“Perm? What were you to do there?”

“We never know. Volkov moves us around like chess pieces. More often than not my ships are used for reconnaissance, but we never get operational orders until we arrive at our assigned patrol station.”

That was useful information, thought Karpov. He might want to keep Symenko alive for a while, just to see what else he could learn.

“Then what about Pavlodar?”

“It was sent south to operate with one of the southern divisions.”

“What ships?”

“Sarkand, Tashkent, Samarkand, Kazan—big ships, all 150,000 cubic meter lift, and high climbers too.”

“Why would one of your ships be detached south right before a major operation? We were watching your division—all four ships—and they were being well dispersed as per the agreement we made with Volkov at Omsk.”

“Yes,” said Symenko. “I was taking my ship to Perm. Astana was pulled west, and only Oskemen was left on the line. Then I got these orders to rendezvous with Captain Petrov at Tyumen, and we were to sneak in here well north of the rail line and, well, here we are.”

“Yes… Here you are. Volkov could have sent me a cable to tell me anything he wrote in that letter. He could have also told me to expect you, so as to avoid any unpleasantries. But that isn’t what he had planned, was it? He wanted to make sure things would get edgy here. That’s why he ordered you to swing well north and approach this place unseen. Well, I have news for you, Symenko, Pavlodar is back, only now we’ve identified at least three other airships coming up from the south. Volkov dispersed your division, showing me the open hand near Omsk, but all the while he was clenching another fist behind his back. I have little doubt that those ships you just mentioned will be crossing the southern border zone even as we speak.”

Symenko held up a finger, thinking, playing the act out as best he could. “And now I recall orders for the 8th Kazakh light armor to move! Yes, I signed transfer papers for a young Lieutenant last week. He was tired of freezing his ass off in the Aero Corps and had been wanting a posting to a ground division for some months now. When I sent him off we talked about how bad the food was down south—he was posting to Karaganda—but he said his division wouldn’t be there long. Those were his exact words.”

“What other divisions were on that border zone?”

“15th Rifles, way down at Oskemen, and the 22nd just arrived to replace a worn out unit at Pavlodar.”

“Yes, we saw them pull out, the old 19th. They were good for nothing, but it looked as though Volkov was lightening up his deployments on the line, so we were glad to see them go.”

“Don’t be so happy. The 22nd is a specially trained unit, Karpov. It’s air mobile! Damn thing operates with that very same airship division coming up from the south. Why… They’re going to swing in over the mountains down there! That’s what they’re up to! There’s a big hole in your line there. I’ve scouted it many times and wet my beak in the high lakes of the Altay Mountains. With that many airships Volkov could lift a full brigade and drop it right on the city your ship is named for.” Symenko smiled. There, he had just thrown the bear a nice fish.

“Abakan?”

“You have nothing there, eh?” Symenko pressed his argument while he had Karpov nibbling. “Don’t you see? Volkov could take Abakan and cut the road all the way south to Mongolia—cut off your 107th division down there and leave them to the Japanese.”

Karpov frowned. “You know a good deal more than you let on, Symenko. Keep talking and I just may find a place for you in my command staff. But first we have a situation here to resolve. What do we do about this Captain Petrov?”

“He won’t surrender his ship, not Petrov. That man is a stiff prick, if ever there was one. He’ll fight.”

“But not long. I have Angara sitting off his hind end.”

“He’ll drop ballast and come up shooting.”

“And he’ll go down the same way. Leave that ship to me. The question now is what to do about your ship? Who is your Executive Officer?”

“Barmenko—a good man, but he’s with me. In fact, most of my officers were with Denikin. Others transferred in.”

“Sounds like Volkov was getting all his rats onto the same ship, but no offense meant, Symenko.”

“None taken, Karpov. Well, I can tell Barmenko we’ve permission to dock at Kansk. We could ease my ship over there, and I could order Petrov to stay put where he is. Then you settle affairs with him any way you wish.”

Karpov smiled. “You see, Captain. The things they say about you have been very much exaggerated.”

“Oh? What have you heard?”

“That you are a hot headed old fart, too quick to anger and without a reasonable bone in your body. But I find you quite reasonable, wouldn’t you say?” Now Karpov raised the revolver, pointing it right at Symenko’s head again, and this time he pulled the  trigger.

 

 

 

Chapter 11

 

There was a dry clink, and Symenko jumped as the hammer of Karpov’s revolver snapped down on an empty chamber. Karpov smiled, seeing the look of real fear on Symenko’s face now.

“The other five chambers all have bullets,” he said as he fixed Symenko with that same evil grin.  He knew damn well that Volkov would have never sent a rabid dog like Symenko out as a courier boy. No. And all that talk about losing his appointment to the Governorate was a nice little sob story. He had his suspicions about Pavlodar moving south like that, and Symenko had just confirmed them, along with a good hint at what was soon to transpire on the southern border zone. Could he be believed?

The Lieutenant rushed in when he heard the gun clink, his eyes wide. He saw Symenko slouched in the chair, breathing hard, a look on his face like a trapped animal.

“Get him to the brig,” said Karpov. This man was too useful to kill just now. “Then get the spy basket ready and signal the Alexandra that their Captain is returning.”

What happened next was planned from the very moment Karpov had news of these air contacts. He knew he had to act quickly, because a third contact had been spotted and it could be here within the hour, changing the odds considerably. For the moment, he had the advantages of both position and surprise, and he was going to use them while he could.

“A pity you won’t be able to see what I’m about to do to your airship,” said Karpov. “Good day, Symenko—at least for me.”

He was up and out of the briefing room, his footsteps hard on the metal grid of the keelway as he hastened forward to the main bridge. He was down the ladder quickly and ready to fight.

“Admiral on the bridge!”

“All guns manned and ready, Bogrov?”

“Aye sir. Shells chambered and guns trained on the targets. We couldn’t miss if we tried.”

“Very good. In a few minutes we will begin lowering the spy basket to return Captain Symenko to his ship. He’s in the brig, but no one down there will know that. Lower it right down on that open gun platform so it blocks their line of fire. The moment that basket comes in reach of their crew, we open fire. Signal the gun crews. All batteries fire on code red! Be ready on that signal flare.”

“Aye sir! Code red.” Bogrov nodded to a Lieutenant, and the order was quickly piped down to the gun pods beneath the gondolas. He had his ship hovering perpendicular to the Alexandra so he could bring every gondola gun to bear on the target. He had a big 105mm recoilless beneath the bridge gondola, three 76mm guns under the main gondola amidships, and two more of those on the aft gondola. Six rounds were going to be a most unpleasant advantage in the opening salvo, and Bogrov was correct, at no more than 200 meters range they could not miss.

Down went the spy basket, even as word was passed via field phone to the upper gun platform on top of the ship: Ready on signal flare one. A young mishman was fitting the red tipped round to his flare gun, waiting for the order, and then the phone rang again. He looked smartly to the gun master, who nodded. “Red, red, red!”

The sound of Abakan’s broadside split the silence with a loud roar. Six rounds blasted into the cotton canopy stretched over the duralumin airframe of Alexandra, penetrating easily and exploding deep within the ship. Not even the Vulcanized gas bags could close a wound from a high explosive shell in that caliber. Alexandra shuddered under the blow, sheets of her envelope fabric torn and set afire, gas bags penetrated and venting their precious helium, shrapnel cutting men down on ladders and lacerating the interior ballonets with a hundred tiny cuts.

“Drop ballast!” Karpov shouted over the action of the guns. “Full retraction on that spy basket. Fire for effect!”

Now both ships seemed to belch white falls of water from the ballast tanks on the undersides, which fell in a grey rain seeding the clouds below. Abakan immediately began to rise, intending to stay well above her adversary, even as the open top gun deck on the Alexandra desperately trained and returned fire with the two 76mm recoilless rifles there. With the spy basket now clear, the second volley from Abakan struck her foe again, and two guns hit that platform, killing every man there and silencing Alexandra’s only reprisal unless she could gain parity in altitude.

But that would not happen. Karpov smiled as he watched the gun duel through his field glasses. There was a moment when the aft 20mm AA gun on the enemy ship was able to rake his central gondola with a burst of fire, but then the big 105mm gun under the bridge scored another direct hit on the brow of the enemy ship.

“That’s the way!” Karpov shouted. “That’s my big bag buster!” He could see that there was now severe damage forward on the Alexandra where the 105 had ruptured at least two main gas bags with that last shot. Even though the elevator controls were desperately trying to get the ship’s nose up, and Alexandra was bleeding more ballast forward, the ship’s tail was much lighter. The airship’s nose tipped downward, and the tail rotated wildly off axis as it careened up, riddled by continuing gunfire.

They put fifteen holes in the outer canvas in the first three minutes. Smoke bled from the nose of the ship, and her big tail fins seemed to jut obscenely up, the rudder moving to try and control the airship’s wild turn. Then one of Abakan’s 76mm guns put a round right into the aft port engine near the tail, and it exploded in angry red and yellow fire. Karpov clenched his fist when he saw the propeller blown clean away, still spinning wildly as it plummeted down and away from the ship.

The spy pod was finally hauled up, and Karpov smiled to himself. A pity I didn’t just put Symenko in there so he could see what I did to his ship, he thought.

Now he turned his field glasses north to see what was happening with Angara in its engagement with the Oskemen. His ship had the advantage of surprise, but that battle was still raging. That stiff prick, Symenko had talked about, Captain Petrov, was better than he expected. He had been ready on all ballast tanks and he dumped everything at once in a desperate emergency drop to try and rapidly gain altitude. He had his nose up, engines full out, good elevator control, but it wasn’t going to be enough. His ship still had nearly a full contingent of troops aboard, and it was just too sluggish with all that weight. Angara was much lighter, maneuvering in a nimble, fiery dance above the other ship and riddling the enemy’s tail fins and elevators with deadly fire.

Both ships rose up into the grey sky, but Angara maintained the advantage of position, and so Oskemen decided to run. Karpov could see all six engines revving madly to gain power, and he saw the enemy ship level off, no longer trying to gain altitude it could never reach in time.

“That’s right, Petrov, you son-of-a-bitch,” Karpov breathed. “Yes! You run level when outgunned from above. You get your ass out of there.” He could see Angara revving up her engines to pursue, but that ship had risen over a thousand meters above her foe and the gunfire was now less effective. Rounds were reaching the target, but exploding above and beside the enemy ship in bright angry blossoms of fire that became blackened roses of smoke in the sky.

Karpov took one look at the Alexandra, burning forward, belching smoke from her wounded brow, flames devouring the cotton canvass envelope. He knew that ship was finished. We must have ruptured half her gas bags, he thought. They’ve lost all buoyancy and gone critical. That ship is going down.

Alexandra had dropped too much ballast trying to climb, and now he saw men flinging equipment overboard in a desperate attempt to halt their descent, but with a full battalion still aboard the loss of buoyancy had become fatal. They could try to jettison their spy baskets and cargo lifts, thought Karpov, but it will still do them no good.

There came a terrible hissing sound, and Karpov knew that the  other ship had opened all their emergency pressurized helium tanks and were pumping it into any gas bags that were still intact. Then he heard another explosion, and saw the side of the ship burst open, revealing the duralumin frame like the bare metal ribs of an animal that had been flayed alive. A man dangled from one of the girders, then fell, a tiny speck vanishing into a cloud below with a fading scream.

“They blew a main gas bag amidships!” said Bogrov. “Tried to pump in too much reserve helium! They’re finished now.”

“All engines ahead full!” Karpov shouted. “Come fifteen points to starboard! Let’s get after the Oskemen!”

He took one last look at the Alexandra, seeing the ship falling like a stricken whale descending into the depths of the sea of clouds. It was a long way down. They were up over 4500 meters, and the ship was now going into an uncontrolled descent, nose down, trailing black smoke as it vanished, swallowed by the cloud deck.

The thrum of Abakan’s engines was a loud roar now as the airship hastened north. Karpov could see that Angara had halted her rapid ascent by venting helium to her reserve tanks and pumping air to the ballonets. Now that airship had leveled off and was also running in pursuit of the Oskemen, about 1500 meters above the enemy ship and an equal measure behind.

“Range to Oskemen?” He looked at his gun director and had an answer soon enough.

“Sir! I make it 5200 meters, and we’re closing.”

“He’s going to dive, Admiral,” said Air Commandant Bogrov. “He’s going to try to get into that cloud deck.”

Yes. Petrov was another sort. He had the nose of Oskemen down, and slipped deftly into the thickening mist. Once masked by the clouds their gunfire would not be able to sight on the target. Damn, thought Karpov. Now we will need to track them on radar. I must get to work with a way to radar control these guns.

“Topaz system! Call out enemy contact by range and bearing.”

“Sir! I have the range at 5000 meters, bearing 290.”

“Gun Master. Fire on those coordinates. We may not hit anything, but we can damn well let them know we are coming. Signal Angara. Tell them to drop a thousand meters elevation.”

They were gaining on the unseen contact, but Karpov knew his fish might easily slip off the line. At this rate Oskemen could run half an hour or more before we might make visual contact to get guns properly trained again. Petrov might even get down below the deck to prevent that unless we come down to look for him. That could be dangerous in this weather… and there is still that third ship to worry about out there. The bastard is good. He’s done everything I would have done and he just might slip away.

The roar of Abakan’s engines was fearfully loud now. The men huddled in their heavy woolen coats, dark Ushankas crowning their heads with the flaps pulled down over their ears, warming them as they muffled the sound. The airship vibrated with the urgency of its labor, and then the engine status board lit up with a bright red light. Bogrov’s eyes flashed as he scanned the board.

“We just lost number six engine!” he shouted over the din. He knew engineers and mechanics were already running to the scene, and they would have men out from the aft gondola hatch and down the ladder to that engine in no time, but it would be bitter cold at this elevation. They were over two and a half miles up!

“That won’t be fixed any time soon,” he said with a shrug.

“What’s our airspeed?”

“80KPH, and we’ll hold that with the other five engines running full out.”

“Topaz operator, are we closing?”

“Range 4800 meters, but holding steady, sir.”

Bogrov shrugged. “They’ve still got six good engines, but they’re heavier than we are. At this rate it will be a long chase if we can hold onto them. We’ve certainly got a fuel advantage. Angara is much closer. They should be able to catch the bastards.”

“There’s a third ship out there somewhere, Captain. Any readings? Is our fighter still shadowing?”

“No sir. They had to return to Krasnoyarsk.”

“He could be leading us right to that number three ship. What do you figure they have, Bogrov?”

“Anyone’s guess sir, but they did have the flagship in the western region for that conference at Omsk.”

“Orenburg? That’s Volkov’s ship, and he wouldn’t send it out on a mission like this.”

Or would he, thought Karpov? It was clear Symenko had more in his orders than the delivery of that diplomatic pouch. That’s why I should have shot the bastard the minute I knew he was lying through his teeth. Was he playing for time with that delivery, time for that third ship to come in at high elevation on us? No time to find out now. I’ll deal with him later. Then the Topaz operator called out a position update.

“Sir, I think he’s descending. We’re closing on his position, but the actual range being reported is out of sync. That can only mean he’s losing altitude.”

“Very well.” Karpov had to decide what to do. Should he go down after this ship? What could he be up to? Think! Then he realized what Oskemen was trying to do. He wants to offload his troop contingent. He’s too damn heavy to maneuver in a gun fight, and if he gets those men landward he can also climb much easier if he needs to do so. But he’ll have to hover to deploy his cargo basket and put squads down. There’s no way he could do that if we’re close. It doesn’t make sense.

“Shall I order Angara to get down after them, sir?” Bogrov was waiting, his eye on the altimeter board. They still had no reading on that third ship. If they both went down after the Oskemen, then that unknown contact could come in on top of them and turn the tables with the same advantage that had just sent the Alexandra to a fiery death. One of his ships would have to stay at good elevation to prevent that. He decided.

“Alright, order Angara to descend and pursue. We’ll remain up here on overwatch.”

It was the only decision he could make given the circumstances, and he hoped that the moment Oskemen hovered to debark her troops, the Angara would be able to catch the damn ship in the act and make short work of her.

But it would not happen that way.

Already 3000 meters below them, well beneath the grey cloud deck. Petrov’s men were standing in tense lines all along the main gondola, their rifles shouldered, eyes grim and set. A loud warning claxon blared and a ripple of movement animated the troops. A gunnery sergeant bawled out an order. “Hook up! Ready on red!”

The light came on and the men heard the aft gondola hatch open as another alarm bell rang. The Sergeant yelled out an order. “Go!”

The first men took three brisk steps and were out through the hatch, leaping from the gondola at 1500 meters. One after another the two lines shuffled tensely forward, the boots of the soldiers loud on the deck plating as they moved, grunting with exertion. The battalion was one of the specially trained air mobile units of the 22nd that Symenko had unwisely named during his interview with Karpov. It was parachute trained, and soon the skies were blooming with soft white chutes, like a school of a hundred jellyfish drifting in the sea, with the great, whale-like shape of the Oskemen high above.

Even as they fell, they could see the smoke rising in the distance from the place where Alexandra had crashed to earth in a fiery wreck. But many men on that ship had leapt to safety this same way, and they were already assembling into makeshift squads, and rushing for the cover of nearby trees in small groups. Only two companies made it off in time. The rest went to a fiery doom. Yet as the sun began to lower on the horizon there would be five elite companies on the ground, all assembled and ready to head south for the place they had been ordered to strike that day.

Ilanskiy.

 

 

Chapter 12

 

Zykov looked at Troyak, a warning in his eyes. He had been working the radio equipment, shifting bands when he suddenly picked up clear signals. He tuned it in, the hiss of the interference abating as the sound of sharp voices broke over the speakers. The two men knew what they were hearing immediately. Those were the hard voiced orders of officers signaling one another on the ground, and the longer they listened the clearer the picture became. There was an operation underway somewhere ahead. Troops were assembling and moving on the ground.

“This doesn’t sound good, Sergeant,” said Zykov. “I’ve heard three different unit designations already. There’s at least a battalion out there somewhere. Very close.”

Captain Selikov had taken Narva to a position northeast of the village Troyak had pointed out. They were hovering at 2000 meters as Zykov tried to get through to Kirov again, when the close signal contacts were picked up, commanding his attention.

Troyak had a restless look on his face. He had been sitting with his men for what seemed like an eternity, cooped up on a submarine and then finally back aboard Kirov again to rejoin the Marines there. They had one good fight in the Caspian that got his blood up and put that fire in the belly that he always felt in combat. Now he could smell another good fight forming out there somewhere, like a man smelling rain at the edge of a storm.

Their Oko panel was now close enough to break through the odd interference that had been restricting its range. He already knew that there were four other airships south of them, very close to Ilanskiy, and then the radar system lost one of the contacts. He knew exactly what that meant. There was a fight underway. This was not a unified force of four airships. They were in battle, and one of them had just gone down.

So what did all this mean? An airship duel, men on the ground shouting harsh battle orders. He could read the situation well enough, though he had no idea who might be involved. Yet it was clear that some of those airships had deployed men here, just as he was intending, and they were already forming up for a battle that he could smell coming, just as he could hear it in the radio voices Zykov had stumbled upon.

Somebody was having a nice, private little fight out here, right in the middle of his well planned operation. The old military maxim that no plan ever survives first contact with the enemy was well proven here. They had thought to slip in quietly, riding the soft grey clouds and then deploying at night. They had thought to make their stealthy approach in the darkness, infiltrating through the wooded park he recalled, just behind the railway inn. It was to be a quick mission, the position easily taken by his well trained Marines. Now what should he do?

Troyak could hear the battle slang easily enough. There were fighting men on the ground, Lieutenants and Sergeants bawling out orders, and now they began to hear the mutter of small arms fire in the background, and the sharp pop of mortar fire through the hiss and static of the radio. It was clear that someone else had moved men and equipment to this place on airships, and a well planned raid was underway by another force. He had no idea what it could be about, though Fedorov had told him this place was very important.

Could these men know just how important that railway inn was? Could they know about that damn back stairway Fedorov had gone down? He remembered how the young navigator, then made a commanding officer on their first mission to Ilanskiy, had told him that incredible story of what had happened when he went missing down those stairs. He had gone back to yet another time, with no nuclear detonation or control rod in the mix. It had something to do with those stairs, the very same stairs Troyak was now tasked with taking and possibly destroying here, though now the odds were shifting against his mission.

They could not get farther south aboard the Narva, not with an airship battle underway there at the moment. Captain Selikov was very skittish about putting his ship in harm’s way, though it appeared to be well armed. That said, if anything happened to Narva, there was no way for them to get back to Murmansk, and that would be a very long walk. So Selikov was probably correct—they had to preserve their line of communications back to the home base. Narva was their only means of extraction and safe return. It could not be compromised.

Now the situation on the ground had changed considerably. He could take his men in, deploy from here, but they would most likely soon find themselves pulled into the fight he could hear growing in those spotty radio transmissions Zykov was tuning in. He could lay low and wait things out. That battle would have to resolve one way or another, but how many troops were involved down there? Would more be coming? His orders were to report his status and let the Admiral decide whether they were to make a go of it.

“Alright, Zykov, enough of that. See if you can punch through a signal to Kirov.”

“Good enough, Sergeant. I’ll keep trying.”

Troyak’s instincts were to deploy his men and go now. The lure of combat below pulled at him. He wanted to get down there and join the fray. This was obviously part of the long simmering civil war Fedorov had told him about. The thought that he might soon have to take up arms against his own ancestors was suddenly disquieting. There had been a lot of talk between the Admiral and Fedorov and the old deputy Director, Kamenski. They had been trying to sort through this impossible puzzle and find a way to put the pieces back together again.

Troyak knew that if he took his men down there he would find no friends on the ground, even if every man was a brother from his homeland. They were all dead and gone before he was ever born, but they were Russians nonetheless, and he would be forced to make them his enemies if they came between him and his objective.

Now strange thoughts that might bother Fedorov came to his mind. What if someone down there is sitting quietly on the tree of life in the branches below where he and his men now sat? He doubted if there was anyone down there from the Chiuchi peninsula where he had been born, but he had men here in his contingent with roots from all over the homeland. What would happen if one of their great grandfathers was down there, and they died here in this fight?

He shook his head, realizing that those were useless thoughts. He had enough to worry about if he took his Marines into battle. The bullets and mortar rounds would be more than enough, clear and present dangers that would quantify themselves in bright red blood when they struck home. An unseen death of annihilation because of all this time business was not anything he could fathom or worry about now. Yet the thought of killing his fellow Russians if it came to it did give him some pause.

Time passed, and Zykov’s eyes seemed clouded over with frustration. He looked up at Troyak, shaking his head. “I don’t get it,” he said. “We can receive now, but I just can’t seem to get a signal through on any of the military bands that Nikolin will be monitoring. The interference is very close. Its clouding over here, at the source—not out there somewhere.” Zykov pointed plaintively.

Troyak nodded. So it wouldn’t be up to the Admiral or Fedorov after all. Orlov would throw his two cents in, but Troyak had his orders. I was to make the final decision if we were unable to get through. Orlov was not to be considered in command. So it’s down to me now, he realized, not the Admirals and Captains and deputy Directors. It’s down to a Marine Gunnery Sergeant with a hankering to get on the ground and kick some ass.

And that was exactly what he was going to do.

 

* * *

 

In Russia they were called the ‘Black Death,’ the elite Russian Naval Marines, their faces streaked with dark grease paint, black berets and dark coats, with heavier mushroom shaped helmets netted with camo scheme when called for. They were called for now.

Troyak had three squads of seven men each, and they were heavily armed with assault rifles, grenade launchers, RPGs, a Pecheneg Bullpup 7.62 machine gun, and a handheld Ilga SAM in each squad. Their motto was a simple one: “Where we are, there is victory.”

“A chance to put my Bizon-2 SMG back to work,” said Zykov naming his weapon as he checked the gun mechanism. “High impulse Makarov rounds in a helical sixty-four round magazine. Very good in a firefight, particularly at close quarters.” He never tired of saying that about his weapon.

“I’ll stick with my Bullpup,” said Chenko. “It combines the firepower of a good heavy machine gun and the mobility of an LMG. Superb accuracy, excellent durability, and with the night vision sight I can hit targets at 1500 meters with this little boy.”

Kolnov was checking ammo on his GM-94 multi-shot grenade launcher. It had pump action, with a three round tube magazine of 43mm grenades, and could be hand fired for close quarters action, which is what it was designed for. That was his fallback. His primary role was fire support with the AGS-30, a belt fed automatic grenade launcher with a high fire rate 30 round drum. It had an adjustable day or night sight, and could range out 2100 meters.

Another man carried an RPG-30 Kryuk, or “Hook,” which was a man portable 105mm anti-tank weapon, with rounds that could defeat 650 mm of rolled homogenous armor, or blast through 1500mm of reinforced concrete and 2000mm of brick. That was almost eighty inches! The Sergeant considered whether or not to take a mortar, but with light, powerful weapons like this at his disposal, he decided against it.

The fighting man had a kind of love affair with his weapon. He lived with it, day in and day out, and would die without it in combat. The other Marines were carrying more standard AK-12 Kalashnikov assault rifles, all with night sights, muzzle fired grenade packs, and plenty of ammo. By WWII standards the three squads would make up a platoon with the firepower of a full company. The typical Russian WWII infantry squad might have two sub-machine guns and eight carbines. Troyak’s squads had the equivalent of seven machine guns, and with much more support fire from the RPGs, and other hand held anti-tank and SAM weapons they were packing. The Black Death was ready to rumble.

Now all Troyak had to do was convince Captain Selikov to get them a bit closer. “There’s a fight going on down there,” he said. “I’d like to get my men into it fresh, and not after an eighteen hour hike.”

“You mean to go down anyway?”

“I have my orders.”

Selikov naturally looked to Orlov, who was standing with arms folded, brooding on the matter. The Chief said nothing, still wondering what was so damn important about this mission—Fedorov’s mission. It had something to do with all this time travel nonsense, but he was not exactly sure what was going down here. Beyond that, he was still steamed up with the thought that he had not been properly briefed.

“What is your mission, Troyak? What’s the objective?”

“As I said, we deploy to Ilanskiy, take and hold the railway inn and make contact with the ship to report our status.”

“Well that isn’t going to happen. We can’t get through.”

“Then my orders were clear,” said Troyak. “I was to destroy the facility.”

“Destroy it? We came all this way to blow up a railway inn? What in god’s name for?”

Troyak just shrugged. “I don’t ask things like that when I get an order, Chief. They want it destroyed—that I can do.”

“And you say there’s a fight underway down there?”

“We’ve heard the combat radio traffic. Some of those airships must have put men down too.”

“For the damn railway inn?”

“Who knows, Orlov? They have their orders—I have mine.”

The best laid plans of mice and men have often gone awry.

Selikov smiled. “That’s this whole damn war in a nutshell, isn’t it. Alright, Sergeant. I can get you closer. We’ll have to drop down low, and it will be damn risky if another airship gets elevation on us. Narva is a big ship, but we don’t climb fast. If someone catches me hovering to put your men down we could be in real trouble.”

“Don’t worry about that, Captain. We brought along a few things that can get you out of the stew if that situation arises.”

Orlov grinned at that. “Alright then, how many men are you taking—just the two squads as planned?”

Troyak hesitated a moment. He wanted all his men with him now, but how could he convince Orlov to stay aboard the airship as the Admiral and Fedorov wanted?

“I’ll need twenty men,” he said.

“All three squads then?”

“Correct, but I have a problem, Chief.”

“What problem?”

“We need someone who knows what they’re doing here on overwatch. I need a man here on our radio set, and someone who can handle a needle and thread.”

“Needle and thread?”

Troyak nodded his head to a nearby weapons cache where two of the Ilga, “needle” SAM missiles, were leaning against a bulkhead wall. “If what the Captain warns about should happen, I need a man who will know what to do about it. Can you man that post, Chief?”

“Me?”

“This airship has some good recoilless rifles mounted,” said Troyak, “and we may also need fire support. I’d like you to coordinate all that with the Captain here, protect the ship, and read our signals for the extraction.”

“Then assign a private, Troyak. I was figuring to get on the ground.”

“Are you ready for combat? All my men are. That’s all we train for. Once we get down there we’re going to be moving fast and humping a lot of equipment and firepower. It’s going to be tough work, and we may have to engage anyone that gets in our way. Besides, I can’t hand off ship overwatch and extraction to a private here, or even a corporal.” A little Lozh now, and some butter on Orlov’s bread was in order.

“You’re senior officer,” Troyak finished. “You’re the only man who can hold this thing together on this end. You command from here.”

It was probably more than Troyak had said at any given one time for months. He was a man of few words, and hard actions, but he knew he had been ordered to make sure Orlov stayed on the airship, and he did his best to convince him here. Then, seeing Orlov hesitate, he said one last thing, and in a tone that Orlov instinctively could hear and understand.

“Those are my orders, direct from Admiral Volsky. You are to coordinate with Selikov, manage the defense of the airship, and oversee the extraction on overwatch. I am to handle the ground operation with my Marines.”

Orlov also heard something more there—my Marines. Even though Orlov had once been busted and placed in Troyak’s detail he knew he was never a member of the club. He was a ship’s officer, not a ground pounder, and Troyak was also correct to point out this would be a combat mission, and Orlov had never been trained for that. He knew that trying to buck the gritty Sergeant would lead to nothing more than a needless confrontation, so he relented.

“Alright, Troyak. Take your men in. I’ve got your back.”

Troyak walked over and clasped him by the arm. “We’ll be counting on you, Chief.”

 

 

 

 

Part V

 

Paradox Dreams

 

“Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?”

 

—Edgar Allan Poe

 

 

Chapter 13

 

Narva hovered in a wide clearing between two stands of pine and was slowly retracting the cargo basket after delivering the last of Troyak’s Marines. Captain Selikov had taken a risk to get the men closer to their objective, particularly when they saw the zeppelin duel to the south was slowly migrating north of Ilanskiy. He swung the airship a bit east, away from that action, and then turned south to approach Ilanskiy from the northeast, getting to within about 20 kilometers before Orlov, who was monitoring the Oko radar panel, reported that an airship had taken notice of them and was now heading in their direction.

“Then up we go,” said Selikov. “And we must be quick about it. We’re twenty men light, so that’s a lot of weight gone. We should be able to get up beyond 2000 meters in no time, but I would expect that contact is much higher.”

“I make it 4500 meters,” said Orlov.

“Then we go up as well. I can’t take the chance that they will get elevation on me. We’ve a lot of lift now, and I don’t think they can match us if it comes to a reach for altitude. Fifteen degree up-bubble and all engines ahead full. God speed to your Marines, Orlov. I don’t like the looks of this situation.”

“Nor do I,” said Orlov.

They made a rapid ascent, passing through 4000 meters in just ten minutes and still climbing. The other airship they had been monitoring was circling now, and Orlov wondered if they might also have them on some form of rudimentary radar. It can’t be seeing anything very well with this interference, he thought. My Oko panel is still only able to give me 50 kilometers coverage—very strange. That’s a third of its range and it is very resistant to jamming. What could be jamming us here in any case? Certainly nothing from this era.

Down on the ground Troyak called in on the radio. His voice was cloudy, but their modern equipment had the power to push through the static and maintain contact at this close range. The Marines were assembled and already moving out to the south. They had set down near a small logging hamlet, then skirted a high tree line that screened that place and started off, soon coming to a thin wagon trail, which they followed south.

The terrain was not bad, and there was a lot of open ground that had firmed up over the cold nights, which made for easy walking. Troyak took in the smell of the land, the trees and fauna, and was reminded of home. All the men felt it as well. They had finally set foot on Mother Russia again, after what seemed like an eternity aboard the ship. It gave them an eager feeling of completion, though the thought that they might be marching into a combat situation was somewhat distressing. They were no strangers to combat, veterans all, but these were not Germans like they had fought in the Caspian. They were their fellow Russians.

They made an easy six kilometers per hour and were coming up on another small settlement noted as Tamara on Troyak’s map. It was then that they heard the distant sound of small arms fire, and the mood of the men suddenly shifted to the purpose of their mission. Their senses keened up. Marines hefted their weapons, and Troyak moved from line of march to a two up, one back, deployment of his three squads. Zykov was on his left as he led the detachment forward into thick woods just south of the settlement.

This is good ground, he thought. We’ll easily skirt that hamlet and move through these woods like fish in water. An hour later the woods began to thin and break up into wide clearings, and the sound of a ground battle was more evident. Troyak saw that the trees thickened east of Ilanskiy where the rail line approached. There was a small stream that ran just north, and parallel to the rail, and it was well wooded, offering his men a perfect avenue to approach the town unseen. When they reached the end of this feature the ground opened again where segments of the woodland had been logged and cleared.

The Sergeant was in constant communication with Zykov and Chenko, who was leading the number three platoon behind him. He knelt, raising a silent fist as a signal to his own squad, which crouched low, waiting. Then he spoke through his collar microphone to Zykov.

“There’s fire on my right coming from that thicker woodland,” said Zykov.

There’s a flooded march just beyond it, and a causeway from the settlement north of that area leading right into town behind the railway inn.” Troyak was consulting his map. “So we’ll have to follow the rail line in. It will swing down and approach the inn from the southeast. I’ll lead. Bring your men up on my signal.”

Troyak checked his weapon, then waved his men on. They crouched low, moving like black shadows, out from the trees and along a narrow footpath that was leading them to the rail line. As they approached, Troyak suddenly heard men shouting in a dialect he recognized. They were reaching a culvert near a short stone rail bridge when a light machine gun opened up on them. Thankfully, the fire was not well aimed, but it sent his men to ground.

Troyak listened, recognizing some words from the Khanty dialect, one of 36 indigenous languages in the Siberian region. Troyak knew several, and many words from others, and this one was common along the Ob River valley. So he decided to try something, and raised his voice.

“Hey, watch out! Who are you shooting at?” He spoke in the same dialect.

Silence. The gun stopped. Then a hard voice spoke. “Who are you? State your unit.”

Troyak decided any designation would do, and he knew his map, so he extended the ruse further. “7th platoon,” he called out keeping that well open to interpretation. “We just came up from Nizhniy Ingash! What’s going on here?”

“What are your orders?” The voice was still hesitant.

“We need to get to that damn railway inn!” The truth served the Gunnery Sergeant well enough, and he just let it stand there.

“Anyone on your right?”

“Don’t worry, Sergeant.” Troyak knew who he was talking to now, another NCO in charge of this squad he was facing, and he had sized up the situation to understand that this was a reserve unit positioned behind the tree line to the north to watch these roads. He needed to convince this man he was a friend.

“Your flank is clear. We scouted the rail line the whole way in. Come on, you’re wasting time. We’ve got the heavy weapons.”

The other voice did not respond for a time, and then finally called back.

“Come up to the rail bridge!”

Troyak did not want to risk his men, so he decided to go alone. He signaled that they should remain in place, and moved up quietly to a small stand of trees just below the bridge. He saw movement ahead, through the bridged culvert, and surmised the other sergeant was there. Then he could see him, raising his fist in salutation.

“How many are you?” The other Sergeant still had a guarded edge to his voice. The sound of gunfire increased off to the north.

“I have three heavy squads,” Troyak said quickly.

“Come ahead then. The rail line is clear all the way to the town center.”

Then came the sound of heavy weapons fire, and Troyak looked up to see an amazing and unexpected sight. A huge steel grey zeppelin had descended from above the town, a vast shadow from above, and its black gondolas were spiked with gun barrels that were now pouring heavy rounds on the town’s defensive positions.

The battle that Troyak had crept up on was bigger than it sounded. West and north of the town, two companies of the Grey Legion 22nd Air Mobile, off the Oskemen, were attacking a single company of Karpov’s 18th Siberian Rifles. The remaining two Siberian companies had broken into six platoons stretched along the town’s northern edge, with good fields of fire over the lower wetlands to the north. But at least three more full companies of the 22nd were deployed to this sector. One was pushing in between the action farther west, and attempting to flank the extreme left of the Siberian line. Two others were trying to fight their way across a small causeway that Troyak had identified on his map earlier. If they won through they would soon swarm through the town center and easily overrun the railway inn. Troyak’s Marines had approached from the far right, where the Siberian line hooked south through a woodland area to the rail line.

Small arms and machine gun fire was already thick at the causeway, but the line had held, the stubborn Siberians holding tenaciously until the sudden appearance of the airship. Now it was blasting the Siberian positions from above with 76mm recoilless rifle fire from its main gondola, and a heavier gun up front on the bridge gondola.

Oskemen was back.

The crafty Petrov had swung south below the cloud deck while the Angara was struggling to descend and take up the chase as Karpov had ordered. He hid there until Angara came down after him, and once the two airships were feeling their way through the clouds at about 1000 meters, he fired flare rockets off his starboard side, then turned hard to port and dropped ballast for a fast climb. Oskemen broke into clear air, but when the Captain on the Angara spotted the flares slowly descending on parachutes, he took them for the running lights of his enemy, and maneuvered to gain position on them. When he fired his forward gun off the bridge gondola, Oskemen’s sharp eyed watchmen made out his position, and Petrov maneuvered off his tail.

Minutes later the Oskemen nosed down again into the soup, all guns blazing on the big fins and elevators of the Angara, returning the insult it had endured when first ambushed at the outset of the engagement. Yet Petrov’s gunners were very good, and they put three 105mm rounds into the big vertical rudder that completely jammed its useful operation. Angara could not maneuver, and could do nothing more than to climb into the thickening clouds and try to hide from the other ship, but Petrov had other business. He immediately turned south, racing to support the troops he had put onto the ground, and now he arrived in the thick of the assault on Ilanskiy, his heavy guns lending much needed fire support to the Grey Legionnaires.

Troyak had no idea which side he might support in this fight, but he was talking to this one, a fellow Siberian, and so he decided that he could do one thing to easily convince this cautious Sergeant that he was a friendly force.

“Hold on!” he called to the other man at the far end of the railroad bridge, still crouching low, suspicious of this sudden incursion on his flank in the midst of a firefight.

Troyak pinched his collar mike and delivered a quick order to Zykov. “Put a needle right through the main gondola on that airship!”

Zykov barked back the order and his SAM team of two men quickly off shouldered the hand held weapon, which looked like an old style bazooka, and was fired in much the same way. Seconds later the SAM streaked up at the big target above, boring right in on the main gondola as Troyak had ordered, and blasting through the thin shell with a bright orange explosion. One of the three 76mm guns there was destroyed completely, the other two pods riddled with shrapnel, and there was a fire amidships on the gondola that quickly involved the number three engine.

The Russians defending the town hooted jubilantly, their voices obviously surprised and delighted with what had happened. “Good enough, Sergeant?” Troyak shouted to the shadow by the bridge. “Come on! I need to get my weapons teams up and we’ll finish the job.”

He heard the other Sergeant shouting again in the dialect he understood, telling his men to stand down. With no time to lose, Troyak waved his squad forward, and the Marines rushed on, Troyak in the lead. They passed into the culvert and under the rail bridge, and saw the Siberian Sergeant staring sheepishly at these big, well muscled men in dark camouflage uniforms and mushroom top Kevlar helmets. Troyak grinned at the man, clasping him on the shoulder.

“There’s no one on your right, Sergeant,” he said. “But from the sound of things there’s a lot of action on the left flank. Follow me!”

They pushed on through the tree line, then skirted the rail line as it made a wide sweeping arc south and curved up towards the town center. Now he began to recognize the place again, for he and Zykov had searched a long hour for Fedorov when he had first gone missing here, though that seemed ages ago. Yes, thought Troyak, this is where we slapped that smart ass NKVD Lieutenant around, and made him clean out those box cars with his squad. No trains here today, and maybe no gulags further east either.

The place looked strangely empty, devoid of life and haggard with neglect. Ilanskiy was no longer a way station for Stalin’s prison trains. Stalin was dead.

Troyak saw the big airship come about, whistling to Chenko when he saw his men come up. “RPG-30!” He yelled, pointing at the airship. Chenko whistled and his squad soon had the weapon in action, which was a man portable 105mm anti-tank weapon that was so good it had come to be called the “Abrams killer.”

“Put one more round into that aft gondola and silence those guns.” Troyak pointed, and the RPG was quickly deployed, a light weight shoulder fired weapon that was designed to defeat reactive armor by firing a decoy rocket ahead of the main shaped charge. The RPG-30 could blast through 650mm of armor. It could smash through the side armor of the toughest battleship, and the zeppelin would pose no challenge in that regard. So Chenko disabled the decoy and instead selected a special long range thermobaric round that relied on the oxygen in the air to create a much enhanced explosion and fire, with a very strong shock wave.

The airship was about 500 meters above them, just within the 600 meter range of this special round. It blasted into the aft gondola, exploded, and blew it clean away, along with both 76mm gun mounts and the number five and six engines in the bargain. The sustained blast wave was so violent that it also blew away much of the duralumin frame above the gondola, and ignited a fire that would burn the Oskemen to a torrid death. The nose of the airship canted upwards as the fire consumed its tail. Fire and shock had ruptured most of the aft gas bags, and the higher buoyancy in the nose quickly pulled the ship’s front end up.

The Siberian squad that had come up with Troyak’s men gaped in awe at the sight of the massive airship in raging flames above, black smoke clouding out like sable blood. Only the two good engines on the forward bridge gondola were still running, and they slowly dragged the burning hulk of the airship northwest over the open ground beyond the village, where it began to fall. They saw long rope lines extending down from the undamaged nose segment, and men clinging to them, hoping to reach the ground before the blazing wreck of the ship as the Oskemen fell to its doom.

“Alright!” Troyak shouted at the Siberian Sergeant. “Take your men across the rail yard and work your way west. That’s your fight now. We’ll hold the town center.”

His manner was so commanding that the Siberians immediately obeyed, their rifle squads rushing across the rail yard and into the town beyond. Troyak smiled. Now to see what is happening at that damn railway inn.

 

Chapter 14

 

Troyak led his Marines swiftly on, racing past squat warehouses by the rail yard and into the cluster of small dilapidated houses at the edge of the town center. The railway inn was another two or three blocks, and he stopped to reorganize his squads, barking sharp orders to the men.

“Weapons teams here! Set up your AGS-30 here!” This was the belt fed automatic grenade launcher with a high fire rate 30 round drum. It would stand in for the lack of a mortar team, and they had a full pack of extra ammo drums to lay down some good sustained barrages. Troyak pointed out the direction of fire. “Right there,” he said. “Make your range about 800 meters. Rifle squad, on me! Demolition teams ready! Zykov! Follow me in!”

The assault rifle squads of five men each moved out, the sixth man was a demolition expert, and the seventh stayed behind with the heavy weapons to fire on Troyak’s order. The men moved with expert swiftness, racing from the lee of one house to the next in brief rushes covered by at least two men on overwatch at all times.

Up ahead Troyak saw a building labeled “Secondary Boarding School Number 1,” and he remembered it from his last visit to the town. School was out today, and there had been no classes in session here for many months. Beyond this place lay the railway inn, so he signaled for a silent approach.

“Zykov, take your squad around the right and through that wooded park behind the inn. Signal me when you are in position. You men, follow me.”

He was through the back doorway to the school building and inside, intending to get a good look at his objective across the street before he committed his men further. He reached a window and peered cautiously around the edge. There it was, with the same quaint sign he remembered: Rail Crew’s Holiday House. It was here that Fedorov had first stumbled down that back stairway, and the iconic figure of the young Sergei Kirov had come up after him. It was here that Ivan Volkov had vanished in the year 2021 in his hot pursuit of Fedorov, so close on his trail in space, yet eighty years off in time.

The railway inn was the hinge of fate that day, for that dark stairwell was a portal to distant times where a knowing man could place his hands on levers that would move the decades and reshape the contours of all modern history.

Now Troyak recalled his orders. He was to take the building and report back to Admiral Volsky on Kirov for final orders. Well, that wasn’t going to happen. They had tried the radio several times and though they could still raise the Narva, they could not get through to Kirov. He put a man on the radio and told him to keep trying.

Now he had to decide. Do I go down those steps to look for this man, Volkov? What in God’s name will happen here if I find him? First things first. Secure this inn. He could see that the entrance was guarded by three men, and he knew there were probably more inside.

The sound of gunfire raged beyond the inn, and he knew the Siberians were hard pressed now. Angered by the fiery loss of their only ride home, the Grey Legionnaires were pressing their attack with fierce abandon. Troyak stuck his head out the front school door and shouted at the guards.

“Hey! Pizda! Get your men up to the front. I’m bringing up two reserve squads to hold this place. Move!”

The guards gave him a wide eyed look, one reflexively leveling a rifle in his direction, but Troyak paid it no heed. He walked right up to the three men, scowling at them. “Didn’t you hear me? Move your men up to support the perimeter! And get that rifle out of my face, Corporal, or I’ll shove the damn thing down your throat!”

The men looked and saw the rest of his rifle squad coming up behind him, hard men the like of which they had seldom seen. One passed a fleeting thought that these were the enemy. Their uniforms were strange and they carried unfamiliar looking weapons. Their insignia was nothing they recognized, but then Troyak gave them an evil grin. “Did you see how we toasted that stupid zeppelin? We’ll make short work of the enemy just the same.”

“You were sent by Karpov?”

That name jolted Troyak a moment, but he seized on it, realizing a moment when he saw one.

“Of course—who else? We’re taking over here. Move your men out to the causeway!”

It was all it took to gain entry. The sheer force of Troyak’s presence and will power, his uncanny command of the Siberian dialect, the dour Marines at his side, and a little lozh. The guards ran off to the front line and Troyak signaled Zykov to bring his men in. He took his squad up the main stairway to the second floor and the men instinctively tramped down the hallway and into the empty boarding rooms to take up firing positions at the windows. They found three more men inside, and sent them on their way.

Now Troyak noted that the upper landing to the back stairway was taped off. He had the presence of mind to give one order that mattered here: “No one is to use that back stairway under any circumstances. Understood? If I give a withdrawal order, and for any reason you cannot get to the main stairs, then use the windows. Otherwise you can check in here for an extended stay.”

Zykov’s team swept through the park, coming to the clearing where a round waterless fountain surrounded by a low, red brick wall sat just behind the inn. He soon saw that the perimeter defense had finally collapsed. The causeway had been forced by the determined assault of Volkov’s engineers, who brought up a heavy machine gun to suppress the defensive fire while three rifle squads had raced across. The enemy was now just two blocks away, and he reported as much to Troyak when he reached the inn.

“Alright,” said Troyak. “We’ll hold here until we secure this place.” Then he gave an order for his grenade launcher. “Drop 200 meters and fire for effect!”

The pock, pock, pock of the rapid fire launcher sounded on the crisp air, and soon the small 30mm grenades were popping off all along the front of the enemy advance. The Siberian riflemen had fallen back through the town and were trying to regroup in the big concrete locomotive depot. A main street from the causeway came right through the town between the inn and the depot, and he knew the enemy would come that way. That would leave Troyak’s Marines as the only force east of that road against the Grey Legion.

“What do you figure we’re up against, Sarge?” said Zykov as he deployed his men on the first floor.

“At least two companies, maybe three.”

“A battalion? Good! It’s a fair fight for a change.” Zykov smiled.

Troyak sized up the situation. I can hold this inn indefinitely, he thought, unless they have heavy weapons, which I doubt if these men came off those zeppelins like we did. But if I let them sweep into town and surround this place… He didn’t like the thought of that.

If he was going to take the risk of going down those stairs, then the inn had to be secure. Fedorov had warned him that time passed at different speeds at both ends of that stairway. He didn’t quite understand it, but grasped the fact that even if only a few minutes passed for him, it could be hours for the men he left behind here. And what if it took him hours, or long days to track down his quarry? What if Volkov was nowhere in sight? What if he ended up in some other year? The unknowns associated with a sortie down those stairs were simply too great.

Now he looked at Zykov, a glint in his eye, dark brows furrowed over his bulldog face. “We can’t let them box us in here.”

“Agreed. But why hold here at all? We should just blow this place to hell and be done with it.”

That made sense. That was what he should do.

“Take your squad back through the park to those storage sheds on the other side and flank that causeway. We need to hold this intersection.” He pointed to his map with a thick thumb. “I’ll take a heavy rifle squad forward and take this position here. Then we’ll show them what they’re up against.”

 

* * *

 

Fedorov was sleeping restlessly that night. Kirov was still anchored in the Faroe Islands and they had been discussing future plans for the ship with Admiral Tovey. Soon they would be bound for Reykjavik. Their plan was to swing up to Hornsrandir, the northernmost cape of Iceland on the Denmark Strait in the Westfjord region. Fedorov knew that there were several old farm houses and hunting cottages there, and he had come up with the idea that they could set up a generator and Oko panel radar team in one. It would give them radar coverage over the whole approach to the strait, and preclude the need to ever use the valuable KA-40 to patrol the region. Admiral Volsky found out that they had six Oko panels aboard, two for each of the three helicopters they would normally carry, so it seemed a good idea to him, and he heartily endorsed it. From the tip of that icy, windswept horn they could close the Denmark Strait, and Tovey was very glad to hear this proposal.

“We will call it the Ice Watch,” Volsky said to Fedorov.

Fedorov had selected the place he had in mind, on a stony finger of land called Hornstrandir. It was a green desolate preserve, pristine in its simplicity, with emerald swards that swept up at near 45 degree angles to the edge of a jagged coastline that suddenly dropped off in sheer cliffs to the rocky shore and cold sea below. The local farmers were abandoning the region now that war had come, seeking safety in the larger communities to the south. So it would be a bleak and lonesome watch there, in a land where legends held that spirits and trolls haunted the stony vales, and polar bears roved the shore to look for seals, or anyone foolish enough to be at large there.

The details of that mission, and his worry over Troyak’s mission, had kept him awake that night, a fitful sleep as he sifted through possible outcomes. What had happened to the Narva? They had missed five consecutive radio checks since leaving Port Dikson. He had this in the back of his mind all through the Faeroe Island conference with Admiral Tovey, but now it came to the fore.

Did they suffer some mishap or accident, or was this a simple radio failure? Did they get through to Ilanskiy? If so, what was going on there? Some inner sense kept nagging at him that there was unforeseen danger at the heart of this mission, deep dark trouble that he had not considered or accounted for. What had he overlooked? Then he sat up in his bunk, suddenly realizing something, his eyes wide and alert.

No! Troyak cannot go down those stairs! Why did he not think of this earlier? He had been so busy with his duty on the ship, planning the meeting with Tovey, and he should have realized this before. He should have talked it over with Kamenski, and now he thought that he may have made a fatal mistake. It was imperative that he get through to Troyak now, and he was up from his bunk, throwing on clothes and grabbing his service jacket and hat to run down the long corridor to the citadel.

A sleepy eyed watchstander heard footsteps on the ladder up to the main hatch there, but was very surprised to see Fedorov when he burst through the entrance. He sat up, startled, and then instinct served and he shouted: “Captain on the bridge!”

“As you were.” Fedorov was immediately to the communications console. Rodenko was standing the late watch and he came over with a curious smile.

“Need to send a message?”

“Any word from Troyak or Orlov?”

“None, sir.”

“Well, we have to get through. Is there any way we can boost the signal from our end? What if we piggy backed it on our over the horizon radar?”

“It would get lost in the microwaves. But we could switch off that system, and then use its high power amplifier to boost our HF radio signal. In fact, I can even configure the top mast radar antenna to receive.”

“Do it, Rodenko, as fast as you can.”

“I’ll need an engineer on the main mast. It’s not something I can toggle from the console here.”

“Then get someone, and wake up Nikolin, I’ll need him here.”

The young mishman at that post was only too glad to be relieved when a sleepy eyed Nikolin showed up on the bridge ten minutes later.

“Sorry, Nikolin,” Fedorov apologized. “I’ll see that you get the entire morning watch off, but I need you here now. We’re going to try something.”

It took another forty minutes, but the radio engineer soon called down from the top mast above the citadel and reported he had cabled the HF military broadcast system to the powerful radar amplifier equipment on the mast.

“Alright, Nikolin. Can you frequency hop from about 1.6 to 60 MHz? I want to blast a signal so loud at them that they would have to be deaf not to hear it.”

“With that kind of power they would have to be dead,” said Nikolin. “Either that or the radio sets are all destroyed.”

That thought gave Fedorov no comfort, and Nikolin regretted it the moment he said it, but they pressed on with the plan. It was a tense five minutes, but then Nikolin saw his secure signal line go green and he knew they had managed to make contact.

“Got them!” he said with a smile, and Fedorov sighed with relief. But a sudden pulse of anxiety swept over him now. If I give this order, he thought, then my own fate is directly involved this time. I could create another insoluble problem for time, and this time she just might go after the offender—me! Yet he knew he had to do something. That stairway was simply too dangerous.

He closed his eyes. Even if it meant he might now be casting his soul to the wolves, he had to act. Then he reached for the handset and pushed the send button.

 

* * *

 

Troyak’s men gave the onrushing Legionnaires a nasty surprise. The enemy had crossed the causeway and were working their way past an old abandoned garage and vehicle park. Troyak let them come, then gave the hand signal for his men to open up. They cut down the two lead squads in seconds, the staccato of their assault rifles sharp in the air. The third enemy squad retreated quickly. They brought up two machine guns to try and answer the heavy automatic weapons fire from the Marines, but the RPG-30 made short work of them.

“Sergeant Troyak! I have comm-sig from Kirov! It’s Nikolin!”

The Sergeant had just reloaded his assault rifle when the radio man he left with the two demolitions experts sounded off in his earbud. “Here it is sir, I’ll patch him through to you.” The man toggled his speaker switch but it was not Nikolin. Troyak immediately recognized the voice of Fedorov.

“Fedorov here. It is imperative that no one utilizes the back stairway. I repeat. Sergeant Troyak—your mission down those stairs is cancelled. Implement plan B, and then move to extract your team. I repeat. Plan A is aborted. There must be no sortie on the stairwell. Implement plan B and extract. Over.”

Troyak had his answer. He kicked a little ass here, pushed these odd legionnaires back over that causeway, and now he was considering what to do about those stairs. The problem was solved when this order came in from well above his pay grade. Plan B was just what Zykov had advised. Blow the place to hell and then pull his men out. Someone has had second thoughts, he realized. Good enough. He acknowledged the signal, reported his status, and confirmed his new orders.

Even as he did so he heard a distant train whistle, sounding high and shrill above the mutter of small arms fire to the west. A train was approaching, and he knew it was probably carrying much needed reinforcements for the Siberians. My brothers here will have what they need to beat these Kazakh scum off now. He had heard the distant shouts of the Legionnaires and he recognized their dialect as well.

“Alright,” he said decisively. “Get back to the railway inn, Litchko,” he said to a nearby rifleman. “Demolition team,” he called on his mike. “Stand ready.” He pinched his collar mike and then gave Zykov the news.

“Hey Zykov! We got through to the ship! Orders are to do things your way now. We blow the place sky high and extract. Spot for the grenade launcher, then notify Narva on the radio. We’ll say goodbye and then pull out.”

 

Chapter 15

 

“I’m not sure why I never thought of this before,” said Fedorov. “I knew it was problematic, but then it just hit me!” He was sitting in the officer’s briefing room with Admiral Volsky and Kamenski. “So I gave the order, sir. I hope I was not out of line.”

“Considering the situation,” said Volsky, “I believe you acted appropriately. But explain it to an old man again, if you will.”

“Well sir, I had been wondering what might happen here if Troyak did go down that stairway and managed to find Volkov. I knew it was a long shot, but what if he did make it to 1908 as I did, and managed to find him? What if he took him back up those stairs again? Where would they appear? In my experience, I returned to the same time that I had left, only what was just a few minutes for me at the bottom of those stairs was much longer for Troyak and Zykov. But at least it was the same year. So I thought that it must be something to do with the traveler. Perhaps there was a connection between the moment he leaves and the place he ends up, as if he had some kind of tether or life line when he went down those stairs, like someone going over a cliff with a safety rope. Then I realized that Volkov was not in this year—1940—so how could he return to this time with Troyak? We can only speculate, but we have been assuming Volkov went down from the year 2021, so his connection would be to that year. How could he go with Troyak to this year if this holds water?”

“But that isn’t the reason you gave this order,” said Kamenski, a knowing light in his eye.

“No sir. I was also trying to understand what would happen here—to us, to this whole world we find ourselves in. If Troyak did find Volkov, and if he was able to bring him up those steps, well… would there be an Orenburg Federation? What would happen? I just couldn’t see how everything in this world could suddenly re-arrange itself right under our noses, and if it did, would we still know about it? What about Troyak? Would he know why he was even sent there when he reached the top of those steps?”

“I see what you are getting at,” said Kamenski, calmly poking at the bowl of his pipe. “If he did find Volkov and bring him to this year, or any other year for that matter, then he would have never had a reason to go there and look for him in the first place.”

“Paradox,” said Fedorov darkly, and the word itself carried a sinister new meaning for him now. He explained it as best he could. “Paradox is not simply some thorny problem—I think it is the force that rearranges things when time is confronted with an insoluble contradiction. It is a real and dangerous force.”

Fedorov had hit on a great truth. Paradox was time’s black hooded executioner, the slayer of impossibility, a sharp sword that cut through the Gordian knots they had twisted with their meddling.

Kamenski gave him a solemn nod. “This is the first time our own necks have been on the chopping block,” he said. “Yes, the edge of paradox is a very dangerous precipice to hike along. We must be very careful here. I cannot say how that problem might resolve itself, Mister Fedorov, but something tells me that time would find a way. Yes. Mother Time does not wish to have her skirts ruffled any more than necessary. She would find a way.”

“Agreed,” said Fedorov. “Yet I realized something else that might be impossible. Volkov is here—in this world, at this very moment! How could he then be brought up those stairs by Troyak?”

“Correct,” said Kamenski with a smile. “Yes, he could not co-locate. There cannot be two Ivan Volkovs here in this moment, one the young man who disappeared in 2021, and one the old man who now rules the Orenburg Federation, or so we have learned.”

“But we rescued Mister Orlov,” said Volsky.

“Correct Admiral,” said Fedorov, but we brought him back to a place and time where he did not exist at that moment. We brought him back aboard to the year 2021, a year he had left long ago when Kirov vanished.”

“I see,” Volsky nodded. “So a person cannot go to a time or place where he already exists. This makes sense.”

“And if he tries to do so he puts time in a most uncomfortable position,” said Kamenski. “He creates work for paradox—yes, Mister Fedorov, I agree with you. Paradox is not simply a mind puzzle. It is death itself—worse than death! It is the force of utter annihilation. If Volkov tried to go up those stairs to this time, then paradox would have to get rid of one version or the other, yes?”

“What about us?” said Volsky. “We’ve been shifting all over time and back again.”

“But we have never shifted to a time or place where we already existed. Each time we shifted we seemed to bounce a little ahead in the 1940s… until we appeared here, in a safe time before our first arrival, but one with a short lease, or so I fear.”

“And summer's lease hath all too short a date,” said Kamenski, quoting the famous bard himself.

Fedorov nodded. “So you see why I have been worried what will happen to us come July 28th next year?”

“Yes, you believe we will be asking Mother Time to make a choice. Which Kirov will she permit in that time and space, this ship, or the one arriving from the year 2021?”

“The one that must arrive from 2021 in order for this ship to even be here,” said Fedorov.

“Mother Time will have to choose,” said Kamenski, “and being busy with other matters, she will not want to be bothered by us again. We have certainly caused enough trouble for her as it stands. Yes?”

“Then she will hand the matter over to Paradox,” said Fedorov. “And one ship or the other must fall beneath his axe.”

“So you ordered Troyak to abort his sortie to 1908 for this reason? You wanted to keep this paradox from happening?”

“Yes sir. I realized there could not be two Volkovs in the same time and place.”

“Well,” said Kamenski. “Time can be quite the magician, Mister Fedorov. Troyak could have collared him, and the Sergeant could have returned to 1940 on his journey up those stairs, while Volkov reappeared in the year 2021, still thinking he is hot on your trail along the Trans-Siberian rail line.”

“Perhaps, sir, but then I return to my first problem.” He swept his arm at the unseen world beyond the ship’s bulkheads. “What happens to this world? What happens to the Orenburg Federation, to all the troops facing off along the Volga. What happens to all the history this moment now rests on? I’ve been reading how Volkov slowly rose to power and established control of Denikin’s White faction after Sergei Kirov forced him out of the Bolshevik movement. Do all those books get re-written, and do I suddenly forget I ever read them this week past?”

At this Kamenski gave him a sympathetic smile. “This is exactly what happened to me,” he said quietly. “I tried to explain it to Inspector General Kapustin once. It is very disconcerting when you reach for an old favorite book, read the chapter where you left off, and find the story is coming out to be something quite unexpected! Then you go back a few pages and find out one of the characters is missing!”

“And you have told us you remember things,” said Fedorov, “from time lines that no longer exist, at least not from our perspective here.”

“Correct, just as you remember the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, and the Americans reprisal at Hiroshima at the other end of that war. Yet there are those who remember the bombing of Vladivostok instead, and have no recollection of Pearl Harbor or Hiroshima.”

“So we retain memories of past times we have lived in.”

“Apparently so,” said Kamenski. “Strange little remnants remain stuck in our head. Are they figments of our imagination or real remembered events? Is your memory of what you did yesterday a real thing, or something you construct within your own imagination? If it is a real thing, then where does it go if you die? Where do all those memories of all the days you have lived go? They are no more substantial than the images from a dream you have in your sleep, and in fact those images are woven from the very same cloth your lived memories are made from.”

Now Admiral Volsky reached for the small flask of Vodka he had in his jacket pocket, giving them both a grim smile.

“The two of you will make a drunkard out of me yet. How can we possibly sort through all of this?” He took a small swig, offering the flask to the others, who both politely declined.

Kamenski tamped down the bowl of his pipe, thinking. He lit the tobacco again with his lighter, watching the thin curl of smoke billow up. Fedorov had been warming his cold hands on a mug of coffee. Each man had their own places to find small comforts.

“So you were worried that this world we now sit in would just go up in smoke like the tobacco in my pipe, correct Fedorov? And I suppose you were worried that you would go up in smoke with it. Yes? And if not, and we are still here when the next wave of change passes through, would we remember anything of the old life, or would our memories vanish too, like the flame from my lighter when I close it?”

“Perhaps I thought something like that, sir.”

“Perhaps, perhaps. But remember that Mother Time does not like to make these kind of decisions. In fact, I believe she will do everything in her power to avoid turning out the dogs.”

“The dogs?”

“The hounds of paradox, Mister Fedorov, the wolves of change that she holds fast with the rein of causality. When time is presented with a situation that cannot be resolved in any other way, she releases the hounds. But before it comes to that, a little sleight of hand will also serve her quite well at times. Notice how you just prevented Sergeant Troyak from going down those stairs and asking an impossible question of time that could make her very disagreeable. You see what I mean? Time finds a way.”

“And what about plan B,” said Volsky. “Have we heard anything further on that question?”

“I have Nikolin glued to his chair,” said Fedorov, “with orders to contact me the instant Troyak confirms the demolition was carried out.”

“Don’t hold your breath, Mister Fedorov,” Kamenski said quietly, and he took another long slow drag on his pipe.

“Sir?”

“Well… If your Sergeant Troyak destroys that railway inn in 1940, then how in the world did you go down those steps in 1942, to eventually end up here and get the idea for this little mission? For that matter, how did Volkov go down those stairs in 2021?”

Fedorov’s pulse quickened at that. My God, he thought. I may have set up yet another paradox by ordering Troyak to demolish that stairway! This is what he had feared. If Kamenski is correct, that would be impossible, and how might time handle such a dilemma? She would have to handle Troyak first, he thought darkly, and realized he may have just signed the Sergeant’s death warrant.

 

* * *

 

Troyak was back at the railway inn with his assault rifle squad. He looked to see Zykov’s men falling back through the park behind the inn with cool precision.

“Hold here!” Troyak raised his fist. They could see that a squad of grey coated soldiers had again come up the roadway from the causeway and they would soon filter in to the town center. “Zykov! Take three men and lay a spider web across these roads.” He was referring to a special kind of anti-personnel mine used by special forces to discourage pursuit on missions like this. The mine would be set, battery activated to eject and deploy up to six stakes, trailing thin tripwires that would shoot out in all directions like the web of a spider. Should anyone trip on them, the mine itself would then pop up a center core that would explode in a hail of fragmentation shrapnel. A single web set on a road would buy them the time they needed to slip away. Zykov set three in an arc protecting their line of withdrawal.

“Private,” said Troyak. “Set off your charges.”

The man nodded, and produced a hand held device with a small retractable antenna. He turned a dial on the back, called out a warning, but Troyak reached down and tapped his shoulder, his palm open as he reached for the device. Then he thumbed down hard on the detonator switch. There was first one, followed by a second loud explosion, with charges set at each end of the back stairway. Troyak waited until the smoke cleared, then raised a small pair of field glasses, studying the inn carefully. The entire left side of the building, including the dining hall, the chimney from the hearth, and a large segment of the second floor above were completely destroyed.

Troyak had just done something impossible, or so Fedorov would believe when he radioed in the report. Yet that thought never entered his mind. This was just a simple search and destroy mission, and the little engagement with the zeppelin was only icing on the cake. It was time to move his men out.

“Alright, back the way we came, and we’ll get ourselves into that tree line north of the rail leading east. Once we get well away we’ll signal the Narva to arrange for an extraction point.”

The men had picked up all their equipment and began moving quickly through the narrow streets until they passed the tin roofed warehouse buildings by the rail yard. From there they sprinted across a 300 meter clearing and back into the woods that would take them to the culvert and small railroad bridge. Even as they went, Troyak looked over his shoulder to see the massive shape of yet another zeppelin descending from the clouds over the small town. Its guns began to blast away at targets on the ground, but he gave it no mind. His mission was accomplished.

The back stairway at Ilanskiy no longer existed.

 

* * *

 

Karpov had been up on high overwatch in the Abakan, worried about that third airship out there somewhere. He was listening to the radio traffic as Andarva continued its pursuit, and keeping one eye on his Topaz radar system, bothered that the strange interference was limiting its effectiveness now. Volkov must have rigged some kind of jammers for that frequency. I’ll need to see if I can get the engineers to figure out frequency modulation and find some ways of hardening my equipment. This damn war is only beginning, and there isn’t anything in any of Fedorov’s history books about any of it. Not here.

The news had also come in on signals traffic that confirmed Volkov’s treachery. Six divisions had crossed the western border. The 17th, 21st and 11th Orenburg divisions were all pushing for Omsk. South of that city, the 9th, 22nd Air Mobile and 15th divisions had crossed the border in a drive towards the Ob river line positions near Barnaul. At least four more airships had crossed there on overwatch, and all he had to oppose them near Barnaul was old Krasny. The men in the Aero Corps called it Big Red, due to the dull red tarp used on its outer shell. It’s real name was the Krasnoyarsk, and he knew that he would now either have to pull that airship out of there or Big Red would likely be a flaming wreck within 48 hours.

The third airship he had been watching for seemed very close on radar, then it withdrew north, possibly discouraged when they saw Abakan was on to them and heading their way, or so he thought. Then he got the news that there were Grey Legionnaires on the ground and attacking Ilanskiy, and he turned Abakan about, heading back to the town.

He followed the action closely on radio, learning of Angara’s fate, alive but unable to maneuver and out of the fight. When the Oskemen doubled back to lend fire support to the Legionnaires on the ground, he pressed Abakan into a rapid descent, intent on getting down there to engage. When he arrived, however, the matter had already been settled. The sight of the flaming duralumin skeleton and the wreckage of the Oskemen on the ground gave him heart. We took down two of Volkov’s airships!

Three hours later he was on the ground, his mood considerably darkened as he stared at another pile of wreckage, this time at the site of the railway inn.

How did Volkov know, he asked himself? That was obviously why he risked those airships and all his men here today—to get a demolition team in here and take out that back stairway.

“What happened to my guards here?” He could see no bodies.

“Sir,” said a nearby Lieutenant. “The heavy platoon you sent relieved them and took over this position.”

“Heavy platoon?” Karpov gave him a strange look.

“Yes sir. They were the ones who took down that second zeppelin. Damn thing was giving us hell, and they just blasted it from the sky. When can my men get their hands on those weapons, sir?”

What was this man talking about? Karpov questioned the  Lieutenant further and soon got a description of the men from this platoon, which struck a hard chord in him.

“These men,” he said quickly, “they all wore this black camouflage uniform? And did you see any unit designation?”

The Lieutenant thought, then he remembered the odd shoulder patch he had seen. “Yes sir. It read ‘Maritime Infantry,’ a symbol of a ship’s anchor, gold on black.”

“And above that a white skull wearing a black beret?”

“Yes sir. That was it! They said they were a special unit, sent to assume this post under your direct orders. I didn’t know we had such men. They were fearsome. Stopped that zeppelin with two shots!”

Karpov’s eyes narrowed. Maritime Infantry, he thought, the Black Death! My God, that was Troyak and his naval Marines! Who else could knock down an airship like the Oskemen with two shots? They must have used shoulder fired SAMs, or even heavy anti-tank weapons. Damn! Volsky and Fedorov were behind this. Who else? The men reported spotting a parachute operation before this ground assault. Did they come here aboard the Oskemen? Were they working with Volkov now?

Then he remembered that third airship, the one he had detected and approached in the heat of the battle. There had suddenly been odd interference on his radio sets and the Topaz radar system went completely bonkers. That was it! Jammers! They must have come aboard that third ship. Symenko said he had no knowledge of it, and I’ll soon revisit that question with him. If this is so, then it was either a third ship sent by Volkov… No! Now he remembered the letter Volkov had sent him. Kirov was spotted at Murmansk. So perhaps they came on one of the Soviet airships. They still had two or three airships up north. It’s the only thing that made any sense. How would Troyak and his men be working with Volkov with Kirov all nice and cozy in Murmansk?... Unless that letter was a lie, and meant to misdirect me.

Now the scene of the demolished back stairway took on a whole new meaning. Fedorov, he thought. But how would he know about those stairs? His damn history books, that’s how. He must have dug something up.

He gritted his teeth, a disgusted look on his face, and no one around him wanted to meet his eye. The scar on his cheek seemed just a little more twisted and evil looking, and his eyes smoldered with inner anger.

“Lieutenant!” he said sharply.

“Sir!”

“Take as many men as you need and go house to house. Turn out everyone in this village and find me the man who owns that railway inn.” He pointed a thin finger at the wreckage.

It wasn’t all gone, he thought. Most of the lobby area, the main stairway and a portion of the upper floor are still intact. Someone built the damn thing. There would have been plans.

Yes… plans. That was what he was sifting through in his mind now. First he would find out who built this inn, the architect, the carpenters, the plans.

After that he had plans of his own.

 

 

 

Part VI

 

The Operation

 

“The planner is a potential dictator who wants to deprive all other people of the power to plan and act according to their own plans. He aims at one thing only: the exclusive absolute preeminence of his own plan.”

 

—Ludwig von Mises: Planned Chaos

 

Chapter 16

 

It was the final hours of the long conference with the British on the Faeroes, and there was a restless energy about the ship. It was a kind of tension, like a bow string held taut, waiting for the moment of release that was sure to come. These hours of quiet had been good for the ship and crew, but Volsky knew they all would have an enormous amount of work ahead of them in the days and weeks ahead, and the sense that they were slowly running out of time seemed to prey upon him. The war was so enormous, so all consuming. How could they make a difference—just one single ship?

Admiral Volsky leaned back, eyeing the empty glass of brandy on the table as he took one final meeting with Tovey, his eye drawn to the candle on the centerpiece, casting its warm glow as it was slowly consumed by the flames. Time, he thought. Yes, time is the fire in which we all burn. Yet how is it I have been spared my inevitable demise in those flames? Or have I? Even though I find myself here before my own time, I don’t think the second hand of my own clock has been wound back. I’m certainly not getting any younger for all this travail. Wiser, perhaps, but I still spend my days like that candle, no matter what table I find myself on, and my glass of brandy empties with every sip I take, just like everyone else here. So how many days are left to me?

He knew that these thoughts were the quiet fears of every man, an inner voice he seldom hears in his youth, but one whose whisper grows ever more insistent as old age creeps up on him.

Admiral Tovey seemed lost in his own thoughts for a moment, and Fedorov was watching him closely. This revelation would take some time in the here and now to be fully believed, but Tovey had seen things here on the ship that were hard evidence he would not easily dismiss.

“Well, Admiral,” Tovey said at last. “One day at a time. Yet it would be a comfort to me to know at least how things might have turned out once. A man needs hope…” He waited, the silence drawn out between them. He had asked, but not pressed on the question, though it burned for an answer within him.

At that moment there came a knock on the door, and Volsky turned, an eyebrow raised as the adjutant came in. “Excuse me, sir,” the man said quietly. “You asked to be informed as to the radio broadcast intercepts.”

 “Ah, yes. Put it on, please.” He pointed to the radio set on a bookcase at the far end of the dining hall. “We have been monitoring your radio broadcasts in the event of any formal announcement that might bear upon these discussions,” said Volsky. “I am told your mister Churchill is now speaking before the House of Commons.”

The adjutant walked briskly to the radio and switched it on, and the voice that was immediately recognizable to every man present was speaking, his words so timely in answer to Tovey’s question that it seemed as though he might have been there in that very room, putting forward an opinion that spoke directly to discussion at hand.

“…I do not think it would be wise at this moment, while the battle rages and the war is still perhaps only in its earlier stage, to embark upon elaborate speculations about the future shape which should be given to Europe, or the new securities which must be arranged to spare mankind the miseries of a third World War. The ground is not new, it has been frequently traversed and explored, and many ideas are held about it in common by all good men, and all free men. But before we can undertake the task of rebuilding we have not only to be convinced ourselves, but we have to convince all other countries that the Nazi tyranny is going to be finally broken.

“The right to guide the course of world history is the noblest prize of victory. We are still toiling up the hill; we have not yet reached the crest-line of it; we cannot survey the landscape or even imagine what its condition will be when that longed-for morning comes. The task which lies before us immediately is at once more practical, more simple and more stern. I hope—indeed I pray—that we shall not be found unworthy of our victory if after toil and tribulation it is granted to us. For the rest, we have to gain the victory. That is our task.”

Churchill went on to speak of the United States and the mutual cooperation he could see growing between England and America, and then made mention of the new offer of alliance and friendship with Kirov’s Soviet Russia. Nikolin translated the words as they were spoken in English, and Volsky smiled as Churchill finished his speech.

“For my own part, looking out upon the future, I do not view the process with any misgivings. I could not stop it if I wished; no one can stop it. Like the Mississippi, it just keeps rolling along. Let it roll. Let it roll on full flood, inexorable, irresistible, benignant, to broader lands and better days.”

 The broadcast concluded and Admiral Volsky extended a hand to Tovey, gesturing to the radio set as the adjutant switched it off and quietly withdrew.

“Well there you have it,” he said. “There is the hope a man needs, Admiral Tovey. I know what you want to ask of me, but as your own Prime Minister so eloquently suggests, I do not think it would be wise to speculate on the outcome of this war while the battle still rages. That outcome, that future is out there, as we can certainly attest. And yes, it will come to us as surely as the inexorable flow of that river. I will say only this to you now. The hope you can clearly hear in that man’s voice, the determination with which he sets himself to the task of facing the unfolding hours ahead, will not be wasted, or spent in vain. Is that enough for you?”

Tovey smiled, feeling a sudden lightness of being. “More than enough, Admiral Volsky.”

“Good! Then let us attend to what we can do in the here and now as we toil up this hill. As I have come here with this offer of alliance and friendship, and with certain means at my disposal, what can we do in this dark hour to assist you?”

Yes, now to that which lies before us in the here and now, thought Tovey, and to leave off the impossible speculation over the twisting of the past and future into a shape we might wish. That can only be done here, now, and it will be done by men and steel, with the vision and will of a man like Churchill behind both. Now to the practical survey of the landscape we can see, the moment at hand.

“Well Admiral, we have two great concerns at this moment. One is the imminent invasion of our islands. Even now we fall under the hammer of the Luftwaffe, and our Royal Air Force is hard pressed. If they fail, and the Germans gain air superiority over our shores, then we face a very grave moment when the war may come quickly to these islands and we will finally feel the enemy’s hand at our throats.”

Volsky looked at Fedorov, remembering what he had told Sergei Kirov in a similar dinner meeting they had shared together. Then he had assured Kirov that Germany could not successfully invade Great Britain. Why not at least do the same here?

“I do not wish to say anything that might slacken your guard, Admiral Tovey. But my Mister Fedorov here is somewhat of a student of military history, and he does not believe the Germans can successfully invade. Fedorov?”

“Correct, sir. Not while the Royal Navy stands resolute.”

“Yet if the R.A.F. should fail us, my ships will soon be seen to be quite vulnerable. We have already faced the hard fact that the German Kriegsmarine now has seaborne air power that poses a grave threat.”

“Yet you saw that I have the means to redress that if my ship is anywhere near the action,” Volsky reassured him.

“Yes, those marvelous aerial rockets you possess. Might they be put to the defense of our homeland as well?”

“If I may, sir,” said Fedorov. “This is about the time the Germans began to intensify their air campaign against England with Adler Tag, the Eagle Day.”

“Yes,” said Tovey. “We have some very capable men at a place we call Hut 6, and they intercepted and decoded the German directive concerning this attack.”

“Then you may also know the approximate strength of the Luftwaffe will be well over 2500 planes in these actions. I’m afraid we haven’t quite that many missiles at our disposal. While potent, our resources are limited, and therefore are best applied to decisive engagements where we can aim them right at the hinge of fate, as your Mister Churchill might put things.”

“I see,” said Tovey, realizing that everything had limits, and even the power of this amazing ship he was visiting was not boundless.

Fedorov could see he was discouraged and offered another thought. “I might say that your Royal Air Force may prove more resilient and capable than you might imagine at this moment. If need be, and the battle becomes desperate, perhaps the Admiral might consider a technology transfer. The radar sets we have discussed, for example. They can dramatically increase your awareness of the battle space over England. Such a radar set at Margate, Hastings or Eastbourne on your Channel Coast could see the German fighters the instant they take off from their airfields as far inland as Lille and Amiens.”

“Our Air Chief Marshal Dowding would certainly welcome that. He places great faith in our radar sets. Would you consider such a transfer?”

“It would require our own service personnel to operate the equipment,” said Volsky, “but yes, it might be arranged if the situation becomes desperate. Beyond that, however, we are a power at sea, as you have seen. Is there anything we might do for you in that regard?”

“Our intelligence indicates you have already done a great deal, Admiral. We owe much to you for your timely intervention during that recent engagement in the Denmark Strait. The Kriegsmarine is much more of a threat than I believe Whitehall anticipated. They might have pushed right out into the Atlantic, and in my mind they will certainly try again. We have not yet seen the full weight and power of what they are now capable of, and this business with the French fleet remains a grave and unsettled matter.”

“Oh?” Volsky looked at Fedorov. “I thought the British had already resolved that.”

“Not quite, Admiral,” said Fedorov. “It seems that a good part of the French fleet escaped to Toulon,”

“That is so,” said Tovey. “We had hoped to bottle them up at Mers-el-Kebir and settle the matter there, but they seem to have had advance warning. Admiral Gensoul took his ships to sea, against orders, we have since learned, but very wisely. Now that Vichy France is openly courting alliance with Germany the French fleet at Toulon is a real threat. Beyond that, there are three ships in particular that trouble my sleep these days, and they are all located in French African ports on the Atlantic.”

“Perhaps we can assist you there?” Volsky suggested.

“My watch remains with Home Fleet, for the moment, but we are picking up some rather disturbing intelligence concerning operations in the Mediterranean Theater. The Royal Navy is strong, Admiral Volsky, but we also have our limits. The Vichy French have powerful ships at their disposal now, and we will have to face them, the sooner the better, for as long as they hold that sword at our backs I can never stand an easy watch here against anything the Kriegsmarine might do again.”

“Well, Admiral, I do not think my ship will be needed in our own home waters any time soon. We taught the Germans a little lesson recently that they will not be eager to repeat. There are many things I could do for you. One might be to stand a watch with you here. I could single handedly close the Denmark Strait to access by German surface raiders. This might relieve you of that burden, and allow you to use your ships elsewhere without concern for that channel.”

“That would be much appreciated, but sir, what if you were to find yourself opposed by a force the size we lately encountered? It is true that our combined efforts were able to deter the Germans in the last go round, but what if you were caught out there alone?”

“If it came to it, the result would be the same. I will tell you now, and this is no mere boast, that you have not yet seen the full measure of what this ship is capable of. I could stop anything the Germans send at me. Rest assured.”

Tovey smiled. “Well then, the Denmark Strait is yours, Admiral. The plan to establish your Ice Watch is also a splendid idea, and I thank you. I can also arrange facilities at our establishment at Iceland should your men need shore leave, and of course I would make it my intention to stand out cruiser patrols to assist your operations, and even place them under your command if it would facilitate that watch. You cannot sail on indefinitely. Might I arrange for fuel transfers to that port so that you may replenish?”

“That will not be necessary,” Volsky said with a smile. “In fact, we can sail on indefinitely. We do not use diesel fuel oil on this ship. Our propulsion system can operate without any necessity for re-provisioning.”

This was yet another surprise to Tovey, as he could not conceive of the possibility. “You require no fuel at all?”

“We certainly need regular maintenance, as any ship must. As for fuel, we carry all that we will ever need with us at this very moment.”

“Quite extraordinary. We must discuss this further some time.”

“There are other things we might assist you with that will not require missiles,” said Volsky. “Our Mister Fedorov is also very adept at signals decryption, are you not Fedorov?”

“That I am, sir, in my way.”

“You see,” said Volsky, “information is as much a weapon in this war as anything else. The questions you will want to ask us about how this war turns out attest to that fact. Yes? Well I must tell you that these events may at times ring true to what we knew in our own time, yet at others they are dramatically different, and things happen that are completely unknown to us. That battle we found ourselves in, for example, was one that will not be found in any history book I have ever read. It is something we wrote together as we stood our respective watches and fought side by side. This will be the case again. There will be things that may occur here, and we will have no foreknowledge of them. That said, we have a man here with a keen ear and the ability to decipher codes.”

“Indeed?” Tovey now looked at Fedorov with a new eye. “We have such a man as well,” he said. “In fact, I have only lately come from a meeting with him, and it was he who uncovered the photographs and other material I shared with you here. Perhaps your Mister Fedorov might wish to meet with our people, and with our own Mister Turing at Bletchley Park. We’ve been working the German Enigma code, and any help you might offer would be greatly appreciated.”

Fedorov passed a moment of apprehension, realizing that he had no innate ability to decipher codes of any kind. If anyone did on the ship, it would be Nikolin, but the applications he had on his pad devices already stored the life’s work of the very man Tovey had just mentioned, Alan Turing. Fedorov knew that he, like the moon, shined by the light borrowed from that great mind.

The thought of actually meeting Turing was as compelling to him as this meeting here with Admiral Tovey, but he wondered in those brief seconds, if he might upset some delicate balance again. Turing’s work on the Enigma code was not yet finished. Yet my application stores all the conclusions he will come to on his own. Could I reveal them? Would that affect his work? What might happen if he never comes to those conclusions on his own and relies on my computer data, my Enigma tool? Would that mean that tool could never exist or function as it does now? He realized that he was skirting the dangerous edge of paradox here, and felt a moment of cautious alarm.

“Perhaps some caution would be advised here, Admiral,” he said to Volsky, holding a hand up to stay Nikolin’s translation of that.

Volsky was quick enough to see that Fedorov had some issue with this, so he deftly skirted the matter and moved on. It was eventually decided that Fedorov might meet with Turing in the near future, though that was deliberately left indefinite. As for the radar it was decided that they would first monitor events and only intervene with the technology if it appeared England was losing it air battle with the Germans.

The radar would be just a nudge that would assure the delicate balance Air Chief Marshal Dowding was maintaining in his deadly duel with the Luftwaffe, and enough to ensure that the Battle of Britain would again be won by England. The real work would be done by the brave and dogged pilots of the R.A. F., but the Oko panel could be there to let them do their job in the most efficient way possible.

As for the ship itself, Kirov would stand a watch on the Denmark Strait, a place that had long been the favored channel chosen by German surface raiders reaching for the Atlantic convoys. Volsky could, indeed, make good his boast if he wished. While the ship’s missile inventory was limited, he nonetheless had enough power in hand to stop any ship or ships that would attempt to try his patience. But even as he warned Admiral Tovey, things would happen in this war that no man could truly foresee or fully anticipate.

And they did.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter 17

 

The aid and pledge of friendship offered by the Russians was a great relief to Tovey, but he knew there were things that he learned that would best be kept highly secret. Admiral Volsky had urged his discretion in the matter before the two men concluded their Faeroe Islands conference.

“I hope you do not think I am unforthcoming in regards to the support we can offer you now,” he had said. “I insisted that you come alone for this visit aboard my ship, and for reasons that should now be obvious to you. Things we have revealed to you here will not be easily explained to others. In fact, I would suggest that you consider limiting the information you have in hand to only the most trusted few.”

“In that I agree fully,” said Tovey. “You can rely on my discretion, Admiral, as I am sure I will rely on you.”

Volsky nodded. “I must tell you that I considered this matter long and hard before making the decision to contact you and make these revelations.”

“I am grateful that you did, and also for the able services of your Mister Nikolin here as he builds a language bridge between us.”

Nikolin smiled at that, as did Volsky.

“Yes, our Mister Nikolin is a most capable man. In fact, we owe him more than he may realize, for when the fate of this ship and crew once hung in the balance, it was Mister Nikolin here that saved the day when he came forward with information that was vital and timely.”At this Nikolin blushed, and he gave Tovey a much abbreviated version of that line, but he was deeply appreciative of the Admiral’s praise.

“That said,” Volsky continued, “it is the question of timely information that we must now discuss. Information is power. It can move the hinge of fate we have talked about, but I must tell you now that there may be others in this world with access to information that could prove decisive to the outcome of this war, and they are not all our friends.”

“Others?” Tovey was not quite sure he knew what the Admiral was hinting at here, and Volsky could see this.

“Admiral… Until Mister Fedorov and I have determined how those photographs and reports came into your intelligence archive, I would be very, very cautious. Fedorov’s suggestion that they could only exist here if they were brought here by someone at least makes some sense to me—but there is a darker side to that. Who might this person be, I wonder? How did he get here? I must tell you now that the cracks in time that allowed my ship and crew to slip through to this era remain a great mystery. We came to believe that it was our own foolish meddling here, as evidenced in those photographs you showed us, that caused all the fractures in the history that is now unfolding here, but now we are not so sure of this.”

“Yes, well there is good and bad in all of that. Your meddling was kind enough to see to the delivery of HMS Invincible to the Home Fleet, if I can believe what you have told me, and I would have been lost without her these long and arduous months.”

“Very true. Yet what I am trying to suggest now is that, even as we have slipped through those cracks, some of our analysts have come to think other men may have done the same. A few we know of, but those photographs you have showed me lead me to suspect that there are others we may not know.”

“I understand the implications,” said Tovey. “Perhaps we need to keep watch on more than the cold seas, Admiral.” Even as he said that, he was struck with the feeling that he had come to this same conclusion before, and set a long and well guarded watch on time itself, one that extended through all the remaining days of his life.

“This is a matter of some concern to us,” Volsky continued. “We are presently involved in an operation to see if we can collar some of the other men we do know about, and plaster over a few cracks in the wall, if that makes any sense. I have no illusions that I can ever mend the world and restore things to the way they once were—at least the way I once knew them to be. But I must tell you, even though you may see our coming here as the arrival of a guardian angel with a flaming sword from some unseen future, there are dark angels as well. There are dangerous men at large in this world.” He let that linger, and Tovey thought long and hard about it after the conference concluded and they bid each other farewell.

Volsky had said enough to tip his British counterpart off as to the need for secrecy and vigilance, but he did not tell Tovey anything more about the fate of that operation, or that one of the men he was most worried about from that unseen future, one of those dark angels, was named Ivan Volkov. Nor did he reveal the fact that another man at large had been a member of his own crew, the former Captain of the mighty Kirov. Volsky had decided to reveal nothing of the operation that was then underway at Ilanskiy, or its vital purpose. Tovey had enough to chew on as it was.

 Kirov departed, heading west to take up the post Volsky had agreed to watch in the Denmark Strait. This gave Tovey the time he needed to work out with King George V and Prince of Wales, two most welcome additions to his Home Fleet. It was not long, however, before other dangerous men, well known to Tovey himself, began to make plans and arrange meetings of their own.

 

* * *

 

Hitler had his doubts about the conference as his train made its way through Vichy France under heavy guard. Was he making the right decision here? Was Canaris correct in pointing out how unstable and unreliable Franco and Spain might be as an ally?

It was raining, and the gloomy weather seemed to settle over the whole affair, promising failure and an end to all the grandiose plans that had been argued and debated for months. Now it would all come down to this, a final meeting arranged in a train car at Hendaye on the Franco-Spanish border, and no one would have thought that this simple rain storm could have unhinged the entire strategy of the war in the West. But that is exactly what the gathering weather front threatened to do. It would not be the silver tongued arguments of the negotiators, or even Hitler’s blistering personality and iron will that would decide the day.

It was going to be something quite different.

 

* * *

 

In the late summer of 1940, the Germans were faced with any number of alternatives. Flush with victory, and with new allies flocking to their banner, Hitler believed his forces were invincible. While many now argued the time had come to consider taking the war to Soviet Russia, Admiral Raeder continued to advocate strongly for alternative operations aimed against Britain. The most direct approach would have been Operation Seelöwe, the planned invasion of England, but as it progressed, Raeder continued to identify more and more obstacles to its success. Germany had no amphibious ships worth the name. It had few craft suitable for landing operations or cross channel assault, particularly to move heavy armor or mechanized support units and their artillery. Beyond that, the strength of the Royal Navy was unbowed, and the recent engagement in the Denmark Strait did little to convince Hitler that the new Kriegsmarine he had ordered was as yet ready for the job.

Goering stepped up at this point, claiming he could smash the British with his Luftwaffe, and this confident boast, coupled with a request for a delay until the Spring of 1941 for Seelöwe, led Hitler to issue the following orders:

“An attempt must be made to prepare the operation (Seelöwe) for 15 September 1940. The army should be ready for action by then. The decision as to whether the operation is to take place in September or is to be delayed until May 1941 will be made after the air force has made concentrated attacks on southern England for one week. The air force is to report at once when these attacks will commence. If the effect of the air attacks is such that the enemy air force, harbors, and naval forces, etc., are heavily damaged, Operation SEA LION will be carried out in 1940. Otherwise it is to be postponed until May 1941.”

Even as Goering launched his air force at Britain on “Eagle Day” in August of 1940, Raeder continued to advocate strongly for a second alternative, a way to defeat Great Britain by taking a more indirect approach through the Mediterranean. “Take Gibraltar, Malta and the Suez Canal, and you have all but destroyed the British Empire outside the UK. What good are their colonies in the Indian Ocean when they are completely isolated? Then we have a direct link to the Oil from Orenburg. It can flow through the Bosporus to ports in Southern France and Italy, and once these routes are established, all the resources we need will be in hand. Then Soviet Russia will have no option but to sue for peace, or to join the Axis as Orenburg has done.”

“Yes,” Hitler agreed, “But remember this as well— Britain’s hope lies in Russia and the United States. With Russia smashed, Britain’s last hope in Europe would be shattered. Germany then will be master of Europe and the Balkans. Russia’s destruction must therefore be made a part of this struggle. The sooner Russia is crushed the better, and the Spring of 1941 would be the time to begin. Can this operation against Gibraltar be completed before then?”

“It could be launched this winter, my Führer, assuming Franco agrees. All that would be required would be a few divisions, yet the fruit such a victory returns in the harvest will be considerable. How many divisions will be necessary for the struggle against Soviet Russia? How long before we have a clear decision there, and secure rail and sea connections to the Orenburg Federation? Your Generals tell you three months, but I think it will be very much longer.”

“And you tell me three months will take me all the way to the Suez, Raeder. Can I believe you any more than Jodl?”

“Take Gibraltar first, and watch the dominoes fall, my Führer. I am certain of it.”

It was a compelling argument, and one that Hitler began to show more and more interest in, particularly when Jodl and others began to look on it with more favor when it became evident that Goering could not deliver on his promise to smash the R.A.F. The incredible sacrifice of the British fighters in their stalwart duel with the Luftwaffe would finally put an end to Hitler’s dream of Operation Seelöwe. Hitler told Halder to continue the planning, but as nothing more than a deception to keep psychological pressure on the British. Now his thoughts turned south to Gibraltar.

A British fortress since the early 18th century, ‘the Rock’ was a bastion of Royal Navy sea power and the crucial link between her Atlantic and Mediterranean forces. If the Germans could capture it they would gain a commanding position from which to influence both naval theaters, along with a deep water port that could hold and service all their biggest ships. There was no comparable port on the Atlantic French coast, and the capture of Gibraltar would drive a wedge of steel into the heart of the Royal Navy.

Hitler listened, seeing the opportunity but yet hesitating for two reasons. What would Britain do in reprisal? Would they seek to mount an amphibious operation through Portugal? Would they land in Morocco or French West Africa? The head of the Abwehr, Admiral Canaris, had argued just that, but when Goering saw how he attempted to persuade the Spanish Foreign Minister to discourage the plan against Gibraltar, he took steps to intervene. Canaris was seen to be the obstructionist he was, and his influence was minimized by an unexpected troika of all three arms of the German military, Raeder, Goering and Jodl.

OKW finally agreed. Before anything was decided about the East, the West should be held secure. Now that Italy had also joined the war on Germany’s side, it might be possible to drive the British from North Africa, Egypt, and isolate them from their colonies in the Middle East and India. The British Empire would be broken in two, and crumble.

Hitler decided the matter. He was the planner that would unhinge all other plans and force his will on the world, or so he believed. The war in the West would now supersede his plans for the invasion of Russia. France was already courting alliance, and only Spain and Portugal remained holdouts on the continent. Detailed plans for the operation against Gibraltar had been drawn up and completed by the Wehrmacht ahead of schedule, and soon they were personally signed by Hitler.

Now there was only one question: Would Franco cooperate?

Preliminary negotiations were underway at that very moment. Franco’s list of demands had run on and on. He worried over British reprisals should he join the Axis, a blockade or possibly even an invasion on his Atlantic coast. He suggested that any German troops involved would have to wear Spanish Army uniforms as a point of honor. He asked for thousands of tons of wheat and other resources to feed his shattered state. He fretted over the possibility that the United States would shut down their extensive Telecom system in Spain. In the end Hitler became so frustrated with the man that he exclaimed he would rather have a tooth pulled than speak with him again.

Urged on by Raeder, Hitler had agreed to this one final meeting on the Franco-Spanish border to secure Spain’s cooperation. If those negotiations failed, Barbarossa was still sitting quietly in his back pocket. The only obstacle to Raeder’s plan was Franco’s Spain. Would he join the Axis, or at the very least cooperate with Germany in the initial phase of the Mediterranean campaign?

Ever equivocating, and a master of playing one side off against another, Franco was proving to be a difficult fish to haul in. Canaris also seemed to be quietly undermining the effort to move Operation Felix along, suggesting that Franco, and Spain itself would be a shaky and unreliable partner. At Raeder’s urging, Hitler agreed to meet with Franco and his foreign minister to see for himself if the man could be relied upon, and then persuaded to cooperate with the plan.

Hitler knew what Franco wanted, nominal administrative control over Gibraltar after it fell to German hands, military and economic aid, a slice of the French colonies in Tangiers and French Morocco across the straits. All this could be arranged, for without Spain, the Gibraltar operation was as problematic as Operation Seelöwe, and Hitler always had Barbarossa if Franco proved to be adamant.

Yet none of that mattered, really. Things had already been quietly decided by another man, witless, unknowing, yet slowly tightening a screw on the hinge of fate that would soon decide the future course of the war.

 

 

 

 

Chapter 18

 

Hitler’s train pulled into the little railway station at Hendaye, the rain still pattering on the roof as it came to a halt. No one imagined that a rainy day in Spain was threatening to make an end of all these plans and devices; all these directives and negotiations. No one knew how it had been foiled. In fact, in the history Fedorov knew, the rain prevailed, just as it might have here if not for the diligence of one simple man the previous day.

He was not one of the negotiators. There were no medals on his chest or titles attached to his name. He was not one of the planners, scheming and brooding over maps. No. Juan Alfonso was just a simple janitor, last man on the shift the night before the meeting in Madrid. He was supposed to make all the final checks, working through the train car by car to see that all was in order, for this was no ordinary train.

The following morning the Caudillo himself, Francisco Franco, would be riding in this train, along with Foreign Affairs Minister Ramon Serrano Suñer. They would travel to Hendaye on the Franco-Spanish border for a secret meeting with the Führer of Germany, Adolf Hitler himself, and his own Foreign Affairs Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop. There the two sides were set to negotiate the possible entry of Spain into the war on the side of the Axis powers, a stroke that would have grave implications for the entire course of the war.

It was raining that night in Madrid, and the forecast called for more rain the following day. Juan Alfonso was nearly done with his work that night. He checked the engine and coal cars to see that all was in readiness, then inspected the wheels and undercarriage of each car. Tired and cold, he ventured inside to dry off and eat a bit of cheese that he had in his tool kit.

Alfonso looked around as he sat in the main coach, listening to the sound of the rain on the roof and thinking that tomorrow would see all these important men here in that very car, perhaps sitting right there where he sat at that very moment. Then it happened, the tiny spill of water from above, just a few drops at first, falling on his pant leg, but then more until a steady drip had developed, slowly building a pool of water on the floor of the car.

He looked up, seeing the row of screws in the ceiling and wondering if something might be loose there. It was very late, and he was very tired, but the longer he sat there, the more he realized that he could not go home just yet—not until he stopped that leak. Who knows, perhaps Franco would be seated in that chair, and if it rained again tomorrow…

He opened his tool box, hearing the dry squeak that was, in fact, the hinge of fate at that moment. Juan Alfonso reached for his screwdriver, and slowly stood up, getting a nice fat drop of rainwater on his cheek for his trouble. We’ll see about that, he thought, testing each screw until he found two loose candidates. Yes, that was the problem. The cowling was loose there, and the water was slowly working its way through.

He paused a moment, thinking, then fished about in his tool box until he found a pocket knife and the old chamois cloth he used here and there in his work. He could spare just a little here, he thought as he carefully cut a strip away. Then he loosened the screws enough to allow him to work the chamois into the crevice there, poking and prodding with his pocket knife until the cloth was tucked away, completely unseen, before he retightened all the screws again. There… That was all it needed. The leak was stopped.

He sighed, put away his tools and slowly closed the box before starting away, off shift at long last and heading home. The sound of his footfalls on the coach floor would echo through time, though he could not know that then. For Juan Alfonso was going to set events in motion that few could see at that moment. Juan Alfonso, a leaky roof, a screwdriver, pocket knife and a bit of chamois—no, it was not supposed to happen that way at all.

Juan was supposed to simply leave work and go home that night, and not sit there listening to the sound of the rain on the roof of that train car. He was never supposed to see or feel the tiny fall of water drops he had just attended to. The leak in the roof was supposed to have gone unnoticed, in spite of his very careful inspection of everything else that night.

The following day the ministers would board the train. It would roll north for that decisive meeting with the Germans on the border, and it would be raining all that day. The Spanish minister would take the seat where Juan had enjoyed that brief moment of rest with his nibble of cheese. The nasty leak there would become a nuisance that would drive the minister to distraction, to the point where he was completely irate and out of sorts when he finally reached the meeting site several hours later.

 His anger apparently carried over to the negotiations, and he was so adamant and testy that his demeanor, along with Franco’s persistent equivocation, convinced both Hitler and Ribbentrop that the Spanish could not be dealt with. No deal was signed in the history Fedorov knew, and Spain ended up joining the Allies instead. The leaky roof in that train car had worked its will on fate.

But not this time.

Not after Juan Alfonso sat in that seat and saw those rain drops falling to soil his pant leg. Everything was going to be different now, because that bit of chamois and a couple well tightened screws were enough to stop the leak, which was enough to remove that annoying and persistent perturbation for Foreign Affairs Minister Ramon Serrano Suñer. Instead he was in a fine mood when he arrived at Hendaye on the border, so agreeable that he even served to soothe Franco’s doubts and smooth over his objections, and the outcome of the meeting was quite different.

The meeting was held, and Hitler and Ribbentrop worked diligently to allay all Franco’s fears. They pledged that Germany would protect and defend Spanish interests against any reprisal, provide grain, sign lucrative trade agreements, even secure the telecom network owned by AT & T. So in spite of his many doubts, Franco and Spain would cast their fate to the wind and shake hands with Adolf Hitler that day, and everything would change. It was not supposed to happen that way, but a simple man named Juan Alfonso made it so.

 

The German Plan

 

“Operation Felix,” was now to become Germany’s next primary operation of war. Hitler emphasized all his key objectives in Fuehrer Directive #18:

“The most urgent duty of the French is to secure their African possessions (West and Equatorial Africa), offensively and defensively, against England and the de Gaulle movement. From this the full participation of France in the war against England may develop. Political measures to bring about the entry into the war of Spain in the near future have already been initiated. The aim of German intervention in the Iberian peninsula (cover-name 'Felix') will be to drive the English from the Western Mediterranean. To this end: Gibraltar is to be captured and the Straits closed. The English are to be prevented from gaining a footing at any other point on the Iberian peninsula or in the Atlantic Islands. The preparation and execution of this operation is planned as follows:

PHASE I

a.    Reconnaissance parties (officers in plain clothes) will draw up the necessary plans for action against Gibraltar and for the capture of airfields.

b.    Formations detailed for the operation will be concentrated at a considerable distance from the Franco-Spanish frontier and without previous briefing of troops. Three weeks before troops are timed to cross the Spanish-French frontier, a warning order will be issued. In view of the low capacity of Spanish railways the Army will detail chiefly motorized formations for this operation, so that the railways are available for supplies.

PHASE II

a.    Units of the Air Force will set out from French bases and make a well-timed air attack on English naval forces in Gibraltar harbor. After the attack they will land in Spanish airports.

b.    Shortly after this attack units detailed for operations in Spain will cross or fly over the Franco-Spanish frontier.

PHASE III

a.    An attack will be made with German troops to seize Gibraltar.

b.    Forces will be made ready to invade Portugal should the English gain a footing there. Formations detailed for this purpose will enter Spain immediately behind the forces intended for Gibraltar.

PHASE IV

After the capture of the Rock, the Spaniards will be assisted to close the Straits; if necessary, from Spanish Morocco also.

General Ludwig Kübler's 49th Corps would lead the assault. The German mobile divisions would cross the northern passes of the Pyrenees and sweep south, straight through Madrid and on to Gibraltar. The assault forces for Gibraltar would be spearheaded by a company of the elite Brandenburger commandos, and a special fallshirmjager unit. These troops would soon be supported by a crack regiment of the Grossdeutschland Division and the 98th Regiment of the 1st Mountain Division, their initial assault elements to be air lifted by the Luftwaffe, and landing at Spanish airfields. 26 medium and heavy artillery battalions, and three engineer battalions would follow overland.

Their flank on the Iberian peninsula would be watched and guarded by the whole of the 39th Korps, the 16th Panzer Division, and the ‘greyhounds’ of the 16th Motorized Division. Further forces had been detailed to support the main overland operation, including a detachment of the 3rd SS Panzer Division, and two more infantry divisions would be detailed to cross the straits and occupy the shores of Spanish Morocco.

“I also request that the problem of occupying Madeira and the Azores should be considered,” said Hitler, “together with the advantages and disadvantages which this would entail for our sea and air warfare. The results of these investigations are to be submitted to me as soon as possible. As to the Vichy French, now let them prove their pledge of alliance with us and use the ships they sit on in Casablanca and Dakar to support such a move.”

This extended campaign would deny the British these valuable outposts as staging areas for counter-operations against Gibraltar and Spain, while at the same time affording Germany valuable refueling stations for its navy. They would also sit astride the convoy routes Britain used to move supplies and resources to and from Freetown and around the Cape of Good Hope.

Gibraltar, however, was the real prize. Once the German Army had hold of the fabled “Pillars of Hercules,” the British would be denied this vital base, and it would soon serve German/Italian needs while they continued the fight to destroy what remained of the British outposts in the Mediterranean. Then the Axis Powers could finally voice the old Roman claim when they once referred to the Mediterranean as Mare Nostrum, our sea. Malta would be completely isolated and fall within a month. The British position in Egypt would be in grave danger, as the Germans could move forces to North Africa easily by sea, while the British would have to rely on supply lines thousands of miles long, around the Cape of Good Hope. The British Army in North Africa would be effectively cut off.

The Kriegsmarine had returned to friendly ports after the abortive sortie to harass the British convoy shipping in June of 1940. They began the operation with a game of shadow boxing, aiming to draw the attention of British heavy ships, but encountered a mysterious adversary that seemed to foil their every move, sinking the tanker Altmark and forcing them to backtrack north to refuel with an alternate supply ship. A strong battlegroup of the German fleet had then sortied, Bismarck and Tirpitz leading the way beneath the heavy grey overcast, intending to strike south for the Atlantic. There they met the Royal Navy on equal terms for the first time at sea since the big sea duels of WWI. They learned, much to their great surprise, that new and powerful weapons of war were now threatening to upset the careful balance that would decide naval supremacy in the Atlantic, and by so doing, decide the war.

Suddenly Raeder’s plans were all thrown to the wind. The development of rocketry had received passing attention in Germany before the war, but now it was given the highest possible priority. If the British could field these weapons, or the Russians as it was later learned, then so could Germany. Seeing that the application of the weaponry was apparently limited, and observed on no other Russian ship, the Germans concluded it must have been a new prototype, deployed in battle for the very first time.

There had not been a hint or whisper of these weapons in the Mediterranean, and no British ships seemed to have them. Yet the impact they had in German war planning was nonetheless significant. What if Soviet Russia had these weapons ready for use as a land based system? This, among other reasons, prompted Hitler to postpone the immediate invasion of Soviet Russia until intelligence could be developed on the scale of deployment for these new weapons.

In the short run Doenitz argued that no rocket cruiser could in any way harm his U-boats, and was glad to see that his budget for new construction was dramatically increased, while that of Raeder diminished. The Germans would finish the fitting out of only one more major capital ship, the Oldenburg. The third big battleship Hitler had ordered long ago, the Brandenburg, was summarily cancelled, and the steel allotted for the project was diverted to the production of small screening ships like destroyers, and more U-Boats, and the completion of the large fleet carrier the Germans had captured from the French in Saint Nazaire. The name itself would also transfer to that ship, and carrier Joffre would soon be christened CV Brandenburg.

As for the fast AA cruiser De Grasse, Raeder managed to preserve enough of his resources to convert this ship to a hybrid escort cruiser/carrier, the Hannover, named after the old pre-dreadnought battleship from an earlier day. These two ships, would join Peter Strasser in the shipyards and were expected to reach completion by mid-1941 to bring Germany’s carrier fleet to a respectable four ships.

Yet Raeder had much more planned, just as he had explained it to Doenitz earlier. His navy would play an important role in Operation Felix, and that attack would be supported by the core of his new battle fleet in a gamble to break the back of the Royal Navy by seizing Gibraltar. Raeder would send out his gladiators once again, hoping to draw the Royal Navy into another pursuit and battle at sea. He would fling his newest battle squadron down through the Faeroes Gap and into the heat of the action. And they would be led by the greatest champion the German Navy had ever put to sea—battleship Hindenburg.

Raeder could see the ships moving in his mind’s eye, even as he visualized them on his battle map in the operations center at Wilhelmshaven. If his Admirals and Kapitans kept good heads on their shoulders, then he could guarantee Hitler that his segment of the plan would be accomplished—disrupt the Royal Navy so badly that any hope of reinforcing Gibraltar or landing forces in Portugal or Morocco would be impossible. This he could do, rockets or no rockets. Every variable and factor in the equation of his thinking told him that his fleet was ready for the task as Germany prepared to strike at another hinge of fate—Gibraltar.

 

 

 

 

Part VII

 

Dakar

 

“You must never underestimate your opposition.”