John Schettler - Kirov

He could hear the voices of the Admiral and Zolkin within as he quietly moved the emergency lock bracket into place on the outside of the closed hatch, and slipped on the padlock. His hand was shaking, but he forced calm on himself. Then, with a quiet click, the lock was in place. Now he took the wire cutters, reaching high to get at the thick grey intercom cable above the hatch, which he cut with an unsteady hand. There was an audible snap when the wire was cut, and with it something snapped in his mind as well. Volsky was the last remnant of the authority that was given to them by older men in their dark blue coats, in an old system of power, all of them back in Severomorsk. Yet with one taut snap the last link to that was cut for him now. It was done. He had chewed through the last wire. His course was set now, for good or for ill.

He took a deep breath, listening, but the voices on the other side of the door kept on in their conversation. Volsky and the doctor were now locked up in the sick bay, and the Captain scurried away, his footfalls whisper soft and strangely light, glad that no member of the crew had seen him in the corridor.

Moments later he was back on the bridge again, two hours before Orlov’s watch was to end. He found the Chief and waved him over to the briefing room, closing the hatch there to keep their conversation private. The close confines of the room helped him to calm himself, like a dark quiet hiding hole.

“Volsky is awake,” he began, breathing heavily. He could feel a cold sheen of sweat on his brow, even in the chilly confines of the bridge. “The doctor is hovering over him like a mother hen, and he seems to be making a recovery. We don’t have much time, Orlov.”

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean. Volsky was not happy that we engaged the Americans. The man is getting soft and slow. He was talking about taking the ship out into the Atlantic. He doesn’t see the opportunity we have here.”

“Perhaps not,” said Orlov. “But what are you doing, Captain? You’ve been steering us south right into the thick of things. Had we turned east we could have avoided this engagement with the Americans.”

“What? Have you been sleeping with Fedorov now? Are you getting soft hearted on me as well? You, Orlov?”

“You misunderstand me,” said the Chief. “We hit them very hard and they will be angry now. We must realize that there will be consequences for this.”

“You are sounding like Volsky now.” Karpov was not happy. He folded his arms. Then wagged his finger at the Chief. “Look, Orlov. Little thieves are hanged, yes? But the big ones escape.” He was referring to an old Russian proverb that went roughly: ‘take three kopecks and hang, but take fifty and be praised!’

The Captain knew that there could be no halfway measures now. They had engaged both the British and American fleets. They would not encounter another friendly ship at sea-not now not, not ever. He knew he was fully responsible for the choices he made in the heat of action, but he could not see that he could have done anything else. The British flung their ships and planes at him, fully intending to find and sink Kirov if they could. The Captain, insofar as he saw things, did what any competent officer would have done under the circumstances, he defended himself, with all the skill and weaponry at his command. As he was trying mightily to salvage that image of himself now, he used all his considerable intelligence to defend his actions, no matter how skewed his logic had become, or how much vranyo had subtly crept into his line of thinking.

With Orlov at his side he might dispel that sense of harried isolation that had dogged him up until now. In spite of his ambition, and his devious insistence in getting his own way aboard the ship, Karpov had taken entirely too much on his round narrow shoulders when he cut that last wire. He was beginning to feel the weight of what he had done, and now he was looking for an ally, and a strong right arm to back him up.

“I thought I could count on you, Orlov. Let us face the matter squarely and decide.” He repeated all his old arguments, all the reasons he had ferreted out in the dark safety of his mouse hole. “We are never going home again, and there will be no one at Severomorsk to chasten us for anything we do here. We answer to no one but ourselves now, understand? This is war and we are a ship of war, with power to take history itself by the throat and choke it to death if we so decide. But that will take a man, not a vacillating old Admiral with too many stripes on his jacket cuff. Volsky’s day has come and gone. You and I? We have many long years ahead of us, and the power to see that those years are very agreeable. I need to know where you stand, Orlov. Are you a man, or are you going to stand there like a school boy when Volsky returns to the bridge?”

“Without a cat around the mice feel free.” Orlov stated the obvious, but all of this was more than the simple license a man might take when he could, as any man might. “Do you realize what you are saying?”

“Of course I do. Volsky will reverse us at every turn, and all the while the decisive moment slips away, or worse, our enemies will gather sufficient strength to find and kill us all.”

“But the junior officers-the crew. They worship that fat old man like a father. If it comes down to a choice between the Admiral and you, Captain, I have little doubt where most of the crew will stand.”

Karpov’s face registered irritation with that, but he kept his emotions well controlled. The Chief was repeating all the same doubts and fears he had sat with in his hole, all the same tired reasons why he should stay there in the stench, and remain a mouse.

“Look, Orlov, neither of us will win a popularity contest here. Don’t think the crew jumps when you growl because they love you either. They jump because they recognize authority when they see it; strength; will power. They jump because if they don’t it will be your boot in their ass, and the devil to pay. You know why you are the Chief, Orlov, and it is not because you are so very smart, yes? It is because you know how to clench a fist when the time comes for it, and you know how to smash a man’s face if he bothers you.”

Orlov smiled, nodding. “Volsky will be a problem,” he said, his voice even more hushed now. “Perhaps Zolkin as well.” He hesitated, his eyes revealing his uncertainty. He had seen power plays of this nature in the Russian underground, that hard world of cut-throat men, loose confederations of gangs and bosses, and he had seen more than one man toppled from his post, and more than one man killed trying just what Karpov was proposing. But this was not the Russian underground, it was a navy ship. This was mutiny…Yes, there was a special word for this sort of thing, and there had not been a mutiny on a Russian ship for decades, not since Sabin tried to take the frigate Storozhevoy to Leningrad in 1975. He hung for that, and his second got all of eight hard years in prison for his complicity. Orlov weighed the situation in his mind, and realized it took more than one man to do what Karpov was proposing.

“What will you do with them,” he asked flatly. “You can’t kill them. Kill Volsky and you’ll have to watch your back for the rest of your life on this ship. The crew love that man for a reason, Karpov. He’s not just any boss. They won’t like it, believe me, and some will have the guts to do something about it when they realize what you have done.”

“That’s where you come in. Who’s going to back you down, Orlov? Don’t worry, they won’t be harmed, of course not. Nobody is talking about killing anyone here-except the British and Americans. They are the enemy, Orlov. Keep your mind in the right place and just leave Volsky and Zolkin to me,” he finished, deciding to say nothing more about what he had already done. When the Captain perceived that Orlov still had reservations, he played out his last card. “I have spoken with Troyak,” he whispered. “He and his men are ready should we need to call on them.”