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 thought why you 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's truth. 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-blasted Christian?

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 — and no one else — 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.

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 am not one 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 might say, 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 protect humanity and 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 — fascists. Capitalists. Spies. Enemies of the people. Pyotr even said it himself: he was against humanity.

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. Full rations. 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: Dmitry Mikhailov

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.