Get Lenin

by Robert Craven

  Kravchenko began to taste copper in his mouth. Behind him the shooting had stopped, the shouts and screams falling silent as grenades were lobbed into the carriage. This is it, he thought, this is where I die, trapped like a rat.

  Soldiers, desperate, surged, pushing him further into the alcove, smothering him. The first grenade flashed and the carriage shook.

  Then the rest went off, muffled by the bodies pressing into him. Men screamed, cried out and, like cornered animals, sought escape by any means back into the snipers line of vision. More fell onto the dead, dying and injured, and a pile of bodies was mounting in the middle of the carriage. Muffled explosions outside, followed by the crack of a heavy machine gun, told Kravchenko that the second troop carrier was under attack. The body on top of him fell forward and he realised that he and two others at the alcove on the far side were all that was left of forty-five elite troops. Men were expiring in the choking miasma and the respite was brief. More grenades rolled in and detonated simultaneously, the shock wave throwing him upwards against the ceiling. Stunned, with tears rolling down his eyes, he spotted a rent in the floor. He decided he wasn’t going to wait for the next round of grenades. Grabbing two machine guns and a helmet he dived over the mass of bodies down the hole onto the snow below.

  He rolled clear of the train carriage, hoping that he hadn’t been spotted. Pushing himself slowly backwards through the snow, he surveyed the carnage. Both troop carriages were destroyed. The locomotive had been derailed, making a meandering S-shape along the tracks.

  Lenin’s carriage was untouched and German soldiers were disconnecting the carriage. Unaware of the carriage being unhitched, some Russian troops had escaped from the second troop carriage. They were firing into the trees in fire-fight desperation. They began to drop one by one as the snipers picked them off.

  German soldiers appeared on the roof and began shooting down on them. Kravchenko’s mind began to race. Part of him wanted to join his comrades but it was clear that this situation was hopeless. They had been set up and the ambush was flawless. In minutes the entire elite NKVD unit had been wiped out. Slowly he eased into the line of trees, pushing the snow together with his arms in front to cover the trail.

  Sitting against a tree stump, he fought the terror that had gripped him. His leg was involuntarily shaking as he checked himself for any injuries. His chest ached from the dive out of the carriage and he was almost totally deaf from the grenades. Blood mixed with snot ran down his face and his eyes swam with double-vision. He fought the wave of nausea that swept him. He took deep draughts of breath, the icy air piercing his lungs.

  His head began to clear and he gingerly checked himself for injuries; nothing broken and no serious cuts. Apart from a gash across his upper left hand which he dressed roughly, he was in pretty good shape.

  Focus, he thought.

  They were in the middle of nowhere, on a secret mission with only a handful of people who knew where they were. Tyumen would only start to become concerned four or five hours from now. He checked the two guns — PPSh-1941Gs — robust, full magazine, intact and not inclined to freezing. His sidearm was fully loaded and, in a sheath strapped to his calf, was a knife his father had made for him although these only marginally improved his odds of getting out of here alive.

  Already the temperature was starting to drop. Added to the state of shock he was in, time was running out. The carriage containing Lenin and his embalming team was now disconnected and a German soldier on the roof fired a flare up into the sky. The area was washed in an unearthly red light and Kravchenko pressed himself further against the tree.

  The forest overhead shook to the sound of engines revving and in the fading red light the immense shadow of an airship manoeuvring appeared across the snow. It positioned itself directly over the carriage, dancing only slightly in the breeze. The soldiers swarmed over the carriage, fastening harnesses around it. Within minutes the airship gunned its engines and slowly the carriage rose from the rails, groaning into the murky sky.

  The soldiers remained standing on the carriage's roof, checking the ropes and harnesses constantly. A lone German was strolling back toward the ship, waving to it as he re-holstered his Luger. It was clear that the soldier was an S.S. officer.

  Schenker took his time reaching the rendezvous point. During the ambush he had gone to the locomotive after it had de-railed. Ordering the two engineers down, still dazed from the blasts, he shot them both in the head. They lay slumped beside their engine, their blood mixing with the slush. He had remained out of harm’s way as Brandt’s Korps had taken out the two carriages.

  The little untermensch Olga was somewhere in the trees. The sooner he could see her, the better he would feel. He considered her presence racially unclean for such a noble operation and, if the opportunity arose, he would put a bullet in her.

  By the time he was back to Lenin’s carriage, it was leaving the ground under the drone of the airship's engines. He was joined by Brandt, Kant, Schultz and Kramer. Olga was walking back toward them. On instinct she kept looking in Kravchenko’s general direction but hadn’t spotted him.

  Snow began to fall lightly on the burning carriages and the dead bodies around them. As soon as the team had assembled, the airship banked towards a clearing. Regan could be seen hanging out of the bridge with a hand-held camera pointing at the carriage. Bader, Hauptmann and Koheller looked up, giving the thumbs-up from its roof. The carriage was swinging slightly, dragging the airship with it.

  Rathenow and his crew would have their work cut out if they had to ship it any further than the river. Rope ladders descended and the team climbed aboard. Only Schenker and Brandt remained behind.

  ‘Where were you, Schenker?’

  Schenker’s jaw clenched. ‘Neutralising the enemy.’

  ‘Two defenceless train drivers?’ The attack had gone to plan. Had it gone the other way, and his unit been wiped out, it would have been acceptable. That was war but Schenker’s actions were cowardly.

  Brandt slipped his Mauser pistol out of its holster and pressed it into SS officer’s ribs. ‘You first, Captain. From now on you will do as I say or I will shoot you and leave you in the tundra.’

  ‘Brandt, believe me, when the High Command hears of a Slav bitch fighting alongside German Soldiers, I can guarantee your remaining days will be in Russia.' He paused then sneered, ‘Too bad about that last mission in Norway. I believe it was very, very messy,’

  Brandt pushed the pistol deeper into Schenker’s gut. It yielded softly. ‘You SS officers have no head for heights … and as for Olga, at least she and I will be fighting men who aren’t afraid of a fight — climb up!’

  The Tura River was frozen as far as the eye could see and, sitting on the ice, was Kincaid’s private Short S26 C flying boat on modified skis. His studio’s logo of a bald eagle astride a film reel was emblazoned on the tail. On the nose section was the painting of a girl in a Grecian robe sitting side-saddle on a flagpole. In true cheesecake fashion, her red hair flowed out behind her and her infeasibly long legs seemed to kick joyfully the American flag flowing below her. Emblazoned beneath her in yellow day-glo letters was the flying boat’s name — The Liberty Belle. Its engines rotated against the cold, their immense blades cutting the air like scythes. Sitting beside it like toys were five fully fuelled ME 109s acting as fighter escort.

  The plan was for it to fly to Helsinki where the sarcophagus would be transferred to a U-Boat waiting among the small islands dotted around the Baltic. A small encampment stood on the edge where the fighter pilots and Kincaid’s private operators waited. Standing at the flying-boat’s door, Kincaid watched through high-powered binoculars. Below the airship’s hull hung the carriage like an injured farm animal. Brandt’s team held their positions on the roof.

  Kincaid began to smile. ‘Sweet Jesus, Eva,’ he breathed, ‘they have it.’

  Multiple explosions echoed above the tree-line where the unit had left charges in the de-railed train. Smoke rose gracefully in
to the air.

  ‘By the time the Reds realise what’s just happened, Lenin will be ensconced in Berlin.’ He grinned and began to whistle tunelessly.

  From her seat, Eva watched the airship making good time. From the encampment ran a rail that led directly to the flying boat’s hold. The carriage would be opened, the technicians removed and Lenin’s tomb would be loaded aboard.

  The half-track that had acted as the radio jammer appeared through the trees and took up position not far from the temporary rail. It towed the two anti-aircraft guns that had protected the airship hangar, their crews standing on the guns' chassis.

  The interior of the flying boat was plush; mahogany, soft leather, polished oak and gold at every turn. Eva sat in a living room area with bedrooms and a bathroom behind it. A liveried steward hovered nearby. She had just finished a meal; fillet of sturgeon, with fresh asparagus and grilled vegetables. This was followed by a Martini, and she lit another expensive French cigarette.

  Two of Regan’s cameras were set up at either end of the room. A long table with crystal goblets and champagne bottles on ice sat in line between them. On the far wall hung an American flag and on the opposite side, a Swastika. A banner between them read ‘Mission accomplished!’

  Below the floor was a hold with a compatible generator system for the sarcophagus and quarters for the embalming team. It was dependant on Zbarsky’s mind after that and whether or not he would co-operate. Kincaid’s and Schenker’s view was simple: if he and his embalmers refused to help, they’d be shot.

  Eva sipped her Martini, waiting for the moment she would contact Chainbridge and Peter. The pilots started their final check before take-off. Below, the fighter pilots climbed into their cockpits and started preparing for take-off, their engines rising to a screech from a whine.

  The flying-boat’s radio operator was communicating with Berlin on a secure channel and excited chatter went back and forth.

  Looking out, Eva could see the airship filling the sky and manoeuvring to the rail link. It banked slightly, descended, and dropped anchors either side of the rail. Eva started to seek out Brandt among the men slipping down the ropes. She spotted him and found herself watching his every move.

  She pushed her hair behind her ear almost as a reflex and chided herself immediately for doing so.

  The carriage was placed perfectly onto the rail. She spotted the SS officer hovering near the carriage door, his gun twitching in his gloved hand.

  He had changed out of combat wear to full SS regalia: black uniform, brown shirt, armband and highly polished boots. Regan slid down from the airship with a pack on his back. From it he quickly assembled a tripod for a camera and mounted one from the pack. Still filming the airship with a hand camera as it inched into position, he shouted instructions to Schenker. Preening himself for film, Schenker stepped back from the door, preparing for Regan to switch cameras. Regan loaded some cameras he had finished with into a basket hung from the airship. He tugged on the line and it was hauled up for shipping on to Berlin. Brandt’s team then released the harnesses and the carriage glided down the incline to a stop.

  Brandt and his tall lanky sergeant gave a hand signal and, with a roar, the airship rose and banked toward the west, bound for Army Group Central.

  Kravchenko worked his way through the forest. There was little to salvage after the German devices had destroyed the carriages. He had walked along both sides of the destruction hoping to find the other two men in his carriage but found only corpses.

  He managed to salvage some supplies, ammunition and, by a miracle, vodka, black bread and cold sausage. Undoing his bandaged hand, he poured the alcohol over the wound, winced, and then drank the last few mouthfuls.

  His choices were stark. Get Lenin back before the Germans could remove him from Russia or trudge back to Tyumen and report what happened.

  Either way he was a dead man.

  The airship was easy enough to follow with the carriage weighing it down, but following it on foot wasn’t easy. Having been raised in the Urals, Kravchenko knew that the wolves would be drawn to the smell of the dead. As an afterthought he could add them to the firing squad and the Gulag as his options for the future.

  He picked his way between the trees, listening for the airship. Occasionally the top-most branches would shake as the carriage was dragged along. It was heading in the direction of the River Tura, which meant he would probably encounter more Germans — yet another way to die, he thought wryly. He kept the vodka bottle as an opportunity to fill it with petrol and use it as a bomb might present itself later.

  He began to recover from the shock of the attack and his mind started to focus on what, if anything, he could do. He needed above all else to get hold of a radio. It was still two hours at least before anyone would suspect anything was wrong. The forest began to part and he could hear heavy vehicles roaring, trying to keep the diesel flowing in the dropping temperature. He skirted along the edge and stopped in his tracks.

  The flying boat out on the ice seemed to go on forever, the crew moving around like ants with the fighters dwarfed by its bulk. Glinting in the faint light like a prehistoric bird, its engines shook the surrounding air like a gun battery.

  Kincaid had stepped down onto the ice and joined the German team. They were relaxed and laughing, drinking coffee laced with strong Irish whiskey. Snow was falling lightly, giving the air a festive feel. Brandt and Kant smoked quietly, talking low and looking around. Olga joined them, wrapping her arms around Kant briefly.

  The message from Berlin was, 'Congratulations — keep moving — U-806 is en-route.'

  An SS trooper descended from the plane and trotted over to Schenker. He motioned the captain to lean closer and uttered something into his ear. He handed Schenker a message. Schenker straightened slowly and nodded. The trooper trotted back up into the plane.

  After reading it, Schenker produced a lighter and lit the paper. It burned to his glove as he lit a cigarette from it, the ashes scattering in the breeze. Separated from its locomotive, the carriage doors were easy to prise open and Kincaid and Schenker strode in.

  Dr Zbarsky and his team raised their hands in surrender, blinking in the glare of torches and powerful lights for Regan to film with. Schenker and Kincaid leaned in to look at Lenin. He was intact and showing no signs of damage. Schenker turned to Zbarsky, smiling coldly. ‘Good evening, Herr Zbarsky. I trust you had a good flight.’ He smiled at his own joke and pointed his idle Luger at the Doctor. ‘We have much to discuss.’

  Zbarsky just stared ahead.

  Bader and Hauptmann watched Lenin’s technicians and Zbarsky, Kincaid and Schenker walk toward the flying boat. Instinct warned them that something wasn’t quite right. They exchanged glances. Brandt and Kant hadn’t been invited to board the plane. Regan had cameras standing idle and he wasn’t making any effort to use them.

  Schultz was radioing in co-ordinates for their collection by transport, his broad back sitting like a boulder on the ice. He looked up, sensing something too. Years of training and combat operations gave the unit a collective intuition for danger. Bader and Hauptmann started scanning the tree-line along the shore, their fingers resting lightly on their machine gun triggers.

  Schultz shouted in frustration, ‘Scheisse! The signal is still jammed. That bloody half-track over there — I’m going over to kick their arses!’ He trudged toward the half-track, cursing loudly and waving his fist,

  ‘Poor bastards are in for a roasting,’ grinned Bader. The unease was growing in his gut, but he was unable to pinpoint it.

  Hauptmann tried to smile about it. Schultz’s finely honed perfectionism was the butt of endless jokes. Hauptman’s eyes kept flicking from Brandt and his sergeant to the tree line, back to his officers and to the river’s edge.

  Olga stiffened nearby and unslung her rifle, almost sniffing the air for impending doom. The Alpine commandos and the Chechen were now collectively coiled tight like a spring.

  Distracted by the activity on th
e ice, the three crewmen in the cockpit craned their necks, watching the airship’s departure. The stewards and attendants blocked the plane’s doorway laughing and cheering standing out on the steps.

  Regan was trying to get them to pose for a photograph. Kincaid standing at the bottom step was sweeping his arm back toward them.

  Eva slipped out of her seat, pretending to get a better view. Smiling sweetly at the crewmen in the cockpit, she stumbled onto the radio operator. He blushed intently under her smile, grabbing her waist and helping her steady her feet.

  His headset slipped off his head, and as he swivelled on his chair looking for them, Eva twisted the band-width dial several times in succession, counting 1-2-3. As the radio operator tried to pull himself together, she pushed into him again, giggling as if tipsy. Apologising, she got out of the cockpit and made a good attempt at a blush.

  The crewmen smiled and laughed back, saying it was ok with hands raised. Smiles all round and she made her way back to her seat. She smiled coyly at the radio operator as if sharing a private joke. He returned the smile, blushing deeper and without even noticing the radio channel had changed resumed radioing into Berlin on a secure channel.

  The snow was falling heavily in Helsinki. Chainbridge and De Witte sat in the British Embassy on Itainen Puistotie with the head of Overseas Intelligence.

  Eva’s reports had been sporadic. The Germans had uncovered a spy and were now tightening the net within the Reich. The underground in Berlin were being hunted down and they could no longer forward Eva’s Braille. She had got word to Chainbridge through Kincaid’s studios via her agent in London. Kincaid would be leaving for the Baltic within the next week and she was accompanying him. On receipt of this, the two men had arranged to travel to Helsinki, a hazardous trip that had taken over a week aboard a Portuguese merchant ship, avoiding German commercial raiders and U-Boats.

  The small basement room was filled with cigarette smoke, the smell of coffee and a faint undertow of sweat. A large tri-band radio receiver was tracking any and all radio signals out of The Soviet Union. The highly experienced radio operator would crane his neck forward at the slightest change in signal.