Metro 2035
| novel | |
|---|---|
| title | Metro 2035 |
| Original title | метро 2035 |
| country | Russia |
| author | Dmitri Gluchowski |
| publishing company | Издательская группа "АСТ" |
Metro 2035 is a dystopian novel by Russian author Dmitri Gluchovsky , published in Russia on June 12, 2015.
The book is the third offshoot of the "Metro series" that Gluchowski created in 2007 with his novel Metro 2033 . The plot follows on from the events of the second video game offshoot Metro: Last Light , picks up on them and expands them.
In contrast to the previous novels, Gluchowski largely dispensed with mutations as elements of horror. Rather, unfolds before the Metro background political thriller .
announcement
While working on the story of Metro: Last Light, Gluchowski already indicated that the plot he had in mind for this story was too big for the game and that it would therefore make sense to write a new book.
In April 2014, Gluchowski announced the book on Twitter , so it should appear later in the year. The novel was finally announced on Instagram .
A Polish translation was published in January 2016, the German version on April 11, 2016.
action
The plot follows on from the events from the predecessors Metro 2033 and Metro 2034 as well as the video game Metro: Last Light and links their characters and storylines with one another.
Two years after the devastating bomb attack on the blacks' nest (see Metro 2033) and the grueling battle for the bunker (see Metro: Last Light), Artyom has withdrawn to his home station, the VDNKh , and lives there with his wife Anja, Melnik's daughter. After his brief service in the Order, Artyom finds it difficult to return to the simple life on the metro. Packed with regret, he goes on excursions to the surface every day to look for traces of other survivors and a possibility of returning to the surface. With a heavy army radio in his luggage, he climbs onto the roof of the nearby “Tricolor” towers and tries (so far without success) to establish radio contact with other survivors. His motivation is reinforced by the memory of the events two years ago, when he and the radio operator and religious Ulman heard noise and disturbed call signs on the radio radio on the Ostankino tower .
The other people at VDNKh encounter Artyom with incomprehension and hostility because of his activities. This also includes his stepfather Sukhoi, who is now head of the station, and his wife Anja, who consider him crazy with his obsession and are afraid of the radiation he has "brought with him". The relationship with Anja is also burdened by her desire to have children, since Artyom does not want to father a child in the Moscow Metro.
In the exhibition of the achievements of the national economy , Artyom meets Homer (the protagonist from Metro 2034) who is looking for him. Homer continues to write books and above all wants to capture the story on the metro. This includes the fight against the blacks, which was won thanks to Artyom. After initially refusing to cooperate with the old man, he was finally able to convince him of the cooperation when he told him that he knew someone who had radio contact with the city of Polyarnye Zori . Against the promise to introduce him to the radio operator Umbach, who lives on the Teatralnaya, Artyom agrees to tell Homer the story of the blacks.
The way to the Teatralnaya leads via the Hanseatic League, which has currently declared a quarantine due to the spread of a fungal infection with a "white mold" . Anja, who grows mushrooms, had previously indirectly accused Artjom of being to blame for the epidemic due to the radiation brought from the surface. At the barriers they meet the “slurry broker” Ljocha, who wants to bribe them into the ring line. However, the heroes are arrested and interrogated by Boris Swinolup, a security chief of the Hanseatic League. They are also accused of espionage for the Red Line (communists), which makes an escape seem hopeless. By showing his tattoo on his arm, Artyom threatens that an operation by the order is being hindered. Fearing the consequences, she lets Swinolup run and take an escort to Novoslobodskaya , which forms a satellite station with Mendeleevskaya .
The station is completely flooded, the people living there live in absolute poverty and hunger and eke out their miserable existence on elevated platforms. When asked how to get to the neighboring station Tsvetnoy Bulvar in the flooded tunnel, the heroes get no clear answer. In search of food, Artyom and his companions meet the businessman Oleg, who owns the only chicken at the station and offers them the purchase of an egg. Because of the conflict with the local homeless, Lyocha gets upset and throws away the shell of the egg. Since this serves as food for the chicken and is the source of income for Oleg, Oleg tries to commit suicide with Artyom's weapon. When the Hanseatic League does not want to take in the seriously wounded man, the heroes and some volunteers leave the station on a raft in the direction of the Fourth Reich (Iron Legion, fascists).
While Oleg is being cared for by a local doctor at the next ward, Tsvetnoy Bulvar, Homer and Artyom explore the ward, which is a huge brothel. Over the discussion of a way to the Teatralnaya bypassing the Reich, they end up in a bar and get drunk (especially Artyom). In a semi-unconscious state, Artyom confides in a Nazi recruiter and spends the night in a coma with a prostitute who talks all night to a strange customer. It later turns out that this is Sasha, wanted by Homer since the events of Metro 2034. The next day, he wakes up robbed, cigarette burns on his hand and a half-burned order tattoo. After he was found by Homer and Lyocha (Oleg is now dead) and an attempt to reach the Sretensky Bulvar station is unsuccessful, the heroes join the volunteers who set off for the Nazis in the Reich.
When they arrive at Chekhovskaya , they are examined . In the past two years, since Artyom was with the fascists for the first time, they have changed their ideology and are no longer trying to fight for the racist and ethnic purity of the metro, but rather to "restore" its population. The so-called degenerates such as people with disabilities or radiation damage are exterminated or abused as slaves. Lyocha apparently does not survive the draft and is led into an unknown room, Artyom and Homer finally end up with Dietmar, a high-ranking fascist at the head of the empire. He threatens Homer and forces Artyom to carry out an act of sabotage against the independent, but more of the Reds, Teatralnaya station in order to get his hands on them.
With a remote ignition mine and a radio in his luggage, Artyom makes his way across the surface to the Teatralnaya. After discovering the bodies of several mercenaries apparently doing the same job, he is chased by strangers on a motorcycle and off-road vehicle. The strangers who probably also murdered the other mercenaries let go of him at the gates of the Teatralnaya. With the passport of one of the dead, Artyom sneaks into the station and deposits the mine near the hermetic gate. While searching for the radio operator Umbach, he is arrested before Artyom can speak to him. Artyom, who mistakenly thinks the KGB people were looking for him, tries to free the radio operator from the clutches of the Reds. In a conversation with the KGB major Hleb Swinolup (brother of Boris an der Hanse) he angered him, so that Umbach was shot in front of Artyom. He now admits himself to have been the one who wanted to carry out the act of sabotage, but at that moment the fascists attacked and set the mine on fire. In the midst of the turmoil, Artyom is able to grab the major's weapon and tries to persuade the other prisoners to flee with him. When nobody wants to do this, he shoots Swninolup and flees to the surface. Without protective equipment he walks in the radioactive rain to Borovitskaya, which belongs to the polis.
After he was admitted as a stalker and fighter of the Order, Artyom had a heated discussion with Melnik, his father-in-law. Like Anja and Suchoj, Melnik doesn't want to know anything about any other survivors and is more concerned about his daughter Anja. He asks Artyom to leave them, to which the latter agrees on the condition that he may accompany the troop who is to personally deliver a letter with an ultimatum to the leader of the empire. Together with Letjaga, one of his old buddies in the order, whose life he saved by donating blood after the bunker fight (Metro: Last Light), and two other order fighters, they make their way to Chekhovskaya. There they are not allowed in at first, only Artom can enter the ward because of his acquaintance with Dietmar. While the others are being sent back, Dietmar steals the letter and sends Artyom to the slavery on Pushkinskaya , where he has to do forced labor with other degenerates. There he meets Homer and Lyocha again and can finally tell the old man the full story about the blacks. While the latter is being freed from slavery because he is supposed to help the fascists as a writer in writing a story, Lyocha and Artyom are used as cannon fodder against the Reds. The fascists and the Reds, who also sent their prisoners as a “protective wall”, meet at Kuznetsky Most. Both sides hack into each other, but finally stop when they realize that the other side has only been sent forward. Artyom questions the survivors again about the surface and learns that the Reds are supposedly building a radio control center in the city of Balashikha , very close to Moscow. He and Lyocha escape through a shaft to the surface, where he loses consciousness.
Artyom is dragged back to Tsvetnoy Bulvar by Lyocha, where he receives medical attention. Here he not only meets Sasha again, but also learns that he probably only has three weeks to live due to his serious radiation damage. After telling Sasha about the radio station, the station puts him in touch with one of their stalker customers, who agrees to bring Artyom and Lyocha to Balashikha. With the station wagon of the stalker named Saweli, the heroes discover wind turbines for power generation and cleared streets on the way, which actually suggests survivors. You will also find the said radio station and a pit with tons of corpses. In the absence of most of the guards, Artyom and his companions storm the radio center and receive dozens of radio signals from other cities such as Saint Petersburg and Berlin . The radio masts turn out to be jammers to make the residents of the metro believe they are alone. People coming from other cities were killed to maintain the bill.
Saveli decides to go to Yekaterinburg ; Artyom wants to destroy the jammers and tell the metro the truth. When he tries to get in touch with the other cities, three people appear who say they come from the city of Murom , 300 km away . After a brief exchange about life there, Saweli comes back, followed by two trucks that surround the heroes. When Artjom tries to destroy the radio masts with an excavator, Letjaga suddenly stops him by radio. The radio center does not belong to the Reds and he can explain everything when he is there. When Letjaga arrives, he shoots the three people from Murom and establishes a connection for Artyom to Melnik, who tells him that the war is not over and that the jammers are needed to hide Moscow from the world. They return to the metro and on Arbatskaja Melnik tells him that the radio center belongs to the Hanseatic League. It was also always known that Artyom had made trips to the surface and sought radio contact. Melnik gives Artyom his dog tag and asks him to come back to the Order. Before the start of a new operation, Artyom meets Anja again, who knows from the radio center and tells him that Melnik has not killed Artyom out of love for his daughter and her love for Artyom.
Artyom realizes that they are delivering 20,000 rounds of ammunition to the Reds, from his point of view the enemy. The instruction came from a mysterious Bessolov, to whom even Melnik seems to report. They go to Komsomolskaya , where ammunition is not used to buy food for the starving, as expected. Instead, the revolters are simply shot. Saweli dies in the crowd on the station, Artjom and Letjaga just manage to escape. Artyom concludes that Bessolov must be behind it all. At the same time, he remembers his night with Sasha and deduces that Bessolow is her owner. He goes back to Tsvetnoy Bulvar. Once there, he meets Homer again, who is appalled that Sasha is now working as a prostitute. Sasha admits that she knew about the jammers and everything and actually knows Bessolov. Artyom faints while waiting for him. Letjaga, Homer and Lyocha are arrested by the order.
A week later, Artyom wakes up in a kind of hospital in a much better looking tunnel. After a blood transfusion and the care of the doctors, his chances of recovery have increased significantly and Artyom tries to find out where he is. He meets Bessolow and finally learns the whole truth. The former ruling elite as well as former government representatives have always lived in the Metro-2 in luxury and from there they manage everything that happens in the Metro. All factions and all ways of life are directed from the outside and staged as a great spectacle to distract people and prevent them from returning to the surface. Only under the earth could people be held together as a nation, on the surface they would scatter to the winds. He offers Artjom to stay there, too, which the latter refuses and is brought back to the metro with the aim of telling everyone the truth and persuading them to return to the surface.
After a disappointing breakup with Sasha, who wants to stay with Bessolov, Artyom is arrested in the polis and tells Letjaga, Homer and Lyocha about the news in the cell. At a comradeship court , the entire order is supposed to vote on the verdict against the three deserters , while Homer serves as a witness. The three plan to reveal the whole truth and print leaflets there. First Letjaga makes his report and reports on the radio center, the observers from Metro-2 and the possible betrayal of the order. Before he can finish, he is shot by someone from the crowd and there is a commotion and the order is split into the veterans around Artjom and the new order soldiers from the Hanseatic League around Melnik. These hold Anja and demand Artjom in exchange. Homer makes his way to the Fourth Reich to print the leaflets, Lyocha is supposed to confront Bessolov. Anja is released in exchange with Artyom.
While the people demand the truth, the council of the polis meets and discusses what to do. The chairman of the council finally announces that there are survivors outside the metro, but the enemy is not defeated, has survived and still has weapons. The real truth is not told, after which Artyom attacks Melnik and is beaten up. Lyocha betrays him, becomes Bessolov's assistant and enjoys the convenience of the elite. Artyom is helped to escape by Timur, a former comrade of his and Letjaga. He meets Homer again, who doesn't believe the whole story and didn't print any leaflets. He doesn't want to end his book like that and not write a political story, but a real heroic story about Artyom. Bessolow offers him a room and a large edition for his book - an offer that Homer accepted. Desperate at the realization that people don't even want to know the truth and would rather continue their lives as they are led to believe, Artjom collapses with laughter. Together with Anja he escapes in Saweli's car over the surface back to the VDNKh.
Once there, Artyom tells his stepfather Sukhoi and all the other residents of the station the truth about the metro. Meanwhile, Artjom is to be extradited to the Hanseatic League under threat of a blockade of the station. Due to the fungal epidemic, the VDNKh is dependent on supplies from the Hansa, which means that the threat to the hungry people at the station is serious. Artyom tries to persuade people to come to the surface with him, but nobody but Anja wants to follow him. Even Sukhoi finally stays at the station before he and Anja set off in Saweli's car in the direction of Vladivostok to see the sea.
literature
- Dmitri Alexejewitsch Gluchowski: Metro 2035 , Heyne Verlag , 2016, ISBN 978-3-4533-1555-6
- new edition: Metro 2035 , Heyne Verlag, 2018, ISBN 978-3-4533-1902-8