Panic Switch полностью

“Good-bye, Losharik,” Captain Kovalov said, his voice trembling, his hand over his heart.

“It was a good boat,” Alexeyev said to Kovalov. “It saved our lives.”

“Imagine if we’d had a full load of nuclear fuel,” Kovalov said. “We could have sailed right into Kola Submarine Base.”

As they watched, the bow angled up, the hatch went under, and eventually the conning tower lowered into the dark water, the boat standing straight up, the bow pointing at the sky, until it settled lower in the water, and after a long moment of the bow hanging there, the hull gave up and sank out of sight, with nothing but a thousand bubbles rising to the surface to mark her departure.

Georgy Alexeyev listened to see if he’d hear the sound of the hull hitting the bottom, but it was no longer quiet on the icecap. The wind had risen steadily and it began to snow. At first, the flakes were almost microscopic, but then began to grow. He looked over at Kovalov.

“We need to walk,” he said. “East-northeast. Eight kilometers.”

“What are you talking about?” Kovalov said.

Alexeyev pulled Kovalov away from the crowd. “Remember the ghost of Matveev?” he said.

“Oh no. Another revelation?”

“She returned. She was more specific this time. She said east-northeast. Eight kilometers. She said we had a long walk in front of us.”

“But, Georgy, there’s nothing to the east-northeast,” Kovalov said.

“Yes, there is,” Alexeyev said. “The Americans have a camp.”

Kovalov shook his head. “Georgy, you are mistaken. The Americans are no more.”

There was the sound of a loud thump from the east-northeast, then the sight of a bright orange flash, the sound of the explosion coming a few seconds later, the force of it shaking the ice beneath their feet. A mushroom cloud of orange flames rose up into the sky, shrouded by dark smoke.

Kovalov stared at the mushroom cloud, which had calmed down and was no longer orange flames, but only dark smoke wafting upward.

“Maybe the Americans were there,” Kovalov said. “But after that, they probably aren’t any longer.”

“They just blew up their weapons to avoid salvage of their submarine,” Alexeyev said. “Just as we would have if we’d had the means.”

“You seem convinced the Americans are still alive,” Kovalov said, looking at Alexeyev as if he’d escaped from a psychiatric hospital.

“I know they are,” Alexeyev said, his hand rubbing his right eye, missing his eye patch. “Engineer Matveev knew they would be. Come on. Let’s get this crowd moving. Walk toward the smoke of that explosion.”

The wind howled and the quarter-sized snowflakes blew horizontally, illuminated by the ghostly strobe light that lit up the polar night, the lamps of it broadcasting at all points of the compass and straight up, the Morse code spelling “D.X…. S.O.S.” and repeating over and over.

Lieutenant Anthony Pacino pulled his fur-lined hood close to his face, the mask beneath it ineffective against the wind and snow. Above the mask, his clear goggles kept fogging up. He’d put them on top of his inner hood beneath the parka hood, but then his eyes felt like they were freezing and he’d have to put the goggles back on.

He paced back and forth in front of the entrance vestibule of the high density polyethylene bubble of the shelter, the bubble round and plump, the shape designed to avoid being blown over by high winds, the shelter’s corners and mid-walls secured into the ice by thirty-six-inch drilled steel foundations. Pacino could hear the rumbling of the diesel heater and diesel generator, barely audible over the roaring noise of the wind.

The vestibule outer door of the shelter opened and shut behind Captain Seagraves. He walked toward Pacino, who stood at attention, cradling his high-powered rifle.

“How are you doing, Mr. Pacino?” Seagraves asked, shouting over the noise of the wind.

“I was colder than I’ve ever been in my life two hours ago,” Pacino said, shouting back. “Now I’m used to it. That or I’m just numb.”

“Can you go on another hour?” Seagraves said, idly looking around the ice beyond the camp, but visibility was less than a hundred feet.

“Yes, Captain. No problem.”

“I brought you this,” Seagraves said, pulling a military helmet out of a fabric bag. “It has night vision and infrared. Strap it on under your parka hood. Use it occasionally.”

“What’s this for, Captain?”

“Polar bears,” Seagraves said. “The people in the shelter would be quite the meal for a hungry polar bear.”

Pacino nodded and pulled on the helmet, trying the night vision and infrared. If he pointed the monocular away from the strobe, he could see much farther. Not that there was anything to see.

“Captain, I’m thinking that if there is a polar bear, we should be eating him. How long will the rations last?”

Seagraves shook his head. “There’s a problem. They should have been good for four days, but anything with chicken in it is contaminated. Probably salmonella. We’ve got forty hands sick of food poisoning. I’m having the bad rations brought out of the shelter.”