Ministry Protocol: Thrilling Tales of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences
Page 44
*****
June 30, 1908
Podkamennaya Tunguska River Basin
26 Minutes Later
White. All was white.
The Ministry agent tested all his limbs for the second time in twenty-four hours, assuring himself of their presences. Hot wind tousled his hair, and he inhaled the sharp scent of smoke. He couldn’t see anything through his blind eyes, and he rested his cheek against Zhenya’s warm back.
“Miss Babikov?” he whispered.
“Yeah?”
“Are we alive?”
He felt her let out a long sigh through the fall of her shoulders. “Yeah, just a few minutes into the future,” she said. “Damn crack shot, you are.”
“And you’re not bad at... What is it you do? Time travel, I suppose?”
“That, and prepare for the worst,” she said, looking around their Mortar. “We have just enough shielding around us to keep the heat at bay.”
The light gradually became shadow, and Vasily opened his ailing eyes upon Hell. Pine trees had been laid low like piles of corpses, and granite had been blasted into orange glass for miles around. A tremendous column of smoke reached toward them as they flew, surveying the damage. Hot winds whistled past them, carrying clouds of cloying dust and flaming debris.
He swallowed dryly, thinking of the million people back in the intended target. Fourteen years prior. “My God... That could have been Peter. All of that, just to kill a few politicians.”
“But they failed, thanks to us.”
For minutes, they flew around the countryside, surveying the damage. If the gods had been looking for a place to chain forsaken Prometheus, they would have found it in Tunguska. The thought of what the Lev had nearly done to the imperial capitol would haunt Vasily’s dreams for years to come.
Zhenya eventually steered her mortar away from the devastation and out over Lake Baikal. The clear waters did much to calm Vasily’s mind, and soon, the agent felt peace return to his bones.
“I imagine my superiors will be surprised to hear how this all played out,” he finally said.
Zhenya gave a gruff laugh. “I hate to tell you this, farmboy, but they’ll never hear the story.”
He recoiled. “What?”
“No, I’m not going to kill you to preserve my secret,” she chuckled. “I don’t have to. Did you just forget what just happened? We time travelled. Into the future. By fourteen years.” She glanced at one of her panels and added, “And thirty-one minutes.”
“So the Ministry thinks—” Then Vasily nodded. “You can’t take me back, can you?”
“I don’t know how to say this, so I’m just going to say it. The next time jump will take us to New York City, for the 1964 World’s Fair. I don’t know what the old hag wanted us to do there.” She bit her lip. “Or I could just let you out here. I’m sure you could find your way back to some sort of sanity.”
Maybe it was because he couldn’t be surprised anymore after his fight with the Lev, maybe it was because he didn’t want to go home, anyway; somehow, though, he couldn’t bring himself to be angry, disappointed, or even dismayed about the fact that he was fourteen years removed from everyone who knew him. Well, almost everyone, he thought, resting his cheek on her back.
For the second time in his life, he’d been abducted by Baba Yaga. This time, it suited him just fine.
“And you’d have me with you?”
She shrugged. “You’re a decent enough shot, and the guns only get better in the future. Maybe you could be my bodyguard. You’re certainly hideous enough.”
He smiled and she grimaced. He remembered his missing front tooth, and closed his mouth. “Maybe the dentists are better in the future.”
“Maybe so,” she said. “Only one way to find out.”
He nodded his head, and the Mortar disappeared into the blossoming sky, the sun stained orange with the smoke of the impact.