Paradox Hour
Number XVI of Kirov
John Schettler
The Writing Shop Press (2015)
* * *
Kirov Saga:
Paradox Hour
By
John Schettler
A publication of: The Writing Shop Press
Paradox Hour, Copyright©2015, John A. Schettler
Discover other titles by John Schettler:
The Kirov Saga: (Military Fiction)
Kirov - Kirov Series - Volume I
Cauldron Of Fire - Kirov Series - Volume II
Pacific Storm - Kirov Series - Volume III
Men Of War - Kirov Series - Volume IV
Nine Days Falling - Kirov Series - Volume V
Fallen Angels - Kirov Series - Volume VI
Devil’s Garden - Kirov Series - Volume VII
Armageddon – Kirov Series – Volume VIII
Altered States– Kirov Series – Volume IX
Darkest Hour– Kirov Series – Volume X
Hinge Of Fate– Kirov Series – Volume XI
Three Kings – Kirov Series – Volume XII
Grand Alliance – Kirov Series – Volume XIII
Hammer Of God – Kirov Series – Volume XIV
Crescendo Of Doom – Kirov Series – Volume XV
Paradox Hour – Kirov Series – Volume XVI
Award Winning Science Fiction:
Meridian - Meridian Series - Volume I
Nexus Point - Meridian Series - Volume II
Touchstone - Meridian Series - Volume III
Anvil of Fate - Meridian Series - Volume IV
Golem 7 - Meridian Series - Volume V
Classic Science Fiction:
Wild Zone - Dharman Series - Volume I
Mother Heart - Dharman Series - Volume II
Historical Fiction:
Taklamakan - Silk Road Series - Volume I
Khan Tengri - Silk Road Series - Volume II
Dream Reaper – Mythic Horror Mystery
Mailto: [email protected]
http://www.writingshop.ws ~ http://www.dharma6.com
Kirov Saga:
Paradox Hour
By
John Schettler
“Mother Time is a dressmaker specializing in alterations.”
— Faith Baldwin
Kirov Saga:
Paradox Hour
By
John Schettler
Part I – Escape
Part II – Ghost Ship
Part III – Keeper of the Keys
Part IV – Turnabout
Part V – Lenkov’s Legs
Part VI – The King’s Business
Part VII – Choices
Part VIII – Peake’s Deep
Part IX – Maxim 17
Part X – The Uninvited Guest
Part XI – Twisted
Part XII – Empty Chairs
Author’s Note:
For readers who might be dropping in without having taken the journey here from book one in the Kirov Series, this is the story of a Russian modern day battlecruiser displaced in time to the 1940s and embroiled in WWII. Their actions over the many episodes have so fractured the history, that they now find themselves in an alternate retelling of those events. In places the history is remarkably true to what it once was, in others badly cracked and markedly different. Therefore, events in this account of WWII have changed. Operations have been spawned that never happened, like the German attack on Gibraltar, and others will be cancelled and may never occur, like Operation Torch. And even if some events here do ring true as they happened before, the dates of those campaigns may be changed, and they may occur earlier or later than they did in the history you may know.
This alternate history began in Book 9 of the series, entitled Altered States, and you would do well to at least back step and begin your journey there if you are interested in the period June 1940 to July 1941, which is covered in books 9 through 16 in the series. That time encompasses action in the North Atlantic, the battle of Britain, German plans and decisions regarding Operations Seelöwe and the attack on Gibraltar in Operation Felix. Action against the French fleet at Mers-el-Kebir and Dakar is covered, along with O’Connor’s offensive in North Africa, and the coming of Rommel. The little known British campaigns in Syria and Iraq get a good deal of attention, and other events in Siberia occur that serve as foundations for things that will happen later in the series.
To faithful crew members, my readers who have been with me from the first book, this volume stands as the sequel to the Grand Alliance Trilogy and also concludes the second eight volume “Altered States” saga in the series. It will take the action to the eve of that fateful day and hour on July 28, 1941, when Kirov first displaced in time.
-J. Schettler
Part I
Escape
“You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.”
― Abraham Lincoln
Chapter 1
Karpov stood on the gondola bridge of Tunguska, riding the turbulence of the angry skies in the largest craft ever to fly above the earth. Everywhere on the ship, men were standing in taut readiness at their battle stations, the gunners behind the long steel barrels of their recoilless rifles, the flight engineers at their stations to watch speed, buoyancy, elevation and the trim and cut of Tunguska’s massive tail rudders. There was still a stunned silence on the bridge, and Captain Bogrov could still feel the sting of Karpov’s gloved hand on his cheek. They had all seen the agonizing death of Big Red, the awful searing fire of the explosion when Karpov launched every RS82 rocket that remained into the tail of the ship to ignite his terrible fire bomb.
The flagship of the enemy fleet was caught in that explosion, her sides rent open, canvass shell burned away, gas bags serrated by the fragments of Big Red’s shattered duralumin tail frame. Both ships had been struck a fatal blow with Karpov’s merciless order, and both would die in those last terrible minutes, suspended in the fires until the weight of their own twisted airframes overcame their buoyancy, and started the long plummeting fall to their doom. Down they went, like two massive smoking comets in the sky, crashing to earth with a thunder that challenged the storm above in its fury.
Yet out of that calamitous moment, a few souls were lucky enough to escape, leaping for their lives from the burning airships, and the men on the bridge of Tunguska watched in horror. Parachutes bloomed in the sky, and something fell like an evil seed from the deep underbelly of the Orenburg—a small metal sphere.
Karpov saw it fall, and immediately knew he was seeing the desperate retreat of his enemy, Ivan Volkov. His hard voice had broken the stillness on the bridge, the biting barb of orders forcing life and movement into hands, arms, and legs again, setting the crew to the task that was now uppermost in his mind—get Volkov. Get him before that seed fell to good ground and could sprout again in the Devil’s Garden he had made of this world. And so the Rudderman was hard on the wheel, then engines roared, and Tunguska lurched about in the sky, turning north by northwest, and riding the wind in feverish wrath.
Ports opened on the smooth brow and chin of the ship, and the concave Topaz radar dishes deployed, ready to search the grey lines of clouds for any sign of the enemy. Up ahead, Karpov could see a smaller silver fish diving into a cloud, the Abakan, slowly taking up position in the vanguard of his formation. This was all that remained of his fleet at the moment, unless Talmenka could hasten up from the south, or he could get help from his last two battleships to the east, Irkutsk and Novosibirsk.
Volkov believed he would destroy my entire fleet, thought Karpov. Instead he got a nasty little surprise here again. The tables are turned! Orenburg is a smoking wreck down there, and I’ve already killed or
beaten off eight of his ships! Yes, we paid a heavy price for that. It was not easy for me to do what I had to do just now and sacrifice Big Red. So now I must be certain Volkov suffers. He’s down there somewhere, and if he managed to survive that fall, then he will be scrambling to make contact with his men on the ground and get to another airship as soon as possible.
Good, let him try.
“Topaz stations, report!” His voice was hard on the voice tubes, the thin reply barely discernible over the noise of Tunguska’s engines.
“Contact bearing zero-one-two degrees true. Large signal. Speed and elevation unknown.”
Rodenko would come in handy at a time like this, thought Karpov. But even he would have difficulty reading the signals from this antiquated equipment. Four enemy airships remained, and this could be nothing else than what it seemed. Volkov was planning to get there on the ground and gain the protection of those airships. His signalmen had been listening to the enemy on radio as orders were called out, ship to ship. In the heat of combat they had foolishly resorted to use of the open airwaves, instead of coded Morse signals. He knew he might now be facing these four enemy airships, and last reports had three at good elevation, at least 5000 meters, somewhere to the north. Now he finally had a good read on where they were.
They have two S-Class ships out there, Sarkand and Samarkand, and they’ll have no more than eight 76mm guns each. The other two ships were reported as A-Class, the Armavir and Anapa—eight guns each again, though they will have a single 105 on the main gondola. That’s 32 guns in all for the enemy. I’ve got 24 on Tunguska alone, and half of those are heavy 105s. Throw in the eight guns on Abakan and we match them easily enough. It will all come down to tactics and air maneuvers, and let them try to best me if they dare. One look at Tunguska will probably send them scattering like a flock of frightened birds.
So there you have it, Rudkin!
He spoke now to the unknown author of that precious little book Tyrenkov had inadvertently picked up on that trip up the back stairway at Ilanskiy. When Giants Fall—The Death of the Siberian Air Fleet. Well you can tear all that to pieces now, can’t you, Rudkin—just like I tore Volkov’s fleet apart here. Yes, this isn’t over yet. We’ve another good battle to fight, but I have little doubt as to the outcome. And one day, where ever you are, Rudkin, you’ll settle into a library chair and find out that everything you based your stupid little story on has been turned on its head! It will not be Ivan Volkov you glorify with that flowing prose. You have a good deal of editing to do. Try to write me out of the story? I don’t think so. No! I don’t go down so easily. So this time get it right. Remember my name—Vladimir Karpov. I’m going to re-write your entire book!
He smiled, his thin lips tight as he gloated inwardly at his victory. Now to make that victory complete. Now to get up north to those last few ships and finish them off before Volkov could get to one and escape. Three at good elevation… That will mean they are standing on overwatch, while that fourth ship goes to ground to lower a cargo basket and haul up Volkov’s sorry ass. If I try to descend to get that fourth ship, the other three will all be well above me, and Abakan will not have the guns to hold them off. So I must send Abakan down after Volkov. It’s the only way. Only Tunguska has the firepower to stand with their top cover. Yes, I hate to hand off this task to Abakan. I’d much rather be the one to get down there after Volkov, but tactics first.
“Signal Abakan,” he said calmly. “Tell them they are to bear on that enemy contact, but begin a gradual descent. They are to look for any enemy ship near ground level, and destroy it. We will hold elevation at 5000 meters. After that, get word to Tyrenkov on the ground. Tell him I want a flying column assembled as soon as possible. Get them north to the coordinates of that contact. As to our remaining ships. They are to make for Ilanskiy, and stand on overwatch there. One ship may descend for ground support fires, but only one. I want at least two of the three ships up at 4000 meters, preferably Irkutsk and Novosibirsk, if they ever get here.”
Those last two ships were both good battleships, 16-guns, and in the same basic size class as old Big Red. They were aging, but still had the firepower for a good fight. Once they arrived, Karpov knew he would have complete air superiority here. Yes, there were still twelve more airships in Volkov’s fleet, and two others that were detached after that first fight with Yakutsk. But many of those ships will be far away, some as far south as the Caucasus where Sergei Kirov’s troops were struggling with Volkov’s 6th Army. So in Karpov’s mind, the situation was looking very good here, very good indeed. He had a firm rein on things now, and was convinced that final victory was also within his grasp.
Yet he did not have command of all the facts. Those two ships that had been detached because of damage sustained in that first fleet battle had returned—Pavlodar and Talgar—and with them was yet a third ship, another 8-gun heavy cruiser, the Krasnodar. Of the three, the best of the lot was Pavlodar, a 160 cubic meter lift battlecruiser with twelve guns. And Ivan Volkov was not heading north to try and reach the four ships Karpov now had on his radar screens. Yes, the reports had been accurate. There were three ships on overwatch, and one at low elevation, the Armavir, but that was only because the ship had been fighting a bad tail fire suffered in that hot ambush when Tunguska had first come on the scene and nearly destroyed Admiral Zorki’s entire four ship division.
The grey skies and limited range of the radars had all conspired to hide the arrival of Pavlodar and Talgar to the west, where they had also brought in two much needed companies to reinforce Volkov’s ground force. As such, they were both at low elevation to land those troops, and not seen by the rudimentary Topaz radar systems.
Volkov, his devious mind still sharp enough to read the situation, knew he would be a fool to try and reach the airships to the north. The land was broken with stands of trees, and occasional marshy clearings, and he would never get his motorbikes through all that in any good time. But he would get west on the good road to Kansk where Pavlodar was still hovering low, if the Siberian Tartars did not get him first.
* * *
Volkov looked up to see the massive shape of Tunkuska high above, a dark blight in the skies, slowly swallowed by the thickening clouds.
I have one great advantage, he thought. I can see that bastard easily enough when he’s up there lording about in that monstrosity, but the inverse is not true. He knows I may be down here—at least he must assume as much. Now he’ll be trying to read my mind, and he knows I’ll want to get airborne again as soon as possible. In that he will be correct. I cannot take the chance of lingering here like a common soldier. I can see now that the decision to detach Pavlodar and Talgar was premature. I was overconfident, too brash, and I underestimated that son-of-a-bitch Karpov yet again. Now there is no further room for error.
He looked west, along the road to Kansk where the situation on the ground still remained very confused. Some of his men had landed there earlier, thinking to surprise the enemy at Kansk and quickly seize that town. There they were to have set up a blocking position to stop any rail traffic from the Ob River line front from reaching Ilanskiy. But the situation in the main battle had compelled Colonel Levkin to recall those troops, leaving only his motorcycle platoon astride the road as a rear guard. They had been surprised by squadrons of Karpov’s Siberian Tartar cavalry, and those who could, fled east along the road.
All this was happenstance, thought Volkov. All of it—Kymchek’s failure to read the enemy strength on the ground, the cavalry ambush that sent those motor bikes to me here, and now that decision to detach those two airships pays me an unexpected dividend! So I head west, right down this road. I should find two companies up ahead, and Pavlodar waiting for me at ground level. No sense wasting any further time here. I must get to that airship!
“Sergeant! Lead the way!”
There were no more than twelve men left from the Motorcycle Platoon, but they would have to do. It seemed a feeble escort for the General Secretary of the Oren
burg Federation at that moment, and the noisome bikes would be easily heard by any Tartars still lurking in the woodlands flanking the road ahead. This was going to be very dangerous, perhaps the most dangerous thing Volkov had done in many years. A man in his early sixties, he was still fit, and his mind was as sharp as ever. Now the thrill of danger seemed to catalyze him, and his eyes gleamed as the column started off.
Sergeant Beckov led the way, with three bike-mounted troopers. Then came the only sidecar bike in the squad, where a gunner was manning a DT-28 ‘record player’ machinegun. Behind this went Volkov, flanked by a man on either side, with the last section of four men following. The motor bikes were quick and very agile, and easy to ride on the good road surface. They roared off, leaving a thin trail of dust behind them, and Volkov glanced up warily, thinking he might see the dark shadow of Tunguska looming above him at any moment.
It was only his fear whispering to him. That airship was far too high to spot him here on the ground, and the heavy cloud cover was providing a good cloak against observation from the air. They sped down the road, until Sergeant Beckov raised his right arm, fist clenched, bringing the column to a halt. He looked over his shoulder, shouting back to Volkov.
“Cavalry up ahead. Not many, but they are blocking the road.”
“Well don’t just sit there, Sergeant. Clear them off!”
Paradox Hour Page 1