Endgame (The Red Gambit Series Book 7) Page 6

  Thirty-nine minutes after they had opened, the hydraulic doors shut tight, allowing the working lights to be turned on and the work of unloading all the vessels to begin.

  Each submarine had its official party ready to greet the important naval officers and scientists who came ashore.

  Admiral Oktyabrskiy waited patiently as the shore party worked with the deck crew of I-401, noting the ragged honour party form on the giant submarine’s deck. Normally a stickler for such matters, he was conscious of how long the submarine had been at sea and the incredible journey it had undertaken.

  ‘Hardly surprising, given their achievement!’

  Three Japanese officers, rigged in their best uniforms, emerged on deck and inspected the honour party with what could only be similar acceptance and understanding, as not one of the line of submariners would normally pass muster on the first morning at training school.

  The naval officer saluted the deck officer before the three turned to salute the national flag that had magically appeared.

  Ceremony over, they moved to the gangway and set foot on dry land.

  All three were clearly unsteady on their feet, the oldest of them, Yamaoka, even grabbed for a support.

  Oktyabrskiy threw up a salute, which received salutes and bows in return.

  “From the General Secretary and people of the Soviet Union, may I welcome you and your men, and congratulate you on your amazing achievement.”

  Yamaoka, still unsteady, moved forward, bowed again, and offered his hand.

  “Taishō Oktyabrskiy… Shōshō Yamaoka. Thank you for your most generous welcome. If I might introduce my officers?”

  Yamaoka turned to his left.

  “Shōsa Nanbu Nobukiyo, captain of the I-401 and senior naval officer on the mission.”

  Nobukiyo bowed as Oktyabrskiy extended his hand.

  He retracted it and went to bow as Nobukiyo went to accept the handshake.

  Both men got into synch and shook hands.

  Yamaoka turned to the other officer.

  “Surgeon General, Chūjō Shiro Ishii, former director of the Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department of the Kwantung Army.”

  There was no repeat of previous embarrassing exchange.

  “Gentlemen, there’s no time to lose. I’ve work parties ready to start moving the equipment and files from your vessel. I appreciate your men will be weary. I have arranged rest and food in the mess hall for all...”

  Oktyabrskiy ground to a halt as he realised that the naval officer wanted to speak.

  “Taishō Oktyabrskiy, with the deepest respect, but my men wish to finish the mission and I request that they be included in the work parties to transfer all matters of our responsibility to Russian soil.”

  The admiral could only grin.

  “But of course, Comrade Nobukiyo. Perhaps your men could hand over to my men on the dock? We have practiced loading, so we will load into the barges and lorries. Is that acceptable to you and your men?”

  “Hai!”

  Nobukiyo bowed to the Soviet admiral, and then to his own mission commander.

  Turning to the waiting deck officer, he shouted the agreed command.

  “Daii Jinyo!”

  Lieutenant Jinyo sprang to attention.

  “Ima, Jinyo, ima!”

  The deck became an instant mass of bodies, some of the honour group sprinting to their work parties as other groups brought crates and other articles from within the hull.

  Oktyabrskiy observed for a little while, and then turned to watch the activities on the other submarines, particularly the large blue crates being gently shifted out of the I-402’s huge hangar.

  Yamaoka saw the Russian’s interest pique.

  “Ah, Taisho Oktyabrskiy, in many ways they are the prize, eh?”

  “I wasn’t sure. So… they’re the machines on which the programme depends?”

  “Hai. Enshinbunriki.”

  Whilst the Black Sea fleet had an all-important part to play in the whole operation, Oktyabrskiy wasn’t briefed on all specifics, but he was certainly aware of the emphasis on careful handling and transport regarding fifty-four specific crates that would be contained in blue packing, and how vital the contents were to all things Raduga.

  The two men looked at each other hoping for more but neither had the language skills for the job.

  “Kapitan?”

  A Captain Third rank stepped forward, Oktyabrskiy’s Japanese specialist.

  “Enshinbunriki.”

  “Arigatō, Shōshō.”

  The Captain bowed and turned to his commander.

  “Sir, the contents are Enshinbunriki… centrifuges.”

  Oktyabrskiy looked like he understood but actually didn’t have the faintest idea what a centrifuge was… but he knew a man who might.

  But for now, he contented himself with watching the hive of activity that had transformed the base into an anthill.

  0109 hrs, Sunday, 8th September 1946, Vinogradar Young Communists Sailing Club, Black Sea, USSR.

  The scientists and some of the smaller items had long gone, whisked away to their rendezvous with cars or aircraft, depending on the movement schedule that covered absolutely everything from man to file.

  When the Soviet personnel had stopped for a break, the Japanese commanders had permitted their men a ten-minute cessation for refreshments and other comforts before driving them back to work once more.

  All the blue crates were loaded on the barge in the berth adjacent to I-402, and the skipper of that craft was anxiously waiting the opening of the doors, as he had to get the precious load under cover in the camouflaged dock in Novorossiysk before the prying eyes of the Allied air forces came snooping.

  Next to I-401, the last items were being secreted and covered with waterproofing, all under the watchful eyes of Yoshio Nishina, the former director of the Riken Institute and head of His Imperial Majesty’s Nuclear Weapon research programme, and Soviet scientist Igor Tamm, head of theory at the Lebedev Institute, the senior man present from the Soviet Atomic Weapons project.

  The two men compared their ledgers and were satisfied.

  Beside them, a Soviet naval officer waited patiently.

  “Da?”

  Tamm’s voice queried the final check box.

  “Hai.”

  Nishina punctuated his response with signing the checklist.

  Tamm followed suit and turned to the lieutenant.

  “Comrade Leytenant. Inventory complete. You may proceed.”

  “Thank you, Comrade Academician.”

  The young officer turned and gave a gesture to the base commander, who in turn gave the command that started a low-level klaxon sounding, indicating that the lights were about to be extinguished prior to the base doors opening.

  Thirty seconds quickly passed and the lights disappeared to be replaced by the low red lights.

  The doors remained closed as numerous eyes became accustomed to the new light.

  As per procedure, the base commander waited for reports on activity at sea.

  Soviet vessels off shore and the base stations that probed the seas and skies of the Black Sea all reported in to Naval Command at Novorossiysk, and it was from there that the all-clear came.

  Again, the low-level klaxon sounded, this time ten times in succession, indicating that the base was about to open itself up to the sea.

  The vast majority of the workers, both Russian and Japanese, had taken themselves off to consume the food and drinks laid on for them, so they missed the departure of the two barges and the closure of the huge doors.

  Admiral Oktyabrskiy found Nobukiyo enjoying fresh coffee and fine tobacco… American.

  “We liberated many nice things from the Capitalist’s storehouses. No reason why we shouldn’t enjoy them, eh, Comrade Captain?”

  The interpreter’s words drew a smile and a courteous nod from the submarine’s commander.

  “Please walk with me. You may enjoy what is about to happen.” />
  The two strode off to the viewing stand at the end of the empty bay next to I-401.

  The facility’s clocks clicked round to 0130.

  A strange low moaning sound made itself known, initiated by an order from the base commander.

  The jury-rigged speakers directed their sound not into the air but into the water in the two recently vacated bays.

  No submariner could fail to understand what was about to happen as the water in the bays churned and bubbled.

  The two XXI submarines rose to the surface almost perfectly together.

  Nobukiyo was impressed, not just with the sleek and beautiful lines of the submarine he focussed on, but also with the depth of water in the base that permitted such a concealment.

  “Twenty-seven metres.”

  Oktyabrskiyanswered the Japanese officer’s unspoken question, but still Nobukiyo questioned the interpreter’s words.

  “The submarine itself is twelve metres high… we allowed fifteen… the draught of the barge was four metres at full load… there was no risk.”

  Nobukiyo nodded his understanding and turned back to watch as the crew started to emerge from their confinement.

  Oktyabrskiy sipped his coffee and felt a chill travel the length of his spine.

  In front of him sat two of each of the AM class, a pair of the huge Sen-Tokus, and both of his advanced type XXIs.

  Whilst he was not briefed in on the mission that lay ahead of his command, the admiral sensed that the six submarines secreted in the facility were to be employed on a mission that would change the nature of warfare forever.

  In that, he was in every sense correct.

  Common sense is not so common.

  Voltaire

  Chapter 175 - THE SHIELD

  1522 hrs, Friday, 13th September 1946, Panemunė, Route 146, theŠilinė - Pauliai road, Lithuania.

  Her eyes narrowed as the man she had positioned to warn of any approaching traffic whistled from his position in the treetops.

  She looked up and saw six fingers, the lookout’s way of telling her that the approaching convoy was of six vehicles.

  He also held up a dirty palm, which indicated that there were no armoured vehicles involved, an enemy that the Lithuanian partisan group tried to avoid at all costs.

  Normally led by the 45-year-old Antanas Pyragius, today it was the young Janina Mikenas in command, a position which she had earned by right.

  Pyragius lay recovering from wounds he had sustained during a raid outside Ariogala a fortnight beforehand.

  The partisan group, known throughout their native land as ‘The Shield of St. Michael’, were experienced and competent and, most importantly in the majority of Lithuanian’s opinion, lucky.

  Many such national resistance groups had been liquidated by the dreaded NKVD, but the Shield had survived all such close encounters.

  Mikenas checked her group’s dispositions as best she could, the warning whistle having already made the men and women melt into the undergrowth with weapons held tight and ready.

  Her eyes returned to the road and immediately the lead Soviet vehicle, a staff car, came into view, rounding the bend and starting on the gradual slope that led to the junction of Routes 1710 and 146.

  Mikenas’ eyes instinctively flicked back to the road, seeking out any tell-tale marks that might give away the mines, but there were none.

  Behind the staff car came five lorries of different lineages but all marked with the insignia of the NKVD.

  ‘Bastards!’

  The hated NKVD, responsible for deporting most of her family and murdering her brother Romek, and probably younger brother Maxim too.

  Fig # 225 - Areas around the Neman River, Lithuania.

  Janina Mikenas smiled an unsmiling smile similar to a cobra about to strike.

  The staff car slowly moved past the waiting partisans, at which time luck deserted the Shields.

  Unbelievably, it missed the five mines and drove on its unsuspecting way, unaware of the reprieve.

  The first lorry found two at the same time and all hell broke loose.

  The reprieve for the occupants of the staff car proved to be purely temporary as one of the partisans’ two DP light machine-guns was positioned to flay the length of the road and the gunner was experienced enough to concentrate on the staff car first.

  The NKVD Major commanding the convoy lost his head, literally.

  His second in command lost his metaphorically, and ran screaming from the car covered in the spray of grey-red detritus from his former commander’s brain.

  The two soldiers in the front had no chance as the DP’s bullets carved them up.

  The fleeing 2IC ran into a tree in his panic, knocking himself out in the process.

  Up and down the small convoy, the partisans poured fire into the rear of the covered lorries and their cabs, and were rewarded with shrieks and screams as bullets struck home into defenceless flesh.

  One of Mikenas’ partisans had run a string of mines out behind the convoy, but not one vehicle made an effort to escape.

  Two slipped back down the gentle slope, coming to rest against one lorry that stayed put, its dead driver having applied the handbrake before failing in an attempt to grab for his rifle.

  Yet another ran back and angled itself into the modest ditch where flames lazily started to consume it, burning from the engine compartment backwards.

  Janina Mikenas wasn’t sure but she felt that not one shot had been returned from the convoy, which in itself started warning bells ringing in her head.

  Acting on impulse, she stepped out onto the road, waving her hands above her head. One by one, her partisans responded to her command and the firing died away.

  The sound of guns firing was replaced by the sounds of men and women in extremis.

  The experienced guerrillas made their move. Some crept forward leaving others to watch over them in case of any resistance, while yet others formed at the head and rear of the shattered convoy, ready to repulse any new arrivals.

  Voices were raised, voices seeking mercy… or help… voices speaking Lithuanian.

  ‘Oh Jesus and Maria!’

  Janina understood immediately.

  “Oh Jesus and Maria! Help them!”

  The convoy had been transporting prisoners.

  Reaching the rear of the nearest truck, she threw open the cover and was greeted by a veritable charnel house.

  The two NKVD guards caused her no upset, but the sight of the bodies of her countrymen and women gripped her heart like a vice.

  ‘Oh God, what have I done?’

  A hand waved weakly from the pile, and she hoisted herself inside to take hold of it and burrow deep for the still-living owner.

  The young man died before she could pull him clear.

  There was no one else in the vehicle who needed anything more than his or her own small plot of Lithuania and the ministrations of a priest.

  All along the shattered convoy, Janina could hear the groans of wounded combined with the wails of her own men and women, who so wished they could undo the work of the last few minutes.

  The burning lorry yielded up two survivors. A third died in the act of being dragged clear.

  One of her best men, Jurgis Lukša, was screaming his wrath whilst also crying like a child, all at the same time as two of his group pulled him away from the awful sight in the third lorry.

  Janina’s second in command ran up to her, his face as white as a sheet.

  “His sons… he killed his own sons… fucking hell… we all have… Mother of God, Janina…” his voice trailed away as his tears came.

  The information had been that the NKVD were shifting police records back to Soviet soil, records that were better off destroyed as far as the partisans were concerned.

  Janina worked through the shock and pain of what had come to pass, and tried to reason what had happened.

  Despite her youth, she managed to overcome the grief and work out what had happened… or at le
ast what she feared had happened.

  “Get ready to move! If you find anyone alive, bring them with us. We set fire to everything. Two minutes! Two minutes!”

  The already burning lorry was beacon enough to anyone closing in on them, so Janina had no compunction about ordering everything else to be burnt with it.

  “And our people?”

  “Burn them all.”

  Some lifeless forms were pulled from the third truck; the sons.

  Jurgis Lukša and his cousin took one each and moved to the main group, both men clearly in the extremes of grief.

  Someone, a woman, scrabbled free from the second lorry and was assisted down by two partisans. Her unsteady feet gave way and she was picked up and put over one of the men’s shoulders.

  A man and a woman were pulled out of the last vehicle, both wounded and disoriented, but capable of walking.

  In total, eight Lithuanian prisoners survived the ambush.

  Two of the NKVD guards were found alive and dispatched with knives and without mercy.

  The whistling burrowed into Janina’s conscious thoughts and she looked up.

  The hand signals said it all.

  They had been tricked.

  Eight vehicles in total, three of them armoured.

  ‘Shit!’

  Karelis, the woman in charge at the rear of the column, finished her work and looked up the road to Janina, seeking guidance.

  Mikenas cupped her hands and shouted at the lookout.

  “How far?”

  The tree dweller looked to confirm his figures.

  His hands did the talking.

  ‘One and a half.’

  “Move! Move now!”

  Karelis understood the gestures and ordered her group away as the tree dweller descended more in a controlled fall than by a proper descent.

  The prime escape route was to the southeast, over a small watercourse and into a temporary hiding place, hidden by fallen leaves and the boughs of a dense wood.

  It was two kilometres distant, and now the party were encumbered by the wounded and the dead.