Petrov heard the words, but could not understand what was happening. “What?” he blurted out, his instinct for survival suddenly pulsing with the adrenaline in his chest. “What do you mean? I have killed no one!”
“Correct,” said Tyrenkov, “for the moment. But you will kill someone if left to your devices. But not this time.” He reached into his service jacket, drew out a pistol, aimed, and fired. The sharp report of the weapon in the confined space was deafening, but Tyrenkov hardly blinked. He took a long look at Petrov satisfied that the bullet hole he had put in his head was fatal, and then turned, his boots hard on the cold stone floor of the prison hallway.
Ten minutes later his men were ascending to the ship in the sub-cloud car, and history groaned as it turned over in its sleep. For Sergei Karpov had been slated to become head of the Okhrana in Saint Petersburg before Petrov’s bomb prevented that. Now he would become head of that nefarious organization, and like his grandson, he had a very long list of things he planned to do, and some of them were going to matter a great deal in the years ahead.
While Tyrenkov and his men were away on their mission of death, Vladimir Karpov had passed the time listening to the memoirs of Alexander Petrov as fetched from the library material he had stored on his service jacket computer. A shiver went down his spine when he began to hear names in the narrative that were all too familiar. The man who had first approached Petrov was called “Sergei,” the name of both his Great Grandfather as well as a certain other figure that had risen to prominence in the revolution—Kirov. One day Petrov was invited to Sergei’s house, along with other members of the nascent underground revolution. The moment he arrived a bomb went off with a roaring explosion, throwing Petrov to the ground. His legs had both been injured, but he still had the presence of mind to drag himself towards the door, managing to eventually reach the street outside, dazed and wounded.
The police arrived, pushing into a crowd that had gathered around Petrov, and added to his misery by kicking him with their boots. It was just another revolutionary, or so they believed, and they took Petrov off to the police station. There the local chief ordered the man taken to the hospital to see to his bleeding legs. In one of those strange twists of history, the doctor who operated on him was named Fedorov! Later, the Okhrana actually did recruit Petrov, and provided him with a false passport under the name Rodenko! So there were the names of men who had served on the bridge crew of the battlecruiser Kirov—all strangely associated with this Petrov figure, a man who was planning to kill his own Great Grandfather! The dark implications of that did not go unappreciated by Karpov. If Petrov had done his deed just a few months earlier, he would have snuffed out the life line that now sustained him, as Colonel Sergei Karpov would have died before he had conceived his son.
The eerie echo of those names in the narrative unnerved him as he listened—Fedorov, working to sustain the life and mobility of Petrov, Rodenko, lending him his identity so that he might move unnoticed in the murky seas of the early revolution…
I was that close to annihilation, thought Karpov. But why did Petrov want my Great Grandfather dead? Was it his own doing, or was he put up to it by someone else? Was it merely revenge for the attack that injured him? Were these other men secretly involved, Fedorov? Rodenko? And who was this “Sergei” that had tried to kill Petrov himself that day? Was it really his Great Grandfather? Why would he do this if he was really seeking to turn Petrov as an agent, as all the other accounts had it in the history? Was it someone else named Sergei? Who? Why?
He sighed, switching off the computer in his service jacket that had been reading him the file, a cold, clammy feeling on the back of his neck. Something about this incident was entirely too personal now. It was not like the grand strategy he had been plotting, aimed at striking decisive blows to the history. No. It was darker, more devious, more sinister. People were moving through the waters of history, like submarines lurking beneath the thermals of time. People were out there trying to kill him!
The sound of a knock on the door shook him from his fearful reverie, and he sat up in his chair, eyeing the door with suspicion.
“Who is it?”
“Tyrenkov, sir. Here to report.”
“Come.”
The door opened, and Tyrenkov strode in, saluting as he came. He reached into his jacket pocket and drew out his pistol, handing it to Karpov. The barrel was still warm.
“The operation was successful,” said Tyrenkov flatly. “Petrov’s defense did not work this time. He is dead.”
Karpov took a long, deep breath. The assassin was dead, and now his Great Grandfather would live, or so he believed. His life line seemed more secure—at least for the moment. He breathed deeply, satisfied, and appreciating Tyrenkov’s efficiency and calm yet again.
“That will conclude our business here,” he said. “We will depart for Ilanskiy immediately.”
“Very well, sir. I’ll go to the bridge and inform the Air Commandant.”
“Don’t bother,” said Karpov. “I have already informed him by telephone. We’ll be underway shortly. Why don’t you sit down for a moment. As to Petrov, you were certain he expired?”
“I put a bullet right through his head, sir,” said Tyrenkov. “If he did survive I don’t think his brain would have been of any further use to him. Why did he wish to kill your Great Grandfather?”
“An interesting question,” said Karpov. “The thought did occur to me that he was put up to it by others.”
“Who sir?”
“Don’t think I reached this position without making enemies, Tyrenkov. I can think of several people who might want me dead now. This attack on my Great Grandfather always bothered me as a young man. My father told me about it, and I once thought that I might not even be alive if this man Petrov had done his dirty work a few months sooner, before my grandfather was conceived. It is a very sly way of completely eliminating someone from the line of fate. You just kill his ancestors! Who might wish to do this, I wondered? Ivan Volkov came to mind immediately.”
“Volkov?” said Tyrenkov. “But how would he have any influence over Petrov, a man of this day and age?”
“I thought the same thing,” Karpov replied. “If Volkov was behind this plot, then he would have had to have some means of traveling to this year in time to recruit Petrov for this task. I can think of no way that would be possible—except for one.”
“Ilansky,” said Tyrenkov quietly.
“Precisely. You are very sharp, Tyrenkov. Yes. If Volkov were to gain control of Ilanskiy, and learn of that back stairway, then he might send someone back and do something like this. He could not come himself, as he is already here—even as we speak, but as the impudent young officer who was sent to inspect my ship. He’s still probably trying to figure out what happened to him, and drowning his sorrows with some good vodka. But that Volkov would know nothing of my rise to power in Siberia, or of our enmity. Only the Volkov of 1941 would have that knowledge, and also the knowledge of Ilanskiy if he had mind enough to associate his fate with that place—and I think he did. Otherwise, why did he violate the treaty we signed at Omsk, and make that stupid attempt to seize Ilanskiy? You see? Volkov already tried to get Ilanskiy under his control once…”
Tyrenkov was silent for a time, thinking. Then he looked up and asked another question. “You think Volkov may have made a subsequent attempt—and one that succeeded this time?”
It was a dark thought, and still sent a shiver down Karpov’s spine. “That is a possibility,” he said. “But it would mean he was able to drive all the way to Ilanskiy, and I don’t like the sound of that. It would mean we were defeated on the eastern front by the Grey Legion.”
“You mean beaten by Volkov’s forces? At some future time?”
“A bit unnerving to consider that, isn’t it?” said Karpov. “Yet that is one scenario that would have to occur if Volkov were behind the plot to kill my Great Grandfather. It gave me fits for a time, until I realized that for Volkov to at
tempt this, I would have to still be alive, and a viable threat to him in that future time.”
“Why wouldn’t he just send someone back and shoot one of your ancestors, as I just shot Petrov?”
“Who knows? Perhaps he prefers a subtle touch, and one that does not directly implicate him… Yet all of this is mere speculation. I have come to conclude that Volkov was not the culprit. If someone did put Petrov up to this attack, then it was another man.”
“Who?” Tyrenkov was simple and direct, another reason Karpov admired him.
“That is what you and I will set our minds on now,” said Karpov. “If Petrov was a tool, then the man who sought to use him would have to have the means of traveling to this time to do so—this much we have already determined in considering the Volkov question. So that creates a very short list of names, Tyrenkov. First off, the man must have the knowledge that time travel is possible, and that is known to very few. Secondly, he must have the means to travel in time, and that is another major obstacle. Thirdly, and this is the part that is certainly bothersome, he must have a motive for wanting me dead. Yes. This list is a very short one. As far as I know now, there are only a handful of men who might fulfill all these requirements.”
Who are they, sir? Give me the names and I will begin making arrangements to eliminate them. There are still five more bullets in that revolver.”
Karpov smiled. “That may take some doing,” he said. “But if you want to know, here is the list.”
Chapter 30
“First off,” said Karpov, “there is another man named Sergei who might want me dead, and his last name is Kirov, the head of the Soviet state and Bolshevik party in 1941.”
“Sergei Kirov?” This took Tyrenkov by surprise. “But didn’t you just conclude an armistice with him?”
“You mean like the accord I signed with Volkov at Omsk? Things change, Tyrenkov. Yes, I made the decision to support Kirov, but in doing so I had to reveal my true identity to him. Now he knows I am not from his time, and he also knows about Ilanskiy, giving him the means of sending someone back to the pre-revolutionary era where we find ourselves now.”
“Then you also told him about Ilanskiy?”
“No, and that was quite a shock to me when I learned about it. It seems Sergei Kirov discovered that back stairway all on his own—with a little help from one of the other officers aboard my old ship, a man named Fedorov.”
“The man you suspected as the doctor who cared for Petrov?”
“Yes, though I have not proven that connection yet. Now listen carefully, Tyrenkov. Sergie Kirov was never supposed to rise to the position he holds in your time—in 1941. No. He, himself, was the victim of an assassination plot, in 1934. This gets to be a long and convoluted tale, but suffice it to say that Soviet Russia, and the Bolsheviks, were led by another man in the history I know, a man named Josef Stalin. Kirov learned of Stalin’s rise to power, and took steps to change that.”
Now Karpov explained what he had learned, of Fedorov, and the chance meeting at Ilanskiy with the young Sergei Kirov, and of Kirov’s subsequent journeys up those stairs to glimpse the future Russia that Stalin built. Then he revealed that it was Kirov who killed Stalin as a young man, just as Tyrenkov had eliminated Petrov, while he languished in prison.
“Amazing,” said Tyrenkov. “To think that the entire history of our time, of my time, was shaped by these events. It’s very chilling. So now you think the man who attempted to recruit Petrov, the man name Sergei, was actually Sergei Kirov? But why would he want you dead?”
“That should be obvious. Because I represent the strongest possible challenge to his power—indeed, to his very existence. He knows that I have learned the secret of Ilanskiy, and that I control that site in 1941. In fact, there were more than two airships involved in that incident at Ilanskiy when Volkov launched his raid.”
“The third airship…” Tyrenkov paused. “My intelligence apparatus eventually determined it was a Soviet ship, the Narva, dispatched from Murmansk.”
“Yes,” said Karpov with obvious anger in his voice, “and it was carrying a team of elite Naval Marines, the men actually responsible for the demolition of that back stairway.”
“Were they sent there by Kirov?”
“No my friend,” said Karpov. “Not the man, but the ship. They were the Naval Marine contingent aboard my vessel, a ship named Kirov. So it was obviously a plot hatched by the senior officers of that ship.”
“The same officers who opposed you earlier?”
“Correct.”
“What was their motive?”
“Obvious again—to prevent me from discovering or ever using that back stairway. To prevent me from ever being able to get here, Tyrenkov, to a time where I can now make truly decisive changes to the history. Don’t you see? Even as we just settled the Petrov matter regarding my Great Grandfather, I have more irons in the fire here. If Sergei Kirov wanted me dead, it is because he knew I could come here and hunt him down before he ever enacts his own plan to seize power in Russia. From here I can decide everyone’s fate—Stalin, Kirov, even the officers on that ship of mine who dared to oppose me. I can deal with them all!”
“Then they are also on your list of possible suspects,” said Tyrenkov, “these other officers.”
“A few might want me dead. They have already taken bold and aggressive action against me to prevent me from achieving my vision—betrayed me, after I fought and saved that ship more times than I can count. That is how I came to Siberia! I was betrayed, and left behind.” He said nothing of the real truth, of how he came to get that scar on his cheek, of that headlong fall into the sea that was as much fate, or happenstance, as it was any betrayal by the officers and crew of Kirov.
“Perhaps they have learned who the Karpov in Siberia really is—Vladimir Karpov. If they cannot act to prevent my plans, then perhaps they would attempt to eliminate me altogether!”
“I see…” Tyrenkov thought about that. “But they are not here now, in this time. And how could they travel here?”
“Remember my old ship,” said Karpov quickly. “They meet all three conditions I specified earlier, the knowledge of time travel, the means to do so, and a motive to eliminate me. So yes. They are on my list—Admiral Volsky, and Captain Anton Fedorov. I haven’t decided about Rodenko yet, but the fact that his name came up in this Petrov business has me thinking about him as well. He was quite truculent when acting as my Starpom aboard the ship. He may also be involved in this conspiracy.” Karpov held up a finger, but Tyrenkov said nothing.
“So you see,” said Karpov. “We have quite a few things to do. We will be very busy in the days ahead, Tyrenkov.”
“I understand sir, but…”
“But what?”
“Well I was wondering about the war, the situation on the eastern front near Omsk, and our plans for the offensive. Now that we are gone—that you are gone—what will happen?”
“Don’t worry about that,” said Karpov. “First off, suppose we returned to 1941 right now, and arrive there an hour after we left? You see? We would not even be missed. But that doesn’t matter. Things we do here may rewrite all that history. What if we were to find Ivan Volkov here, and give him the same treatment we just gave Petrov? Think about that, Tyrenkov. Think long and hard. Who would we be at war with on the eastern front? There would be no Orenburg Federation when we returned—at least not under Volkov.”
“Interesting,” said Tyrenkov, though he did not speak his full mind on that subject.
“The same goes for Sergei Kirov. What if I find him here and return him to the dust bin of history where he belongs? Then who ends up ruling the Soviet Union?”
“This man you spoke of… Stalin?”
“Well I would certainly not leave that little matter unattended. Think again. Who rules if I eliminate Kirov?”
Tyrenkov allowed himself an appropriate smile. “Why, you, Admiral. That is evident. You would easily outmaneuver any opposition in this time.”
“Correct! And you will be my chief of state. I have big plans for you. Together we can accomplish a very great deal.”
“And the war? The Germans? What about that?”
“From here all that history is in play—the rise of the Nazi party. The life of Adolf Hitler himself—I hold all these things in the palm of my hand, and all I have to do is close my fist to crush anything I desire!”
The light in Karpov’s eyes could start a fire.
* * *
Tyrenkov did think long and hard about what Karpov had told him, and his logarithmic intelligence soon began to come to some very alarming conclusions. If all this were true, and he would accept as much for a starting variable in his thinking, then what if Karpov did eliminate Ivan Volkov now?
Just as Karpov said, it would mean there would be no Orenburg Federation if they ever did return to 1941. But how would they manage that? The Admiral had not given him any clear reason for their arrival here in 1909, though that storm obviously had something to do with their situation. He did not really know what had happened, but that did not matter. They were here, in 1909. He had seen that with his very own eyes when they reached Saratov. Instead of the long lines of entrenched positions around the city, there was no sign of any military activity. The city was much smaller, and the people clueless as to who he was. They were awed by the appearance of Tunguska, and not because it was an anachronism in a world that had largely abandoned airship technology. No. They had never seen a thing like Tunguska before, and that had made a strong impression on Tyrenkov’s mind.
The Admiral did not offer any clear explanation. In fact, he even stated that his own movement in time seemed to be accidental. If that were so, then the importance of Ilanskiy was redoubled. If there was a hole in the history there, then it was perhaps the only means Karpov had of returning to the future, to their own day of 1941 or even years beyond. That was why he was so eager to get there—this grandfather business aside.
Hammer of God (Kirov Series Book 14) Page 26
