Near Novokuznetskaya, the tunnel forked and the section car took the left-hand path. When Artyom asked what went on down the right-hand path they explained that that way was barred to them: a few hundred metres into it there was an advance post of the Hansa, a veritable fortress. This unremarkable tunnel, it seemed, led directly to the three Ring stations: Oktyabrskaya, Dobrynskaya and Paveletskaya. The Hansa didn’t intend to destroy this little inter-tunnel passage and its very important transport link but it was only used by Hansa secret agents. If someone else tried to approach the advance post, they would be destroyed immediately without even being given the chance to explain themselves.
After travelling a while along this passage, they came upon Paveletskaya. Artyom thought how right his friend at VDNKh had been when he had told him that in the old days you could cross the whole metro system within an hour – and he hadn’t believed it at the time. Ah, if only he had a section car like theirs…
But anyway, a section car wouldn’t really have helped since there were lots of places that you couldn’t just pass through like a breeze. No, there was no point in dreaming about it, in this new world there wouldn’t be anything like it anymore – in this world each step required an improbable effort and searing pain. The old days were long gone. That magical, wonderful world was long dead. It didn’t exist anymore. And there was no point in whining about it for the rest of your life. You had to spit on its grave and never look back.
CHAPTER 10. No Pasarán!
There were no patrols visible in front of Paveletskaya station, just a group of dishevelled people sitting thirty metres from the station’s exit, moving aside to let the revolutionaries’ trolley pass and watching it respectfully.
‘What, nobody lives here?’ asked Artyom, trying to make his voice sound calm. He certainly did not want to be left alone in this deserted station, without weapons, food, and documents.
‘At Paveletskaya?’ Comrade Rusakov looked at him with surprise. ‘Of course they do!’
‘So why is there no border guard?’ Artyom persisted.
‘Because this is Pa-ve-lets-ka-ya!’ Bonsai interrupted, enunciating the syllables for emphasis. ‘Who would bother it?’
Artyom thought to himself how much he agreed with the ancient sage who said, as he was dying, that the only thing he knows, is that he knows nothing. They all talked about the inviolability of Paveletskaya station as if it needed no explanation, as though it was something everybody understood.
‘What, you mean you don’t know?’ Bonsai was incredulous. ‘Just wait, and see it for yourself!’
Paveletskaya station captured Artyom’s imagination at first glance. The ceilings were so high that the flickering flashes of light from the torches that protruded through rings hammered into the walls, did not reach the ceiling, creating a frightening and bewitching sense of the infinite directly overhead. Enormous round arches were supported by slender columns that somehow managed to support the mighty vaults. The space between the arches was filled with bronze castings, tarnished, yet evocative of their past greatness; and although these were only the traditional hammers and sickles, framed as they were by arches, these half-forgotten symbols of a destroyed empire looked as proud and defiant as they did when they were forged. A never-ending row of columns, interspersed with the wavering, blood-coloured torchlight, faded off into the incredibly distant haze, and even there, it seemed never to stop. The flames that licked the graceful marble pillars a hundred or a thousand paces away, seemed simply unable to penetrate the dense, almost palpable, gloom. This station once was, to be sure, the residence of the Cyclops, and therefore everything here was gigantic…
Did no one dare to encroach upon it simply because it was so beautiful?
Bonsai shifted the engine to idle, the trolley rolled slower and slower, gradually coming to a halt, while Artyom kept looking intently at the strange station. What was it all about? Why did nobody bother Paveletskaya? What was so sacred about it? Certainly not only because it looked more like a fairy-tale underground palace than a building built for the transportation industry?
A whole crowd of ragged and unwashed urchins of all ages gathered around the stopped trolley. They enviously eyed the machine, and one even dared to jump down onto the track and touch the engine, respectfully silent, until Fyodor drove him away.
‘That’s it, comrade Artyom. Here our paths diverge,’ the commander interrupted Artyom’s thoughts. ‘I talked things over with the other comrades and we decided to give you a little present. Here you go!’ And he handed Artyom a submachine gun, probably one of those taken off the killed security guards. ‘And here’s something more.’ He placed in Artyom’s hand the lamp that had lit the way of the fascist in the black uniform with the moustache. ‘These are all trophies, so take courage from them. They are rightfully yours. We would stay here longer, but we mustn’t delay. Who knows how far the fascist bastards will decide to chase us? But they certainly won’t dare to stick their noses into the Paveletskaya.’
Despite his newly acquired firmness and resolve, Artyom’s heart throbbed unpleasantly when Bonsai shook his hand, wishing him success. Maxim slapped him on the shoulder in a friendly way, and bearded Uncle Fyodor thrust him a half-drunk bottle of his potion, not knowing what else to give him:
‘There you go, buddy, we’ll meet again. And we’ll be alive – we won’t die!’
Comrade Rusakov shook hands once again, and his handsome, manly face grew serious.
‘Comrade Artyom! In parting, I would like to tell you two things. First, believe in your star. As comrade Ernesto Che Guevara said, Hasta la victoria siempre! And second, and most important, NO PASARÁN!’
All the other soldiers raised their right hand in a fist and repeated the slogan: ‘No pasarán!’ There was nothing left for Artyom to do but to also raise his fist and shout the refrain, with just as much resolve and revolutionary fervour: ‘No pasarán!’, although for him personally, the whole ritual was just gobbledygook. But he didn’t want to spoil the solemn moment of his departure with stupid questions. Apparently he did everything right, as comrade Rusakov looked at him with pride and satisfaction, and then solemnly saluted him.
The motor revved louder, and, enveloped in a blue-grey cloud of smoke, accompanied by an escort of delighted children, the trolley vanished into the darkness. Artyom was completely alone again, and farther from home than he had ever been before.
The first thing he noticed, as he wandered along the platform, were the clocks. Artyom counted four of them right away. At the VDNKh, time was something rather symbolic: like books, like attempts to set up schools for the children – a demonstration that the station residents continued to care, that they did not want to degenerate, that they were still human beings. But here, it seemed, clocks played some other kind of role, a much more important one. Wandering about some more, Artyom noticed other strange things. First, there were no living quarters of any kind at the station, except for some hitched-up subway cars on the second track and on into the tunnel. Only a small part of the train was visible in the hall, which is why Artyom did not notice it right away. Tradesmen of every imaginable kind, and workshops were all over the place, but there wasn’t a single tent to live in, not even a simple screen behind which one could spend the night. Some beggars and tramps were lying around on bedding made just of cardboard. People bustling about the station approached the clocks from time to time; some, who had their own watches, would anxiously check them against the red numbers on the display panel, and then go about their business again. If Khan were here, thought Artyom, it would be interesting to hear what he would have to say.