《Mecha Stalin Massacre (An alternate-universe steampunk LitRPG)》


 Death Is Always The End

    I land a solid punch, knocking the little fascist off balance.


    Solid hit!


    You have done 5 damage.


    Opponent HP at 19/24.


    Opponent is Unbalanced


    This surprises me. Thirty-five years old, level 22, and this is the first time I¡¯ve thrown a punch since that one fight as a kid. The dice rolls of the universe must be going my way.


    The notifications scroll across my vision, not so distracting that they take me out of the fight, but unfamiliar enough that each one grabs my attention for a half second.


    You have gained 240 EXP to Punching, Strength.


    Your Punching skill has reached level 6!


    Then again, I¡¯ve never been this Confused or Angry. The events of the past few days have given me status effects that I rarely experienced, all stacked on top of one another. And then this little fascist had gone and insulted Mecha Stalin.


    ¡°You party stooges always come in here so self-righteous,¡± he spits. ¡°You¡¯ll figure out soon enough that in here, you¡¯re just like us.¡±


    He¡¯s recovered from Unbalanced, and is now coming at me and throwing a wild punch.


    Solid hit!


    You have received 7 damage.


    HP at 13/20.


    You are Unbalanced.


    He¡¯s already done more damage than me, and that was with me landing as lucky of a blow as I possibly could.


    You have gained 240 EXP to Resist Impact, Constitution


    Your Resist Impact skill has reached level 8!


    Your Constitution attribute has risen to 17!


    I¡¯m not cut out for camp life, but that is okay. Mecha Stalin will fix this error. Mecha Stalin will save me.


    I recover my balance ¡ª the throng of zeks surrounds us and quietly chant my opponent¡¯s name, so he doesn¡¯t seem to be in a big hurry to finish me off ¡ª and proceed to throw another punch at my opponent.


    Glancing blow.


    You have done 1 damage.


    Opponent HP at 18/24.


    You have gained 240 EXP to Punching, Strength.


    Your Punching skill has reached level 7!


    Your Strength attribute has risen to 15!


    At least, after Mecha Stalin has saved me, I¡¯ll have gained some EXP from this. It¡¯s been so long since I¡¯ve gained more than the minimum 10 EXP from a task that I forgot how good it feels. Even this low-level exchange is revitalizing.This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.


    That is, if I don¡¯t drop below zero HP¡­ at that point, I would pass out, and he could keep beating me until I hit -10 HP. No coming back from that.


    The fascist quickly returns a blow.


    Solid hit!


    You have received 6 damage.


    HP at 7/20.


    You are Unabalanced.


    You have received 240 EXP to Resist Impact, Constitution.


    Your Resist Impact skill has reached level 9!


    One more hit and I could be Knocked Out. Once that happens, it is fully up to my opponent whether I live or die.


    I back up while unbalanced, into the circle of chanting zeks that surrounds us, and I realize there will be no escape. They push me back into the makeshift ring.


    ¡°Don¡¯t do this, comrade,¡± I say to him. Is that pleading in my voice? I do not mean to plead. The status effects have even effected even my strongest abilities. ¡°We should be working together for the good of the Motherland.¡±


    You have attempted Persuasion.


    Your opponent is not effected.


    You have received 870 EXP to Persuasion, Charisma.


    I¡¯m surprised that I receive EXP ¡ª his Wisdom and Discernment are low enough that this shouldn¡¯t be a challenge ¡ª but then I remember the other factors at play. I have no reputation with him, as I have just arrived at camp. Our ideologies are opposed: I am an upstanding party loyalist who show the proper love towards Mecha Stalin, while he is a dirty fascist, although he calls himself something else. Finally, I have several Status Effects which drag down my ability to reason and persuade.


    The Status Effects only effect my success rate, but reputation and ideological alignment effect both success rate and how EXP gain is calculated.


    It is nice to have someone to test my abilities against, a way to gain EXP. How long has it been since I¡¯ve leveled up?


    I¡¯ve taught the same subjects, to the same type of loyalist student, for ten years. The gains to my various Intellect, Wisdom, and Charisma skills had been substantial in the early years. It had been a challenge. Then had come the comfortable years where, though the objective EXP gains stayed the same, the skill increases had happened slower due to the increased demands of the higher levels. If I wanted to keep leveling at the same rate as before, I would have to seek more difficult challenges, but I was content to do the same tasks over and over, with greater and greater percentages of success. Finally, when my tasks were no challenge at all, my EXP gain per task had dropped to 10.


    Now, now that I am surrounded by fascists, I can finally start levelling again.


    Of course, this will do no good if I die, which is looking increasingly likely.


    My opponent moves in and trips me, knocking me to the ground despite my best efforts to stay up.


    You have been successfully Tripped.


    You haved received 5 damage in the fall.


    Your HP is 2/20.


    You have received 400 EXP to Grappling, Strength.


    Your Grappling skill has risen to 2!


    Your Grappling skill has risen to 3!


    Your Grappling skill has risen to 4!


    He straddles me. ¡°Be sure to greet your precious Mecha Stalin when you see him in hell.¡±


    I reel from the blasphemy. Hell isn¡¯t real. God isn¡¯t real. The only reality is Mecha Stalin and the party. I receive the Status Effect Righteous Indignation, but it is too late. He punches me one last time.


    Critical hit!


    You have received 10 damage.


    Your HP is -8/20.


    You are KOed.


    I lose consciousness and accept my fate.

 Stool Pigeon

    I wake in a bed that almost feels like home.


    The ceiling is concrete, as in my apartment, and not the shabby wooden planks that make the ceiling in the prisoner barracks. This concrete will keep out the wet. It will not collapse under drifts of snow.


    I sit. My first sight is a trio of pictures: Marx, Lenin, and Stalin, paintings in the Soviet Realist style. They are faithfully reprinted in stunning color, and they are nearly three feet tall so that they can be seen easily from the bed.


    Marx is studying and writing in the book that would eventually become Das Kapital.


    Lenin is leading the Red Revolution, a crowd of the proletariat at his back, engaging the Tsarists in early Mecha combat. The armor is still partly chain mail (for lightness), and the engines are huge compared to their power output. The machine gun attached to his right arm cannot be aimed well, and the flamethrower on his left arm has only two minutes of fuel. This is the most popular image of Lenin, although the one where he executes a half dozen bankers of questionable descent is also very common.


    Finally, in the middle and slightly larger than the other two, is Stalin. Stalin, level 99 in all skills, glorious in his Mecha suit. The lightest and strongest metals plate his body. At his sides are two copies of the most powerful engine that Soviet engineering can come up with. His right arm not only has a machine gun far more powerful and accurate than the one on Lenin, but it also has a rifle that can be used at long ranges. On his left arm, the flamethrower has been joined by a grenade launcher. On his chest is a device which can cause the eyes and ears of his enemies to betray them, which allows Mecha Stalin to show great kindness and mercy to the confused capitalists that he must reeducate. Mercy is Mecha Stalin¡¯s greatest virtue.


    You have received the status Soviet Pride.


    +10 on wisdom checks against enemies of the state


    -10 on wisdom checks against friends of the state


    I wait, staring at the pictures for quite some time. There is nothing better to do, and I am used to waiting.


    You have received 800 EXP in Patience, Wisdom .


    Eventually one of the guards enters. I inspect his stats out of instinct. It''s what teachers do.


    Name: Sacha Astakhov


    Age: 40


    Level: 25


    Occupation: Correctional Labor Facility Compliance Officer


    Ideological Alignments: Communist, Stalinist


    Stats


    Strength: 33


    Constitution: 48


    Dexterity: 18


    Intelligence: 25


    Wisdom: 26


    Charisma: 31


    Top Skills


    Intimidation: 59


    Punching: 58


    Pistols: 51


    Persuasion: 44


    Resist Cold: 41


    I used to be able to trust myself when I saw these stat sheets. Inspect had occasionally given me blank values, for recalcitrant students who didn''t want to be Inspected, but it had never given me wrong answers before... at least until the night of my arrest.Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    I will know later, when I receive the EXP for Inspect. If it''s 10 EXP then it means that they were not trying to hide anything from me. If it''s more, then that means they were trying to hide something. The delay in EXP gain for Wisdom skills is annoying, but it makes sense. If you gain a bunch of EXP in Discernment, that means that someone tried to tell you a lie. If you gain all that EXP immediately, like you do after throwing a punch, then you would know exactly what statements were false.


    I often wonder why the underlying systems of the world are so much more balanced than the systems that are created by men, but I do not wonder out loud. Things are infinitely more balanced than before the party, when the Tsars, those bourgeois scum, ruled Russia with an iron fist of oppression. The party has made things more balanced in society, although they haven''t quite reached the beauty of the natural.


    All of this I try not to think on too hard. If I do this, I may start thinking of a Designer, and if I do that then I will deserve to be in the camp. As it is, it is simply a mistake that will soon be corrected.


    "Why am I here?" I ask.


    "You were in a fight," says Sacha, "and you lost. Quite badly. However, since you were defending the name of Mecha Stalin, we decided to rescue you from the criminal rabble out there."


    "I mean, in this camp. There must be a mistake somewhere. I''m a loyal Communist. I love Mecha Stalin."


    Sacha looks confused. "You signed a paper specifying the crimes that you committed."


    "I did it to help! They said that I was holding up the processing of real criminals, and that if I signed then Stalin would be pleased, and that it would all get fixed. I wanted to help my comrades..." It sounds pathetic as I say it. Who would sign to a list of crimes they barely read? Someone who is very patriotic, I tell myself. Someone who truly loves Mecha Stalin.


    "There''s no paper saying that," says Sacha, "but there is one listing your crimes. You signed it! Would you like me to read it to you?"


    I nod. He walks out of the room and returns a few minutes later with a sheet of paper.


    "You must understand," he says, "this is a great privilege. Most do not get this kind of treatment. It is only because I can see that despite whatever you have done to deserve correctional labor, you do deeply love Mecha Stalin."


    "Please read it to me," I say, trying to keep the pain from my voice. I must not question the wisdom of Mecha Stalin. It was, however, possible that a mistake was made by a bureaucrat, a lowly party official who did not have enough love for country, party, Mecha Stalin.


    Sacha reads from the paper. "Vladimir Federov is sentenced to ten years hard labor for spreading anti-Soviet propaganda. There is further documentation, a quote from two anonymous sources. It says that during the course of a lecture you casually expressed admiration for an American mathematician. A capitalist mathematician."


    I have no defense. I didn''t think it was a crime, but I see now that it was. To promote a work that had been created by an exploitative system, to praise someone who was involved in perpetuating that system without even the slightest regard towards class struggle... it hits me in the heart. I stare open-mouthed. Tears come to my eyes, and soon I am weeping openly as I understand the depths of my crimes. I thought I loved Stalin, but it was mere words! In my actions it was as if I had shut down Mecha Stalin''s engines myself, then stabbed him through the heart.


    "I see you understand the depth of your crimes," says Sacha.


    I nod, still sobbing uncontrollably.


    "There are ways to make up for your betrayal." Sacha is like a comforting father. "Ways that will make the day of your release come quicker and, more importantly, bring Mecha Stalin''s grand plan closer to fruition. Do you wish to help?"


    "I do. I want to make it up. Anything I can do to bring about Utopia, I will do." I truly mean it.


    Sacha lays out what he wants me to do. It''s a method of reporting on the other prisoners, should they do any act that is against the people or the party. I''ve heard the zeks talk of this: I''m going to be a "stool pigeon".


    I agree. The zeks will hate me, but they will already do that, seeing as I have spent a night in the guard''s cabin. This way I have the Sacha''s trust and protection and I will be able to exit the camp sooner.


    I am utterly confident that this is the right thing to do.


    As Sacha leaves I am hit by a flurry of EXP notifications. My Wisdom attribute increases to 47. I know, intellectually, that I¡¯ve been manipulated, but I just can¡¯t bring myself to care.

 Luka

    We walk towards where we will cut lumber all day. We are low-threat, unlikely to rebel, and as such we are trusted with axes. However, we are not trusted completely ¡ª guards withPPD-40 submachine guns follow behind us, in front of us, to our side, and if we make moves that are a bit too sudden, a bit too threatening, it''s rat-a-tat-tat and away we go. None of us here have the constitution to withstand a spray of bullets.


    Yes, I am one of them now, serving my time at a correctional labor camp. In ten years ¡ª or perhaps less, if I show myself to be loyal ¡ª my errors shall be scrubbed away, and I will be able to reenter society reeducated, corrected, clean.


    I shudder with horror at what would have happened if they hadn''t caught my error. I would still be spreading anti-Soviet propaganda, destroying any chance of reaching our dreamed-of end-state of perfect Communism. I laugh at my train of thought ¡ª the goal of Communism is to end the state, so the end-state... I know exactly which of my students would laugh with me if I told that joke.


    Surely there could be some other way to correct my thoughts than tearing me away from the classroom... and yet, as I think it I realize that this thought also needs to be corrected. Perhaps I will need the entire ten years to truly become the ideal proletariat that I had thought I was.


    My thoughts are interrupted by a punch on the arm. Light, light enough that it doesn''t trigger even my low-level Resist Impact, but still a punch.


    "What''d you do that for?"


    The man shrugs good-naturedly. "All the cool kids are punching you. I didn''t want to get left out."


    I don''t want to like this man, but it''s hard not to. I growl. "Didn''t you see that I punch back?"


    Then he laughs. "I watched the entire fight and I didn''t see you punch back once. You went down like a martyr. Old Pete, he was a lion, and you just walked into his den like Daniel. Except you got eaten, because unlike Daniel, God hates you."


    I really don''t want to like this man. He insults me, strikes me, and even compares me unfavorably to a superstitious idiot, but I still like him.


    I Inspect.


    Name: Luka Shuysky


    Age: 42


    Level: 39


    Occupation: Factory Worker


    Ideological Alignments: Communitarian, Christian (unspecified denomination)


    Stats


    Strength: 29


    Constitution: 38


    Dexterity: 27


    Intelligence: 19


    Wisdom: 40


    Charisma: 77


    Top skills


    Raise Spirits: 91


    Persuasion: 64


    Mechanics: 55


    Discernment: 54


    Resist Influence: 53


    A Charisma score of 77? That is insane. And Raise Spirits... I''ve never seen a skill in the 90''s with my own eyes. You have to spend a lifetime devoted to a skill to get to level 99.


    "You paused," he says. "That means you''re inspecting my stats, aren''t you."The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    "No," I say with a curse. Then, as he looks at me questioningly, I relent. "Yes."


    "It''s okay. Many people wonder. If my Charisma is so high, why not hide my religious affiliation? Why not pretend to be a Communist? Why not dress up as Joseph Stalin, steal a Mecha, and rule a small town?"


    "I was thinking more along the lines of: why aren''t you an actual Communist? Your Discernment is high, and you''ve seen the wonders of our state."


    "Yes, I have... but I''ve seen wonders far greater than any state."


    "This is treasonous talk, you know."


    "Oh yes," he says, "and I know you''re a stool pigeon too. You could have me serving in solitary confinement by this evening, or on half rations, or even under the torturer''s screw. And yet I know you won''t. Do you know why?"


    "Because you have a Charisma stat far higher than anyone at your age should?"


    "Well, that is part of it. But the bigger reason is because you are a good person, deep down, below those layers of brainwashing and sin. God has plans for you."


    "What if I do turn you in?" I ask. I know I won''t.


    He lifts up his shirt, no mean feat in this weather. His flesh is covered in scars. "Then I will accept God''s will."


    I should yell at him, tell him he is being stupid to put his trust in this far-away God, but there is something about him that makes me not want do so. When he shows me the scars he radiates peace. Who am I to ruin that?


    Yet, habit is engrained deeply. I am ever the teacher. "Would God have willed something horrible upon someone He loved? Would he let his children be killed?"


    "You worship Mecha Stalin, do you not?"


    "No! I simply revere him, wish to serve him, and stand in awe of his perfect plan." Okay, that sounded a little bit like a god. "Stalin deserves the praise. He''s real. Have you ever seen your God?"


    Luka nods. Like an idiot.


    "Then where was he when you were being tortured by the agents of Mecha Stalin?"


    I can''t believe it. I''m arguing "my god can beat up your god" with an uneducated, traitorous factory worker. I''ve instructed students in how to stamp out superstitious nonsense, and yet this stupid idiot doesn''t even flinch!


    "He was with me," says Luka. "He was with me the whole time."


    I stop in my tracks, long enough that a guard yells at me to keep walking. I comply. Mecha Stalin must be served.


    "You''ll see," says Luka. "You''ll understand."


    "Yea, I''m sure your Persuasion skill will see to that."


    Luka smiles gently. "You''ll know soon enough that I haven''t used that. Keep waiting for the EXP and it will never come. I have used Raise Spirits, that is true, and your resistance to it will no doubt raise your Resist Influence... but your Discernment levels will not rise, for I have not lied to you or attempted to Persuade."


    "I don''t believe you. How did your Persuasion get so high?"


    He caresses his shirt. I remember the line he traces ¡ª it''s where one of the larger scars resides. "God works in ways we can''t imagine, giving us the strengths that we need."


    Then he walks off to another part of the line, leaving me with a barrage of EXP notifications.


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    Your Resist Influence skill level is now 39


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    Your Resist Influence skill level is now 40


    You have gained 9,183 EXP in Resist Influence, Wisdom


    They''re all Resist Influence, just like he said. I check every single one.


    No Discernment.


    Fuck him.

 Chop

    It''s September and there''s already snow on the ground. The coats they give us are barely enough for the current temperatures, and I shudder to think of what will happen in January.


    Ten years of this.


    Forget what the crazy religious nut says, I have to get out of this sooner rather than later. I''ll be their stool pigeon. I say this even without Sacha in front of me manipulating my emotions.


    But I won''t turn in Luka. Besides, what are the odds that they don''t know about Luka? He''s insane, not dangerous.


    Still. 77 Charisma. If he chose to use his Persuasion, that man could wreak havoc.


    No one else comes to talk to me.


    While we''re walking I use my Inspect on them all and find nothing interesting. A bunch of mediocre men. Like myself, but with fewer brains.


    I do notice a particular status effect: Underfed. It''s a nasty effect, one I''ve seen on a couple of students, but here it is epidemic. It takes 50% off of your Strength and Constitution, and 20% off of your other attributes. It cripples your ability to function properly, to progress. There''s another status effect I see as well, rarer but more worrying: Starving. 90% off of your Strength and Constitution, and 50% off of your other attributes.


    I am thankful that I''ve been chosen to be an informant. That means I just might get out of this alive.


    You gained 253 EXP Cold Resist, Constitution


    Your Cold Resist skill level is now 17


    This is not the last notification I''ll get about Cold Resist. I''ve spent time out in the cold before ¡ª everyone in Russia has ¡ª and it triggers every hour that you''re outside. Most of the zeks here have Cold Resist skill levels in the mid to high 40s. I''ll be there soon enough, if I don''t die from Starvation or a fist fight, or some other madness. Hopefully I get high enough before the winter really sets in and I lose a finger from Frostbite.


    We finally get to the work site. It took an hour. But that hour doesn''t count towards our day; we''ve got twelve hours of that and then another hour walk back.


    The guards throw axes on the ground and hurriedly step away. The men withsubmachine guns are on alert.


    I don''t know how to swing an axe. I try to watch someone to figure it out, but the guards yell at me for slacking off.


    I ask one of the zeks for instruction, but he curses at me and calls me a dirty stoolie under his breath. He''s Underfed, and close enough to Starvation. I could get him put on half rations. He would go to Starvation and into a downward spiral, never to recover. He would die. He cursed me, and I can kill him in return.


    I can''t do it. I am almost as bad at being a stool pigeon as I am at swinging an axe.


    I ask another, and another, and another, all with similar lack of success.


    I pass one of the guards. "If you weren''t Sacha''s new little pet, I''d shoot you right where you stood for slacking off." I recognize that tone of voice. Half threat, have detached statement of facts. It''s how I get recalcitrant students to study for a test. "You''d better hope he keeps liking you."


    Finally I go to the last person on the team: Luka.


    "Well, well, well," he says, a hint of satisfaction on his lips. "God works in mysterious ways."


    He shows me how to swing the axe correctly.


    You gained a skill: Axes.


    We chop in silence.


    Within an hour my skill is level 5.


    I chop, and I chop, and I chop.


    You have gained status Numb Fingers


    -10 Dexterity


    My Shoulders and Back are gaining skill levels as well. I''ve never thought about how weird some of the Strength skills were. Is "Shoulders" really a skill, in the proper sense of the word? Whatever. I''m gaining skill levels.


    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    You have gained status Muscle Cramps (shoulders)


    -10 Strength , Shoulders, Back and related skills take 50% more energy and cause pain


    Within two hours my Axes skill is level 8 and I want to die. I''m meant for a chessboard or a classroom, not a work camp.


    My Strength and Dexterity both gain a point. My physical attributes are some of the least impressive here, but soon I''ll catch up with the others. My Constitution will get a point soon, due to all these Cold Resist checks.


    The progress feels good ¡ª actual progress, the first in four years! ¡ª but it doesn''t make the cold wet snow and the muscle pain go away.


    I really don''t think I''ll make it. I''m going to die before my body can catch up. The Muscle Cramps status has intensified, temporarily cancelling out nearly all the gains that I''ve made today.


    I notice Luka humming a song, a haunting song, but it somehow inspires me to keep going. It''s his goddamn Raise Spirits skill. He''s humming what seems like a funeral dirge, but it somehow makes life feel okay. Life will end, sometime, but this is not yet our time.


    You have gained status Inspired


    +10 to Strength, Constitution, Wisdom


    Is it possible for a simple melody to say that much? Luka is not singing any words.


    The guards send him dirty looks, but they don''t mess with him. His Charisma is nearly as good of a shield as Sacha''s protection.


    As I chop, I idly wonder how long it takes blisters to form. Will they form even with these thin gloves we''ve been given to wear? I realize that I know nothing of hard work. I spent my childhood in front of a chess board, and when my skill wasn''t sufficient to continue I ended up teaching mathematics and logic, with a brief stay running grain shipments.


    I wish fervently that instead of studying Strategy I had spent just a little time upping my physical attributes. I would have had time to heal. I''ll be working twelve hours today, and twelve hours tomorrow, and twelve hours the next day, and so on for the next ten years, with no time at all for my muscles to recover. What good is a higher skill level if you''re afflicted with Crippling Muscle Soreness and Starving?


    "God gives us the strengths that we need..." How delusional could Luka be? Maybe that was just something he said when using Raise Spirits. How could Chess and Strategy andTeaching and the skills I developed running thefood distribution networkbe any good in a corrective labor camp? My ability to understand and guide students is equally useless, unless they decide to turn this into a corrective mathematics camp.


    I put down my axe for a moment to rub my shoulders and back, at least as well as I can reach them. I do this for a couple of minutes until a guard yells at me. After that I pick up my axe and begin to chop again.


    We chop, and chop, and chop.


    Sometime, about eight hours in based on the the gains in Cold Resist I''ve received, a man falls on the ground. The guards yell at him.


    I inspect.


    Name: Roman Yablokov


    Age: 52


    Level: 24


    Occupation: Teacher


    Ideological Alignment: Communist, Trotskyite


    Status Effects: Starving, Exhausted, Despairing


    Stats


    Strength: 40


    Constitution: 39


    Dexterity: 31


    Intelligence: 61


    Wisdom: 40


    Charisma: 38


    Top Skills


    Instruction: 65


    Foreign Languages (English): 57


    Resist Cold: 55


    Patience: 44


    Axes: 41


    His stats and occupation are a distinct echo of mine, although his are higher in nearly every way that matters for camp life.


    And he''s dying.


    A guard shoots a flurry of rounds over his head, to encourage him. The guard kicks him, but Roman barely moves.


    "That man..." I say.


    "He''s been a Last-Legger for a while," says Luka.


    "How long has he been here?"


    "A little over ten years."


    "More than ten years? They do that?"


    "He had a ten-year sentence, and then they gave him another. I think it was the grief that killed him."


    "What did he do?"


    "He was a fighter in the revolution. You know, the one which ended oppression for all time. Very loyal to Leon Trotsky, which was a good move for a while. But then Trotsky fell from favor. Most characters knew which ways the wind were blowing, but Roman... he refused to change. He still thought the righteous faction, or at least what he thought was the righteous faction, would win."


    I raise my eyebrows. "That''s different from you how?"


    "Roman believed in characters. I believe in God. He believed in this little game that we play down here. I believe in the Designer behind the game, the one we''ll all see once we hit the great Game Over screen in the sky."


    Whatever gets him through the day. Maybe I''ll be able to convince myself of it eventually. Anything to push through these ten years. "What I meant was, what did he do to get his sentence extended?"


    Luka laughs. "You are like a baby in the womb! You still believe you have to do something to get punished around here. Do you think they would let a dyed-in-the-wool Trotskyite loose among polite society? Imagine the damage just one dissenting opinion could do to their perfect system! That is why they will never release me. Not with the mind viruses I''ve picked up in here."


    Then it is decided. I will not take Luka''s religion, not if it delays my release it any way. It was a stupid idea anyways. I will not stray. I will not become like Roman, dead in a September snow.


    We chop, and chop, and chop.


    As we walk back, even Luka doesn''t talk to me.


    I eat the gruel they give us hungrily, though I already know it''s not enough to recover from the day''s exertions.


    I collapse in bed and sleep.

 Binary Search

    I wake too early, and we have the morning meal.


    I do the calculations. I will be in an energy deficit for a time, while my muscles grow and I become used to the hard labor, but after a couple weeks ¡ª if nothing goes wrong and I don''t do anything stupid like get in a fight ¡ª then my energy expenditures should be able to match perfectly the calories in the gruel they give us.


    Doing calculations, this is what I''m good at.


    As I go through yesterday''s notifications, I see one that catches my eye. EXP gain from an Inspect: 10,521. Someone has been hiding their stats. Unfortunately, the notification doesn''t give any indication as to who was hiding stats. It could be anyone in our work crew of twenty zeks and five guards.


    But I know how to deal with this. It is simple. A process of elimination, a crude form of binary search.


    Today I will Inspect twelve of them. Tonight, when I receive the EXP notifications, I will know that either the one hiding his stats is one of those twelve or he''s one of the thirteen I didn''t inspect. I will repeat the operation tomorrow with six, and then the next day with three, and the next day with two or one. Every day, I will eliminate half of the remaining suspects. Within five days ¡ª four days if I''m lucky ¡ª I will know who has been hiding their stats from me.


    During the walk my legs complain ¡ª yesterday leveled them up as well, though not as much as my shoulders ¡ª but it is bearable. Knowing that my energy expenditures will be balanced within a week or two brings me comfort, and knowing that there is someone here holding a secret brings an excitement to the proceedings that had been lacking when I was simply looking at the finish line ten long years into the future.


    Luka is looking up at the trees, awestruck. I hurriedly follow his gaze, but see nothing.


    We continue walking.


    After a few minutes I see it. There is beauty here, in these woods. The way the snow hangs off the evergreen branches. The deciduous trees late to lose their leaves, a few flecks of orange and red bursting out between the heavy brown and white. Even the sky, the cold brilliant sunrise pushing stains of vibrant color across the sky.


    Then I realize that we are going to cut down these woods, to use them for buildings and fire. The sunrise will turn to day, which will warm us for a time. All the beauty gone for a little heat. That is truly the spirit of Russia.


    I cannot believe I am thinking these blasphemous thoughts. If Mecha Stalin could see me now, he would surely torch me with his eternal flamethrower.


    That night, after the work is done, I get my Inspect EXP notifications. The one hiding his stats was in the twelve I inspected that day. I only inspected the zeks ¡ª all five guards were in the group of thirteen that I didn''t Inspect. Interesting. I pick out the six I will Inspect the next day.


    As we walk towards the work site I try to make small talk with the prisoners that I''m Inspecting. They''re guarded, as they should be. It is known that I am a stool pigeon, that I punched someone for insulting Mecha Stalin and was rescued by the guards. Why would these criminals talk to me? I can only bring them harm.


    I do what I can. I look for the man who I fought. I''m going to apologize. Apologizing is not the correct thing to do, since it is never wrong to hurt a fascist, but it will help me in my new mission of being a good little stool pigeon and gaining the trust of the crew here. However, I can''t find him.


    "Where is the man I fought," I ask Luka.


    "Gonna have another go at it?" he asks, bemused. "All this chopping will help, but not enough. Your arms are still flabby and your form is worse than my grandma when she''s drunk."


    "I want to apologize."


    "Well, ain''t that interesting. Your apology doesn''t happen to include a fist, does it? I don''t know how things get done on the outside anymore."


    "No, I want to actually apologize. With words."


    "You''re gonna have to wait, then. He''s in solitary for insulting Mecha Stalin, thanks to your bringing attention to that fact."


    It is even more clear now why no one will talk to me.


    We work. My Axes is up to 16, although progress is slowing. After all, the task isn''t getting any harder to match my new Axes skill. I''ll stall out eventually. First it will be that the EXP will stay the same, but the amounts required to gain a skill level will keep growing. Then the EXP gains will drop to 10, and at that point it will take tens of thousands of chops to gain a single level. The same thing will happen to Shoulders, Cold Resist, and all the other skills I''ve been practicing. It will be just like with teaching and all its associated skills ¡ª fast progress at first, and then slowing, and then completely stalled.


    But that won''t be all bad. After all, the less challenging a task is compared to my current skills the less energy I''ll expend in completing it, and the less likely I am to starve.


    Just a couple of days in and I''m already figuring out how to not starve.


    Now that I know I deserve this fate, I realize that Mecha Stalin won''t come to rescue me. I''ll have to figure things out on my own. Anything to avoid the fate of Roman the Trotskyite.


    That night I get my Inspect EXP notifications. None of them are large amounts, so I know that the one hiding his stats is in the group of six that I Inspected yesterday but didn''t Inspect today. I choose three from among them to Inspect tomorrow.If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    Luka was one of those I inspected today. That means he''s not hiding his stats from me. It makes sense. If he was hiding stats, there''s no way he would allow his Charisma and Persuade to appear that high. Who is it, then? There are six suspect left, and none of them will talk to me, so I really have nothing to go on besides their supposed stats. Perhaps I could try to find things that were incongruous, but there''s a lot of EXP coming in to my Inspect skill. Whoever''s doing this has had practice.


    As I go to bed I wonder what will sustain me after I figure out this current mystery. I''m a strategist. Despite the pain and hardship and possible death coming to my body, this is the most alive my mind has felt since the days of the chess league.


    In the morning my body is filled with pain. I don''t even want to look at what status effects I have, but I do it anyways. I have to figure out my energy expenditure. I run the numbers and I figure I''ll make it.


    We line up for morning rations. The first zek in line curses up a storm. "What is this?" he yells.


    "Two days ago, Roman Yablokov didn''t return with your crew," says the guard. "For aiding in his escape, your entire team will be on half rations."


    "He''s dead!" yells the man.


    The guard makes a motion, and two other guards grab the poor zek, who is now yelling obscenities I''d never allow in my classroom. As they drag him off he''s yelling, saying Mecha Stalin is a dictator. He''s saying Mecha Stalin is... neo-bourgeois.


    When they hear that, one of the guards shoves him against the wall, head hitting loudly, and holds him immobile while the other punches him in the stomach.


    There is no more yelling, only grunts, and then the sound of gently shifting dirt as they drag his unconscious body away. To solitary? To a torture cell?


    One of the men who is Starving starts to cry.


    After eating our half rations we walk in silence to where we''re to chop trees that day.


    Chop. Chop. Chop.


    My muscles are a tangle of pain, my stomach a pit of hunger.


    "We''re all going to die."


    Luka nods amiably. "I''m glad you''ve come to that realization. Most people try to avoid the thought, but only the young can truly succeed."


    "I mean soon. How many people do you think will survive on a week of half rations?"


    "Oh, so now you care about your fellow zeks?" He says it without blame, without accusation. "You''re right, of course. A few will go on a downward spiral on a week with half rations. Even though they may die a year from now, it will have been this week that does them in. But perhaps what you meant to say is that you think you will die soon."


    I nod.


    "Well, if that''s what you''ve decided, I suppose I can''t stop you. It would be such a shame, though."


    "And why would that be?"


    Luka looks at me like he''s confused. "Because God has a plan for you, of course. If you decide to die early..."


    "Decide?! I''ve run the numbers! My strength, my constitution, they''re not good enough yet. I''ll become Underfed. That will cut my Strength and Constitution in half. Other status effects will pile up, and then... dead. That''s even if nothing else goes wrong."


    Luka starts humming a tune, one I haven''t heard before.


    It''s quiet. Mysterious. Melancholy.


    It''s the most beautiful thing I''ve ever heard.


    It shouldn''t be allowed in a place like this. I feel like this place will crush it.


    "Why haven''t I heard this song before?" I ask.


    He doesn''t answer. He just keeps going. Louder now.


    Status effect notifications flash across my field of vision. I ignore them, but already I feel their affects. The cold doesn''t bite as much. The ache of my muscles lessens.


    I hear a hint of sadness in the song. No, not a hint. It is sadness. If it wasn''t sadness, it wouldn''t be true. But there''s something else in there, something that I wouldn''t have believed if it was on its own.


    Hope.


    Peace.


    Love.


    The song cuts out as a guard hits Luka with the butt of his rifle.


    "WORK!" he yells, furious. "Mecha Stalin isn''t feeding you and giving you a bed so you can sing!"


    I realize why I haven''t heard this song before.


    If this song were heard every day, we wouldn''t think we need Mecha Stalin. For his very existence to continue, Mecha Stalin cannot allow something this beautiful to exist.


    The guard kicks Luka.


    I, very stupidly, step between them.


    The guard looks at me like I''m insane. I probably am. I really should check those status effects.


    And yet, I find that I do not care.


    Mecha Stalin killed Roman Yablokov. Not with his guns, but with fear. With hopelessness. After all, if we are living in the perfect Communist state and things are still terrible, if things are still lifeless and grey, then what is there? Nothing. To say that things could be better is treason. The greatest hope you are allowed is to continue your wretched existence undisturbed. The greatest hope is that you are not snatched off the street and taken here, to these camps. Your greatest hope in the camp is that you can somehow withstand the cold, the twelve hours of hard labor, the half rations, the wanton cruelty.


    In this moment, I hate Mecha Stalin. A part of me, the part still in my comfortable classroom in Moscow, is horrified, but that man has never been here, to this camp. That man has never seen beauty stamped out in fear. That man, in his ignorance, could not have known. And yet he did know. He had to know. I was not stupid. There were simply things I did not think about, things that I chose to ignore for my own good.


    Rumination does me no good. This hate I hold does me no good. They have the PPD-40s. I have the half rations.


    My strategic brain kicks in just in time. "Hit me once," I whisper. "Just hard enough that they''ll believe it."


    The guard smiles sadistically. "Sacha was right about you."


    He still hits me harder than he should.


    Solid hit!


    You lost 10 damage.


    HP at 11/21.


    You are Stunned.


    You have received 570 EXP to Resist Impact, Constitution.


    Your Resist Impact skill has reached level 10!


    I lay on the ground rubbing my temple where he hit me. He walks away laughing.


    Luka picks himself up, slowly, carefully. He got hit harder than I did and his HP is low.


    Quietly, under his breath, he hums a gentle melody.

 Beautiful Pain

    The other zeks don''t dare gather around us.  That would be a provocation of the guards, to gather and obviously shirk work.  However, they find other ways of showing their appreciation.


    Smiles.


    Coming over to "help" with a piece of wood that Luka and I can obviously carry on our own, even with our wounds.


    One even asked what I did before coming to the camp.


    Through it all, Luka hums softly.  I know it''s his Raise Spirits skill at work, but that doesn''t make the effect any less real.  It doesn''t make the songs any less beautiful.  None are as haunting as that first one, but they each have an effect on my psyche.


    Through it all, I begin to think of them as people just like me.  They are not horrible criminals.  They are people who said the wrong thing once, who didn''t declare their love strongly enough, who were the first to stop clapping for Mecha Stalin.


    I realize that I am not a horrible criminal.  That American mathematician did fine work.  So what if he didn''t rattle off Communist Orthodoxy?  So what if he didn''t bow down to Mecha Stalin.   You don''t declare that a man lost the chess match just because he is a capitalist or a religionist.  You declare that he loses the match when he loses the match, his beliefs be damned!  Why should math be any different?


    It was good math.


    "God''s opening your eyes," says Luka.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    "Something like that," I say.  Let the man have his fairy tales.  I''ll let him ramble on about God as much as he wants as long as he keeps humming.


    How is it that we can hear that music, wordless as it is, and know immediately that it''s treasonous?


    "You never said what that song was called."


    "It''s an old hymn," says Luka.  "It''s about grace."


    "It felt like pain."  Even as I say it I know it''s not quite right.


    Luka nods anyways.  "That''s certainly part of it."


    "What it would be like without the pain?  If you kept all the good parts of the song, but dropped the pain."


    He traces his biggest scar.  "Do you know how long I was tortured?"


    "What does that have to do with anything?"


    "It has to do with everything.  How can you pretend to understand life when you keep on ignoring it happening all around you?


    "Without pain, the song would be nothing.  It would be trite.  A toy.  A lie.  But you would feel the pain anyways.  Don''t you see?  We''ve tried to reject pain, but it keeps on coming back.  We''ve tried to deny it, to cover it up, to pretend that the Soviet Union is a world without pain, but what does it lead to?  In these camps, our lives contain all of the pain denied to them.  Concentrated suffering.  But they have it worse, for their lives are empty.  The spark has been drained out of them.


    "Music, real music, gives us life.  We can''t have life free of pain, and so we can''t have music free of pain."


    He is a madman.  He is absolutely insane.


    "But what if we could?" I protest.  "Surely your God can give us a life without pain."


    He laughs.  "Don''t you know anything?  My God was tortured.  My God died."

 Mission

    I won''t be their stool pigeon.


    Luka''s logic is bizarre ¡ª nonexistent, really ¡ª but after hearing that beautiful melody, and seeing it silenced, I know that I cannot serve the guards.


    I can still serve Mecha Stalin. I can still love Mecha Stalin, no matter what I might have temporarily felt in my recent frenzy. I just know that these particular guards are corrupted. These particular guards are capitalists and fascists. I will fight these guards for the sake of Mecha Stalin''s glory.


    My tools, though... there are more zeks than guards, but the guards are well-fed, and the guards have thePPD-40 submachine guns. It''s like eight pawns versus three rooks.


    I have Luka. Would he be willing to use his Persuade to help take down the guards?


    Persuade works best if it''s close to the truth, and if the target wants to believe it. Ideological alignment helps, but it''s relatively easy to persuade an enemy that you''re weak. I''ve done it many times in close chess matches, given my opponent the impression that I was ignoring an important part of the game when it was really a strategic deception meant to lure them in. It worked because my play style was close to what it would be if I really did have that weakness, and they wanted to believe they would win. If they were more objective it wouldn''t work. If I had tried something that wasn''t even close to the truth, like convincing them that my Knight was in a different square than it really was, then it wouldn''t have worked at all.


    If I want to use Luka, I have to prepare a deception that the guards will want to believe, and that Luka will want to perform.


    This could prove difficult.


    At the very least, once we reach the coms he can help persuade Mecha Stalin that we were doing this for all the right reasons. Can I get him to do that without mentioning his tortured God?


    I can''t rely just on Luka.


    The other work crews won''t trust me. Word will get around about what I did here today, but they saw me punch for Stalin, and will have only heard about me getting punched for Luka. Besides, I can''t Inspect them for fear of messing up my investigation into who''s hiding their stats.


    That leaves me, Luka, the guy who''s hiding his stats, and sixteen half-starved pawns.


    That night three EXP notifications pop up for Inspect. One gives me a huge amount of EXP. Our man with secret stats is one of the three.


    The next day I decide carefully which of the three to Inspect. If I get it right, then I know who my guy is tonight. If I get it wrong, I''ll have to wait until tomorrow.


    I pull the records from my log and compare to what I have observe.


    Serg¨¦y''s muscles are bigger than his 24 Strength would imply, and his 33 Constitution seems a bit off as well. You can only fake how the stats display when Inspected, so anyone faking lower Strength or Constitution attributes wouldn''t be able to hide much ¡ª and indeed, it''s not much that he''s displaying. His Strength looks to be low 30s, and his Constitution in the high 30s.


    Dmitry has an especially low displayed intelligence, 17, but he seems to be able to follow all that goes on in the camp. It''s possible that he does this on instinct, but it''s also possible that he''s hiding his stats. Then again, if he had a high intelligence then he would know not to fake one of his core attributes that far from its natural place.


    Pyotr''s stats check out with what I''ve observed, with no obvious anomalies.


    I decide to Inspect Dmitry.


    I''ll have to wait until the end of the day to find out, and the fourteen-hour ordeal drags. However, it''s much better than previous days. I''ve somehow managed to curry favor with both the zeks and the guards, since they are both convinced I''m on their side. Not all the zeks, granted, and not all the guards either, but I am temporarily the second-most-like person on the crew. The first, of course, is Luka.


    Luka hums merrily, something less offensive to the guards than yesterday''s tune, but it still evokes a sense of wonder. With his voice we''ll all survive half rations.


    "Hey kid, what are you thinking about?" he asks. "Those birds up there are real pretty if you ask me."


    "Is that what you think about when you''re up here? The birds?"


    "They sing, they''re made by God... in a way, they''re exactly like me."The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    When we''re far away from the guards, I broach the topic of deception.


    "You don''t use your Persuade stat when talking about God. What do you use it for?"


    "I''ve been here many years, I believe something that is strictly forbidden, and yet I am not Underfed. Why do you think that is?"


    "So you''ll lie to the guards?


    The other option is that he is secretly a stool pigeon. That is not something I want to believe. If I believe that, my whole plan will collapse.


    "I let the guards believe things that are not strictly true. I let them like me a little more than they objectively should. So I don''t get mistreated as much as you might otherwise think." He grins mischievously. "I also lie to them, for practice. Don''t tell anyone, but I once got it into the camp director''s head that American diplomats were coming to see what camp life was like. We all got warm showers and double rations for a week, not to mention new clean bed linens without lice. To this day he thinks that it was all his own idea."


    "So, if I came up with a plan that could help the zeks here, and it involved Persuading some guards..."


    "See?" Luka smiles widely. "What did I tell ya? God has a plan, little chess-master."


    Wait. Of course he knows I''m a chess master. Of course he sees my strategy skill level, my Intelligence. It hadn''t even occurred to me before now how weird it was that the most popular man in the work crew would spend nearly all his time with me, a new prisoner who still loved Mecha Stalin and had even punched a man for daring to insult the leader.


    Now I''m laughing. "You bastard! When you say God''s plan, you mean your plan!"


    "Oh no," he insists. "The plan, this specific plan, will be completely yours. God''s plan is for you to come up with a plan. God''s plan for me was to convince you to make one."


    "Is there anything else I should know?"


    "Only that there''s someone in the crew who''s hiding their stats."


    "I know. I''ve got it narrowed down to three. I should know by tonight or tomorrow night."


    "Then it''s a good thing that you turned the corner yesterday before finding out his identity. On the way back, we walk next to Pyotr."


    Pyotr? He was the one of the three I least expected, the only one who didn¡¯t seem a bit off. Was he really that good?


    The rest of the day I am excited, thinking of plans. However, it''s difficult when I don''t even know Pyotr''s true capabilities.


    Instead of forming concrete plans I go over the facts of the situation.


    In the entire camp, there are approximately a thousand zeks and two hundred or so guards. We have them outnumbered greatly, but they have all the guns. They are also better fed. We could fix both of these problems, given time and access ¡ª food and weapons have to be stashed somewhere ¡ª but getting there could be difficult.


    Next issue is that they''re far more organized than us. They have a command structure. Meanwhile, our ranks are riddled with stool pigeons, and so any grand plan that involves masses of zeks will be discovered before we can execute it. Their only use, en masse, is as a distraction.


    Finally, we don''t know their capabilities. The guards that walk us to the work site and watch over us are fairly unremarkable, and I''ve already determined that they aren''t hiding their stats. Sacha is dangerous and persuasive, and I still don''t know his true stats. Is he better than Luka? There could very well be other guards that we''ll have to watch out for.


    I think over the facts for hours, my head going in circles. I need to get a better look at the layout of the camp. I also need to start Inspecting the guards in command, if I can get a line of sight on them. Most importantly, I need to know what Pyotr is hiding.


    Finally the time comes. We walk back, and Luka and I find our place in the shuffling line close to Pyotr.


    "He''s ready," says Luka.


    Pyotr nods. "Make it quick. Don''t want anyone else to get a look at what you''ll be seeing."


    I Inspect Pyotr and gasp.


    Name: Pyotr Usatov


    Age: 34


    Level: 51


    Occupation: NKVD operative


    Status Effects: Underfed, Determined


    Stats


    Strength: 51


    Constitution: 55


    Dexterity: 56


    Intelligence: 35


    Wisdom: 39


    Charisma: 60


    Top Skills


    Hide Stats: 81


    Pistols: 75


    Grappling: 70


    Imitate Accents: 68


    Punching: 68


    A former NVKD operative. And based on his stats, as well as the fact they they''ve recruited me to be the brains of the operation, he''s one that worked in the field instead of in the office.


    I compare with his previous sheet. His Strength and Constitution are twice what he displayed previously, but they hadn''t looked off because he had also hidden his Underfed status as well. Smart. 35 Intelligence wasn''t stunning, but it was above average, and as a former NKVD agent he would likely have a bunch of tricks like that from his training.


    I can''t believe my luck. Suddenly the assortment of facts I''ve been mulling over all day start fitting into place. We might just be able to do it, the most daring operation ever undertaken at a Soviet Gulag. It''s going to be hard, but with the unlikely collection of talent in this work crew it just might be possible.


    We''ll take care of these corrupt, capitalistic, fascists who run the camp now and free it so that it can work correctly again, just like Mecha Stalin intended.


    I ask him one simple question. "Are you willing to kill guards?"


    "Quite frankly," says Pytor, "I''ll be disappointed if you don''t let me murder them all."

 Borscht

    When we arrive back at camp, Sacha brings me in.


    He has a bowl of borscht.  My mother favored the soup.  It was never my favorite, but I can taste it now ¡ª the beets, cabbage, and onion flavors blending together into something that is sour yet satisfying.  There is meat there as well, real meat, as I haven''t had since several days before my arrest.  It had been a special occasion even then.


    My mouth is watering, and I realize this must be a trick.  What is Sacha planning?


    He pushes the bowl towards me.  "I heard about your little performance yesterday, gaining the trust of your work crew.  I like that sort of initiative.  So this food is your reward."


    I grab the bowl and eat hungrily, before he has a chance to change his mind.


    "But you need to know, such tricks are not strictly necessary.  You misunderstand your purpose here.  Your purpose is not to uncover nefarious plots against us.  Do these miserable little fascists look capable of going against us?  Look at the towers.  Machine guns in each of them, with a full sweep of the yard.  Even with those, without our guns, look at our stats.  Fighting men, every one."


    I know that this isn''t true ¡ª most of the guards are only dangerous if they have a gun or are fighting someone untrained like me ¡ª but I let him continue.


    "Danger doesn''t come from masterfully plotted revolutions, for those who are put here by definition have no revolutionary spirit.  It comes from the most stupid among them who blaspheme Mecha Stalin''s name in private, who may decide that they don''t want to work as hard as they should, or who might have a fit of anger that demoralizes the rest."


    I''m not sure whether it''s encouraging or discouraging that Sacha thinks our revolution has no chance.  It means that he won''t be expecting it, but it also speaks to the incredible difficulty of what we''re about to undertake.  Sacha continues, not giving me time to properly think.


    "The man at breakfast a couple days ago, he caused our production to decline by ten percent that day, not to mention his own lost labor while we re-educated him.  Had someone caught his lack of fervor earlier, we could have dealt with him appropriately before he caused damage to the Motherland.  No, the danger is not from a counter-revolution, but from men who are not aware that they are completely surrounded by friends of the Party.  And you... you are one of the friends of the party.  They should be terrified to speak out against Mecha Stalin or the party, for fear that you might hear.  And then, instead of punching the one who blasphemes, you report him.  He will be taken in the middle of the night and tortured until he agrees with the party and shows Mecha Stalin the proper love and respect.  Do you understand?"If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    I nod dumbly.  There are so many ways that this could go wrong.  If they torture a man for speaking against Mecha Stalin in private, what would they do to one who really did plot and scheme?  Would they even believe it?  Perhaps not, but I feel that they would torture me anyways.  These guards, I remind myself, are capitalists and fascists, not true comrades.  Mecha Stalin will be glad to be rid of them.


    "This is much for you, I understand.  You had a luxurious life as an intellectual."


    I think back to my cramped apartment with the creaky bed and the drafty windows and realize that compared to anything in these camps, even the guards'' quarters, it really was luxurious.


    "But you are lucky.  This camp is doing real work that is important to the party, and we are in constant need of men.  We cannot simply throw them away like the others.  That¡¯s why discipline has been so lax.  A fight even broke out for five minutes before we could intervene!  Indeed, you are lucky to be here at this most lenient of camps.¡°


    Throw them away?  Sacha must mean release them early.  But then how would it be considered lucky to not be released early?  Surely Sacha didn''t mean to work them to death!  No, this was a trick.  This is the worst camp, and Sacha is lying to me in order to hide his crimes.  If the other camps are worse, that means that Mecha Stalin is either stupid for not seeing it or cruel for letting it go on, and I know that he''s not stupid.  It''s much more likely that Sacha, who is hiding his stats, is lying so that others don''t report him to Mecha Stalin.


    I must look and see how the camp communicates with the rest of the command structure.  That will be the core of our plan: get to the communication room and fend off the guards while Luka explains to Mecha Stalin all that''s gone on in this camp.


    I finish with the Borscht, and Sacha seems finished with his speech.


    "Did you enjoy it," he asks.  He already knows the answer, but he wants to hear me say it.


    "Yes."  I nod enthusiastically.


    "Good.  Next time you want Borscht, you bring me someone who''s thinking of causing trouble.  Until then..." he points to the line outside waiting for their half rations.


    I understand, and exit quickly.  After I close the door I try to make it look like I''ve been scolded and put up a fight.  I don''t know if it works.


    I get in the rations line.  If I didn''t it would be suspicious. Besides, my stomach grumbles.


    Revolution is hungry work.

 Rations

    Pyotr is the keystone of this plan.


    We need him to be strong for when we make our move, but he''s Underfed, and that means that half of his Strength and Constitution is gone.  As great as it was for blending in, it''s bad for taking down guards.  We have to get him more food.


    So here it is: my first supply line problem.


    I''d heard about these from real-life warfare but hadn''t paid much attention.  Supply lines are nowhere among the strategies required for high-level chess.


    However, there are certainly similarities between this and handling a classroom.


    Luka, Pyotr, and I walk close together and whisper so that the guards and the other zeks cannot hear us.


    "Do you know who the stool pigeons are?" I ask.  It''s important to know where trouble might come from and be able to shut them down early.  I still don''t have my full strategy in mind, but the start of it has to be getting Pyotr to full strength without alerting the command structure of the camp.  Only then can he be assured of success when taking down that very important first guard.


    Luka points at two men in turn.  "Those I know to be rats.  However, there could be others.  They''re not always as obvious as you were when you came to camp, and to be honest, almost everyone has been called into Sacha''s office at one time or another.  They could be anyone."


    I think over this information for a while, then Inspect the two men that Luka pointed out.


    In a classroom, you have to know what will make each student cooperate.  For some it''s the regard of their peers.  For others it''s the far-future hope of a position in the politburo.  For many, it''s the simple avoidance of pain.


    Often these characteristics don''t show up on a stats sheet.  You have to watch them a while.  Fortunately, Luka has been doing just that.You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    "Which one of them," I ask, "is doing it for love of Mecha Stalin, and which is doing it for the extra food and privileges?"


    Luka looks at me strangely.  "Love of Mecha Stalin doesn''t last long here.  I''ve only seen it go past a year a couple times."


    Well, that threw out the option of appealing to their better nature.  There would be no convincing them to sacrifice for the sake of overthrowing these capitalist guards, not when there was warm Borscht waiting for them if they ratted on us.


    It would have to be the other way.


    "Pyotr," I say, "how would you feel about killing a stool pigeon.  If it came to that."


    He thinks on it.  "It''s not as clean-cut as killing a guard, but I would do it if the plan required it."


    "Well, let''s see how... Luka, which one of them is more easily frightened?"


    "Igor."


    "Let''s see how Igor decides."


    I explain my plan, then Luka goes and does his part.  I can''t tell what Luka is saying, but I can hear the foreboding up and down of his voice, almost a dirge.  It is not beautiful.  Igor looks at us, frightened.


    Luka comes back.  "Congratulations, Pyotr.  You have three-quarters rations."


    "More than that," I say.  I feel a little bad about what I''m going to do next, riling up emotions against Mecha Stalin, but it''s for the greater good of Mother Russia.  "Who here hates the guards enough to sacrifice?"


    Luka points out five crew members.


    Five!


    I''m shocked.  There''s that much hatred here?  Yes the days are long, the rules aren''t fair, and even I felt that one brief moment of hatred for Mecha Stalin, but to have a quarter of the crew... no, more, because Luka and Pyotr must also be counted! To have a third of the crew hate Mecha Stalin and the guards that much was simply astounding.


    "Luka," I say, "go work your magic.  Without the threats this time, just the promise of vengeance.  They trust you, right?"


    Luka goes.


    "Pyotr," I say, "You just might be getting double rations."


    A week, by my calculations.  A week until Pyotr is no longer Underfed, no longer at half Strength and Constitution.


    A week until the violence begins.

 Sacrifice

    I feel it, their eyes on me.


    Sacha suspects me.


    My banter with Luka is too real, I huddle in the corner a little bit too much. When he brings me in there is nothing I can give him.


    Eventually Sacha will catch me and our plan will be destroyed.


    There are five days until Pyotr is no longer underfed.


    They''re all fascists anyways, right? Once Mecha Stalin gets a hold of this camp, rips away the evil capitalist spy guards that are currently running it, then some of the fascists will die because that is what is right. So what''s one sacrifice? The guards will all die when we make our move, and the only difference between them and the zeks is that the zeks were caught.


    There are five fascists, Stalin-haters to the core, that are helping us. I cannot sacrifice them. Even though their beliefs are wrong, it feels immoral to send an ally to the torture chamber. But there are others. Didn''t Luka say that there were no loyal communists left here?


    When we chop trees, there is a notch that forms where we are making progress. Sometimes I miss that notch because I am thinking about everything I must do, thinking about who knows what, thinking about Sacha''s eyes. The guards yell at me, but it is half-hearted. They think of me as a stool pigeon still.


    Perhaps they know, in their hearts, that I am right and they and everyone else here is wrong. If they''re kind to me, then perhaps Mecha Stalin will be kind to them when he sets everything to rights.


    I''m under no illusions that Mecha Stalin will set me free. That would be wrong. I committed a crime. But the conditions of this camp, the cruelty, that cannot be part of his plan. If we were given more food we could work harder. If Roman had been given a thicker coat he might not have died.


    Mecha Stalin is level 99 in all stats, but sometime even He requires our aid. 99 wisdom does not let you see everything, and 99 strength and dexterity doesn''t mean you can turn every crank and chop every tree yourself. It''s only natural that He might miss a correctional labor camp gone wrong, especially one as small as this with only a thousand prisoners.


    That is what I tell myself as I turn in Dmitry.


    Sacha leers at me greedily as I spin him a yarn about a whispered curse, one directed both at Mecha Stalin and one of the guards personally. I feel him trying to do something, I feel some sort of wisdom check being made, but I can''t tell quite what he''s doing.


    It won''t work, whatever it is. Luka has given me the status effect Hidden Thoughts, letting me plan in peace without worrying about someone like Sacha barging in and figuring out what I''m doing. If he asks, I''ll say it''s to trick the the other prisoners. After all, only someone with high Inspect can see it.Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.


    I devour my Borscht and only stop to enjoy the flavor once it''s all gone.


    Dmitry is taken the next morning at three a.m. The man I fought was taken after the fight while I was unconscious. The man in the ration line was taken as he cursed Mecha Stalin. This is the first snatching I''ve seen that is done based on stool pigeon reports. It''s important that I see this.


    They unbar the door to the barracks, loudly, making sure to wake us all up. Two guards come in and turn on the electric lights, brightening the room in a buzzing flourescent white more intense than even mid-summer''s daylight. The whole room stirs as one, each one of us hoping that it isn''t time to work yet. Hoping to have a bit more time pretending to be dead.


    Not me, though. I''ve been pretending to sleep, so my grogginess is feigned. It''s a risk, adding sleep-deprived to my growing list of status effects, but Hidden Thoughts can cover many sins, and the guards will be even softer on me now. Pyotr has also stayed up, and we rely on his training to mask the effects.


    The guards do not draw their pistols. They expect no trouble. After all, why would there be trouble? We are but humble zeks, dirty fascists, and we have neither guns nor food nor a will to fight. And they are right, for all but a few of us.


    They don''t expect Luka, who worships his invisible God with almost as much fervor as I worship Mecha Stalin. It gives him some sort of bizarre power.


    They don''t expect Pyotr, an ex-NKVD who... come to think of it, I don''t know why he left or what he''s doing here. Whatever the reason, he is different than the common western sympathizer that gets put here.


    Finally, they don''t expect me, a true Communist, with the spirit of 1917 running strong in my veins.


    The guards make us all stand at attention with our hands behind our heads.


    There are five work crews in our barracks, for a total of about one hundred zeks. The guards go down each row and stop to stare down random prisoners. They want you to wonder if it''s your time. If you''ve been caught speaking against them. To make you feel guilty for whatever sin you might have committed against the state.


    Sometimes the prisoner will tremble. It must be more nerve-wracking than being walked to the worksite by submachine guns, because no one trembles at that anymore. Here it is just you and your conscience.


    At a proper correctional labor facility, one run by real Communists, I might even approve of the technique. It''s certainly effective. Even I wonder if Sacha saw through me, if they''ll stop in front of me and take me away.


    Finally they stop in front of Dmitry. He''s too stupid to tremble. 17 Intelligence, like an especially dull child. When they lay hands on him and drag him away, that is when he becomes frightened.


    "I haven''t done anything," he whimpers.


    One of the guards hits him.


    "I haven''t done anything," he repeats, his voice higher this time.


    "We''ll see what you say after a day of truth-finding," says the guard as he hits Dmitry again.


    The guards shut off the electric lights. Dmitry''s moans and complaints become quieter after they bar the door, and then the night fades into silence.


    We all get back to sleep almost immediately, including me this time. I will be glad of the few short hours I have left.


    No one here suffers from insomnia, not if they''re allowed a bed.

 All Part of the Plan

    Luka is cold to me the next day.


    The others don''t know it was me who ratted Dmitry, but Luka and Pyotr know.


    At least we''re back on full rations. The work must have been going slower. Grabbing Dmitry gives Sacha an excuse to bring us back up early without looking soft.


    We chop wood in silence, but during a short respite he stares at me, studying my face.


    "Part of the plan," I tell him. It''s true.


    "I know," he says. He''s not happy today, which is rare.


    "We agreed. Besides, his intelligence is only at 17. He doesn''t matter."


    His face turns even stonier than before. "All of God''s children matter."


    "What about the guards we''re going to kill? Are you gonna get cold feet because they''re also ''God''s children''?"


    He shrugs, letting the displeasure fade from his face until he displays a mask of indifference. "They chose their path. Their eternal souls will suffer far greater torment than what we bring to them, or what they bring to Dmitry. I just want... I want you to keep those souls in mind."


    I hate it when he talks about his God nonsense. "After all our science, you still believe in souls?"


    Suddenly his mannerisms take on the joking character I remember from the early days of... less than a week ago. Wow, a lot has happened quickly. Anyways, he''s jovial again, and it disturbs me for a moment before I melt back into his seductive chatter.


    "You believe in souls too, brother, or at least you claim to. You just don''t call them that. The goal of Marxism is to free all people from oppression, is it not?"


    I nod.


    "And you are a Marxist?"


    I nod. I don''t have the heart to tell him I''m more than just a Marxist. I still believe, with everything I have, in the goodness of Mecha Stalin.


    "Have you ever thoughtwhyyou want to free all people? Why not just a couple people? Why not just the most worthy? Now, you personally may not actually believe everything you say you do. I''ve been there. But why would you want to free them? I¡¯ll tell you. Marxism itself relies on the concept of a soul to lend each human worth. Even though they may have superficially cast off the chains of religion, at its base it is still a religious proposition.¡± He grins at me, proud of his mental leaps, and claps me on the shoulder. "I got ya good there, didn''t I? Your brain can''t break that down because it''struth. Doesn''t matter if you''re smarter if I say truer things."


    There''s a flaw in the logic there, I''m sure. There has to be.


    More interesting to me, though, is the part where he admitted to not always believing what he says he does. What truly lurks in his mind, and what would he hide? What could be more damning than being a steam-blastedChristian?


    Or perhaps I''m reading too much into it. His Charisma far outweighs my Wisdom, so my odds of catching him if he does try something tricky are marginal at best. I''ll just have to keep an eye out and hope his heresies don¡¯t lead us to damnation.


    The rest of the day is spent in a mostly normal manner. Dmitry''s usual buddy chops alone today, but he does not seem any more dispirited than usual. I want to tell him to cheer up, that Mecha Stalin will make it all better soon, but to do so might give away a part our plan.


    The work crew is in good cheer this evening. Full rations are here.


    "We may be able to start sooner," says Pyotr. The six people we told to bring him half their food continue to do so, and thus he''s eating as much as four zeks. His strength is rapidly returning.


    The other stool pigeon, the one we threatened, brings his food in fear. Last night was a reminder to him ¡ª and no one else ¡ª the power I have with Sacha. The five true believers, the actual fascists, they bring their food gladly, without threats. They are now on half rations instead of quarter rations. All of them are Underfed. One is even Starving, and still he brings his food willingly to Pyotr, a man who is already eating much better than anyone outside the guards. This man Pyotr refuses. "The calculations have changed. You need it more than I do now."


    They bring their food furtively, out of sight of the guards. It would not do to have them questioning why Pyotr was getting all this food. Pyotr would not crack, the NKVD taught him well there, but an interrogation might destroy what we''d built up. It would certainly take him off the board for a while, and he was our Queen in a board full of pawns.


    "Tell me when you''re ready," I say.


    He nods.


    I sleep soundly that night, recovering from my sleep deprivation. Even the cold doesn''t bother me. When a machine gun from the watch tower goes off, I wake up for only a moment before falling back to sleep.


    In the morning a body is left in the snow. An escapee, I learn, from another work crew. This happens every once in a while, I am told. A man thinks he can make it past the barbed wire without being noticed, but there are spotlights, and the wire is sharper than he thought, and his body is weak, and some nights they have dogs. I need to take the dogs into account with my plan. His leg is chewed up a bit, although it was definitely the machine gun fire that did him in.


    It is the first attempted escape I have seen, but they say it happens with some regularity. Sometimes they''re real, like this one. Other times a guard is having a bad day, and a zek steps the tiniest bit out of line on the way to the work site, and the guard entertains himself with his PPD-40. The prisoner "tried to escape". This is to be expected, I am told.


    I am more and more glad of what we are doing. I see how necessary it is.


    The day goes by as normal.


    Luka is back to humming, and I like this much better than his questions and lectures. If believing in his God was just this music, and not having to believe all the stupid things that came along with it, I might just do so. Despite what I thought in my rage, surely Mecha Stalin could coexist with this beautiful music.This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    He''d have to. The world wouldn''t make sense if he couldn''t.


    Pyotr remains a mystery to me. Beyond showing me his skills he doesn''t seem to want to open up much. I don''t blame him. The things the NKVD does for the party are secret for good reason. Still, I can''t help but wonder what exactly he did to get himself kicked out and put into a work camp, and why he''s so eager to kill the guards


    Maybe he also suspects that they are capitalists and fascists. Could this be an undercover operation? It would be risky, hoping that he finds people to help him, but maybe they knew. Maybe that''s why Mecha Stalin sent me here. After all, praising an American mathematician isn''t that bad. It''s not like I had insulted a Soviet mathematician or compared the two. Yes, that had to be the reason. And then Luka, he was crazy, but it was a somewhat predictable crazy. He would make friends, babble on about God, and do some humming. They must have known that Luka would bring us together. Maybe Luka is in on it! Yes, that has to be it! His charisma is high enough that he could easily put on a crazy act and still be likeable, even without having to hide his stats.


    But that doesn''t make any sense. The guards are part of a chain of command. If the NKVD knew the guards weren''t acting properly, it would be much easier to just send a command to replace the guards. If the guards put up a fight, then we could send tanks rolling in. If that doesn¡¯t work, then we could send a mecha. That path is much less risky than sending in one NKVD agent.


    Perhaps he told his boss, and his boss was in on the scheme. Yes, that was it! Then Pyotr was sent here as punishment, since his boss was trying to protect the guards here, and any report that Pyotr then sent would look like sour grapes, revenge. Or maybe Pyotr knew his boss was dirty and so, rather than tell his boss about the guards, he schemed to get sent here. Acting on his own in the service of Mecha Stalin.


    "If you were anyone else, the guards would''ve smashed your head in by now." I snap back to reality. Luka is there, and so is a tree, and I haven''t been chopping for quite some time. Luka seems merry. Full rations do even him some good. "Or at least given you a little love tap with a Tommy gun. How about you start chopping, then tell me what you''re thinking about?¡±


    I swing my axe at the tree, the action warming me. It almost feels good. My muscles are mostly recovered from the trauma of the first few days, and my energy deficit is quite minor compared to what it was for a while. Whatever Luka had been humming while I daydreamed seems to be helping as well.


    "I was wondering about Pyotr. I don''t know much about him aside from his stats."


    "Well, why don''t you ask him?"


    "You don''t think I''ve tried?"


    "Try with me there," said Luka. "I''ll help open him up. We''ll do it on the way back."


    When the walk back happens, we take our time. There is an hour, after all. Slowly we change our position in line so we''re next to Pyotr, and because the guards like me and Luka no one Tommy guns us.


    Luka starts humming one of his tunes, one I haven''t heard before.


    "How long have you been in the camp?" I ask Pyotr.


    He grunts. "Springtime. But I''ve only been in this camp since summer."


    Well. There go a couple of my theories. "Why''d you get sent here?"


    He looks at me hard, like a kid who''s about to do something bad just to show he''s not afraid of you, or how Luka looked after we condemned Dmitry. It''s an inquisitive, demanding gaze. "How much do you know about the NKVD?¡±


    "You protect the party and the Motherland, doing what the other organizations cannot."


    "I amnotone of them," he says with a hiss. "Not anymore."


    "What happened?" I ask.


    "Conscience happened. You see the things I see and you have to decide: do I care for humans, or just simply for humanity? There''s a difference. One can smile and breathe and love and have their bones cracked and their family torn from them and their very sanity ripped from their skulls. The other is the faceless mass that is acted upon by the party, that the party idolizes and serves and seeks to exalt."


    I''m baffled by the distinction. "Humanity is made up of humans, isn''t it?"


    "You''ll see it someday," says Pyotr. "Hopefully soon. For your sake."


    "And so they kicked you out and sent you here?"


    "I left. I got back to my life. I went to a collective farm and worked. I married. I have a kid on the way. I guess it''s born now. Then two years after I left, someone decides they don''t like the idea of me roaming free." He''s bitter, no doubt about that. I can understand why he didn''t want to talk about it. "There''s no telling what I mightsay,what with my knowledge of what goes on. Not that people can''t guess, if they care to open their eyes. I was perfectly happy to let things be, to just pretend ignorance, but to protecthumanityand the party I was stuck here."


    Luka nods along with him. "We are all responsible for the state of the world. Trying to live separately, meaninglessly, is only inviting disaster. It took me a long time to see that."


    I have so many more questions to ask, but one of the guards is getting close. As it is, there''s plenty to think about. All my theories blown out of the water. So Luka and Pyotr really are as they seem ¡ª fascists. Capitalists. Spies. Enemies of the people. Pyotr even said it himself: he was againsthumanity.


    Still, they are my ticket out of here. They''re how we''re going to take down the guards and set everything to rights. I''ll see that Mecha Stalin is merciful to them, since they are rather nice for fascists and they are helping me bring down other fascists.


    We finally reach camp and it''s time for our rations.Fullrations. They''re not as much as I would have eaten at a normal meal out in freedom, and the mushy gruel they serve us isn''t even as good as bread and an egg, but compared to half rations they are a feast. The other men feel the same way, and the mood is practically jubilant... until Dmitry returns.


    His eyes are red and his legs are shaky. He''s never been the brightest, but now he has a vacant, haunted stare. One of his buddies motions for him to come eat with them, and I can''t help but watch. He sits down and starts to eat. Two of his fingers are blackened. Frostbite?


    "He''s lucky to have come out after less than two days," says Luka. "He must have caved easily."


    When one of Dmitry''s friends claps him on the back, Dmitry flinches and lets out a yelp. Caved? What did they do to him? His coat covers his body, but I can''t see any markings on his face aside from the bloodshot eyes.


    I Inspect.


    Name: DmitryMikhailov


    Age: 39


    Level: 12


    Occupation: Collective Farmer


    Status Effects: Frostbite, Underfed, Bruised (hidden), Sleep Deprived (intense), Shattered Mind, Tortured


    I stop reading before I get to his skills. What is there to see in his skills? He is useless as a human being. Barely competent enough to farm, even before everything that has been inflicted on him.


    Nothing on the stat sheet says "soul". You don''t get to live just by virtue of being born, of having a stats sheet. You have to be loyal to Mecha Stalin, and useful to the proletariat. From each according to their abilities, and to each as the Motherland can spare. They''d tried to each according to their need, but it was impossible, at least until worldwide capitalism is defeated and the perfect stateless, classless people''s utopia is set up. For now, the Motherland simply cannot spare anything for Dmitry.


    And yet... he''s a human. Dmitry is a human, who I have sacrificed for the greater good. For humanity.


    Perhaps once this is all done, if I can overcome this churning in my stomach, I will join the NKVD.