“The dentist will fit you with a false tooth containing a suicide pill,” she’d offered. “He’ll train you on how to open it to get the pill. You bite it. It’s a cyanide capsule with about five times the dose required to kill you in ten seconds. It won’t be an easy death, Grigory, but it will only last a few heartbeats.”
He’d looked at her and said, “I sincerely hope they just shoot me on the spot. But if not, I guarantee I’ll take the pill.”
She’d left him then and he’d kept the dentist appointment. The tooth felt odd in his mouth, a smooth plastic feel to it. Whenever his tongue ran over the capsule, he thought about how it would feel to die from its poison, but then he turned his mind to memories of growing up with Anatoliy.
There was a noise coming from the entrance hall to his apartment. Arkov threw off the covers and was standing up from the bed when the front door crashed open and a dozen black-clad commandos in tactical gear and rifles burst in. Before he could react they grabbed him and put on zip-ties over his wrists and his ankles, duct-taped his mouth and roughly rushed him to his apartment door, down the apartment stairs to a waiting black van.
This was it, he thought, the moment he’d confessed he feared to the FSB turncoat officer. He had told her the truth that he feared capture, interrogation and torture far more than death, and he found the tooth with his tongue, praying to God that it would work. He felt the capsule released from the tooth just as he hit the floor of the van. He bit the capsule hard, the bitter taste in his mouth, and then the horrible pain of the poison killing him.
As his vision got darker, he consoled himself that there would be no torture in his future, only the end. In his last seconds, he thought of Anatoliy, and one thought of regret, that he’d never been able to kill Vostov.
After that, there was nothing.
Weapons Officer Captain Lieutenant Katerina Sobol, the senior watch officer in the central command post, stood behind the under-ice sonar console, which was manned by Sonar Officer Senior Lieutenant Valerina Palinkova. Sobol frowned, her arms crossed across her chest.
“Watch Officer, get over here,” Sobol called to Captain Lieutenant Vilen Shvets, the communications officer. Shvets bolted up from the seat he’d occupied on the starboard side attack console and joined Sobol at the under-ice station, glancing up at the large flatpanel screen that displayed the output of the under-ice sonar.
“Oh, that’s not good,” he said.
On the display, a looming wall of ice was coming closer.
“Order all stop,” Sobol said.
“Boatswain,” Shvets barked, “all stop!”
“All stop, Boatswain, aye, and engineroom answers all stop.”
“Report speed zero knots,” Shvets called.
“Aye, sir, ship’s speed one knot,” the boatswain at the ship control console called. “Ship’s speed, zero, sir.”
“Engage the hovering system,” Shvets ordered, “and rig out forward and aft thrusters.”
Sobol picked up the tactical phone circuit handset from her station back at the command console and pushed the button for the captain’s stateroom. It took the captain a long moment to pick up.
“Captain,” Alexeyev’s voice buzzed in Sobol’s ear.
“Sir, I think you need to come to central.”
“On my way.”
A few seconds later Alexeyev stood next to Sobol and Shvets behind the under-ice sonar console.
“Looks like pressure ridges have collided here, Captain,” Shvets said. “We’ve got a brick wall dead ahead.”
“Train the under-ice view to the port beam,” Alexeyev said.
Palinkova turned her joystick to the port side. The view darkened as the wall of ice receded into the distance.
“Twist the ship to the port side,” Alexeyev ordered. “Let’s see if there’s a passage on the north side of this wall. If not, we can look to starboard.”
“Boatswain,” Shvets ordered, “take charge of your thrusters and twist the ship to the left to heading three five zero.”
Lieutenant Duke Squirt Gun Vevera leaned over the number one sonar stack manned by Sonarman First Class Jay Snowman Mercer. Vevera wore his Indian Motorcycle leather jacket over his coveralls, with the control room temperature in the low 60s. He wore his customary wrap-around sunglasses, which he claimed helped him see the displays, and which Captain Seagraves had ordered him to throw away. Mercer shook his head and turned back to look at Vevera, alarm on his face.
“Master One’s screws have stopped and his signal-to-noise ratio is climbing. He’s stopped.”
“Pilot, all stop!” Vevera shouted to Chief McGuire at the ship control station.
“Too close, you need to back down,” Mercer said.
“Pilot, all back two thirds.” Vevera stepped to stand behind the ship control station. “Mark speed zero.”
Vevera turned to the command console and grabbed the 7MC phone and buzzed the captain.
“Speed zero, sir!” McGuire called.
“All stop,” Vevera ordered. “Hover at present depth.”
“Depth two one zero feet, sir, and engaging hovering.”
