Siberius (9 page)

“
Hey, elephants in France?” he said with genuine excitement. “Don’t that beat all?”

Talia grabbed the book out of his hands and slammed it closed. Nick backed away as she returned to her notebook. The cabin now felt very small, and he wished he were somewhere else.
Anywhere
else.

“
I’ll be out of you hair in the morning,” he said sitting down on the edge of the bed.

A moment of uncomfortable silence followed, then Talia looked over at her guest and sighed. “Here,” she said tossing the book back to him. “Animals. That’s what a zoologist studies.”

“Oh,” was all that Nick could manage.

Talia went back to her writing. After a few minutes, Nick opened the book and flipped through the pages. He closed it again, then wandered around the cabin. Assorted odds and ends littered the walls, but they all had some semblance of order. Animal pelts, most of them squirrels and foxes, were nailed to the blanketed walls. Steel leg traps rusted beyond use hung from ceiling beams, their chains draped like Christmas garland. In one corner of the back wall, an assortment of antlers hung from a line of hooks. Upon closer inspection, Nick saw that they were elaborate hats, like the kind American Indians would wear. They were decorated with small bones and quail and partridge feathers. There were also several ornate gowns made of pelts, bones and beads. Nick reached out, ran his finger along one of the gowns. They all looked and smelled very old.

“Those are my husband’s,” said Talia. “Please don’t touch them.”

“
Sorry,” he said. “What is he, a witch doctor?”

Talia sighed again, a long, loud sigh so Nick could hear her. “No,” she said. “He’s an anthropologist.”

“Uh-huh. Should we expect him back soon?”

“
Who?”

“
Your husband.”

Talia closed the notebook, shook her head. “I shouldn’t have brought you here.”

Nick’s whole face tightened up. “Should I leave?” he said. It was a hollow gesture. The last thing he wanted to do was spend the night outside.

“
That’s not practical now, is it?”

“
Well, you don’t want me around,” said Nick.

“
It’s not that,” Talia said. She stood up and started pacing. “I don’t know you. I don’t know anything about you. Your very presence might already have jeopardized my-” she stopped, searched for the word, then settled for “research.”

Nick watched as she broke off into a conversation with herself in Russian. Did he fall asleep here, in this bed, in this cabin, with this disturbed woman? And what of her husband? Judging from the antler hats and furry robes, he reckoned he must be a piece of work too.

Talia slumped back into a chair, breathless. Pressing her hands against her flushed cheeks, she looked over and saw the apprehensive look on Nick’s face. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m not a crazy person.” It felt like a hollow statement.

“
Sure you are,” Nick said forcing a smile.

“
What do we do now?” said Talia.

“
Well, I feel safe with you,” he said. “I mean, if you wanted to kill me, you wouldn’t have saved me from the wreck.” He spoke in half-truths, knowing that she could be harboring plans to turn him over to the Red Army.

Somehow, though, he didn’t think she’d do that. He didn’t know why he felt that way, but his instincts had proven right before. He wanted to trust them again. “My guess is that you feel pretty awkward right now. You just brought a strange man into your home. Can’t say I’d have done the same thing, although I’m not a woman who-” He stopped himself, but she jerked her head at the trailing end of his words.

“What?” she said. “You think I’m a recluse? Some sort of wild woman of the taiga?” Her accent grew thicker as her words grew stronger. She stood up and paced the cabin again, ranting on in Russian. Nick scooted to the other side of the bed, increasing his distance from her.

At last, she slopped back into the chair again, winded from the tirade. “You’re not dangerous,” she said in a vulnerable voice. “Are you?”

Nick shook his head and said, “Lady, I’m the least of your worries,” then added as an afterthought: “Whatever they are.”

11

Bundled up under a blanket in the truck cab, Corovich tried to sleep. He stirred in search of a comfortable position, then found one against the frosty driver’s side window. The shocking cold on his cheek woke him, and bleary eyed, he stretched and yawned and tightened the blanket up over his neck. Sucking slivers of pickled beef from his teeth, he reached for a flask amid empty MRE tins, unscrewed the cap and took a long, satisfying drink. Wiping his mouth, he glanced outside. Through the windshield, fir trees swayed in the wind and he felt fortunate to have fallen from the plane. If he hadn’t been injured, he might be out there right now with the others, slogging through the snow in a search for God knows what.

Earlier, Vukarin had awakened him with the news that Colonel Barkov had promoted him to corporal and that he wanted him to lead the search to the north. Though he was thrilled, Corovich had little time to celebrate. After two hours of rest, Barkov ordered the convoy south, leaving the new corporal one of the trucks and four men. Much to their delight, Corovich’s first command decision was to drive instead of hike back to the plane wreck. Corovich felt power making the decisions, and when he found a path through the trees wide enough for the big 6x6, he also felt vindication. It had taken half an hour to get back to the wrecked plane, but that time had allowed the men to sleep a little more.

They had easily found the second set of tracks again, for the snow had stopped falling hours before. But Corovich’s decision to stay behind while the men searched was at once unpopular. They grumbled, but he smoothed things over by seeing to it that they got more MRE’s and a few sips from his flask. He ordered the men to follow the tracks until 19:30 hours, then return. He doubted they would find anything anyway, and it was his opinion that the tracks were those of a caribou or wolf. They couldn’t be human, he reasoned, because they headed north into the thickest part of the taiga
.
And there just wasn’t anything there.

“
Corporal Ivan Corovich,” he said aloud. “No,
colonel
Ivan Corovich.” He liked the sound of that. He listened to the wind outside as it whistled through spruce and leafless birch trees. A sliver of moon peeked out from the patchy black sky. He looked at his watch:

21:00 hours
.

Hadn’t he told them 19:30? He looked at the field radio on the dash cradle. If they were lost, why hadn’t they reported in? Perhaps they lost track of time and were still searching. Corovich decided that was impossible and picked up the radio. Depressing the button, he called into it. “Corovich to-” He tried to remember who he had given the radio to. “Uh, Corovich to Yergetchin, over.” Nothing. No voices, no static. Then he realized that the radio was turned off. When did that happen, he wondered?
Idiot
, he thought.
Why did you turn the radio off?

He switched the radio on and static poured out of the speaker. He depressed the button. “Corovich to Yergetchin, over.”

This time, static followed, but the voice on the other end wasn’t the one he wanted to hear. “This is Vukarin, corporal,” said the lieutenant. “You’re on the wrong channel. Everything okay?”

Corovich swallowed, summoned the most confidence he could, then said, “Yes, lieutenant, everything’s fine. I dropped the radio. Just wanted to make sure it was still functioning.”

“Don’t drop the radio, corporal. It’s your lifeline. Where are you?”

He was getting in deeper, but Corovich couldn’t tell him the truth. Not on his first command. “We’re, uh, 12 miles north of the wreck. Haven’t spotted anything yet. The tracks are gone.”

There was a long silence, followed by static. “Colonel says head back to your truck. Meet us at the rendezvous on Road 2-7 at 0:300. Vukarin out.”

He turned off the radio, realized what he had done, turned it back on again. “Keep it on,” he chastised himself. He placed it back in the cradle. “Head back to your truck,” he said
. I should’ve gone with them.
He wondered if his decision to stay behind was an act of logic, of laziness or of cowardice.
I’m a corporal.
I made the right decision
.

The men were over-due by an hour and a half. He couldn’t imagine they’d want to search further than he had ordered. That was ridiculous. He couldn’t help but think that something had happened to them. If they were lost and had tried to call in, they would have gotten static. Obviously, they hadn’t called into Vukarin either. Corovich punched the dashboard in frustration. He scanned the forest surrounding the truck. It was as lifeless as a cemetery. He took a swig from the flask and wondered what kind of reception he’d get if he returned four men short. Soviet command couldn’t transfer him to Siberia; he was already there. Images of a firing squad shook him up.

A firing squad.

He began to sweat, but not from heat. Corovich threw off the blanket. He grabbed his cap and rifle and reached for the door handle. Before he could get out of the truck, though, something materialized in the forest ahead. It was a dark shape and in the streaky woods lacked a recognizable form. Corovich hesitated, cursing his fear.

The shape appeared and disappeared randomly from behind trees. It passed behind one tree but then didn’t show itself again. He watched. And waited.

His grip tight around the rifle, Corovich opened the door and left the truck. Pointing the weapon toward the trees, he made his way around the hood and stopped in front of the grill. The forest was silent.

“Who’s there?” he said. There was no answer. “Show yourself,” he shouted with growing anxiety. And then the shape reappeared and Corovich could see that it was one of the soldiers. “Fuck,” he said, then ran into the woods.

Private Yergetchin collapsed into Corovich’s arms. Quickly, he laid him flat on the ground. The man was as white as the snow around him, his eyes wide, his pupils large and black. Shredded strips of cloth that once formed a coat lay across his body, its dark green wool made darker with frozen blood. His pants were mostly gone, his legs scratched and bruised. He was missing a boot.

“Arin,” said Corovich, trying to avert panic. “What happened?” Yergetchin reached up with bloody hands. The knuckles were broken and bruised, as if the man had continuously beaten them against something solid. Corovich stifled fear and made a quick assessment of the injuries. Across the soldier’s arms and chest were deep gashes, all grouped in patterns of four. The wounds were deep, but the cold helped subdue the bleeding. If Corovich hadn’t known any better, he’d have said they were claw marks.

But they weren’t the most serious wounds. Corovich pulled the shredded coat aside and recoiled at the wound hiding underneath. Yergetchin’s left side, from the top of his hip to the bottom of his rib cage, was crushed and mangled. Intestines peeked through two large ragged puncture wounds, and Corovich guessed that an animal had bitten him.

Blood bubbled from the wound with each shallow breath and Corovich felt growing nausea. Yergetchin mumbled incoherently. The newly-promoted corporal responded with light slaps to his cheeks, bringing him around. Yergetchin came to life and screamed, a sound that chilled Corovich.

“
Comrade,” Yergetchin said. Blood filled his throat and he choked and spit before it filled again. He fought to talk. “Comrade, the snow.”

“
Where are the others?” Corovich said. He tried to maintain his composure, but the snow around Yergetchin was beginning to turn red. “What happened to you? What happened to the others?” The soldier coughed, his breathing labored and raspy as his lungs filled with blood.

“
The snow,” the soldier said. “Watch the snow.”

“
Why?” said Corovich. Panic was setting in.

“
The snow,” he managed. “It has eyes.” He heaved before his lungs gave out.

Corovich shook him, slapped his face. “Arin,” he said on the verge of tears. “Arin.” Yergetchin didn’t answer. Wide-eyed with shock, the new corporal turned his attention to the dark forest surrounding him.

He was now totally alone.

*   *   *

A light flurry had begun to fall as Kurskin and Warnikov made there way through the compound toward the main gate. Falling snow, no matter how light or hard it was, prompted Kurskin to pull his collar up and hunch his shoulders forward. It was all psychological, an attempt to convince himself that he was warm.

It didn’t work.

He looked over at Warnikov as they walked side by side. The private stared forward and didn’t seem to mind the fact that it was cold and that he was dressed in nothing more than his autumn-issue overcoat. He just stared straight ahead, his eyes barely blinking.