Journey to another world in the subway

Chapter 189 Mirror
Ah, how long has Homer been waiting to come to these places again, how long has he not been to these magical places
Bolovite Station, where intellectuals live, has comfortable apartments built directly into the arches.

The reading room of the Brahmin monk is located in the center of the hall - a long wooden table covered with books, and a low-hanging lighting lamp with a textile cover.

Here, even the culinary skills have miraculously returned to the level before the crisis and the war.

At the Arbat station, the entire station is decked out in white and bronze, like Kremlin offices.

People live and work in an orderly manner, as if the catastrophe of the world has nothing to do with their lives.

There is also the very old Lenin Library Station, which has not been renamed for a long time. This name still has a certain meaning.

The station is so old, it was very old when Kolya first entered the subway as a boy.

In this station, the transfer channel is located in the middle of the platform, and the decorative patterns on the platform are romantic and simple...

Alexander Garden Station is always in the semi-darkness, angular, like a blind old man suffering from gout, always recalling his Communist Youth League-style youth years.

Homer always wondered if the station would be very similar to their Pygmalion counterparts?

Can every station be seen as a self-portrait of the person who carved it?

Have they absorbed part of the essence from the builders?

But one thing he might be sure of was that the station would leave its mark on its residents, sharing its temperaments with them, passing on its moods and illnesses to them.

Homer's wisdom, his eternal musings, his incurable homesickness belong not to the poor station of Sebastobol, but to Polis, as bright as ever.

But life is another matter.

Now, even if he finally came here, he still doesn't have the leisure and idle time to walk through these noisy halls, admire the beautiful outline of the station and the exquisite castings, imagine, fantasize, imagine...

He should run, run as the hunter bids him run.

The hunter used all his strength to tame the man living in his body. This was a terrifying existence, and the hunter had to feed him with human meat from time to time to satisfy his appetite.

No sooner had he erected the bars of the inner cage than there was not a single bar left of the outer bars.

Should speed up.

Melnik - what is this?
Is it a name, or a nickname?

Maybe a password?
The pot-bellied Guardsman Hunter doesn't want to bring Homer into the presence of anyone with that name.

Homer calls the name aloud, and it elicits an incomprehensible reaction among the guardsmen: talk of Hunter's trial, locked up, ceases, and Homer's hands, handcuffed almost to the joints, stop. The handcuffs were back in the drawer inside the desk.

Accompanied by the guards, Homer climbed up the stairs, walked through the transfer passage, and arrived at Algite Station.

At the entrance of the palace, there was a row of offices and concierges. The big belly asked Homer to wait and strode into the corridor.

He returned within three minutes, gave Homer a startled look, and invited him into the hallway.

The crowded corridor led them to an unexpectedly spacious room, where the walls were covered with maps and charts, densely packed with annotations and passwords, photos and drawings.

At the broad oak table sat a bony elderly man with broad shoulders who seemed to be wearing a felt cloak.

He was of a manly height - his eyes were almost at the same level as the standing Homer's.

"Thank you." The owner of this office let the big belly go, and the big belly closed the door outside with obvious regret. "Who are you?"

"Nikolaev Nikolay Ivanovich." Homer was at a loss.

"Don't play tricks. You asked to see me. You said that my closest comrade-in-arms was with you. I buried him with my own hands a year ago. There must be something hidden in it. Who are you?"

"I'm nobody..." Homer didn't lie. "I'm not the key to the matter. He's still alive, that's true. You just need to come with me, and the sooner the better."

"I'm thinking now, it was a trap, an idiot's trap, or just a mistake." Melnik took a drag on his cigarette, blowing the smoke ring into Homer's face.

"If you knew his name and came to me with that name, you should know his story too.

You should also know that we have been looking for him every day for over a year.

You should also know that we lost a few people trying to find him.

You will also know how much he means to us.Maybe, I will also know that he is my right arm. "He smiled.

"No, I don't know these things... He never said anything to me." Homer's head dropped to his shoulders, "Please, just come with me this way, to Bolovet Stop. Time is running out.”

"No, I'm not rushing anywhere. I have my reasons."

Melnik put his arm under the table and made a very strange movement. He didn't get up but stepped back strangely.It took a few seconds for Homer to realize that he was in a wheelchair.

"Then let's talk calmly. I want to find out, what's the point of your presence?"

"God." Homer now gave up any hope of talking through this wooden man. "Just believe me. He is alive and is now being locked up in Bolovet's cell. In any case, I hope that by now He is still there..."

"I want to believe you too." Melnik's silence lasted for a while, and Homer heard the sound of burning paper,
"It's just that there are no miracles in this world. It makes me uneasy... Forget it. I have my own version, who is going to tease me? But it takes someone specially trained to check..." He reached for the phone.

"Why is he so afraid of aliens?" Homer's question surprised him.

Melnick carefully put down the receiver, without saying a word.He finished smoking his cigarette and spit a short butt into the ashtray.

"Damn it, I'm going to have to wheel my wheelchair to Bolovit," he said.

…………

The guard was pushing the wheelchair, and Homer walked beside him. He quickened his pace and looked at the burly guard next to him from time to time.

"If you really don't know all the stories," says Melnick,

"I'm ready to tell you them. If it's not him I saw at Bolovi Station, then just wait and amuse your fellow prisoners with these stories...

The hunter is one of the best fighters in the cavalry regiment, a real and upright hunter.His senses of smell, touch, sight, and feeling are all as sensitive as a beast, but he never leaves room for things.

A year and a half ago he had become aware of the presence of aliens... at the VDNKh station.Have you never heard of these? "

"At the All-Russian Exhibition Hall station..." Homer repeated casually, "Well, yes, the invulnerable aliens, they can read people's minds, they can stand still...I thought they were called the Dark Race?"

"It doesn't matter," Melnik interrupted.

"The hunter was the first to notice their sound. He sounded the alarm, but at that time we had neither strength nor time... I refused him. I was busy with other things at the time."

He moved his arm, "The hunter rushed there by himself. When he contacted us for the last time, he said that these monsters can suppress people's will and bring terror to every corner. The hunter was born to be an unbelievable fighters, he alone is a whole platoon..."

"I know," said Homer vaguely.

"He was fearless, sent a boy back to us with a note, and went to the ground to deal with those deformed monsters.

If he disappears, the threat proves to be more dire than expected.He disappeared and died.We have a whole set of communication system, every living person has to report upwards every week.it is necessary!And he has not been heard from for more than a year. "

"What about those aliens?"

"We cleaned up the place where the incident happened. We haven't heard anything unusual since that incident." Melnik smiled,
"No one wrote a letter, made a phone call... The exit to the VDNKh station has been closed, and life is back on track. And the little boy he sent back at that time was a little deranged, but according to my observation, Someone is taking good care of him, and his life is a normal life. But Hunter... in my conscience..."

As he slid down the steel ramp and the monks gathered at the head of the stairs scattered, he turned his head and waited for Homer, panting, to add:
"It's best not to tell any of this to your future fellow inmates."

One minute later, the group finally arrived at the entrance of the confinement room.

Melnik was not in a hurry to pull the latch. He leaned against the guard, gritted his teeth and stood up, clinging to the peephole.

Less than a second was enough for him.

He was so exhausted that he seemed to have walked on his stump from Arbat Station to here.

He slumped on the wheelchair, his dim eyes flicked across Homer, and he made his own sentence:

"not him."

…………

In the dim light, the cell door opened.

The stingy light was enough for Homer: the silhouette of the prisoner inside was too frail to be alive, such a body could not have belonged to Hunter, as if sitting behind the fence was a scarecrow—without will , listless and dull.

Could it be that the guard...

This is a dead man.

So where did the hunter go? !
"Thank you. I can't wait so long." A deep voice said, "I'm there...it's too crowded."

Melnik turned around faster than Homer in his wheelchair.

The tall hunter stood in the passage, his hands were tightly intertwined, as if one hand did not trust the other, and each was afraid to let go of the other.

He turned half of his deformed face towards the people.

"Is this...is you?" Melnik's face twitched.

"Still." The hunter coughed strangely.Homer doesn't know that hunters never laugh, all he can do is use this sound instead of laughter.

"What's wrong with you? What's wrong with your face?"

Melnik, who wanted to ask a lot of other questions, signaled the Glancers and ordered them all to leave.

Homer was left behind by him and the hunter.

"You don't look very good either." Hunter coughed again.

"Nonsense." Melnik curled his lips, "It's just a pity that I can't hug you. Damn it...where have you been...we've been looking for you for too long!"

"I know. I have to be...alone," the hunter stammered. "I...I don't like crowds. I want to go away and never come back, but I'm afraid..."

"What happened at that time, you and those aliens? Are these left on your body?" Melnik looked at his light purple scars.

"It's nothing, I couldn't kill them." Hunter touched the scar, "I couldn't. They ripped me in two."

"It turns out you were right," said Melnik suddenly excitedly.
"Forgive me, I didn't pay enough attention at first, I didn't believe it. At the time we had...you know...but we found them and burned them clean. We thought you might be dead, they put You…for you put them…for you. Burn them all!”

"I know," said the hunter hoarsely,

"And they know there will be this consequence - because of me. They all know it. They are very good at looking at people and looking at everyone's fate. You won't even know who the real opponent we are fighting against... in the last time This adversary smiled at us...sent them...gave us the last of them...and we...I was doomed, and you were done. Because that's who we are. Because the monsters..."

"what……"

"When I walked towards them...they showed me in front of me. I saw myself in a mirror, the real me. I started to understand everything about myself, and I understood why this happened to us. everything……"

"What are you talking about?!" Melnik stared at his friend in distress in horror, and quickly glanced at the door—was it a mistake to rush the guards away?
"I said, I saw myself through their eyes, as if in a mirror. Not outside, but inside... saw what was under the shell... They lured him into this world, lured him into In front of the mirror, just to show me.

A cannibal, a monster, but I see no human.I was terrified by myself and I was sober.It turns out that I have been deceiving myself...I always say that I am defending others, saving others...that is a lie.

I'm just a hungry beast tearing at flesh and blood.The scum of a beast.

The mirror disappears, but it...this...remains.I woke up and never wanted to fall asleep like that again.They thought I ended up committing suicide.Why do I still live in this world...I didn't commit suicide.

I should fight.

At first, I have to fight alone... so that no one can see my true face.Stay away from crowds.

I figured that instead of letting them punish me, I could punish myself.I think, through the pain, I can drive it away..." He touched his scar again,
"Later I understood that without everyone it would conquer everything. I forgot about myself and came back."

(End of this chapter)