Metro 2033 Diaries Part Four

This is my ongoing exploration of the Metro games, played in release order. I will chronicle my playthrough of each title in turn and discuss any recurring themes and noteworthy events. This time I continue Metro 2033 Redux.

After a brief stopover in Market, Bourbon and I had run into more than we could chew, and escaped by falling into a building through the window…

I don’t know how long we climbed between the window and the ladder that we were suddenly on, but at least it was away from those demons. My gas mask had cracks along the edges, which surely wasn’t a good sign, so I needed to stay below ground.

Bourbon was taking us to Dry station to meet his friends. Of course, there was a chance that his friends wouldn’t be there, so he went out of a grate first to check things out. Sure enough, the men just outside grabbed him, beat him up a bit, then dragged him off to see “the boss”. I was getting the feeling that people didn’t like Bourbon… Since he’d left his stuff in the vent with me, I took his AK-47 - sure, we weren’t at the destination yet, but I had a feeling I’d need it.

Sneaking out when the coast was clear, I did a bit of recon, finding out that there were half a dozen or so men, and traps. Admittedly, I only realised that when I triggered one and got slammed in the face by another chunk of wood. So, I stabbed a guy to try and be quiet, and someone stood behind two wooden barriers called an alert.

Quickly hiding behind some cover, I waited for them to get closer before opening fire. Luckily enough, I must have had silent gunfire because the first went down, and the second behind him without anyone coming to shoot me. I went to kill another, but he went down after a weird noise. I heard the same noise a couple more times, and assumed people were killing themselves or setting off traps as I cleared up the area, though I had a bit of trouble with a sniper.

After some looting, I went into the next area where they apparently hadn’t heard the commotion I had caused. Two laughed about how Bourbon might have been okay - but unluckily for him “the boss” wasn’t “the old boss”. I tried to sneak around, but was quickly spotted.

I shot one guy, then ducked into a side tunnel. Someone followed, but since I was hiding behind a partition he forgot I was most likely still right there. I shot him in the head, then tossed a molotov outside the doorway. I figured I was stuck, until I noticed that the stacked crates made a bit of a maze. I went inside, and made my way behind all of the men looking for me.

Once in position, I tried to sneak to the door where I assumed Bourbon was being held. Unfortunately, I was instantly spotted and had to toss another molotov as I returned fire. I dashed for the opposite tunnel and waited for them to follow. They didn’t, so I went back out and shot the lone survivor. After looting the corpses, I went to save Bourbon.

As I entered the room, more enemies began to rush towards me - despite none surviving my wrath. I didn’t have time to question as I locked the door behind me, as the leader of this group turned his attention from Bourbon. It was long enough for Bourbon to grab the man’s gun and knock him down. Unfortunately, there was an AK on the ground, so the two men wound up shooting each other dead.

With a resigned sigh, I moved to search the corpses, when a man dropped from the vent above. He introduced himself as Khan, and judging by the banging at the door, he was my only way out - and probably the reason for that weird noise killing people earlier. However, when I went to check a door at the back of the room, I interrupted what he was saying - something about me having a choice - and he told me that I’d made the right decision, so we left.

Despite the door having been open already, the amount of cobwebs showed that nobody had been out this way in a long time. Khan explained that he knew this tunnel, and urged me to listen to the pipes because “they” knew we were coming. I did so, and there was a child laughing - which given what I’d experienced so far was exactly as unsettling as you can imagine.

Khan told me to keep my light on, and as we walked there were shadows moving on their own. I was advised to not touch them. I realised after a couple that they were tied to the bodies we were passing - their last moments before death. Khan stopped in a train car, and I could make out a shadow of a child through the very dense cobwebs. I burnt them away, and the silhouette turned into a mutant which leaped at me, turning the screen black.

Once the screen had returned to normal, and I took a moment to collect myself, I followed Khan out of the train, and onto a gantry. He insisted that I step to the side, and judging by the train lights coming towards us, the train was about to relive its final moments. The train rushed past, and indeed as the final car went past there was the noise of a train crash.

We continued as Khan explained his theory that this tunnel was reliving things because heaven and hell were destroyed by the nuclear holocaust which decimated civilisation. Of course, when an anomaly - a ball of light, similar to the one which had hit Artyom shortly before reaching Riga - came along, he didn’t have an explanation for that.

We remained still, and it hovered close to us before heading off down a parallel tunnel and zapping some mutants. We continued to the end of the tunnel, where a pack of nosalises attacked us. I managed to use up all of the ammo in my AK-47, and had regrettably swapped my shotgun for it without realising the Bastard Gun used the same rounds. Thankfully, I ran out of ammo at the same time the anomaly came back, zapping the hell out of the remaining mutants.

With them out of the way, we boarded a motorised cart, and set off for Cursed station…