'. . . Everything on this earth is a consequence of the Great Worm. Once the whole world consisted of stone and there was nothing on it except stone. There was no air, and there was no water, there was no light and there was no fire. There was no man and there was no beast. There was only dead stone. And then the Great Worm made it his home.'

'But how did the Great Worm get here? From where does he come? Who bore him?'

'The Great Worm has always been. Don't interrupt. He made a home for himself in the very centre of the world and said, "This world will be mine. It is made from hard stone, but I will gnaw my own pa.s.sages in it. It is cold, but I will warm it with the heat of my body. It is dark, but I will light it with the light of my eyes. It is dead, but I will inhabit it with my creations."

'Who are the creations?'

'The creations are the creatures the Great Worm issued from his womb. Both you and I, all of us, are his creations. There you have it. And then the Great Worm said, "Everything will be as I said, because this world henceforward is mine." And he began to gnaw pa.s.sages through the hard stone, and the stone softened in his belly, saliva and juice moistened it, and the stone became alive and began to bear the fungi. And the Great Worm having gnawed the stone, let it pa.s.s through himself, and he did it thus for thousands of years, until his pa.s.sages went through all the earth.'

'A thousand? What? One, two, three? How many? A thousand?'

'You have ten fingers on your hands. And Sharap has ten fingers . . . No, Sharap has twelve . . . That won't do. Let's say Grom has ten fingers. If you take you, Grom and other people so that all together there were as many as you have fingers, they each of them all would have ten times ten each. This is a hundred. And a thousand, this is when it is ten times each 100.'

'That's a lot of fingers. I can't count them.'

'It's not important. When the Great Worm's paths appeared on the earth, his first work was finished. And then he said, "So, I have gnawed thousands and thousand of paths through the hard stone and the stone has been scattered into crumbs. And the grit has pa.s.sed through my womb, and has become soaked with the juice of my life, and it has become alive. And earlier the stone had occupied all the s.p.a.ce in the world, but now an empty place has appeared. Now there is a place for the children I shall bear." And his first creations came forth from his womb, the names of whom they no longer remember. And they were big and strong, like the Great Worm himself. And the Great Worm loved them. But there was naught for them to drink, for in the world there was no water and they died of thirst. And then the Great Worm grieved. Grief was unknown to him before then, for there had been no one to love him, and he had not known solitude. But, having created new life, he had loved it, and it was difficult to part with it. And then the Great Worm began to cry, and his tears filled up the world. Thus water appeared. And he said, "See, now there is also a place so that one may live in it and water, so that one may drink it. And the earth, sated by the juice of my womb, is alive, and it bears fungi. Now I shall make some creatures, I shall bear my children. They will live in the paths that I have gnawed and drink of my tears and eat the fungi grown in the juice of my womb." And he feared giving birth once more to huge creations like himself, for you see there was not enough s.p.a.ce or water or fungi. At first he created the fleas, and then the rats, then the cats, and then the chickens, and then the dogs, and then hogs and then man. But it did not turn out as he had thought: the fleas began to drink blood, and the cats to eat rats, and the dogs to oppress cats, and man to kill them all and eat them. And when man for the first time killed and ate another man, the Great Worm understood that his children had become unworthy of him and he cried. And each time that man eats man, the Great Worm cries, and his tears flow through the pa.s.sages and flood them. Man is good. The meat is tasty. Sweet. But one can eat only his enemies. I know.'

Artyom clenched and unclenched the fingers on his hands. His hands were tied behind his back with a piece of wire and they had become numb, but at least they were responding again. Even the fact that his whole body ached was now a good sign. The paralysis from the poisoned needle had turned out to be temporary. The idiotic idea spun in his head that he, in contrast to the unknown storyteller, had no memory of how chickens had got into the metro. No doubt, some merchants had succeeded in bringing them from some market somewhere. They had brought swine from one of the VDNKh VDNKh pavilions, he knew, but chickens . . . He tried to see what was next to him, but around him was absolute, inky darkness. However, someone was not too far away. It had already been half an hour since Artyom had come to. Gradually he was becoming aware of where he was. pavilions, he knew, but chickens . . . He tried to see what was next to him, but around him was absolute, inky darkness. However, someone was not too far away. It had already been half an hour since Artyom had come to. Gradually he was becoming aware of where he was.

'He is stirring, I can hear it,' a hoa.r.s.e voice said. 'I'll call the commander. The commander will do the interrogation.' Something had moved, then stopped. Artyom tried to stretch his legs. They too turned out to be bound with wire. He tried to roll over onto his other side and hit something soft. A long, drawn-out moan, full of pain, was heard.

'Anton! Is that you?' Artyom whispered. There was no answer.

'Aha . . . The Great Worm's enemies have come to . . .' someone said derisively in the darkness.

'It would have been better had you not come to.' It was that same broken, sage voice that had been relating the story about the Great Worm and the creation of life for the past half hour. It immediately became clear that his keeper differed from the other inhabitants of the station: instead of primitive, chopped phrases, he had been speaking properly, somewhat pompously, and even the timbre of his voice was completely human, unlike that of the others.

'Who are you? Release us!' Artyom wheezed, moving his tongue with difficulty.

'Yes, yes. That's just what they all say. No, unfortunately, wherever you were headed, your travels are over. They are going to torture and grill you. And what will you do?' the voice answered from the darkness with indifference.

'Are you . . . also imprisoned?' Artyom asked.

'We all are in prison. They are releasing you this very day.' His unseen companion giggled.

Anton groaned again and began to stir. He mumbled something unintelligible, but had not yet regained consciousness.

'Why are we are sitting together in the darkness like cave-dwellers? '

A lighter was struck and the spot of flame lit the face of the speaker: he had a long grey beard, dirty, matted hair and dull, mocking eyes lost in a network of wrinkles. He could be no less than sixty. He was sitting on a chair along the other side of the iron bars that broke the room in two. There was something like it at VDNKh, VDNKh, too. It had a strange name: the 'monkey house'. Artyom had seen monkeys only in biology textbooks and children's books. In any event, the facility was used as a prison. too. It had a strange name: the 'monkey house'. Artyom had seen monkeys only in biology textbooks and children's books. In any event, the facility was used as a prison.

'There's no way I can get used to the d.a.m.ned 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 h.e.l.l 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! d.a.m.ned 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, hoa.r.s.e 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 pa.s.sage. 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 pa.s.sed 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 pa.s.sages. Then man said he does it. No. The Great Worm. He gives life, he takes life. He digs new pa.s.sages, 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?'

Artyom was silent. The old man said no more and only breathed heavily, trying to calm down. And Anton finally came to.

'Where is he?' he said in a hoa.r.s.e voice. 'Where is my son? Where is my son? Give me my son!' He began to scream and, trying to get free, began to roll about the floor, hitting the bars of the cage, then the wall.

'Violent,' the old man remarked in his former derisive tone. 'Dron, calm him.'

A strange sound was heard, as if someone had coughed. Something whistled through the air, and Anton was calm again after several seconds.

'Very instructive,' the priest said. 'I will go and bring the boy, let him see his papa and say goodbye. A good laddie, by the way, his pop can be proud of him, he resists hypnosis so well . . .'

He began to shuffle along the floor, and then the door creaked.

'No need to fear,' the jailer softly said unexpectedly. 'Good people do not kill, they do not eat the children of enemies. Little ones do not sin. It is possible to learn to live well. The Great Worm forgives young enemies.'

'My G.o.d, just what is this Great Worm? This is completely absurd! Worse than non-believers and Satanists! How can you believe in him? Has anyone ever seen him, your Worm? Have you seen him or something?' Artyom tried for sarcasm, but lying on the floor with his arms and legs tied didn't make it easy. Just as when he had been waiting in prison to be hanged, he became indifferent to his own fate. He put his head on the cold floor and closed his eyes, expecting an answer.

'It is forbidden to look at the Great Worm. Banned!' the savage snapped.

'And such a thing cannot be,' Artyom replied reluctantly. 'There is no Worm . . . And people made the tunnels. They all are shown on maps . . . There is even a round one, where Hansa is, and only people can build round ones. I don't suppose you even know what a map is . . .'

'I know,' Dron said quietly. 'I study with the priest, he shows us. There are not many pa.s.sages on the map. The Great Worm has been making new pa.s.sages, and they aren't on the map. Even here, our home, there are new pa.s.sages - sacred ones, and they are not on the map. The people of the machines make the maps, they think they dig the pa.s.sages. Stupid, proud. They don't know anything. The Great Worm punishes them for this.'

'Why does he punish them?' Artyom didn't understand.

'For arr . . . arr-o-gance,' the savage articulated carefully.

'For arrogance,' confirmed the voice of the priest. 'The Great Worm made man last, and man was his favourite offspring. For he did not give intellect to the others, but gave it to man. He knew that intellect is a dangerous toy, and therefore he ordered, "Live in the world with yourself, in the world with the earth, in the world with life and all creatures, and honour me." After this, the Great Worm went to the very bowels of the earth, but said beforehand, "The day will come and I shall return. Behave as if I were with you." And the people obeyed their creator and lived in the world with the earth he had created and in the world with each other and in the world with the other creatures and they honoured the Great Worm. And they bore children, and their children bore children, and from father to son, from mother to daughter they handed down the words of the Great Worm. But those who had heard his order with their own ears died, and their children died, and many generations were replaced, and the Great Worm has not yet returned. And then, one after the other, people stopped observing his covenants and did as they wanted. And there appeared those who said, "There never was a Great Worm and there is not now." And others expected that the Great Worm would return and punish them. He would burn them with the light of his eyes, devour their bodies and cause the pa.s.sages where they live to crumble. But the Great Worm has not returned and has only cried for the people. And his tears have risen up from the depths and flooded the lower pa.s.sages. But those who have turned from their creator have said, "No one created us, we always have been. Man is beautiful and mighty, he cannot have been created by an earthworm!" And they said, "All the earth is ours, and was ours, and will be, and the Great Worm did not make the pa.s.sages in it, but we and our ancestors." And they lit the fire and began to kill the creations which the Great Worm had created, saying:, "Here, all the life that is around is ours and everything here is only to satisfy our hunger." And they created machines in order to kill more quickly, in order to sow death, in order to destroy the life created by the Great Worm and to subdue his world. But even then he did not rise up from the extreme depths to which he had gone. And they laughed and began to do more against that of which he had spoken. And they decided in order to degrade him, to build such machines that would replicate his likeness. And they created such machines and they went inward in them and they laughed:, "Here," they said, "now we ourselves can rule as the Great Worm, and not as one, but as dozens. And the light strikes from our eyes, and the thunder rolls when we are creeping, and people leave their womb. We created the Worm, and not the Worm us." But even this was not enough for them. The hatred grew in their heart. And they decided to destroy the very earth where they lived. And they created thousands of different machines: that belched flame, and spat iron, and rendered the earth into parts. And they began to destroy the earth and every living thing that was in it. And then the Great Worm could not bear it and he condemned them: he took from them their most valuable gift, intellect. Insanity overtook them, they turned their machines against each other and began to kill each other. And they no longer remembered why they did it and what they were doing, but they were unable to stop. Thus did the Great Worm punish man for his arrogance.'

'But not everyone?' a child's voice asked.

'No. There were those who always remembered the Great Worm and honoured him. They renounced the machines and light and lived in the world with the earth. They were saved, and the Great Worm did not forget their loyalty, and he preserved their intellect, and he promised to give them the whole world when his enemies have fallen. And so shall it be.'

'And it will be so,' the savage and child repeated together.

'Oleg?' Artyom called out, hearing something familiar in the child's voice. The child did not reply.

'And to this day the enemies of the Great Worm live in the pa.s.sages burrowed by them, because there is nowhere else for them to take shelter, but they continue to worship, not him, but their machines. The patience of the Great Worm is enormous, and it has been sufficient for long centuries of human outrages. But even it is not eternal. It has been foretold that when he makes the last strike at the dark heart of the country of his enemies, their will shall be crushed, and the world will fall to the good people. It has been foretold that the hour shall come and the Great Worm will summon the rivers and the earth and the air for aid. And the earthly layer will sink, and the seething currents will rush, and the dark heart of the enemy will rush to oblivion. And then finally the just will triumph and there will be happiness for the good, and life without diseases and fungi for one's heart's content, and every kind of beast in abundance.'

A flame was lit. Artyom had succeeded in leaning his back against the wall, and now he no longer had to bend agonizingly in order to keep the people on the other side of the bars in his field of view. A small boy sat cross-legged on the floor in the middle of the room with his back to him. Over him loomed the withered figure of the priest, lit by the flame of the burning lighter in his hand. The savage with the blowpipe in his hands stood alongside, leaning against the door jamb. All eyes were fixed on the old man who had just finished his narrative. Artyom turned his head with difficulty and looked at Anton, who was fixed in that convulsive pose in which the paralysing needle had caught him. He stared at the ceiling and was not able to see his son, but he certainly heard everything.

'Stand up, sonny, and look at these people,' said the priest. The boy immediately got to his feet and turned toward Artyom. It was Oleg.

'Go closer to him. Do you recognize any of them?' the old man asked.

'Yes.' The boy nodded affirmatively, looking sullenly at Artyom.

'It is my pop and I was listening to your songs with this one. Through the pipe.'

'Your pop and his friend are bad people. They have been using machines and have been disparaging the Great Worm. Do you remember, you told me and Uncle Vartan what your papa did when the bad people decided to destroy the world?'

'Yes.' Again Oleg nodded.

'So tell us again,' the old man placed the lighter into his other hand.

'My pop worked in the RVA. The rocket forces. He was a missile man. I wanted to be just like him, too, when I grow up.'

Artyom's throat dried up. How had he not been able to work out this riddle earlier? So that's where the lad had got that strange tab and so had declared that he was a missile man, just like the slain Tretyak! The coincidence was almost incredible. There remained in the whole metro people who had served in the rocket forces . . . And two of them had ended up in Kievskaya. Could this have been by chance?

'As a missile man . . . These people created greater evil for the world than all the rest put together. They sent machines and equipment that burnt and destroyed the earth and almost all life on it. The Great Worm forgives many who stray, but not those who gave the orders to destroy the world and sow death in it, and not those who carried it out. Your father has caused intolerable pain to the Great Worm. Your father destroyed our world with his own hands. Do you know what he deserves?' The old man's voice had become stern.

'Death?' the boy asked uncertainly, while glancing first at the priest and then at his father, doubled up on the floor of the monkey cage.

'Death,' the priest confirmed. 'He must die. The sooner the evil people who have imparted pain to the Great Worm die, the sooner his promise will be fulfilled, and the world will be reborn and delivered to the good people.'

'Then papa must die,' concurred Oleg.

'That's the boy!' the old man tenderly patted the boy on the head.

'And now run, play with Uncle Vartan and the kiddies again! Only, look out, be careful in the darkness, don't fall! Dron, lead him and I'll sit some more for a while with them. Return in half an hour with the others and grab the sacks, we'll be ready.'

The light was extinguished. The swift, rustling steps of the savage and the light tread of the child faded into the distance. The priest gave a cough and said to Artyom, 'I'll have a little chat here with you if you aren't opposed to it. We usually don't take captives unless they are children, and then they are all puny and born sickly . . . But we are seeing more and more adults who are deaf. I would be glad to talk with them and maybe they would not mind, only, well, they eat them too quickly . . .'

'Why then do you teach them that it is bad to eat people?' Artyom asked.