‘Patricia — ’ She made as if to approach the other woman.
‘Back,’ said Medievsky.
In the entrance hall, Medievsky advanced and prodded Clement to a stop with the rifle barrel. She stood, facing away from him. The others wandered into a semicircle before her, like spectators at a circus.
Purkiss said, ‘Where’s Gunnar?’
‘In the Hangar, loading the Ural,’ said Medievsky.
‘You need to get him in here.’
Medievsky seemed reluctant to take his eyes off Clement. ‘What? Why?’
‘Because we have to change our plans.’
Now Medievsky looked at him. ‘Change in what way?’
The front door opened and Haglund came in, fully suited, carrying his rifle. He uncovered his head and face and started to say, ‘Where’s the rest of — ’ before he registered the scene in front of him.
Purkiss touched the back of his head gingerly, felt the swelling already the size of half a squash ball. ‘To sum up, I was looking into the movement records of all of you, trying to work out if there were any suspicious patterns, anything that might link any of you to what’s been going on here. I didn’t find much. But Dr Clement here came in and attacked me from behind, damn near bashing my head in.’ He turned to Clement. ‘Why was that, Patricia?’
She avoided eye contact with him, her fingers still interlaced behind her head, her face tight and unreadable.
Purkiss looked at each of the others in turn. ‘She’s the one. God knows why, or how. But Clement is the person who killed Keys, and Wyatt, and, probably, Feliks Nisselovich two months ago. She’s the one who wrecked our link with the outside world. She’s the one trying to steal six nuclear missiles from the crashed plane near the Nekropolis.’
Their heads switched from Purkiss to Clement as if they were at a tennis match, following the ball as it was smashed over the net.
Medievsky said, ‘So we go. Make our way to Saburov-Kennedy Station, taking her along, and we deliver her to the authorities there.’
‘There’s no need.’ Purkiss spread his hands. ‘Don’t you see? We have the terrorist. She’s the person the FSB are interested in. We wait here, and when the Spetsnaz arrive, we simply hand her over.’
The wind outside, separated from them by a single layer of wall, hissed through the silence that followed.
Avner pulled off his cap, raked a hand through his matted curls. ‘That’s bullshit. You said so yourself, man. They’re going to hit this place with all guns blazing. They don’t know how what kind of threat they face, so they’ll shoot first, kill us all, then figure out where each piece fits afterward.’
‘I agree with Efraim.’ Budian’s voice, so seldom heard, was startling. Behind the thick lenses of her glasses, her eyes were dull. ‘These are State troops, sent by the FSB. The KGB. They do not care for fairness, or nuance, or human rights. They will assume we are all involved, and they will kill us.’ She looked around for support. ‘We leave, now. No matter how difficult the journey north.’
‘Hey.’ Avner’s tone was desperately enthusiastic. ‘How about we head southwest, to Yakutsk? It’s further to go, but there are roads. The highway. It’ll be a hell of a lot easier.’
‘And if they send ground troops that way?’ said Purkiss. ‘We’d be ducks in a shooting gallery.’ He turned to Medievsky. ‘It’s your decision, Oleg. You’re in charge. Do we stay here, and hand this woman over, and get a helicopter ride home to warmth and safety? Or do we strike out across a hundred and forty kilometres of frozen hostile terrain, at night, with a platoon of special forces men, trained killers, on our tail?’
Medievsky’s jaw worked. The seconds passed.
‘We vote,’ he said.
It was done by the raising of hands.
Budian, Montrose and Avner chose leaving immediately and heading for Saburov-Kennedy Station. For remaining at the station: Haglund and Purkiss. After ten seconds’ thought, Medievsky joined them.
Three votes for each option. Stalemate.
‘Jesus. Now what?’ muttered Avner. He stared at Clement. Medievsky had allowed her to lower her arms, and ordered her to sit down against the wall. She complied sullenly. ‘Dr Patricia, how do you vote?’
Clement didn’t reply. Didn’t even look in Avner’s direction.
Medievsky said, ‘An executive decision. We stay. No further discussion.’
Avner twisted away, muttering. Budian let out a groan of anguish.
Montrose said, ‘I disagree, Oleg.’
‘My decision is final.’
‘How about we split up? Those of us who want to leave, leave. The rest of you stay behind.’
‘No.’ Medievsky said it before Purkiss could. ‘We have to stay together. Pool our resources. If we fragment, at least half of us will die. You know the rules of Yarkovsky Station, Ryan.’
Ten more seconds of silence.
Avner said, ‘So we stand around like a bag of spare dicks, here in the hall, waiting for the invasion? Waiting for god damn Godot?’
‘Yes,’ said Medievsky. ‘If we move to the mess, we may not hear them arrive. We therefore remain here. Sit down, if you want to rest.’
Avner’s head jerked up suddenly. He looked as if he was sniffing the air.
‘Whoah,’ he murmured.
‘What?’ Medievsky’s grip tensed on the rifle.
Avner closed his eyes, his head still raised. ‘Choppers,’ he half whispered.
Purkiss strained to listen. He heard nothing but the pitiless wind, gathering slow, gradual force beyond the walls.
He watched the expressions on the faces of the others. Even Montrose shook his head.
‘No,’ Purkiss said. ‘They’re not here yet.’
Later, much later, when the night and the fatigue were crowding in and threatening to drag him into the ground, Purkiss had time to reflect on how he’d misjudged the situation. How he’d blown it, and allowed a blameless man to be killed.
They’d been sitting and squatting and pacing in the entrance corridor for fifteen minutes. Nobody spoke. Few of them made eye contact, and then only fleetingly.
Like Purkiss, Medievsky and Haglund remained standing. They held their Rugers at a slant, across their chests with the barrels just below their left shoulders. Their attention seemed to drawn towards the external environment, the black void beyond the door and the walls.
Purkiss saw the first signs in Avner’s face. The twitching around the mouth, the jumping of a wedge of muscle in the right cheek. The flickering of the eyes.
Instinct told Purkiss that timekeeping was about to become important. He glanced at his watch.
He couldn’t be certain, but he thought approximately one hour had passed since his call to the FSB man in Moscow had been terminated. Assuming the troops had been scrambled and dispatched from Yakutsk ten minutes later, they could arrive in the next forty minutes.
Avner’s yell stabbed through the quiet, amplified by the broadness of the corridor. It sent a jolt through the rest of them, triggering a ripple of movement wherever they sat or stood or paced.
‘God damn it.’ He was on his feet, stumbling slightly, and he stared at them, his eyes wild. ‘Look at us. Listen to us. Sitting here like a bunch of turkeys the week before Thanksgiving, kidding ourselves that those guys approaching with shotguns will leave us alone as long as we offer up one of our number as a sacrifice.’ He strode to Medievsky, shouted into his face. ‘We’re going to die. Oleg? You understand me? Die. In the next hour. Maybe sooner. The last thing we’re going to hear is the sound of our brains hitting the wall. The last thought we’re going to have is, shit, why didn’t we get out when we had the chance? Why did we listen to this asshole?’ He jabbed a finger repeatedly at Purkiss.