Modern Australia is beset by ecological and social problems. It's been a long time since the Cold War, and everyone had forgotten about the infiltration of the national institutions by the KGB. Forgetting history always ends in tears.

A history and analysis of Zoroastrian religion with exploration of its Indo-European origins and its subsequent influence on Western moral systems

A savage son of a savage system, Mironov was not afraid to die. But that was not his last mission. An officer of a commando unit of the Red Army, he knows no pity or pain as he exterminates the enemies of his hungry empire, until one day he is ordered to take an inordinate risk. In the ensuing bloodbath he does not hesitate to sacrifice himself to save his remaining men. But death does not claim him... Instead, he finds himself in the surreal landscape of post-Soviet Russia. His final mission takes him on a tour of his country's social and economic transformation. That journey through the ruins of Soviet society is a study of moral systems and beliefs that clash in modern Russia, seen through the eyes of a man who has only known Russia as the Soviet Union. Mironov is a classic Homo soveticus - a man of swirling contradictions. He doesn't believe government rhetoric but remains fiercely patriotic. His entire career may be described as a series of war crimes, yet his personal conduct is governed by a strict code of honour. Considering himself a part of an inherently evil world, he is still capable of great decency and compassion. Alas, Russia's political culture is centuries-old. It was not invented by Bolsheviks, and it did not change with their passing. Mironov's cynical views and homicidal skills prove as practicable as ever - but touched by the suffering he sees, he begins to evolve into a moral being. For such men the new Russia is as deadly as the old, and heightened awareness of right and wrong begins to complicate his existence. At the end of his mission he is left with the hardest choice of all - should he become one of the vulnerable living or remain, forever, the ghost of an executioner?

Contemporary Australia - a mature society with a defined cultural identity but not without rough edges, which make lives unnecessarily hard and complicated. Into this landscape drifts a demonic figure who calls himself Darius, who first appears in a short prologue, set in Southern Germany in the closing days of World War II. It turns out that alongside humans there exists another race, outwardly human but with far greater longevity and physical strength. Their intelligence is about the same or greater than human, albeit it with certain blind spots. They hate humanity for displacing them from the top of the food chain, and their character traits give rise to traditional demonic myths - an enemy moving amongst us, intelligent, resourceful and hostile - and in constant search for human virgins. Yet Darius does not merely wish to reproduce - he hopes that humanity is now such a self-evident failure, that it is possible to find women who will be willing accomplices in rebuilding his race and overthrow humans as the dominant species. He ruthlessly pursues this goal with all means at his disposal. Darius behaves as a magnet - all who meet him instinctively line up to serve him or to oppose him. But time is on his side.