John Schettler - Three Kings

Then he had heard what happened to the Admiral Scheer, and he could no longer dismiss the talk as the idle fancy of officers too new to battle in this war. Lindemann, Hoffmann, Krancke… these were all good men, well experienced, fighting Kapitans just as he was. They would not shirk from battle like Lutjens, and yet…

Three British battleships now. Perhaps Admiral Lutjens had been correct after all. If we had stayed there and fought with the first, the other two may have come up on the action just as it was getting interesting, and they would fight fire with fire. It was a battle he still thought they may have won, but Hindenburg was out on its maiden voyage. The Fuhrer was undoubtedly jubilant with the news of the wreckage they had already left behind them. If they had fought, there was always the chance that the ship would be hit, and that did not seem to be something Hitler would enjoy hearing about. Tell the Fuhrer that his new fleet flagship has just sunk a hundred thousand tons of British merchant shipping and that was one thing-tell him that Hindenburg was blackened by the fire of the enemy’s guns-that was quite another thing.

In this light he now came to see Lutjens’ decision to turn away and make for the coast of France in better light. It’s our maiden voyage, he thought. He wants to deliver the ship to a safe harbor, take his laurels, and then scheme on fighting his battle some other day. Perhaps that was the wiser course after all, he thought, but it still did not feel all that comfortable as he turned and started for the hatch and the warmth of the inner citadel of the conning tower. They still had a long way to go. The French coast was another 2000 kilometers away, and they certainly would not run at 30 knots the whole way. This odyssey was not yet over. They would have to fall off to two thirds to give the engines and turbines a rest. Then they would see if this shadow behind them fell off as well, or came boldly forward to engage.

I might get my battle in any case, he thought, and in spite of his confidence, in spite of the power he could feel beneath him as the ship hurried on, another voice whispered in the back of his mind, and gave the old warning-be careful what you wish for…

Another man who once stood in the shadow of an Admiral was also thinking that night. Vladimir Karpov was a man who might understand Adler all too well and, if he could have heard his thoughts, he might have reinforced that note of caution in the Captain’s mind. But he was far away from the sea, hovering in the mist above the endless green forests of Siberia, scheming in his own way over what he would now do about Ivan Volkov.

There had always been someone like that in his way, he thought, and Volkov would be no different than any of the others-the school teachers, classmates, coaches, commandants and rival officers had all tasted the poison of his envy and ire. Not even Admirals were spared, and now, after demonstrating his own brand of conniving duplicity and treachery, Volkov would not be spared either. But what to do?

Sitting there aboard Abakan, thinking, Karpov knew what he would do in this situation, if only he had the power. In two years he had scratched his way into the good graces of Kolchak, but that man still had half the army facing the Japanese at Irkutsk. What remained here in the west was barely enough to hold the line. One of his best divisions, the 18th Siberian Rifles, was now invested at Omsk in the second battle his men had fought with Volkov for that city. The rail line east was cut behind the city, and now there was no way he could get supplies or reinforcements in except by airship. Behind that forward outpost, he still had four good divisions on the main line of defense along the Ob River, including his elite 32nd Siberian at Novosibirsk, and then there was the cavalry he had boasted about to Volkov. They were mostly north of Tomsk watching that flank. He had gathered his only reserve division, the 91st Siberian, here at Ilanskiy after Volkov’s ill fated raid. What was that man thinking? He threw two airships and a couple good battalions to the wolves here, all in a foolhardy attempt to take this place when he knew he could never hold it. Did he really think he could punch through and come all the way from Omsk to relieve this force?

No. He didn’t think that at all. In fact, he intended to throw me this bone all along- Symenko, the surly Squadron Commandant in the Eastern Airship Division of the Orenburg fleet. Yes, he was one ofDenikin’s old guard, the bald headed old fart who tried to lead the White movement in the Revolution. Volkov made short work of him, and easily took control, and all he was doing with this raid was cleaning out his cupboard and settling some old, unfinished business. Karpov understood that instinctively as well.

But the raid could not go unpunished, nor could the treachery Volkov had used as a prelude to this attack at Omsk. What he needed now was a nice big hammer to smash this nail, but how? He thought, musing on the awesome sight of the nuclear blast that incinerated the Naval Arsenal at Kansk. He had seen that when he went up those steps, and now he knew there was no going back that way. The war in 2021 was in its final death throes. That world was not going to survive the missiles and bombs in their thousands.

I could certainly make good use of one right now, he thought. That would stop Volkov’s offensive right in its tracks, but he knew where the only viable warheads on earth were at this moment-on the battlecruiser Kirov, the ship he had once commanded in that hour of destiny… so long ago it seemed now. The heated memory of that final moment on the bridge would still come to him from time to time, and the lashing rebuke of Doctor Zolkin’s words, the confused, yet stolid presence of Victor Samsonov as he stood up, refusing to obey, the last straw…

Yes, Samsonov was so mindlessly efficient at his post that it had seemed to Karpov the man was just another part of the ship itself. When he stood to oppose him it was as if Kirov itself has turned in rebellion, the weapon no longer willing to serve the warrior… He shook the bitter memory of those last moments with his comrades from his mind. Comrades? He sneered at that now. They were all traitors as well, no better than Volkov. One day he would settle that score, but he had other fish to fry now-Ivan Volkov.

He thought about that hammer he needed; about the arsenal at Kansk, and then an idea came to him, a devious, sinister thought of something he could do here that might suddenly change the balance of power. He did not have the warheads at his disposal any longer, and there would be no more until the Americans bumbled their way into the atomic nightmare five years from now. Yet he could create something that might serve his purpose very well here, and these old airships he commanded just might be the perfect way to deliver it.

The more he thought about this, the more he realized how easy it would be to do what he was now imagining. That thought rising in his mind like dark smoke, he turned to his Aide de Camp, a dangerous glint in his eye. “Summon all the engineers. Then tell Captain Bogrov to take us to the nearest fuel depot at Krasnoyarsk. He is to plot a course south toKyzyl, theKaa-Khem coal mine to be precise. Signal Big Red at Novosibirsk to head that way and meet us there.”

An idea was mushrooming up like a dark explosive cloud in his mind, and with the information he had in his computer jacket, he knew exactly what he would need to do.

Several weeks later Karpov had what he needed. The engineers had worked day and night, in double shifts, and all under his scrutinizing supervision. He used the information in his computer jacket to determine exactly what to do, and was pleased with the results, particularly after the first test deployment on a hapless flock of sheep.