Grand Alliance (Kirov Series) (32 page)

“Only
too well,” said Kirov.

Yes,
Ilanskiy, he thought. That was what this whole affair between Volkov and Karpov
was about. Two men from the upper floor were having a nice little tussle for
control of that stairway. They know the power it represents, even as I do. I
used it to see tomorrow—to see this time from where I was on the bottom floor,
and I used that knowledge to eliminate my enemies and take control of the
revolution. But I did not count on Ivan Volkov, and I certainly did not count
on this man Karpov.

Yes,
he’s every bit as dangerous as Volsky said, a bit of a viper, this one. Can I
keep him in a basket if I join with him now? He has Ilanskiy…

“What’s
to stop me from sending ten divisions east to do what Volkov failed to do?”

“Don’t
be foolish,” said Karpov. “You would have to start from as far away as Perm,
and its 2500 kilometers from there to Ilanskiy. No force on earth is going to
take that place from me. Understand?”

“So
what do you propose to do, Karpov? Are you going to sneak up those stairs and
bring back these terror weapons you spoke of?”

Karpov
smiled. “I suppose I could do that, but that stairway goes two directions, does
it not?”

Now the
full implications of what Karpov was saying struck Kirov like a hammer. My god,
he thought. That is true! What if this man were to start on the upper floor and
go
down
those steps? Why, he could do what I did with Stalin! He could
do that to any man alive in that time… .even me…

“Unfortunately,
the place was destroyed, Karpov. You said as much yourself.”

“Yes,
it is destroyed,” said Karpov, deciding to play his Ace, “a nice pile of rubble—for
the moment.”

Chapter 27

“For
the moment? What do you mean by that?”

“I mean
that if an inn was built in that place once, an inn with a nice back stairway
leading to heaven and hell, then one can be built there again. Yes, their
little mission was successful and they destroyed the stairway. But I could
rebuild it.”

Karpov
knew it was dangerous to reveal this, for it would show Kirov the full breadth
of the power he had at his disposal. What would he do now? Here I sit, right in
the heart of the Kremlin, and with no more than a company of security men and
the
Tunguska
hovering overhead to protect me. Kirov could lock me away
in a heartbeat, or worse. Yet if he would do that now, then he would also do it
later, under other circumstances. Yes? So I must measure the man, and find out
where he stands. He will either be my enemy, or my friend here. The die is
cast.

“Rebuild
it?” Now it was Kirov who leaned forward. “Would it still work?”

“Perhaps.
That remains to be seen. I have found the original plans and construction
diagrams, though the builder is long dead. That said, I have skilled men on the
job this very moment.”

“I see…
Then you intend to use that stairway again? In which direction will you go,
Karpov, back to your upper floor to fetch a devil’s brood of new weaponry for
your army, or back to the time of the early revolution?”

Karpov
smiled. Now he had this man’s full attention, but he had to be very careful
here. Kirov could be sounding me out to determine what to do about this
situation, he thought.

“I have
not decided to use it at all, except perhaps to test and see if the gateway
still remains open. Once I learn that, simply having it there presents me with
a final option should things ever go wrong for me. Think of it, Kirov. That
stairway represents ultimate power—the power to pluck out any weed that might
one day bloom in your garden, and long before it ever gets rooted and goes to
seed. I have ringed Ilanskiy with my best troops, and stationed three airships
there now. That and the vast distance any army must march to reach the place
make it a castle I can easily defend and hold.”

“I
suppose that is true. You would see any threat coming long before it could
reach you. But what if Volkov were to throw his entire airship fleet against
you, with every ship carrying a full battalion? He has twenty four Zeppelins!
That could carry over two full divisions of his best troops to that place, and
your air defense could not stop him.”

“He has
twenty-two Zeppelins, remember? And now I have nine. Yes, he might still win
that air duel, but he could not win the battle on the ground—he learned that
the first time he tried to raid that site, and he would be foolish to try
again.”

“What
if he were to use other means? Assassination could solve his problem easily enough.
One good man with a rifle could do what all his airships might not accomplish.
You know how good his intelligence service is.”

“I’ll
match my security forces against his any day,” Karpov folded his arms,
confident he could prevent such an attack.

Now it
was Kirov’s turn to smile. “Suppose I have you taken out and shot this very
moment, Karpov. I could eliminate your little security contingent, and then
turn every flak gun in Moscow on that overinflated balloon you have out there.”

“Yes,
you could do that if you wish. I was very bold to come here, and even more rash
to tell you all of this. You could kill me here and now—but not my plan—and you
could not get force to Ilanskiy before it was carried out. So you see, I am
neither stupid nor foolhardy. I determined that you would either end up my
enemy in this war, or my friend. I had to know which was to be. Coming here
like this would answer that question, for if you are determined to be my enemy,
then you should kill me—here and now—because you know that I can do to you what
you once did to Stalin. Do that, however, and you now make a permanent enemy of
the Free Siberian State. You decide the fate of your own nation if you kill me
here, for in that instance, Soviet Russia, and your regime, could not survive.
No. Your only hope is to find in me the strongest possible ally you could ever
have—stronger even than Admiral Volsky and his fighting ship.
Kirov
is a
great foil at sea in this war, but it only has so many missiles in its hold.
Once they are gone, that ship is no more than a dangerous looking cruise liner.
So what is it to be, Mister General Secretary? Do you want my death, and the
eternal enmity of the Free Siberian State with it, or do you want my friendship
in a grand alliance?”

Kirov
nodded his head, leaning back now and reaching for a flask of vodka and two
glasses that were on a side table. “You have thought this through very well,
Karpov. You are a very daring and determined man. I can appreciate that in a
man. You understand power like few others, and you know how to use it. So no, I
do not think I will have you taken out and shot today, because I understand
power as well, and I know how to wield it when necessary.”

He
slowly poured two small glasses of Vodka, handing one to Karpov. “So there is
no poison in this glass. Instead I will extend my hand to you in friendship, if
that is what you truly pledge here. I have no doubt that you could be a strong
ally, and one I desperately need at this moment. But can you remain loyal,
Karpov? Yes, there I do have my doubts, as your infighting with Admiral Volsky
has shown you will not think twice about opposing any man who disagrees with
you. The threat you leveled at me just a moment ago will overshadow all our
dealings, would it not?”

“Pardon
me for that,” said Karpov. “But I had to make it clear to you that I have a
power now that cannot be matched in any way. And yet, it is clear that without
your help, your leadership here in the heartland of Russia, the Free Siberian
State will remain nothing more than a cold backwater wasteland on the fringe of
this war. Then one day, just as I have warned, the tanks would come for me.
Could I find a way to prevent that by venturing up or down that back stairway
at Ilanskiy? Possibly, but why take the risk? I don’t want you dead, Kirov, nor
do I want to sit in this gilded palace in your place. What I
do
want is
the survival of our nation. Everything I have done in the past was to further
that aim, and not merely for my own personal aggrandizement. The Motherland
must survive!”

“Then
let us drink to her good health,” said Kirov raising his glass, and he took a
long sip of the vodka, breathing deeply with the heat of the liquor on his
throat. Karpov drank as well, heedless of any risk of poison. It was all or
nothing where Kirov was concerned. He had determined that the moment he decided
to come to this place.

“Together
we can try to save her,” said Karpov. “Together we save Russia from the cruel
fate that looms on our horizon. It was never supposed to be this way, Kirov.
This endless civil war should never have happened. We caused it, unknowingly,
and now it threatens to destroy our nation if we do not stand and act to save
it. Volkov does not see this, thinking that Hitler is too powerful to oppose.
He knows that the Germans will not be stopped while Russia remains divided. He
has seen the history of this war, and its outcome.”

“What
does happen, Karpov? I have not ventured up that stairway to your floor. My
sorties only took me to this time, and then back to 1908, never anywhere else.”

“What
happens? I cannot say that for certain now. In our history we prevailed in this
war, driving all the way to Berlin and crushing Hitler and his Third Reich
under the tracks of our T-34s. Build them, Kirov! Build them by the thousands.
Only you can do that. Russia needs you now more than ever, as I need you.”

“But
after that? After the war?”

“Fifty
years of guarded enmity with the West. They never trusted Stalin, and soon we
had the terror weapons they developed in the war, and so we sat, like two men
on opposite sides of a great stone wall that had been built between us, and we
never knew real friendship. Russia was strong, Russia was powerful, but they
worked to undermine us, a death of a thousand small cuts. We were never really
welcomed as a European state, always mistrusted. In my day we were a provider
of the oil and gas—the energy they needed to build and run their glittering cities.
And just as the oil will eventually bring Hitler’s armies to the Caucasus, so
the wars for control of that energy began in earnest in the 21st Century.”

“Another
great war?”

“Unfortunately,”
said Karpov. “I reached an accommodation with Admiral Volsky, and put to sea as
the Captain of the battlecruiser
Kirov
in 2021. I fought the opening
rounds of that third great war—for Russia! Then that slippery fish of a ship
displaced in time again. It is too complicated for me to try and explain it all
to you here. Suffice it to say that the ship took its own journey, all the way
to the time of the bottom floor—the time of your youth, Kirov. There I found
myself in a most interesting position! I could start anew, and re-write the
pages of the history that has been so cruel to our Motherland. That was what I
planned, but Volsky, Fedorov, they had other plans. They are always scheming,
those two, and they found a way to stop me and regain control of the ship. I
need not go into all the details now. Perhaps they have already told you all
this.”

“Somewhat,”
said Kirov. “Well I will tell you that I have also extended my hand in
friendship with Volsky, even as I do so with you here. Will that become a
problem for you?”

“I
cannot say. They will not think fondly of me, nor I of them just now. Both
sides feel they were betrayed, and that is a hard fence to mend.”

“Consider
trying, Karpov, for the Motherland you say you are so dearly hoping to protect.
You know as well as I do that we would all be stronger together as one. If I
could persuade Volkov to join us, I would do that as well.”

“That
would be a fruitless venture,” said Karpov. “Volkov has made his choice in the
matter, He makes it each time he orders his guns to fire on your forces, and on
mine. If there is any man I might wish to eliminate from the world stage, it
would start with Volkov. Who knows. I just might go down that back stairway and
collar the man before he can cause all this mischief.”

“And
what about Hitler. Have you considered that?”

“Of
course. But one must be very careful here, Kirov. We had no intention of
causing these changes in the history—at least that was the way Admiral Volsky
and Fedorov tried to play it. Yet Volkov slipped through, probably by sheer
coincidence, and here he is now, a boil on our backside and the undoing of the
Russian State. Perhaps I was rash and thoughtless in believing I could deliberately
re-write the history, and have it all come out they way I might choose. I have
learned a few things, Kirov—learned the hard way. Loyalty means something.
Power is one thing, but it is not something one can wield thoughtlessly, and it
is sustained and nurtured by those the powerful hope to lead.”

“Or so
I have learned as well,” said Kirov. “So then you will think long and hard
before you rebuild that back stairway at Ilanskiy, or ever think to walk those
seventeen steps again.”

“Seventeen?
I hadn’t taken any notice of that.”

“I did.
I counted them every time I went up those stairs, and every time I walked back
down. It is dark there, Karpov. There is a frost on that stairway that chills
one to the bone, to the root of your soul, the cold breath of infinity. Rebuild
it, if you must, but be cautious. Fear that place, Karpov. You may think it is
the stairway to heaven, Lucifer, but it can also be the stairway to hell, just
as you said earlier.”