Daniel Kalder - Strange Telescopes

This edition first published in the United States in 2009 by

The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc.

141 Wooster Street

New York, NY 10012

www.overlookpress.com

Copyright 2008 by Daniel Kalder

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

ISBN 978-1-46830-467-1

By the same author

LOST COSMONAUT

To Nancy

The publishers have asked me to provide a prologue, as they feel the reader needs some kind of psychic compass to guide him through the madness. Having reflected, I think there are in fact four possible ways in, from which you, the reader, are free to choose.

(1) This book should be read as an inspirational self-help manual, on the theme of pursuing your dream. In essence my message is: if you want something badly enough, reach out and take it. The universe is benign and speaks the language of the heart. It will never turn you down if your desire is pure.

(2) This book should be read as an epic, semi-mythical quest, in which the hero travels to the underworld, does battle with demons, scales a mountain in pursuit of enlightenment and finally attains the object of his desire in a mysterious tower inhabited by a magus-like figure amid windswept icy wastes.

(3) This book should be read as a profound investigation into the tenebrous depths of the human soul, the power of the imagination, and the stark options faced by those who cannot compromise but are compelled, as if by demons, to obey the demands of their own restless creativity.

(4) This book should be read as all of the above, none of the above, some of the above, or perhaps something else entirely.

I think thats cleared that up. Except I would like to add one last thing: I know Ive told the truth. As for the other people whose words are recorded here well, thats a different matter.

Its dull in this world, gentlemen!

Nikolai Gogol

In 1997, not long after I had first arrived in Moscow, my friend Sergei told me about the Diggers. They were a group of sensitive, educated people who had turned their backs on modern life and retreated to the network of tunnels and secret bunkers beneath the city. There they had formed a new society that was fairer and more just than the surface one. It was dark, beautiful, surreal precisely the kind of world I wanted to live in.

I was reminded of a documentary on the homeless of Manhattan I had seen a few years earlier. According to that film, a number of the citys dispossessed had retreated underground, where they had formed their own shadow settlement. It was like something out of a 1970s science-fiction apocalypse movie: a parallel civilisation developing in darkness beneath the golden monuments to avarice and ambition above.

With Moscow being the size it was, why, there had to be someone living down there. But what I really liked about Sergeis story was this: these Diggers had chosen to go underground. They had not been driven there by homelessness or indigence or madness. They were intellectuals and artists, carving out something new, by choice.

I wanted to know more. But the more I pushed, the more the details began to recede from me. Sergei had seen them on TV; they existed; they had a leader. That was all he could say. The programme hadnt lasted very long, and hed only seen it by chance, anyway. Hed switched it on hoping for Dorozhny Patrol, the show that detailed all the deaths and fires in the city that day. It was an interesting programme, after all: it showed lots of pictures of mangled corpses, and always ended with a scorecard listing the number of homicides.

A year later I left Moscow. But all the time I was away I thought about getting back. And I had a plan. Once I returned, Id make contact with the Diggers. I wouldnt join, that would be going too far; but Id befriend them, and thus gain access to their secret world. I might spend about six months down there, studying their rites and rituals, then write about my experiences.

But even before I returned to Moscow, the practicalities were troubling me. I couldnt be sure the Diggers would accept me; and even if they did, well, my Russian wasnt great. How would I be able to record their rites and stories in any detail? I tried to picture myself down there but all I could imagine was wandering up and down sewers all day. What would I actually do? How would I eat? What if I caught some lethal virus? What if I was attacked by giant radioactive rats?

Still, I didnt give up. When I met Sergei again I reminded him of the topic. Do you know how I could get in touch with the Diggers?

With who?

The Diggers.

Who?

The people living under Moscow.

Oh no, they dont live there,

Eh?

They live on the surface, in flats, like everybody else. There was a smile on his face that said, How nave of you.

But I thought

No, its just a hobby. Well, maybe there are one or two who live underground all the time, but I doubt it

So that was that. For two years Id nurtured my belief in these subterranean dwellers, in the contralogical poetry of their existence. Theyd given me hope that it was possible to step outside society, the world of work, of leisure, of money and to live according to your own rules without starving to death. Who wants to sit in an office, eat food, watch TV every day? Not me. It was hard to give that hope up.

And so I didnt. Moscow was vast, cruel, phantasmagorical. It held so many mysteries, so many secrets there had to be someone living down there.

Five years later I was sitting in my kitchen flicking through an expat magazine dedicated to Moscows real estate racket. I dont make a habit of reading that sort of crap, but I need somewhere to put my eyes while I eat, and there was nothing else in the local supermarkets free newspaper rack that day.

The magazine, which we shall call Residential Property Shit as it is very close to its real name, consisted of pages and pages of ads for flats in the centre of Moscow that were leased by cowboys in suits to Western snobs at hilarious prices: $14,000 a month for one room, unfurnished, near the Kremlin, 24-hour security, device for extracting the blood of young virgins included, that sort of thing.

Just as I was reaching the point where I was ready to plant bombs to hasten the revolution, I stumbled upon an article at the back that had nothing to do with the magazines usual rubbish. In fact, its position there made so little sense it looked like a surreal prank.

It was called Notes from Underground. Touring Moscows Catacombs: Skeletons, Ancient Treasures and Stalin Bunkers. Instantly I realised that