Now that Orlov put it to him that way, Fedorov scratched his head, thinking. Yes, what to do about Symenko and his men? It had been easy enough when he thought it would just be his own small group, but Orlov had painted a fairly difficult picture just now. He was silent for a moment, thinking. Timely cruelty… He had come here to wield that sword, and he could have no scruples if he was actually going to do this. They were knee deep in the borscht now, and he knew he could leave no loose ends here—no dangling threads that would spoil the loom of time in the days ahead.
“I’ll… think of something,” he said, but those thoughts were very dark and troublesome for him.
“Well now,” said Orlov glibly. “This will be like shuffling the deck right in the middle of the goddamn poker game! And guess who is sitting across the table—with a fist full of high cards? That bastard, Karpov, and that ham fisted brute of his, Grilikov, he’s the dealer. What will happen when he catches us in his precious railway inn?”
Fedorov knew more than he could say just then. He hadn’t told Orlov the whole story. The Chief thought he was wanting to make certain Kirov lived, not that he had come there to murder him. The Chief thought Karpov’s security men would be waiting for them at the top of those stairs if they all filed up, and had no inkling that none of that was likely to ever take form and shape if he killed Kirov. If he did what he had come here to do, then the whole world would be different when they climbed those steps. Stalin would be back, the Orenburg Federation likely gone, and Volkov dead or in a gulag if he tried to buck the man of steel. If there was one man who could handle Volkov, it would be Josef Stalin.
So there wouldn’t be any Free Siberian State either, and it would not be likely that Karpov ever seized power there. These airships would have gone the way of many other old inventions of history, and so airship Captains like Symenko, and the Irkutsk itself, would have no place in Stalin’s world. The ship and its crew were here, and that thought caused him some trepidation. How would Time account for them if they did try to return to 1942? They might not have a place in the changed future they would be returning to, and now that he thought of it, the airship itself remained a huge unsolved problem. He certainly could not leave it here, with radio sets, rudimentary radar equipment, WWII era guns and engineering. It would simply have to be destroyed, and he made a mental note to have a talk with Troyak about how they might accomplish that.
There was so much on his list to now. Be careful what you wish for, he thought. I got my wish to get through to Ilanskiy and reach this very time. Well, here I am. Now what do I do?
Chapter 35
The black rain was behind them now, but the sky was still alight with that strange astral light. It would be seen as far away as Moscow, where the night was illuminated to near daytime brightness. In Europe and England, people saw the horizon lit by a luminescent red glow, and some reported they could read a book by that light in the dead of night. The next hours saw Fedorov’s mind surrounded by so many questions.
He was reasonably sure of the time, believing this was late on the day after Tunguska, July 1, 1908. Now he struggled to remember the events that took place here earlier. Karpov told him they determined their arrival date when the met a clipper ship at sea. That was on July 10, so if he was correct, and they were back on the old Prime Meridian, then Karpov would appear here in a few days—in the Pacific. Then Fedorov appeared here a week later, shifting back with both Orlov, Troyak and others on the Anatoly Alexandrov. They determined that they arrived on 17 July, staying only briefly, and shifting forward again on 19 July to reach the year 2021.
That was when he hatched the plan to use Rod-25 on Kazan and try to return to 1908. It was a bumpy ride, taking them first to 1945, but they eventually shifted back, right on the eve of Karpov’s big showdown with Admiral Togo. That was July 25-26, 1908. So whatever I decide to do here now must be accomplished before Karpov arrives on 17 July. I have a little over two weeks here, and then I must be gone. Otherwise I could never arrive here on the Anatoly Alexandrov as I did. He realized the incredible danger he was in by arriving in this narrow window between his two appearances in 1908. The threat of Paradox loomed like a cold shadow in his mind.
Now his thoughts moved to Mironov. It was likely that he might still be at the railway inn. He told me he was traveling somewhere, but where? Ah, I remember now. He was traveling to visit relatives at Irkutsk. It was just blind chance that he found himself at the railway inn at Ilanskiy on the 30th of June. I researched that time after that encounter. That was right in the middle of the Great Race, the teams of men from various countries trying to race around the globe in a custom auto. In fact, the German team had just arrived at Ilanskiy, behind the Americans by a couple hundred miles. They were staying right there at the inn on the second floor. I bumped into them near the front desk before I retraced my steps up the back stairway. That was when I realized where I was. I saw the calendar at the front desk—1908!
He closed his eyes, summoning up the memory of that brief adventure. Mironov had two other men with him, a tall man with a Ushanka, and then that stranger—yes—the Englishman. After he got over his suspicion that I was working for the Okhrana, Mironov told me that second fellow was a reporter working for the Times of London, covering the Great Race, a man named Byrne. He might still be there as well.
I also know that Volkov used that stairway to get to 1908, but the details on that are fuzzy. I have no way of knowing how he did that. Or when he appeared—what day. He could be there this very day, or he might not appear for months. One thing I do know, Mironov followed me up those stairs on June 30th of his time, and like Orlov said, that was where I made my mistake and warned him of his fate. Kamenski didn’t think I was fully responsible. He argued that anything Mironov did after that warning was of his own free will, but would he have done those things if not for my warning?
So there he was, approaching that same fateful moment in time again, and wondering if the same actors would be on the stage. Would Mironov still be at the inn? If not, then Fedorov would be in a most difficult position. Mironov should be close, but it might take time to find him.
If he boarded a train for Irkutsk, thought Fedorov, then I suppose I could use the airship to find it, but that would be a very awkward rendezvous. Lord, I hope he hasn’t left the inn to travel by other means. It could take days to locate him, and I have so little time here. He tried to recall if there was a train there in 1908, but it was too fuzzy. The only thing to do was to get there, get on the ground, and then sort the situation out, but he had a lot of loose ends to deal with, and the thoughts in his mind about them weighed heavily on him.
What if I simply cannot locate him? Then what? I have one last play here—Karpov’s arrival in the Pacific. We have just enough fuel, and just enough time to get there. He was in the Sea of Japan, and I could simply radio him. He’ll certainly be surprised to hear from me, won’t he? But what would I be doing? I have no Rod-25 with me, and there would be no way to get him back to 2021. So there I would be, counting out the hours and minutes before the Anatoly Alexandrov appeared in 1908, and I was on that platform.
There it was—Paradox.