by A P Bateman
“Are you okay?” King asked.
“No,” she said. “You knocked me off the damned bike and I’ve hurt my stomach. Shrapnel has torn my leg up, and my eyes are raw…” She forced a smile. “But other than that, I’m fine!”
King chuckled. “Well, it’s been quite a day.” He guided her to the rope and tied it around her waist. He gave a little tug, and the two crew members hand-overhanded her to the top of the coning tower some thirty-feet above the ice.
The rope was dropped back down, and King caught hold of it, gave them the curtsey of climbing as well as he was pulled up the soaking hulk of metal, now starting to freeze in the icy air.
“God almighty, you stink!” one of the men grumbled.
“Thank you, Seaman Archer!” the older man snapped. He looked at King. “I’m Commander Patterson, welcome aboard the boat.”
“The boat?” King asked incredulously.
“Secret squirrel stuff and nonsense,” Patterson said wryly. “No mention of the sub on this mission. Skull and crossbones stuff.”
King nodded. The commander seemed as if he’d been teleported in from 1944. He imagined him to be from a long line of socially awkward men from a family with a long-standing naval tradition. No doubt, some grandfather or great uncle had been an admiral. He turned to the young seaman and said, “And that’s fresh air, in all it’s glory,” he smiled, recalling an anecdote how submariners become so used to recirculated and sterile air, that they can smell the men who have been ‘up top’ from a huge distance. The men’s crewmates would smell the air on them, no matter how pure and fresh from The Norwegian wilderness.
“It’s overrated, Sir,” the young seaman quipped, expertly coiling the rope around his elbow and shoulder.
The commander stood aside and helped Natalia through the hatch and down the ladder. He looked back at King and his expression changed from mild curiosity to terror. “In coming!” he shouted and ducked down into the confines of the coning tower.
King felt the whoosh as the rocket propelled grenade shot past and missed the coning tower by mere inches. It carried on its flat trajectory and after nine-hundred metres detonated automatically. Molten-hot shrapnel showered down on the ice and the cloud of smoke spiralled in the wind. The thunderclap of detonation reached them a moment later.
King turned and saw the figure on the ice. He was staggering, reloading the launcher as he walked. King looked up at the seaman as he swung around the ladder and slid down onto the hull. “Get the sub out of here!” he yelled. “Now! And don’t wait for me!”
The commander was back on the coning tower and shouted, “We can’t risk the boat!”
“I said, don’t wait for me!”
King sat down and slid down the hull of the vessel, hit the ice slab and carried on sliding until he was on the icepack. As he sat astride the snowmobile and could already hear the sub sinking under the ice, and the whoosh of another rocket propelled grenade heading his way. This time, it found its mark and detonated against the thick slab of ice before the shrapnel bounced harmlessly off the coning tower. A direct hit would rupture the steel and the sub would be put out of action. If he managed to hit the hull, then it would sink to the bottom of the fjord.
King saw the man reloading from a canvas satchel. He was closer now, and he could see the man had at least one more rocket after that. He pressed on the throttle and the snowmobile tore off, accelerating savagely and throwing a rooster tail of ice twenty-feet into the air.
Colonel Rechencovitch shouldered the launcher, wincing at the pain in his shoulder. His body had taken the bullet from King, but his ballistic vest had taken the rest. The shot that had found its way through the seam of the vest had gone through, but he knew he would likely bleed to death before long. His clothing was soaked in blood, he could feel it congealing on his snowsuit, yet feel the wetness creeping over his skin underneath. The fragments of bone had nicked an artery. No matter. He would finish the task assigned to him, and his record would go unblemished. It would never be made public, but both Spetsnaz and the GRU would know, and his legend would live on. He watched as the snowmobile drew near. He didn’t want to waste a shot, but he couldn’t take another shot at the submersing vessel with this man coming at him. He crouched low, took aim and fired.
King took his thumb off the throttle and leapt to the side. The grenade impacted in front of the snowmobile and the machine was flung in the air in a shower of shrapnel and chunks of ice and landed back down on the edge of the hole created by the detonation. It started to slide into the water, its engine and manifold hissing as the cold water enveloped the craft. King had hit the ice hard but kept rolling. When he tucked into a crouch, he had the pistol in his hand. The man wasn’t where he thought he’d be, but was running on the ice, getting closer to the submarine as he reloaded the launcher. He tossed the satchel aside, oblivious to King, who had got to his feet and was starting out in pursuit. King fired, clipped the man’s shoulder and he went down. He scrabbled back to his feet, picked up the launcher, again ignoring King as he fired. The bullet caught the man mid-torso. He fell, but the ballistic vest had stopped the bullet and done no more than break a rib. He sucked air in, staggered to his feet again, but his aim was unsteady. He dropped to his knees at the edge of the hole in the ice. The snowmobile was half-submerged, hanging on by its front skids.
King glanced at the submarine. It was pushing forward through the ice, its coning tower carving a path through, still fifteen feet above the ice and dropping slowly. He looked back at the man, stubbornly ignoring him and working on the aim for his final shot. King aimed at the man’s head. His last shot. He fired, but the bullet clipped the man’s neck. The man swiped at the wound as if he had been bitten by a fly. He looked at the blood on his fingers, glanced back at King, then steadied his aim on the submarine.
King was running now. He closed the gap, threw the pistol at him but it sailed past his face. Enough to trouble his aim. King was diving through the air in a rugby tackle. He landed hard, barrelling into the man and pushing his aim off. The rocket launched and sailed off into the sky. King had hold of the man and they slid over the ice and into the hole and the freezing water.
Rechencovitch was thrashing about in the water. He wasn’t just shocked at going in, but incandescent that his final attempt had sailed harmlessly into the night. As if to drive the fact home, the grenade detonated on its nine-hundred metre limit and the darkness was briefly illuminated in its impotent glare. He caught hold of King, growling in rage. King punched and kicked, then rolled onto his back and every kick aimed at the man propelled him to the edge of the ice. One kick caught the Russian in his mouth, and his ferocious attack slowed and put some distance between them. King reached the edge and clambered out. As the Russian reached him, he pushed off him with his right foot and got clear of the water. He was shaking, but as the man reached the ice, he had enough strength left in him to hammer a fist onto the man’s clawing hand. King rolled over, staggered to his feet and looked down at the man as he tried again to reach the side. This time, King managed a boot and the man yelped, withdrew his hand and sunk under. He came thrashing back and stared at King. He knew he’d lost, and his glare said as much. He thrashed through the water, away from King and reached for the other side of the hole. King got there in time to kick his hands back off the ice and watch him go under the water again. He bobbed back up, clawing frantically at the water, but almost at once, he seemed to flounder and stop thrashing altogether. He stared at King, his eyes boring into him, but King’s eyes were the coldest the man had ever seen, and Rechencovitch took the sight of the man standing victoriously on the edge of the ice, his stare unwavering, to the bottom of the fjord, where death was waiting for him in the darkness.
74
The temperature was positively balmy compared to Lapland and London was clearly entering spring with fervour. Buds of green were springing from the branches of the trees lining the streets and mature daffodils filled the borders of the lush-looking gra
ss in Parliament Square. The sun was low in the sky, but there was finally some warmth behind it in the clear blue sky. It had rained earlier and now everything had a sheen that reflected the light with a golden hint of promise for the milder weather to come.
King sat in silence in the rear seat of the Jaguar. He ached, and his left hand was still bandaged from the frostbite. He had avoided surgery, but both hands were burned and discoloured. In his right hand he squeezed a squash ball. The gripping action worked the capillaries and kept the blood flowing to the deadened skin. He had been lucky.
King had stripped naked and rolled in the snow to insulate himself from the water. He had wrung out his clothing as best he could, but the windchill had been like a thousand blades on his skin. Once he had gotten the damp clothing back on, shivering so violently, his body looked like it was going into spasm, he had used the residual heat from the engine in Rechencovitch’s snowmobile to bring some warmth into his hands. He had burned himself on the manifold several times, barely noticing the change in temperature before it was too late. He had rummaged through Rechencovitch’s pack and pulled on the man’s spare over-suit, which cut out the wind and allowed his own body heat to warm and steam the wet clothing underneath.
With the rest of the team on route to Kittila, and without enough fuel showing on the gauge of the snowmobile to return to the ruins of The Eagle’s Nest Hotel, King resorted to heading north on the E6 highway. The road he had crossed, and the northernmost road in Europe, which skirted the shores of the Arctic Ocean. After thirty-miles, he found an all-night truck stop. He nursed strong, black coffee with a lot of sugar and ate scrambled eggs and bacon with extra rye toast. He finally warmed through and the waitress helped him bind his hands with cooling burn gel and bandages from the truck stop’s first aid kit. King paid with his card and used the payphone to leave a message on Simon Mereweather’s voicemail. The MI5 deputy director returned his call and listened intently to King as he relayed the salient facts. Mereweather put King on hold for a minute or two, then told him to get to Karlebotn, where he could contact the police and arrange passage to Bergen through the Norwegian Intelligence Service. Mereweather would arrange a liaison by the time King arrived and the police would be expecting him.
King had smiled as he put down the receiver. Because of his actions last summer, he had allowed MI5 to be manipulated by MI6. Now he suspected the service would be owing Norway a favour or two down the line. He started to suspect fallout would be imminent and the thought of disappearing had been playing on his mind more frequently. He had history of playing musical chairs and having nowhere to sit when the music stopped. He wouldn’t be caught out that way again. He looked out at the murky waters of the Thames as they crossed Vauxhall Bridge. He’d given his best years to keeping this country safe from those who sought to harm.
“Good work up there,” Director Amherst said. He was seated by the other window. Neil Ramsay was sandwiched in the middle.
King didn’t respond. Ramsay was the case officer. His name would be on the sleeve of the file.
“We all played our part,” Ramsay said quietly. “I think it’s fair to say King brought us through.”
“Nonsense,” said King.
“I’m not stroking egos, and I don’t require modesty from either of you,” Amherst said. He stared straight ahead and added, “SIS threw us a curve ball. But it’s done now.”
“Really?” King asked.
“Almost,” Amherst said. “The asset, did she show signs of illness to either of you?”
“No,” Ramsay said emphatically.
King saw her looking at him, her eyes red-raw. The tears on her cheeks. His own eyes were raw, burned by the cold as he had driven the snowmobile to the rendezvous. He hadn’t thought more about it until Amherst’s question. Could she have been infected? Could her eyes have been part of the symptoms? He covered himself, hedged his bets. He wasn’t a scientist. He didn’t even have a GCSE. He shook his head. “No,” he said. But there was a nagging doubt now.
“The submarine has gone missing,” Amherst said gravely.
“Missing! Where?” Ramsay asked, but seemed to realise how absurd he sounded and added, “I suppose if we knew that, then it wouldn’t be missing…”
“Quite,” Amherst mused. “But therein lies the problem. Those vessels are made to be undetectable. They have an unlimited recirculated air supply and desalination systems for unlimited water. Naturally, nuclear power means they have unlimited propulsion and electricity, but typically only ninety days of food. The whole point of a sub is that it makes next to no sound, applies stealth tactics and launches a torpedo on a ship, or a missile on a target without being traced.”
“And there was no distress signal?” King asked.
“Nothing at all. The submarine must surface or draw near to the surface to send or receive messages. Part of its protocols is to do this twice a day. But the admiralty has heard nothing.”
“What about homing devices in the event of emergency?”
Amherst sighed. “There are systems in place, but without the sub coming close to the surface, then they cannot be triggered.”
“And it was close enough to Russian waters to cause an international incident,” King said.
“Exactly. The last thing we want is to have an emergency beacon activate and be left with egg on our faces.”
“But what about the crew?” Ramsay asked sharply. “We can’t ignore the lives of around one-hundred men!”
“We can’t afford a war with Russia!” Amherst snapped.
“Then perhaps we should stop…” Ramsay caught himself and said, “Never mind…”
Amherst shook his head. “The transcripts of conversations have been intercepted and the data wrung dry from the flash drive. GCHQ, the scientists at Porton Down and our own analysts have come up with the same conclusion. There is a missing piece that is key in the creation of this biological weapon. The potential of it being of use to us is to have a subject infected with it. Without that, we have nothing.”
“Just as bloody well,” commented King.
“So, the Russians have an apocalyptic weapon, and we have no chance of replicating it?” Ramsay asked.
“Yes,” replied Amherst. “But what we want most is the antidote to such a weapon. And for that, we need the complete biological formula.”
“I’m sensing a return trip on the cards,” King commented flatly.
Amherst shook his head. “No, nothing like that. In fact, there is going to be a terrible accident at that facility soon. Imminently, I’d say. It’s in the planning stage, but do you know what happens if a super-heated water source flows directly into geothermal shafts?”
“I’m guessing it boils?” King said. “Or super-boils?” He wasn’t a scientist, but it wasn’t difficult to work out.
“That’s right,” said Amherst. “There are people planning how to make it look like that. A sizable enough reaction to devastate the facility and everyone, or everything in it.”
“How to spin it after the bomb drops?” King asked.
“Something like that,” Amherst replied. “If we can’t have it, then neither can the Russians. The experts think that what the Russians have is ninety-five percent complete. As they were still clearly in the infancy of human testing, they most likely don’t have the delivery system in place. This way, we nip it in the bud.”
King watched the guard ahead of them signal the car to stop. Amherst’s driver lowered his window, showed the pass and was waved through to the underground parking. “Well, if the disappearance of the submarine means what I think it means, then you have your infected subject already. Or at least, a hundred of them. You just need to find the sub and get some fool to get onboard…”
Amherst shuddered. He had seen the photographs, the footage caught by Natalia. It did not bare thinking about. “We’re here now. And remember, play the tough guy, okay?”
King smiled. “Trust me. It won’t be a problem.”
75
“I didn’t expect so many of you from across the river,” he smiled. He looked at King and said, “Dangerous times, I suppose a bodyguard is desirable. My chap tends to wear a suit, though.”
King smiled. “But he’s not here, is he?”
“Meaning?”
King walked past him and stood at the window. The Thames was murky wherever you viewed it from. He turned back and said, “Take a seat, Director Villiers.”
“Now, look here…” Villiers started, but was cut short by Amherst.
“Sit down, for Christ’s sake. It’s over!”
“What is over?”
King walked back and shoved Villiers in the chest. The man dropped into his chair and it slid backwards a few feet on its casters. King dropped a photograph on the man’s lap. He followed up with two more.
“What’s this?” He looked up at Amherst. “Enough of the theatrics. Explain yourselves. And what the bloody hell are you doing with pictures of my family?”
Ramsay and Amherst had each taken a seat opposite Villiers’ desk. There were no other chairs but that didn’t bother King. He perched on the director’s desk and looked down at him.
“Peter Stewart told me about you before he died,” he said. “He didn’t trust you, could see right through you. He convinced you that he would be the ideal person to send up there to aid Fitzpatrick. He suspected you were working for the Russians. He also suspected Fitzpatrick at first, but when he was murdered, he knew that it had to be you. It was the phone call he made to you, you see. And when he was ordered back, he slipped off the radar,” he paused. “Because by then he found out that I was going up there to look into it, and he wanted to watch my back.”
