat in his chest.

‘The fire people. He smells like smoke, he smells like fear. One is the smell of the station from that side. The other is foreign. One, the other, they are enemies,’ someone hissed at last.

‘Let Vartan do it,’ another voice ordered.

‘Light the fire,’ someone commanded.

The lighter was struck once more. In the room, besides the old man in whose hand the flame fluttered, stood three shaved savages, shading their eyes with their hands. Artyom already had seen one of them, the thickset and bearded one. The other also seemed strangely familiar to him. Looking Artyom directly in the eyes, he took a step forward and stopped at the bars. The smell from him wasn’t like from the rest: Artyom detected a faint stench of decomposed flesh emanating from this man. They couldn’t stop staring at him. Artyom winced: he understood where he had seen this face earlier. It was the creature who had attacked him in the night at Kievskaya. A strange feeling seized Artyom. It was similar to the paralysis, only this time his mind was affected. His thoughts stood still, and he obediently opened his consciousness to the silent probing.

‘Through a hatch… The hatch had remained open… They had come for the boy. For Anton’s son. They stole him in the night. I am guilty of it all, I allowed him to listen to your music, through the pipe… I climbed into the handcar. We didn’t tell anyone else. We arrived together. We didn’t close it…’ Artyom answered the questions that arose in his head. It was impossible to resist or conceal anything from the soundless voice demanding the answers from him. Artyom’s interrogator knew in a minute everything that was of interest. He nodded and stepped back. The fire was extinguished. Slowly, like feeling returning to a numbed hand, Artyom regained control.

‘Vovan, Kulak! Return to the tunnel, to the passage. Close the door,’ one of the voices ordered. Most likely it belonged to the bearded commander. ‘The enemies are to remain here. Dron will guard the enemies. There is a holiday tomorrow, the people will eat the enemies, they will honour the Great Worm.’

‘What have you done with Oleg? What have you done with the child?’ Artyom began wheezing after them.

The door thudded hollowly.

CHAPTER 17. The Children of the Worm

Several minutes passed in total darkness, and Artyom, having deciding that they had left them alone, began to pull himself up, trying at least to sit. His tightly tied legs and hands were numb and sore. Artyom recalled the words of his stepfather explaining to him once that even leaving a bandage or tourniquet on too long, could kill the skin. Although, it seemed to him that it didn’t matter now.

‘Enemy, lay quietly!’ A voice rang out. ‘Dron will spit a paralysing needle!’

‘It’s not necessary.’ Artyom froze obediently. ‘You don’t have to shoot.’ He had a glimmer of hope. Perhaps he could convince his jailer to help him get out. But how can you talk to a savage who barely understands you?

‘And who is this Great Worm?’ He asked the first thing that came to his head.

‘The Great Worm makes the earth. He makes the world, he makes man. The Great Worm is everything. The Great Worm is life. The enemies of the Great Worm, the people of the machines are death.’

‘I have never heard of him,’ Artyom said, choosing his words carefully. ‘Where does he live?’

‘The Great Worm lives here. Next to us. Around us. The Great Worm digs all the passages. Then man said he does it. No. The Great Worm. He gives life, he takes life. He digs new passages, the people live in them. Good people honour the Great Worm. Enemies of the Great Worm want to kill him. That is what say the priests.’

‘Who are those priests?’

‘Old people, with hair on their head. Only they can. They know, they listen to the desires of the Great Worm and they tell the people. Good people do it thus. Bad people do not obey. Bad people are enemies, the good eat them.’

Recalling the overheard conversation, Artyom began gradually to comprehend what was what. The old man relating the legend of the Worm was, probably, one of those priests.

‘The priest says: it is forbidden to eat people. He says the Great Worm will cry when one man eats another,’ Artyom reminded him, trying to express his thoughts exactly as the savage would.

‘It is against the will of the Great Worm to eat people. If we stay here, they will eat us. The Great Worm will be sad, he will cry,’ he added carefully.

‘Of course the Great Worm will cry,’ a derisive voice was heard from the darkness. ‘But emotions are emotions, and you will not replace a protein food in a ration with anything.’

It was that same old man speaking. Artyom recognized his timbre and intonation. Only he didn’t know if he had been in the room all the time or had just stolen in unnoticed. I didn’t matter. He wasn’t going to get out of the cell now. Then another thought entered Artyom’s head, and it chilled him. How lucky that Anton had not come round yet and wasn’t hearing this.

‘And the child? The children that you steal? Do you eat them, too? The boy? Oleg?’ he asked almost soundlessly, staring into the darkness with eyes open wide from fear.

‘We do not eat little ones,’ the savage replied, although Artyom thought the old man was answering. ‘Little ones cannot be evil. They cannot be enemies. We take little ones in order to explain how to live. We talk about the Great Worm. We teach them to honour him.’

‘Good boy, Dron,’ the priest said. ‘Favourite student,’ he explained.

‘What happened to the boy you stole last night? Where is he? It was your monster who dragged him away, I know,’ Artyom said.

‘Monster? And just who brought forth these monsters?!’ the old man exploded. ‘Who brought forth these mute, three-eyed, armless, six-fingered things who die during birth and are unable to reproduce? Who deprived them of human appearance, promised them paradise and flung them to die in the blind gut of this cursed city? Who is to blame for this and who is the real monster?’