METRO 2033: The Gospel According to Artyom. Read Online Free

for sure that the Dark One did show it to me. That moment it even seemed to me that he did not simply make an image of her face, did not put a mask of her to entertain me, but... As if he channeled her very essence for a moment, allowing her to actually incarnate within him for a few seconds – for one short date with her son. That's supposedly what the mediums do for the summoned spirits.
     
    I felt... adopted. And then I was alone again.
     
    The only words of farewell I felt were “You are the first...”.
     
    But when I returned home, the happening did not leave a deeper trace in my memory than a magic dream does after you wake up. Quite soon it was completely forgotten. Or, at least, that's what I thought.
     
    –         Why are you smiling?! – asked Eugene with suspicion.
     
    I didn't know myself.
     
    When the Dark Ones recalled about me again, I was twenty-four. It was way too late – the humans already did bring me up their way. Hearing stories of the awful beasts breaking into our home from the surface and devouring our guards alive, killing the friends of my stepfather, the fathers of my friends, I suspected that somewhere in my childhood something really bad happened. I thought the dreams that sometimes reminded me of that, are to be chased away. I thought that since the Dark Ones can control the grown-ups like a puppeteer controls a glove puppet, gutting a kid's mind would be as easy for them as snapping their fingers.
     
    I wanted to run from the Exhibition exactly because the fragments of that fateful night would still sometimes surface in my conscience. Because I was afraid of the Dark Ones turning me into a puppet one night to kill my sleeping friends or the military leaders of the station.
     
    Hunter thought I had a natural immunity against the powers of the Dark Ones. The truth was that I was inoculated – I was bearing a fragment of their soul within mine, that's why I didn't feel pain or fear whenever they tried talking to me. I was immune because they already were inside me. But if I ever told Hunter about it, he'd strangle me on the spot despite his long lasting friendship with my stepfather. I'd gladly kill myself, if I was brave enough.
     
    But I was a coward and I ran. I accepted Hunter's task just for that. I thought I'd hide from the Dark Ones, escape my fate. And when I got brave enough, I only had enough courage to shit their voices within me with an MLRS salvo.
     
    I always was a coward and I remained a coward.
     
                 
    *               *               *
     
     
    The canon of the legend of Artyom says that the Dark Ones tried talking to our hero when the missiles were already in flight.
     
    Why do I keep telling about that?
     
    To shrug some of the responsibility? To make the whole world and, consequently, myself believe that I could not have changed anything? That it was already too late when I understood?
     
    Yes. They say that if you tell lies long enough you start believing them yourself…
     
    That's my only hope. What else?
     
                  I understood everything before the coordinates of the “city” of the Dark Ones were transmitted. The Dark Ones told me they came in peace, that they wanted to build a symbiotic relationship with us, that they wanted to understand us but were unable to reach understanding with the remnants of humanity hiding in their holes. They told me that my true destiny was to become a link between the two species and to stop the fray.
     
    I usually stress the last point, so that the legend becomes open-ended and everyone interprets it depending on how bitter he is. Most people just think the Dark Ones were trying to control me in order to avert their destruction. The doubtful ones make an assumption that the Dark Ones were probably not going to eat every last one of us. And I... I wash my hands.
     
    This is all true, but there was more to it.
     
    The first thing I saw in