Kirov II: Cauldron of Fire

“I have an idea, sir.” Kalinichev spoke up. “I'm very aware of the signatures his ECM pods are going to put out. I think I can follow them, sir.”

“You mean you can still track him?”

“Not exactly sir, but what I can do is get a good estimate on the signal strength of this interference and isolate it to determine the source. I know what waveforms to look for because I helped program that system. I think I can get at least a general idea of his location.”

“How close?” Karpov was at his side at once.

“I won't be able to pinpoint it but I can get it within… several hundred meters.” Kalinichev was guessing, but neither Fedorov nor Karpov would know any different. Now Karpov turned and made a suggestion.

“Think submarine here, Mister Fedorov. We don't know exactly where he is, but we get enough of a signal to know approximately where he is. We know where he won't go, certainly not out to sea. And at this moment he is still in a range of our S-300 SAM system. If Kalinichev can get a close enough fix on his location, then a barrage of three or four missiles might have a chance of knocking him down before he reaches the coastline. If we can do that, then he goes into the sea and no one is likely to find it, or ever know about it.”

Fedorov's eyes widened. He had to do something, and this was as good a plan as any he could've possibly devised. Then he remembered what he had told Karpov about the jammers just a few moments ago. “Kalinichev!” he said excitedly. “Can you isolate on the 150 to 176 MHz bands? Can you fine those wavelengths and home in on the source?”

“Well yes, sir, but we don’t usually jam those wavelengths,”

“We do now! Find them if you can. Karpov! Get your missiles ready!” He didn't hesitate a moment. If there is any way possible that they could shoot this helicopter down, he had to act at once.

Karpov was only too happy to oblige. He gave orders to activate the S-300s and told Kalinichev to manually feed his best possible estimate of the helicopter’s present and predicted position to the CIC. He knew they would be taking a long shot, like a destroyer lobbing depth charges into the sea where they thought a submarine might be hiding. They were going to take a proverbial shot in the dark, but the S-300s had a very wide shrapnel dispersion pattern. If he fired three to five missiles he might just saturate the area with enough metal to hit this target. He knew they had very few missiles to waste, but something in him also understood what had spooked Fedorov so deeply about this incident. Beyond that, something else want to throw a punch back at the man in a way that he never could do with his own fist. Kirov would punch back for him, and three tense minutes later he gave the order to fire.

They watched, their eyes transfixed by the phosphorescent glow of the radar screen which received the missile telemetry feedback and clearly tracked the outgoing salvo of five precious S-300 missiles. Their speed was incredible, and they quickly overtook the spot on the scope where Kalinichev had made his best guess as to the location of the jamming source. It was very near the coast, and Fedorov bit his lip, hating what they had to do, yet hoping against hope that it would work. Because if it didn’t work, he thought; if that man vanishes into the midst of the Spanish countryside in 1942, then God only knows what kind of havoc the head and darkened heart of Gennadi Orlov might visit upon the world.

Chapter 26

Five missiles roared from the forward deck of Kirov, the deadly S-300s, capable of Mach 6 speed out to a range of 150 kilometers. They had been aimed at a location Kalinichev had selected at the most likely source of the intense radar jamming, with a focus on any signal emanating at 176MHz or lower as Fedorov suggested. As they fired Karpov realized they had yet another option and he shouted to the tactical officer over the deafening sound of the missile engines.

“Activate the secondary infrared terminal seekers on those missiles!” If they got anywhere near a good target, the missiles could also find it by other means. The five steel fingers reached out from the ship, like a mailed gauntlet clawing the sky as they went.

On the KA-226, Orlov saw the missile warning indicator and he knew he might have only seconds to live. “Bastards!” he shouted, and grabbed the safety parachute harness, knowing he had to get out of the helo at once if he was to survive. He had it on in fifteen seconds, frantically clawing at the release on the side hatch and grunting hard as he dragged it open. Thirty seconds—he was poised at the edge, feeling the hard wash of the overhead rotor and the cool evening air on his face. In that brief interval the missiles accelerated to their top speed and were already over thirty kilometers from the ship, closing fast.

His heart leapt with fear and adrenaline when he looked down. The helo might normally cruise at 1000 meters but they had climbed much higher for the planned radar sweep and were up over 4000 meters. He jumped, battered by the rushing wind, his big frame tumbling and soon falling all of sixty meters per second in freefall. Would he get far enough away before the missiles found their target? He prayed to all gods and demons that he would.

Karpov clenched his fist with jubilation when he saw the telemetry signal go white, indicating a hit. “Got him!” he shouted. The missiles had found their target. The jamming signatures Kalinichev had been monitoring immediately cut off, and now they could clearly see the detonation site of the attack on the radar scope, very close to the coast line northwest of Cartagena. “We got the bastard!”

He looked at Fedorov, who had a grim expression on his face, his eyes dark and searching. “Are you certain?” he asked.

“Of course,” said Karpov. “Nothing could survive that. Five S-300s? It was a high price to pay for that scumbag, not to mention the loss of another helicopter.”

Fedorov nodded, thinking for a moment, then quietly said: “Goodbye, Mister Orlov….” The others remained silent, something uncomfortable in the moment. They all knew the irascible Chief, and each one held some memory of their interaction with him. None among them had been close to the man, and many had felt his rude temperament and brutish ways, yet there was something in the way that Fedorov said that, and it pulled some undefined emotion from them, perhaps pity, perhaps regret, or a sense of waste, and in some way they felt diminished with his loss, and beset by a vague notion of dread, though no man would mourn him. But their emotion was misplaced…

~ ~ ~

Orlov fell a long kilometer before he groped for the parachute release, his unshielded eyes puckered near shut by the cold wind. He pulled hard, his body shaken when the chute deployed to brake his fall and he shouted, releasing the tension, ecstatic that he had managed to get out of the helo in one piece. Then he saw them, the five fingers of doom emerging from a low white cloud and moving at an impossible rate of speed towards his general location. The helo had flown on, cruising at 360 Kph for those last twenty seconds, moving two kilometers off. He had fallen over another kilometer and was now far enough away from the target to be relatively safe from the exploding shrapnel.

Four of the five missiles had locked on to the helo, the verdict of their infrared modules guiding them mercilessly in on its big heat signature. The last S-300 took passing note of another small heat signature hovering near and well below the target. In a few split seconds its missile mind considered what to do, then dismissed the object as a parachuting thermal decoy and joined its comrades, a majority opinion of five now. Seconds later the missiles ripped the evening sky apart with one explosion after another, and the KA-226 was obliterated.

Orlov winced at the sight, realizing how close he had come to death. It had seen him, reached for him, and he felt the cold brush of its steely hands as it nearly grasped him. But he was not dead— he was alive! He was a great laugh, a wild roar of elation, a bellowing shout of thanks to the heavens above as he fell through the cool evening air, vanishing into a low cloud. When he broke out through a gap in the clouds he gasped at the beauty of the last fading light on the stillness of the sea, tears streaking his face, his still bandaged hands gripping the harness of his parachute, oblivious to the pain.

He was alive, alive, alive! And in that jubilant singularity of this moment he realized that he was the only one who knew that. They would see the destruction of the helicopter and think he was