“Exactly, and with Volsky’s hearty approval.”
“I am first rank now?”
“Indeed, and that comes with a new cabin in the officers’ quarters section. Choose any vacant room you wish. It also comes with a raise in salary, and that will be retroactive two months, so it will be enough to double your normal pay next period. I know it isn’t much, but some day we may actually get to go ashore again like we did in Japan, and actually spend some of that money. Chief, I want you at my side. I want to know I can rely on you, and that the ship and crew can all rely on you as well. You can have a tough hand on occasion, but now that third star is going to give you just a little bit more of the respect you deserve.”
Orlov raised his eyebrows, slowly realizing what was happening here. Yes, Karpov did have the authority to do this, and Volsky put his name to it too. He had been six years working up from Captain of the first rank, stuck on the second rung of the ladder for a good long time. Now he would finally get to the top, and be a real Captain.
Karpov continued.
“Ivan Volkov said the same thing to you, yes? Well now I say it, only this time, I can make it stick. I gave the quartermaster orders this morning to send you a new service jacket, dress uniform, and Captain’s cap. And Chief, if there is anything you want, any request you might wish to make, feel free. You have my ear, any time you have anything to say. Come to me here, and we’ll eat together sometime. Or if you are on the bridge, sound off when you have something in mind. You’re a full Captain now, and your opinion matters. Please act like one. Make us all proud.”
Orlov was really quite surprised. This was the last thing he expected, and he didn’t quite know how to react.
“One more thing,” said Karpov. “You are now at the top rank for senior officers, and just one more step up to a Rear Admiral. As you will still be Chief of Operations, I am thinking you need some support. So I want you to look over the roster. You know the men well enough. Select candidates for your operations staff, and then start delegating some of the drudgery of the work load you carry to them. Be careful, and thoughtful. Choose men you know you can rely on. Then start moving things off your shoulders, and task those men as you see fit. You are a supervisor, and that should be more the way you see yourself now with this promotion. I know I can count on you, and I will count on you. Come to me with five names, and Volsky and I will look them over and select three—but I want your recommendation on that, first and foremost. If there is one you feel strongly about, let me know.”
Orlov nodded, still not knowing what to say. But there is one thing that always serves well enough: “Thank you, Admiral,” he said, and smiled for the first time in a very long while.
Karpov extended his hand. “Congratulations, Chief. I will make a general announcement to the crew regarding this promotion as soon as I get back to the bridge.”
Chapter 36
It was cold, too cold in the Arctic winter, and colder yet if they took the airship to any higher elevation. So Volkov had stayed low after the storm, and he knew he had to find a safe harbor now, somewhere to hover over the icy landscape, cable the ship and get the engineers out to have a look at the outer shell. They had inspected the interior framework, and made a few repairs, tightening cables and making a few welds on the duralumin beams.
Tunguska was a fine ship, particularly now after the addition of modern radars and defensive missiles…. And the other things he had loaded. Bigger than the Orenburg, he thought, a vague memory rising from some unknown furrow of his brain. Strange how that happened. Chilling to think that other versions of himself had lived out their lives, and one in particular had risen to the top of a loose federation of breakaway republics from the Soviet Union—the Orenburg Federation.
Because of these lost memories embedded in his mind, he knew Tunguska was a very special beast, one that could literally move in time. Its duralumin bones held strange residues mined near Vanavara, a site very near the epicenter of the event this ship was named for. When he learned Tyrenkov had ordered the airship destroyed, along with its sister ship, Siberia, he immediately sent men to stop the demolition, and just in time. Then he moved his personal effects aboard, munitions, food, comfort items, and the two airships took to the sky, heading north over the desolate Arctic ice.
A chat with a Yeoman had led him to believe that Karpov had deliberately hunted storms with this ship, an odd thing to do at first take, until he realized how much power a typical thunderstorm could generate. He then suspected that they were using that energy to catalyze the duralumin frame. They had even installed a long antenna to help with the harvest of that energy, grounding it right into the frame of the ship.
So he had loaded up the ships, and then he went north, on a little storm safari. So many questions plagued him as they cast off. What if this plan worked as he suspected, and this ship did move in time. Where would they end up? How could he exert any control over the damn thing? There were no rudders here for steering the currents of time. The last thing he wanted was to slip back into the past. Even though he could get himself into a very powerful position there, the notion was fraught with danger. He knew another version of himself had lived, and most likely died there, the memories of that life still haunting him from time to time. Better in the future, he thought. Better after this nasty war here has run its course. Then I can appear and begin picking up the pieces.
In the end, he realized the future was the easiest place he might land if he moved. It was unmarred by all the other versions of himself, free of complications that could lead to paradox, unconquered territory. He reasoned that Time would have to work very hard to send him to the past, but moving him forward would be relatively effortless.
So he settled in with Trushin, his personal aid, and Voronin, the bothersome security man. Of course he had to bring them in on what he was planning, and get them over the hump of incredulity and utter astonishment when he told them he was going to try to move in time. Voronin listened, half believing, yet harboring doubts and inwardly thinking I was daft, he thought.
But now he’s finally a believer.
Here we are again, right back in the New Siberian Islands, the Northern Shamrock. Only one look at the place is enough to tell me this is not the same time we were in before. We could clearly see the crater where that errant missile landed, the lance I had aimed at Tyrenkov’s heart. There is the plane he used to come here that very hour, and make good his escape. Yes, he had to get aboard Kirov to do that. Oh, he might have tried what I just accomplished, these old airships, but Kirov would have been a much safer play, and far more comfortable.
He smiled, realizing that Tyrenkov thought he had burned all the bridges. He had been very lucky to get to these airships before they were destroyed, but where had that luck delivered him after they finally found their Arctic cyclone? It was clearly the future, he knew.
That impact crater is well weathered, certainly not fresh. So yes, it was as I suspected. We have gone forward, but how far? It may take some doing to answer that question. I have had men listening to the radio round the clock, but they hear nothing. The world seems as quiet and desolate as this Arctic wasteland around me here.
So I think the war has ended…. Yes, it’s come to its fiery, bloody end, probably taken most of the world with it. We were such mindless fools. We built those terrible bombs and missiles because they represented absolute power, a means for even a small and backward country like North Korea to be able to spit in the eyes of the other world powers. And when push came to shove, it was too easy to use them.