Sahra was tense. Breathing through the filter of her mask felt especially heavy.The message lay like a stone in her stomach and refused to let go.For the twentieth—perhaps thirtieth—time, her eyes drifted over the same letter.
The seal—red, thick, embossed with the insignia of the highest security level—felt like a slap in the face.Proof that the contents were neither exaggerated, nor misunderstood, nor open to doubt.
As in the Middle Ages, the art of sealing had crept back into the new world.What mattered was once again waxed and stamped, as if reality itself had to be nailed down by force so it could not escape.
Sahra held the yellowed paper so tightly that it crackled between her fingers.She knew every word, yet she kept reading, as though repetition might change its meaning.
The Consul himself had approved this order.No doubt.No mistake.No turning back.
"Comrade Commissar?" one of her political detachment soldiers asked.He gestured toward the sealed supply crates: flamethrowers, ethanol canisters, incendiary grenades—closer to Molotov cocktails than proper military equipment—and dozens of standard-issue magazines.
Sahra cursed her brief moment of euphoria at being transferred away from the Eastern Front.Away from that place of dying.But this order struck her with full force, right in the gut.
A sector termination—those were rare.Very rare.
It hadn't happened since the smallpox outbreak in the stations Neue Donau and Floridsdorf.Back then, the ZSOK had still unified the Metro—and burned three thousand people to avoid wasting medicine.Today, those stations lay empty. Only ruins and stripped storage halls remained.
Now it was her duty to annihilate this new source of contagion completely.Duty as a political commissar.Duty as a guardian of "human existence," as the handbook called it.
"Shit… and they only give us one goddamn regiment…" she muttered as she skimmed the plant-fiber data medium."The Twenty-Third. Half strength. And still…"
"Commissar?" the subordinate asked hesitantly.
"What is it?" she replied curtly, her eyes still fixed on the black text.
"Should the regiment assemble?"
What time was it?Had she missed the start?
She yanked back her sleeve and glanced at her wristwatch.The second hand twitched nervously, as if it understood what lay ahead.
During training, every scenario had been rehearsed dozens of times.Every line of the Red Book memorized.Every contingency optimized.Rationalized.
But the extermination of a thousand people—trained for in theory, now real—felt surreal.
She looked at the watch again.
Another minute had passed.
In ninety minutes, Operation Promethium would begin.In ninety minutes, one thousand lives would come to an abrupt end.
They would begin at Margaretengürtel Station, directly on the border to the territory of the Free Trade Syndicates. Step by step, residential block by residential block, meter by meter, they would burn their way through the infestation.Politically reinforced guard posts sealed off the entire section at both ends. Any resident attempting to flee would be burned without hesitation. Two Darzienen transporters were also part of the cleansing unit's arsenal.
The soldier cleared his throat again to draw attention. His face was hidden beneath a matte-black leather mask; the dull lenses reflected the foolish emergency lighting of the tunnel.
"Good," she said briefly. "Have the regiment assemble. I will brief them."
The soldier snapped a hasty salute and raised his left fist. Muffled by the mask's filters, he croaked:"For the honor of the Consul!"
Sahra returned the salute.
Meanwhile, David stood on the platform. In front of him, behind him, left and right stood his brothers and sisters in arms. All waited for the commissar's address. What was their task? Were they even enough?
Out of their full strength—ninety soldiers—only fifty-five were combat-ready. The rest had fallen or been wounded on the Eastern Front. Why were they in this restricted zone? Right outside the commune? And what were all these refugees doing here?
A hundred—maybe more. Packed tightly together in makeshift tents, flowing like a liquid into every crack, every crevice, every hollow space. They had displaced the market that normally took place here. The Mariahilferstraße transfer station was one of the Union's most important hubs. Normally around a thousand people lived here—roughly one sixteenth of the Union's population—and now the refugees had joined them.
Logisticians sorted construction materials, light bulbs, fluorescent tubes, cables—everything evacuated from the commune. Everything had been packed into new bamboo crates. They were loaded using a rusty, yellow-lacquered cable winch that groaned under the weight. Apparently, there were Class A and Class B markings, clearly labeled. Class A goods were transported to the agricultural stations—the granaries of the Union. Productivity-enhancing material. Class B was for resettlement: all construction materials needed for recolonization. Wood, sheet steel, bricks, tarps, manufacturing equipment, and agricultural tools.
Suddenly, movement: two floodlights flared to life, the surreal hum of a generator suppressing the tunnel's other sounds. An improvised podium was torn from the half-darkness.With quick, hard steps, the officer climbed the stairs. Tense gazes followed her.
She planted both hands firmly on the lectern, raised her head, and looked straight into the soldiers' core.
"Esteemed comrades, hardened defenders of humanity," she began in a steady voice. David thought he detected the faintest tremor.
"As you can see, approximately one hundred communards are currently in this station, awaiting naturalization. Another five hundred have found refuge in other stations. They migrated into our arms due to a disease."Muted murmuring broke out. The commissar raised a warning hand.
"The Consul himself has assigned us to this humanitarian operation. The order is—"She paused for a second."—the order is to disinfect the entire territory of the commune with fire."
Silence. Hard, suffocating silence.
"Since this epidemic is neither curable nor has a vaccine, and because it has a long incubation period, there is no alternative. Everyone living there is a walking dead."
She let the words fall like stones.
"For this operation, ammunition conservation is mandatory. Every person to be terminated shall receive the most painless death possible. In the event of resistance or unrest, fire is to be opened without warning.Anyone with even a damaged gas mask will also be cleansed."
Her gaze dropped to the rails for a single breath, then lifted again.
"To ensure the continued existence of our species, we will bear this burden.For the honor of humanity and the Consul."
The soldiers snapped to attention, saluting. Grim. Determined. Ready to fulfill their terrible duty.
Behind the podium, a military caravan roared into view—a draisine with an old combustion engine. The engine coughed black smoke and soot into the stale air like a sullen ghost torn from a rusted car corpse.A ghost that cursed the living for dragging it from its cold, oily sleep.A ghost its creators had once left to die in the snow—and which now, ancient and obstinate, was forced to serve again.
But it had no choice.It had to obey.And with the last remnants of iron will, it followed its new master—the grim draisine driver.
A whistle shrieked through the station.
"All aboard!" the commissar barked.
Obediently, the soldiers climbed onto the transport platform. Metal clattered, boots stomped, straps snapped tight.Then the draisine lurched into motion—at a speed that felt breathtaking in the dark tunnel.
The world became a flickering corridor of rusted lamps and shadows.The vehicle raced along the rails, rattling, pounding, vibrating.In at most ten minutes, they would have covered the entire distance.The stations lay close together; only concrete, darkness, and decaying maintenance shafts separated them.
The U4 had only been lowered during the Metro bunker plans.That was why these sections were still the least ravaged by time—yet even they had long since lost their former shine.
"Masks on!" echoed through the tunnel.
David obeyed automatically.With a jerk, he pulled the mask over his face.The world grew dull.Muffled.Like behind glass.
He tried not to think about the mission.Not about the heat of the fire they would unleash.And certainly not about the uncertain fate of his friend.
Gabriel was alive.Still.
But for how long?How long until he, too, received a red X? This time, he wouldn't end up in a preliminary group, not one with a number. Just the X.How long until he was sorted out—as a burden, a risk, a walking dead?
Would they ever see each other again?Had their small reconnaissance patrol at the front been their last real encounter?
But the military machinery allowed no thoughts.No doubts.No grief.
The process crushed everything.Beat by beat.Order by order.Machine against human.
And the draisine raced on into the darkness.
Ammunition, filters, and incendiary weapons were distributed.The heavy troops received flamethrowers and strapped the pressurized liquid fuel tanks onto their backs. Stiff from the weight, they awkwardly sat back down. Their fire weapons—called "dragons"—were made from old pipes, welded pressure tanks, and equipped with electric ignition systems.
Normally, the incendiary agent consisted of ethanol, distilled from fermented fungi or potatoes. But for this operation, a tar-like thickener had been added so their lethal barbarism—their own Greek fire—would cling better and burn longer.
David, too, received his tools for the assignment.Five magazines of 5.56×45 mm caliber, two homemade-brand filters, and three incendiary grenades. He stowed everything in the designated pouches. With a final click, the magazine locked into place. With a pulling motion, he chambered a brass-glinting round and let the charging handle snap forward.
Everything was ready now.
Then he was handed a few more incendiary devices. These, however, were different from the usual glass containers with soaked wicks. No—they were made of paper, and inside clung a white powder.
What is this? David thought. Dynamite?Nonsense. Why would they need that? The stations were meant to be recolonized, not destroyed.
Saltpeter, maybe? That didn't make sense either.
Suddenly, he became fully alert.
Shit… that's white phosphorus.
Disgusted, he let the object fall. Could this really be happening? Were they truly being issued these weapons—this horror, the white dragon that burns forever? A weapon banned even before the last world war, and outlawed again in the Treaty of Seibenhirten. A substance that could not be extinguished, smothered, or removed. A material that ignited on its own and turned entire cities to ash.
With this, they wouldn't just kill the commune.
They would erase it in the name of humanity, using the most inhuman weapons imaginable.
He picked the object back up and hastily stowed it in his steel gas mask canister. The draisine raced on into the darkness. With a sudden jolt and a screech, the vehicle braked. The driver slowed the steel monstrosity, which swayed through the tunnels like a metallic centipede.
The stench hit them like a wall.Even through the gas masks—whose activated carbon filters contained millions of tiny cavities—the smoke crept through. Fumes of burned flesh, melted hair, and brittle, scorched bone seared into every nerve.
The machine came to an abrupt halt.
"Why are we stopping?!" the commissar shouted over the infernal stench.
"Comrade Commissar, there are—"The soldier hesitated. For a moment, he seemed unsure whether his eyes were deceiving him."Bodies ahead! Many of them!"
"What?"Sahra straightened, glanced forward—and immediately gave the order:
"All personnel dismount!"
As commanded, the gray-clad soldiers jumped from the draisine.
David saw the pile of corpses. Twenty, thirty—maybe forty bodies, thrown atop one another, some still smoldering like charred logs. Apparently, people were dying faster than the crematorium could burn them.
The faces that weren't fully burned were swollen blue-violet.Caked blood clung to mouths, noses, and eyes. Some hands were clenched into claws, as if in their final seconds they had grasped for air, for help, or for a miracle that never came.
It was a plague worse than anything humanity had seen since the Black Death.More contagious than the Spanish flu.More lethal than Ebola.
Why did this disease have to strike the last representatives of the species sapiens of all people?Had humanity not already paid enough for its sins?
Messages written in charcoal covered the walls:
"The blue suffering devours all."
"The revenge of our ancestors."
Accusatory:
"Atonement for our sins."
And one final message, half smeared:
"God forgive us our—"
To these silent accusations of fate was added the sound of a dead station.All inhabitants wore cloth masks to protect against the deadly aerosols.Corpses were dragged from the station to the pyres and thrown in.The flames devoured bodies and clothing alike.
David looked around more closely.So this was an anarchist stronghold?
Adorned with beautiful mosaics imitating skies, forests, and seas—futile, but earnest.Children played on the floor with old plastic blocks and figurines despite the curfew.
Above a barrack—one that, to David's horror, looked just as bleak as those back home—hung a diagonally split flag in blood red and black.At its center were three white arrows.What they stood for, David didn't know.A symbol of unity?One arrow per station?Belief systems?Or was the motif inspired by old symbols, like those on the Union's flag?
He saw three-phase motors driven heavily by steam power, diesel generators, or even muscle power.Mushroom farms burst at the seams, snow-white champignons growing everywhere.They sprouted from stacked buckets with irregular holes cut into the sides, from which the mycelium's fruiting bodies emerged.
Vegetable and potato farms stood right next to the living quarters.But the fluorescent tubes were missing.Were those what the logisticians had loaded earlier?
Above a severed, dismantled railcar hung a banner:
"Anarchist-Democratic People's Council"
Democracy?David knew the concept from politics and history classes.Democracy, as techno-socialism taught, was only practical and sensible on the lowest levels of society.You wouldn't let someone steer who had no understanding of the subject matter—would you?
In manufacturing stations, farms, and laboratories, electing a supervisor might be a step toward equality.But in a world like this, David believed strong leadership was necessary.Maybe the commune could have been saved… if it hadn't lost itself in the democratic process.
A cracking command tore David from his thoughts:
"Form a firing line!"
As ordered, they formed a front, bayonets pointed at living flesh.Using a sheet-metal amplifier—or rather, a dented metal container—Sahra climbed onto an old, faded blue plastic crate provided by a political soldier with a red armband.
Cursing softly, she muttered, "Then we'll do it differently…"Apparently irritated that her carefully crafted plan had failed, she began with a crooked grin.
"Citizens of the commune," she called out. "We are a humanitarian unit. Acting on behalf of the Consul himself."
A crowd gathered.More and more people poured out of corridors, corners, and side rooms.Even the exhausted gravediggers, still hauling corpses from a tent, stopped and listened.
"We possess a provisional antibiotic. Gather together, and we will begin treatment."She lowered the improvised amplifier.
"Bullshit!" shouted an old man, his remaining eye bloodshot, his teeth black and rotted.
"What do you mean?" the commissar asked challengingly.
"If what you say is true…" he rasped, coughing blood,"then it makes no sense for you to form a firing line. To hold us back with bayonets. And to arrive like this."He gestured at the flamethrowers. Entire fingers were missing from his hand, the stumps glued together with dried blood.
Practiced and calm, Sahra replied through the megaphone:"Since this is an experimental agent, utmost caution is still required. The studies so far are sparse and, at best, incomplete."She raised her arms."And the flamethrowers are only for the corpses! After all, your crematorium is overloaded. It's better to burn highly infectious bodies from a safe distance, wouldn't you agree?"
What is she saying? David thought.Does the Union actually have a treatment—and this order is just a contingency in case the experiment fails?But why did she say in her address that there was no cure?Are they trying to harden us? So it's easier to terminate everyone if it comes to that?
Hope sparked within the sea of people.Slowly at first, then faster, faces brightened, wrinkles smoothed.Like a wave of relief, the terminally ill and the presumed carriers pushed forward.They pressed ever closer toward the central plaza.
Exhausted, emaciated faces stared at the convoy.Women held out their children— their infants—toward the soldiers.Everyone wanted their children to receive the first dose of this ominous cure.
Joyful chants tried in vain to drown out the stench of burning corpses.
The old man tried to incite the crowd:
"Don't you understand?! They're going to slaughter us! They're going to burn us all! Don't you get it?!"
He stood before the mass like a preacher, but the crowd crushed him between bayonets and their own bodies.He stumbled, nearly falling onto the blades.Only a quick step by a soldier saved him from being impaled.
"Fine! Then run like lambs to the slaughter!" he screamed. "But I'm leaving!"He tried to force his way through the crowd, swimming against the current—futile.
David held the line as ordered.What would happen now?
In the background, the political commissar issued her commands.A soldier opened a crate and removed a strangely black, gleaming metal object, placing it on the railing and positioning himself behind it.
Then Sahra's voice rang out:
"Open wedge formation!"
As ordered, the line opened at the center, the soldiers stepping back.The crowd surged forward like thick liquid, arms outstretched, necks craned, children held high.
"Open fire!"
Behind David, a machine gun barked, spewing salvo after salvo into human bodies.Torn, mutilated corpses were flung backward.Bullets slammed into bellies and torsos, shattered skulls, and splintered bones.
The infantry opened fire as well.David hesitated.
Could he shoot them?Children. The sick. The elderly—just because of a disease?Was that his right? His duty?
The order was repeated.David felt something inside him break.
Instinctively, without thinking, he pulled the trigger.
Blood splattered across the ceiling, dripped down, pooled on the floor, and ran along the slopes of the corpse piles toward his boots.He barely knew what he was doing.Round after round tore into silhouettes stretched tight with skin.
He hit an infant in the chest.The small body was flung backward, its ribcage torn open.Gray eyes stared at him accusingly.
Why was he doing this?
Why was this demanded of him?
Yet he kept firing.
A click.Empty.
He ejected the magazine, slammed in a new one—automatically, almost mechanically—and raised the weapon again.
Bodies fell row after row.Projectiles drilled into flesh, made bodies twitch grotesquely before collapsing.
At the edges, a few managed to flee—but they would not escape.
The massacre lasted only minutes.Perhaps three.Perhaps five.
Then the gunfire ceased.
Brass casings still clattered as they hit the ground.Blood flowed across the platform—dozens of liters.
"Soldiers of the Union!" the commissar roared."Search and find the rest of them! One infected person—and we are all lost!"
The soldiers spread out like gray plague doctors, ready to burn out the source of infection. They searched wooden barracks, tents, and ancient service rooms cast from reinforced concrete. In every refuge, a bloodbath was unleashed. The heap of corpses piled before the machine gun was ignited by flamethrowers. Bright yellow flames set the ethanol-soaked remains alight, slowly turning them into charred, misshapen masses. The station filled with smoke and soot.
All inhabitants were erased from existence step by step. Their belongings were then set on fire and finally reduced to black dust.
David and his unit moved through the residential quarters. Dead bodies lined the alleys—either claimed by the Blue Plague or riddled with bullets, slowly dying on the tiled floors. The infected, emaciated, their heads blue to violet, had no strength left to flee their killers. They looked at the soldiers through the reflective lenses of the gas masks, in which the fire of the corpse burnings was mirrored.
"Come on…" one of the infected rasped. He looked up at David with one eye. As with the corpses in the track bed, fresh blood ran from his nose, mouth, and eyes, flowing downward like tears or drool in dark red rivulets. He raised his arm—grasping, searching, pleading. Then he croaked again: "Just shoot me already…" His single eye rolled. The other was likely dead from pressure on the optic nerve. "I know what you're doing here… so go on, pull the trigger… and spare me this suffering." His head slumped forward heavily. Only with effort did he manage to look at David—unsteady, vacant, detached.
With his right arm, he leaned against a red sheet-metal crate whose corners were flaking, exposing dull gray metal beneath. He lay in front of a former residential block reaching up to the ceiling—cobbled together from tarps and boards. Simple. Plain. Like the barracks in the Union. Not beautiful, but efficient and practical.
"Come on… do it," the man spat, already consumed by his infection.
A shot rang out.The man's head snapped backward, twisting slightly to the side.A hole gaped diagonally in his forehead. Blood gushed from the open skull.David turned—it was Achmet, who had matter-of-factly executed the man.
"Set this shit on fire and move on!" the corporal ordered his subordinates.
David stood beside himself, lost in thought. Was this really the great adventure the recruitment posters had promised? Was this the best option? Of course, the Union had tried everything so it wouldn't be the only path. But everything failed—shattered against the iceberg of reality. There was no hope, no forgiveness, no redemption for their sins. Blood clung to them, stained their souls black, and shattered humanity. Humanity would survive this epidemic—but it would lose its humanity in the process.
How much more of it had to die? How much necrotic flesh had to fall from the bones before this nightmare finally ended?
David barely noticed that, as ordered, he threw an incendiary grenade into the mutilated building. With the sound of shattering glass, this breeding ground of infection went up in flames. Automatically, he moved on.
Rationing. Mobilization. Grinding down and burning through their own sons and daughters… how much more? War. Crimes against humanity. Epidemics and flamethrowers. Why? Why couldn't humans stop killing each other, tearing each other apart, at least in the final meters of their moral existence? Why force vibrant beings into machine-gun fire and infernos—shoot them if they refused?
Gabriel had been right. The Union was the only state trying to preserve as much humanity as possible in this inhuman hell—to keep the ember of Homo sapiens alive. History would vindicate it. But other nations would not. There would only be more war, more suffering, more death. A great war.
And Gabriel had been right about something else:When a human loses their humanity, they lose much—but when they lose their bestiality, they lose everything.
But David did not want to live with inhumanity.
He thought of the infant he had mutilated—who had its entire life ahead of it, innocent at the start. It reminded him of Tanja, crying out for her brother in his mind's eye, her red dress fluttering.
I'm sorry, Mother… I'm sorry, Tanja.
He raised his rifle a few centimeters behind his chin—and said goodbye to the world.