Artyom's Diary Metro 2033

Artyom's Diary Metro 2033

Intro
"I was born in Moscow. But I remember nothing of that time. I was just an infant when the old world was destroyed in the flames of nuclear fire. I, along with 40 thousand others, were saved by retreating to the Metro stations deep under the city. Now, 20 years had passed, and going up into the embrace of an endless winter was left to a few brave souls. The Metro was our home, and our fortress against the nightmarish mutants who roamed the tunnels. Still, we never gave up hope that we would return to the surface. But one day, a new threat appeared... and we found ourselves in a war to determine the very existence of our species..."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlddsMFyA8E

Tower
"The tunnel grew colder--Miller and I were close to the surface now. Soon we'd climb up into the howling wind, to find our way through whatever nightmares were waiting there. My long journey was nearly at the end. but would I have the courage... the will to see it through?"
"There's nobody among the Order's fighters who's ever lived at the Exhibition. Why would they risk their lives to save us, total strangers to them. What for? Perhaps they, just as I do, believe that the Dark Ones are a threat not for just our God-forgotten backwater station, but for the Metro as a whole? That, I don't know. But one thing I know for sure: I can't watch these people and not feel admiration. They couldn't care less which station we hailed from, which god and which politics we believed, the one thing they actually cared about was that we were human beings and we were in danger. When one joins the Order, one vows to protect the Metro, one of the last refuges of human race, to the end. Some of them believe they can prevail; a lot more think we're all doomed regardless - but they don't even think of laying down their arms and giving up the struggle. Such were Hunter's comrades. And it would be the highest honor for me to become one of them."

8 days prior...

Hunter
"Life was never easy in the tunnels, but it was our home. There was comfort in its routines, in seeing the same people day after day. But since the mutant attacks has escalated, fear ruled the station. I had just turned twenty...and could never had imagined what would follow on the morning that my stepfather's friend, Hunter, arrived at the barricade..."
"Day after day our patrols go out to the northern tunnels, and day after day they return bearing causalities. Murdered brutally, inexplicably so. Even more casualties come back alive, but insane. And yet it's only by sending our friends, neighbors and relatives out there that we can keep the Dark Ones at a distance. When we run out of manpower to stop their attacks far enough, when they arrive at the station itself, we'll be done for. I hear people talking secretly at the station that it's just us prolonging the agony, that there's no hope for salvation. But Sukhoi, my stepfather and the head of the station, still hopes for a miracle. He insists that an old friend of his, Hunter, can save us. Hunter is a member of the Spartan Order, a battle brotherhood sworn to protecting the Metro from any and all dangers. There is nothing capable of instilling fear into the hearts of those men... At least there was nothing - until the Dark Ones arrives."

Exhibition
"Hunter did not return. It wouldn't be easy to find an excuse to leave the station and travel to Polis, but I had given my word. I learned that the Caravan was heading to Riga the next day, and needed guards. I signed for the ride."
"The tasks of defending our home station from the Dark Ones, enemies horrifying, mysterious and unbeatable, is becoming the sole focus of all our efforts. We've all but forgotten our old enemies - the nosalises and the watchmen, and if not for Hunter these beasts would have been unleashed on our hospital. I cringe to think of the carnage that would ensure, should Hunter arrived a mere hour too late..."
"But Hunter arrived at the Exhibition just one time. I like to think that was not just blind luck, that it was Fate at work. And that it was all the same Fate that made Hunter choose me to travel to polis with his report on the Dark Ones. It seems that I've dreamt of visiting Polis, the great, legendary center of the metro, the center of our civilization, my whole life. But a chance to actually make that dream come true had come by now of all times, when my home station desperately heeds every fighter it can field. Do I have the right to abandon my adopted father, my friends in an hour of danger? Where is my place - next to them on the barricades or at the far stations where Hunter sends me? I don't know for sure, but I still set out on a journey. I'd like to believe that I am summoned by fate."

Chase
"It was the first time I had left the safety of my home station. It troubled me that I haven't told my stepfather the truth; I would not be heading straight back from Riga. But Hunter was depending on me."

Riga
"Riga Station was only my first stop on my journey, but the caravan went no further. So, before parting ways, we drank to celebrate our survival. The vodka didn't drown my fear of traveling on to Polis alone. But I was about to find myself with an unexpected and notorious partner."
"What was that? Strange shadows and voices... Whispers, weeps - they were silent, and yet they still resound inside my head... There are lots of tunnels in the Metro associated with terrifying legends, but I've never heard anything quite like this, and I hope I'll never anything like this from now on. We got incredibly lucky in escaping that place with our lives."
"Rizhskaya... Back home at the Exhibition we always considered this station's dwellers somehow... unlucky. They always used to be in trouble - be it their pigs catching some mysterious bug, their tunnel ceiling leaking, or their merchants getting too immersed in the celebration of a good deal at the Market and drinking all the money away. The people of Riga are nice and hospitable, but they sure are clumsy. We used to pity them and poke fun at them a bit, for we were on top of things, We, at the Exhibition, knew life... And new I actually envy them. They live in peace, they haven't even heard of the Dark Ones, and even those who did never believed what they heard. But if I fail, the Dark Ones will wipe this station out in an instant. And these happy clumsy people with their peaceful clumsy life will be gone. There will be blood and emptiness. I've got to hurry."
"There's a saying in the Metro: "Nothing worse than a chance fellow traveler, but nobody else to rely on either". This Burbon guy surely is strange. Why would he need me? He obviously knows these tunnels like the back of his hand. Somebody told him that "that shit" does not affect me, and he bought it? I don't believe it myself and he does? Well, no use thinking about it. I'll be quiet happy if he just gets me past the Market without trying to quietly snuff me in a dark tunnel."

Lost Tunnel
"As I entered the abandoned tunnels with Bourbon, I wondered if I'd been wrong to trust him. But the station gates were still sealed, and there was no telling when I'll have another chance to leave Riga."
"Bourbon is definitely not as simple as he tries to seem. Yes, he is rude, and his sense of humour is rough at best. But the things he tells about his exploits and, even more, the things he prefers to tell, prove he is way too sharp for a regular smuggler, and his knowledge of the situation not just at the nearest stations, but even the Ring as a while, is mind-boggling. All the passages and tunnels, even the long abandoned ones, are well known to him, he is quite at home in combat, which means he saw his share of dangerous encounters... He's definitely much more than a regular smuggler, of that I am sure."
"These tunnels definitely are cursed... Something really is happening there. Those voices... Perhaps, they are just illusions - but I am sure that if we didn't get dragged out of there then, we would have stayed there forever. It happened so that i saved Bourbon, a stranger to me, while somebody else, whom i was stranger to, saved me. We are used to not trusting others implicitly, but if each of us fights on his own, we're going to be nothing more than a free meal for the mutants. And still... I'm not sure whom am I afraid more of."

Market
"I've never seen a Market like this--you could buy almost anything. But, Bourbon owed money to Hanza sentries, and was anxious to leave."
"Yes, I'd never get here without Bourbon. He's at home everywhere and he knows everyone. Sure, as I suspected, the locals did have some old gripes with him,but looks like Bourbon sorted it out. Which is hardly surprising, since Prospekt Mira belongs to Hansa, a trading union of the Circle line stations, the richest of the Metro's "states". The citizens of Hansa, their wealth ensured through trade with other "states" and free stations, understandably value profit above anything. I think Bourbon betrayed their trust before, and now he surely had to promise he'd pay them back with interest. The only problem is that there's a saying: "Better to be indebted to the Devil than to Hansa". He's going to have one tough time paying them back..."
"Filters, filters, filters... It seems like the Stalkers never talk about anything else. They keep droning about filters being all but unobtainable now, not just the unused, but even adequately reffited. That the reffited, being the bastards they are, don't put enough coal in them, and that you have to reach for a new one as soon as you finish attaching the previous to your mask... But whatever they say about the filters, Stalkers value them more than the bullets. No wonder, that, too: you might sneak by on the Surface without ever being found out by the mutans, but there's no escaping the poisoned air..."

Dead City
"When we emerged into the ruins of Moscow, I felt both fear and sorrow. But, after a life underground, I also saw strange beauty in the dark skies and frozen landscape. "So, that's the dead city," grunted Bourbon. "Welcome home, Artyom."
"From the very day I ended up in the Metro, I've been dreaming of going back up. Seeing that magical city of my dreams again, the living city of my childhood memories. But what I actually see on the Surface is an apparition, a nightmare. I can't recognize it. I can't believe I used to live here... How my mother and I lived here. How happy we were. Even her face... Can't remember any of it. How I hoped that her face, her smile would come back even for a tiniest moment when I went up here... It didn't happen. I'm all alone, and I have no home but Metro."
"It's so strange to think that man used to be the sole master of this world. Now is owned by by totally different creatures, and the sorry few remaining of us have to hide like rats, like cockroaches in our holes in the ground. The fields are burned out and will never bear crops again, the forests stand withered, blackened and dead, the rivers are like dead, congealed blood, even the air itself is capable of killing a man in mere minutes. Our cities are in ruines and populated by monsters. We did all we could to never be able to come back up here again. All that we amount to now is mere marauders. Searching hurriedly, like thieves, through the rubble that used to be our homes and steal anything that wasn't stolen through these twenty years back to our hideout. Our Metro."
"God, am I glad to see another living soul, even though that soul appears to be Bourbon! And it looks like he was happy to see me too, - and we aren't friends or anything, just chance co-travelers... Here,on the Surface, you can't help but feel that we, people, have got to keep together, to rely on each other. Because everything out there is...Hostile. Lethally dangerous. Alien."

Dry
"As we went underground, it struck me that my city was now foreign and hostile place. I felt safe here, in the darkness of the Metro more so, when Bourbon claimed to have friends at Dry Station."
"Are there any loan sharks in the whole wide Metro Bourbon doesn't owe money to or dangerous kingpins he never crossed? Damn, this guy has the whole world on his tail! And this time it seems like his luck has run out. I don't care about him... At least i shouldn't. And yet, for some reason, I can't just leave him alone to his own devices. Sukhoi, my stepfather, once told me: "You save someone once, you have to keep saving them forever". You can't help feeling responsible for someone you didn't let die. They grow into you. That's why he took me in when my Mother died... And, probably, that's why I can't leave Bourbon now."
"It seems men like Bourbon are born with a noose on their necks. They spend their lives walking the edge, risking everything everyday - and they think they can keep it up forever. But you can't cheat death. You make a habit out of walking the abyss' edge, one day you fall... Why I am telling myself this all of this? To persuade myself that I'm not guilty of his death? That he had it coming anyway, sooner or later, because he made his own fate? No... I'm doing this to drown out that little voice in my head that keeps nagging that I could have saved him... Could have changed his life somehow... He was not such an evil man, after all. It's never us, it's the world we live in... And what right does Khan have to judge him anyway!"

Ghosts
"Khan's appearance caught me by surprise, although, while fighting the bandits, I did sense someone helping me from the shadows. Khan assured me that Bourbon's fate was no tied to my own. But I regretted his death."
"I'm used to danger. Used to the fragility of human life. I saw, with my own eyes, monsters that shouldn't exist. I walked the ruins of a city populated by the dead. But all of that was... Real. Conceivable. The things going on around Khan, on the other hand... Are way out of my reach. I feel uncomfortable near him, even scared. When he's around, everything - all I know about the world, people, death, even myself - starts seeming nonsensical. I have no point of reference, nobody to rely on but Khan himself. Another random encounter... Or, perhaps, not so random,after all?"
"There are but a few scraps of of memories, like faded pictures, remaining of my life in the Surface... And I don't remember the trains capable of running the tracks, filling the tunnels with their noise and lights, their windows full of smiling human faces... For me, the trains are just wrecks of the old world, carriages we live in, their complex machinery dismembered to make our impotent trinkets... Our new world is built out of the debris of the old one. The ancestors are not quite dead, it's as if they're still around, invisible, always watching us... Unable to find their peace."
"To say the truth, I first took Khan for a madman. Then I got scared of him. Now I admire him. There are thing in the Metro that eye can't see, but that does not mean they are not real. If Khan didn't take me through these strange reaches of the Metro, if he didn't help me cross the invisible hurdles, didn't warn of the mysterious dangers, my journey would have ended long ago. It's no wonder that I believed in him and told him my story. I have so many question for him - and he seems to have all the answers."

Cursed
"Khan led me into Cursed station. The name was no accident. It's people were locked in an endless war for survival."
"Once, this used to be a regular station - lived in, even prosperous. One of those stations where not only heavily armed fighters can survive, but also old men, and women, and even children. Then the mutants came, as if from nowhere. They were innumerable. The Cursed - sure, then it was called its old name, fought back with all it had. But the means proved inadequate. The defenders were forced to abandon all of their roadblocks in the tunnels one after another, then they barricaded the main platform and had their last stand there. They fought to the last child they were able to evacuate to the neighbor station, the last old lady carried there. To the last bullet. And when the bullets were gone, those at the barricades all stayed there. Then the Cursed station got its name - from the saved wives and children of those who'd stayed there forever. And that is what awaits our Exhibition if I don't pull my task off. And, perhaps, not just the Exhibition,but the whole of Metro."

Armory
"Armory Station was where most of the weapons in the Metro were made. There had been an arms factory located above and after the nukes fell, many of the workers settled here. I was looking for Andrew the Smith but he found me first."
"There are many in the Metro who hate the Reds - because they are afraid of them. The reds always go hungry, even though they work round the clock. They are told they toil for a better future, but year after year their lives get even more miserable. They fight with abandon, as if not afraid of death at all, and their commanders just throw them away, piling their bodies up to block enemy gun emplacements, spending their lives as if their charges were immortal. But they are mortal, and they die - of exhaustion, of overworking, of bullets fired by their enemies and their own commissars ordered to shoot those retreating. They are told they are superior, that they are made of steel, not flesh... And that is why I pity them. What do they live and die for? The idols of the past are long gone, but they are kept in the dark about it. The slogans they communicate with are meaningless in the new world. They are prohibited from speaking or even thinking freely. Anyone asking questions is deemed a traitor. Anyone who says life's better outside the Red Line is a spy and a saboteur. You have to hide everything human about you and become just like the rest of them. But there also are people like Andrew the Blacksmith here. People who refuse to abandon hope and persevere. If I were in his shoes, I'd be long gone. Why is he still here? Is he afraid of being shot making his escape?"
"I was not wrong about Andrew - I just grossly underestimated him. He is not afraid of running. He just does things that take much more guts than that. Andrew helps others escape the red Line, risking his own life every minute. He and his friends saved lots of refugees using a network of abandoned passages and forgotten tunnels, which the Reds are still ignorant about. The refugees usually take this literal and at the same time figurative underground railroad to get from the Red Line to the Metro proper... But for me Andrew is working it in reverse. I need to get to the front lines of the never-ending war between the Red Line and the Reich. I'm taking the train which is delivering a fresh load of cannon fodder to the meat grinder. The important part is to know when to jump off."

Front Line
"Even the apocalypse didn't stop us from killing each other over ideology. I was about to go through the front line between the Nazis and the Communists. I've heard they once fought another war and that the Nazi's lost."
"The red Line has no worse enemy than the Fourth Reich. They say we've been at war for a hundred years; different nations, as if urged by demons, choose a side in this conflict and sometimes, like in the Metro, split and fight till both sides are destroyed. The Reich is supposed to be a complete opposite of the Red Line...But why does it look so similar? Poverty and hunger, forced labor and endless rallies, rambling of politicians and empty eyes of the plebeians. They also talk in slogans and you can't doubt what you're told here, either. They do believe a different thing here, though: supposedly, it's enough for all mutants to be eradicated for things to magically fix themselves. Racial purity is no longer relevant, these Nazis are for genetic purity. And since the norm is defined by the politicians, anyone can be deemed mutant. It's the stormtroopers who ultimately get to decide who gets to live and who dies. And this fight can last forever. And they treat the spies the same way they do it at the Red Line, so I can't allow myself to get captured..."

Trolley Combat
"When I came to my senses, I lost all hope, Nazi prisoners were used for slave labor or target practice."
"And they call this a plan?! The tunnel rats would be already dining on our bones if we didn't get insanely lucky. There were just two parts in Uhlman's plan: insanity and surprise. Nobody among the Nazis expected us to capture their railcar, neither did they expect a lightning backstabbing strike. I feel no remorse - the times of courteous warfare is long passed. If you have to back-stab to survive, we here in the Metro do so without blinking an eye, and then strike once more. The important thing is to keep your own back covered."

Depot
"After our firefight with the Nazi trolleys it seemed we would have an easy road ahead. Once again I was wrong."
"An awful death. My companions are dying one after another, and I can't do anything to save them... I actually feel they sacrifice themselves just to keep me moving forward. But am I worth that? I myself would readily die if that would get Hunter's mission completed... But do I have the right to make the others pay the price? Who gave me this right if I do have it? Was it Hunter? Was it the Lord? Or did I just usurp it? I just don't know anymore..."

Defense
"After Pavel's death, I was on my own. Somehow, I had to reach Black Station. Uhlman would meet me there and take me to Polis."
"Here I feel back home, at the exhibition. These people, just like we, are hanging on to their station, to their simple homesteads, their meaningless subterranean life and the bleak future, as if it has salvation in stock for them... All in vain. The best they can hope for, the best WE can hope for, is a brief respite before we're all engulfed in eternal shadow. And still they don't surrender. I should go, too - time is running short."
"I am wading through a literal swamp of human blood. We kill other people so easily... We kill them for a place to live in, for a bite of meat, for an abstract idea. Our whole civilization was built on human bones, but even after we've taken it apart down to its foundations, pushed the brink of extinction by the horrific abominations created by this new world, we still continue killing each other. Those who died today probably had families, too. Friends. Hell, their parents might still be alive! They died protecting their station from the mutants, not other people, but seen through the iron sights the beasts and humans alike looks like so much paper cutout targets. And here I am, trying to save the people from the beasts... Just to give us another shot at finishing themselves off."
"The children of Metro...Sometimes I feel that they, who were born underground and who have never seen the Sun, are a whole new species. This child has just been through hell, he stayed alive by sheer luck - and he is not falling apart in the slightest. He speaks calmly and rationally... I remember the day the station where my Mother and I lived then right after we went down the Metro, was attacked by rats....When Mother died...And the rats, they....And I was saved by Sukhoi...He says I did not talk for several months after that. And I remember nothing about that time. Nothing at all. While this little boy... Perhaps, the Metro will temper us. Perhaps, the generations raised without the Sun, but also without fear, will claim the Earth. If I give them a chance."
"She offers me some bullets for saving her child. As if I had a choice. But apparently, what used to be natural before, looks strange now, and what would gross out the world then, does not raise any brows today. What do I do? Decline the reward - and insult her? Take the reward - and acknowledge that I saved a child just to rake up a reward? The days when a human life, a child's life was priceless and couldn't be paid for, are long gone. Today we all have a price. The bullets I'm given for saving the boy seem like a good deal, usually the price of a life is only one bullet. Just enough to take it.

Outpost
"I went up again, to the gloomy charm of post apocalyptic Moscow. I was warned in Hole Station about a new squad of Nazi rangers on the surface."
"I remember how happy I was to see Bourbon in the empty city - another living human in this land of the dead. Where did that feeling go? Here, on the Surface, among the dead stones and petrified bones, danger oozes from everything - the mutant animals, the irradiated soul, the poisoned air...And despite all that there is no greater danger than man. And as soon as we pry a tiny piece of living space from this hostile new world, we build a fortress there, not a peaceful colony."
"The Nazis were in a hurry to finish off the defenders of the Cursed station. They were not even prepared to wait till the animals do this for them. Of course, they need the station, they need the living space. But whom would they populate the station "liberated" this way with? So few children are born in the Metro, and those who actually grow up are even fewer...Sukhoi once told me that fifteen million people used to live in Moscow alone. And now there are not more than fifty thousand of us in the Metro - and, perhaps, on all the planet. And yet we continue murdering each other with gust, as if we still number in millions. Only ashes remain of the six billion people that once populated the earth. Ashes and dust. They are all around , they crunch beneath our boots, they disguise themselves as sand and clay, dust and snow. And we richly water them with fresh blood, as if hoping to grow some crops of such soil."

Black Station
"It was clear that Black Station was occupied by fascists, but Ulman had said he'd wait for me there. I had to risk it."
"We all wear impenetrable armor. Even after taking of one's vest, or all the clothes altogether, one still stays clad in in head to toe. We are afraid of opening up to people, showing our feelings, afraid of someone understanding our thoughts. We hide our faces, wearing gas masks, but there is one more mask, beneath that one. Ulman - the indomitable optimist, the light - hearthed jester...I had only seen his real face when his comrade died. Tired to death, almost desperate - that is how he looked...For only a second. A moment later he had his armor back, and was the his regular funny self again. I didn't try to get him open up again. It is not the Metro way and I'm certainly not opening up for anyone myself."
"Metro kills the belief in miracles, but teaches you to live without hope. And still, I can't find any explanation for me being able to successfully negotiate the labyrinth of the Black station, full of Nazis mind you, short of a miracle. As if I was led by someone...Was it my stupid undying hope? Or perhaps fate itself?"

Polis
"It's hard to describe my feelings at that moment.. exhausted, yes, but joyful - I had made it! Once I delivered Hunter's message, the rescue of my home station could be decided by those stronger and wiser than I. And my task would be over."
"For as long as I really remember myself, I always had the dream of visiting Polis. The hard and hopeless life underground wears man down, makes him a savage, a beast - and only in Polis does he manage to keep resemblance to the great people of the past, the ones who had the planet in their pocket. Polis is the last refuge of the scientists, the educators, the artists - everyone who'd be deemed useless by the other stations. The last citadel of culture and civilization. And ... the stories told in the Metro insist that electric lights were on there day and night trought. Just like it used to be in our past, thats never to return....Polis did deliver on all the outrageous expectations I had. Vast, shining, cleaned to perfection....A real underground city. Its four stations united into one rhyme with the halls of the ancient temples I saw in the history books. By just beaing here you start to feel this incredible energy...start to believe that humanity will once more rise froms its knees. If there is a force in the Metro capable of saving the Exibition from the Dark Ones, it must reside here."
"Who said that stupid and pompous phrase about responsibility coming with power?! I thought that Polis was the pinnacle of all power in the Metro. Its guards armed to the tooth, its incredible reputation among any factions and stations, its stores of food and ammunition, its wealth and prosperity...Polis is the hub of the universe. But , apparently, this hub does not care one bit for some backwater station. The council did not even want to waste time hearing us out, but after reluctantly agreeing to do so, it just lazily stamped "declined" on the desperate plea of the Exhibition. And it wasn't just my request that was declined - they did it to Miller, the head of the Rangers. I thought it was all over. If not for Miller and his people...the Rangers are not called an Order for nothing. They are a veritable knightly order a state within a state, a brotherhood of people sworn to oaths, adherence to which they value higher than their lives. And the rangers are sworn to protecting the Metro from all the dangers threatening its dwellers, no matter what station they live at or what they believe in."

Alley
"The council's decision shocked me, but Miller's plans gave me hope. Once more, I climbed up to the bones of Moscow, to search for the secret of D6 and a way to awaken the horde of missiles..."
"The Rangers call their base Sparta, and themselves, either jokingly or seriously - Spartans. They do fit the part, mind you: ready to die rather than surrender. They are also few, just like their historical counterparts. Each of them is a seasoned fighter, worth ten regular soldiers, but they just don't have the manpower to fight a full-blown war or stand against the legions of the Dark Ones. That's why Miller's plan is our only chance. Find a still operable missile launch site, command the missiles and burn the Dark One nest to cinders. If we pull it off, our casualties should be minimal, while my home station, and whole metro with it, saved. Seems like a perfect plan... But something is worrying me. There seems to be a weak spot in it, something is not right. I can't shake the feeling that we're making a mistake."
"I read and re-read al the books we had at the station till they fell apart. I always rushed the traders coming home from the far stations to be the first to try and barter for the few greasy tomes they could have brought... Even though nobody else would ever want them here. I read anything. When you live sixty meters under ground, books become your only windows. I worshiped books. So try and imagine my feelings at the sight of the Great Library! The shrine to all the important books ever written in human history. But I must not forget the reason that brought be to this place. If I let myself get distracted, start browsing those half-rotten moldy tomes, the Library will swallow me up whole and forever..."

Depository
"I was alone again... and soon I would look into the eyes of fear - literally."
"Knowledge is power. A worn-out slogan. Before the war nobody probably ever thought of its actual meaning anymore. Knowledge was available to anyone. My stepfather told me a portable phone could answer any question at a flick of a finger... Nobody cared much about studying, searching for new information and remembering it anymore. And then, in a singular moment, all the information vanished. The phone lines went dead, the phone batteries discharged, and those who were reluctant to admit knowledge into their heads, were left with empty heads. Knowledge became power, a precious commodity again... Too precious. Here, in the Great Library, more knowledge about the Earth and its people is probably stored than anywhere else. But each letter read from its vast vaults has to be paid for in blood."

Archives
"The underground depository was a frightening place, and I had no idea where or what to search. But I refused to think that all my efforts would come to nothing."
"What are these Librarians? We gave these creatures this funny name just because they were way too horrible to remain unnamed. One thing is certain: these are no mere beasts. I have no idea the clay did radiation molded these abominations out of, but they are definitely too smart for regular mutated animals. I see a glitter of intelligence in their eyes... And we don't know what is it that they see in our eyes. But is you don't run, don't fight and just keep staring directly at one of these 0 something happens... And you get to keep your life. Even though one of these can crush an experience and well-armed fighter like a bug. Could it be that when looking into human eyes they recall, however vaguely, that once they were humans, too? .."

Church
"I had found the D6 documents, but Miller had not yet returned. Without his help, I wasn't certain I could get out of the library alive - but everything depended on it."
"Khan... I owe everything to him. If not for him, I'd rot in that anomaly tunnel. I'd never be able to reach the Library. If not for him, Miller would never pay attention to me... I don't really know what kind of man he is, I don't even know if he's a human at all. Yes, I was sent on this path by Hunter, but it's Khan who walks me through it. It's weird, but even Millers' subordinates seem to acknowledge no authority other than their indomitable Colonel's, pay heed to this wandering philosopher and believe him. He has some mysterious power over human souls... I wish I could meet him again. I have too many questions nobody else could answer."
"Why a church? Is it just the sturdiness of its walls, or do Miller's fighters believe it could protect the, better than anything else? It's weird that even those who stand firmly on the ground looking death in the face and, by all accounts, must be quite used to it, still seek protection from heavens. Rangers don't speak of it, but I saw many of them wearing undercloth crosses. I heard someone tell that the world turned inside-out after the Apocalypse, and that while hell ended under the skies, the people had to find refuge where hell used to be. That's why there's supposedly no better refuge on the Surface than the old churches. I don't know about that... But these icons and frescoes, adorning the church walls, instill some kind of calmness even in me. As if we, the sinners who had the divinely created world destroyed, can still hope for absolution. Can still pray for salvation."

Dark Star
"Dark tunnels, wheel rattle, and the smell of death. Thats how our journey to D6 begun. But, our goal seemed closer now."
"My strange dreams still continue. I am no longer sure they are just dreams anymore - and it never happened to me before. The dreams are more like visions... And they become more and more vivid, still holding sway over my conscience even after i wake up - even I still can't understand their meaning. Yet time after time, I wake up with the same heavy feeling: the premonition of a catastrophe. One brought about by my own actions."

Cave
"The chaos of the tunnel was locked away behind the airlock gates. They seemed invulnerable...and at that moment, so did my comrades."
"Everything seems to go well. Uhlman keeps up his jokes, Miller keeps threatening him with extra time on duty... The goal is close by, and nothing can stop us now. We win every encounter. Hunter was right when he said that there never was and never be a more terrifying predator on Earth than human is."
"I didn't really cause their death - and I still feel guilty. I was too eager to celebrate the easy time we had with the last leg of our journey, and that brought about trouble. I couldn't be in the right place in the right time, couldn't help my comrade in time, bringing him back from the brink of death... I brought these brave souls into this adventure that happened to be their last. Our team, small as it was, is growing even smaller. When I look at my palms in the dancing light of a bonfire, it seems they are covered with blood.
"I sure heard stories about the Metro builders were not the first digging tunnels and galleries in the ground deep under Moscow. Hidden passages were being build under the city in the times of the first tzars, but the workers who build those, reportedly, encountered even older caves and burrows, built in times immemorial. The nameless creators of those vanished millenia ago, leaving only endless corridors going from nowhere to nowhere again behind. And now, perhaps a hundred generations later I, the last man alive, am tentatively walking along the same path."

D6
"We were close to D6 now. It was hard to believe that we'd found the legendary Command Center. But, was it worth so many lives? Soon, we'd know the answer..."
"It's incredible, but these long abandoned galleries have preserved the technology in them much better than any of the populated parts of the Metro! The monorail opening its doors for the first time in decades, started and carried us to our goal completely smoothly, as if serviced the day before. There is truth in saying that time eats away metal and stone, man and its creations -- but our fathers built for the ages, and if their work isn't destroyed by their own offspring, it's bout to stay there for thousands of years."
"I still find it hard to believe that all of this was built by humans, not giants from the ancient fairy-tales. And it's not just me, even the larger-than-life, ever jovial Uhlman noticeably shrunk when he considered the sheer size of this place. What was this complex supposed to be, what was it built for? Where did its personnel go, and why hasn't anyone in the Metro ever heard of it? A carpet of spent cartridges on the floor; one would think a fierce battle took place here - but there are no bodies or bones. What could have transpired here?"
"What are these creatures, and can they really be called that? Did they emerge in the ruins of the old world by themselves, or were they created? There's nothing natural in them, they are reverting at all levels. They must be wiped out before they destroy us. Just like the Dark Ones. Either this world will become ours again, or the creatures that entered it after us will destroy us all and continue driving the evolution forward with us becoming a minor side note on its pages. We have no choice. We have to win back the fief of our ancestors with fire and sword. We will claim what is our rightful inheritance, and we will win this final battle - or perish."
"Once again we're going to the Surface, and this time we come prepared. Uhlman's joking about our strides making the earth tremble. But I feel like actually feel it tremble. After we had come through, nothing and nobody will stop us. The enemy is going down, turned into dust and ashes, the way we also treated our enemies... One thing eludes me: why don't the Dark Ones try and stop us? Are we coming straight into their ambush? The weird premonitions still pestering me are becoming even more sinister..."

Tower, reprise
"Miller and I left the train, then climbed up the tunnel to the Korolev Performance Hall. We were close to Ostankino Tower now. In the frozen streets, we joined the other Rangers in their furious battle that began my story..."
"One labored step after another we're rising up the tower. We come from underground, and we're storming the heavens, lead clouds all around like impenetrable walls. The steps are badly decayed and crumble beneath our feet. The wind seems to be strong enough to peel our skins off our bones. We aren't welcome in the heavens, our place is down there."
"I'm all alone now. I have to do the most critical part myself. Nobody to shove the responsibility onto, nobody to ask for help. The fate of the human race is in my hands - as well as the fate of the Dark Ones. And with each step taken my assuredness in justice of my actions dwindles. With each step I'm asking myself more and more questions - the kind of those which could be answered by Khan only. But Khan isn't here, either. I'm alone on top of the world. And I can see things I couldn't see from anywhere else, hear things I couldn't even imagine... I feel the presence of the Dark Ones. I hear them. Strange images crowd my mind, echoes of alien thoughts echo in my head. I know the Dark Ones can enter the minds of men, driving their victims insane... Could this be what's happening to me? I must make it... I must stay sane. I must target the missiles. I hope I can..."


As the Dark Ones burn from the missile strike...

Ranger
"A wise man once said, "He who leads a war for the love of his fellow men, will defeat his enemies." I led my war protecting my family and friends, protecting my home - the Metro. We had won. But to this day, I wonder: When we burned the Dark Ones from the face of the earth, was something lost as well...?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-utRpxU0bPc

NONCANON
Artyom realizes the truth, and stops the missiles...

Enlightened
"H.G. Wells once wrote, "If we don't end wars, wars will end us." And somehow, I stopped my war. At the time, I couldn't say what had made me spare the Dark Ones. But, I came to realize that the strange visions that haunted my journey were their attempts to reach out to us. I don't know if I was the first to communicate with them, but I will not be the last.. And the future--our future--stretches before us like an endless Metro tunnel."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NPKE8CL48k