He stopped.
“Not behind me,” I said.
“Beside me.”
He understood the distinction.
Together, we entered the maintenance tunnel.
He supported my left side while the radio operator carried the handset and red folder.
Petrov and the other officers remained locked in communications with the severed alarm panel and the unarmed grenade still beneath the console.
The tunnel was narrow, hot, and loud with ventilation fans.
Each step forced a sound through my teeth.
Twice I had to stop and brace against the wall while the young officer watched the clock on his wrist.
Twenty-two minutes remained.
At the first junction, two soldiers appeared from a stairwell.
The officer beside me shouted that Petrov had ordered an emergency inspection.
The soldiers hesitated when they saw my uniform.
I raised my rifle.
They placed their weapons on the floor.
At the artillery control room, Petrov’s key card opened the outer door but not the launch console.
A six-digit code flashed on the screen.
The young officer tried two combinations.
Both failed.
After the second attempt, a warning appeared: one entry remained before permanent lockout.
Eighteen minutes remained.
The radio operator searched the red folder.
There were no codes.
General Lawson asked whether we could destroy the control system.
The young officer shook his head.
A direct hit might trigger the firing sequence or make the loaded guns impossible to disarm remotely.
Petrov’s voice came faintly through the radio in the communications room.
He had reached the fixed microphone despite his restraints.
“You need me, Sergeant.”
“I need six numbers.”
“And I need safe passage.”
General Lawson said no agreement could be authorized.
Petrov laughed.
“Then the convoy dies.”
I studied the launch console.
Smudges marked the keypad.
Six keys showed more wear than the others, but that did not reveal the order.
The young officer whispered something.
The operator translated.
“Commander uses dates.
Victories.
Promotions.
His own history.”
I remembered the documents in the folder.
Payment dates.
Meeting dates.
Operational dates.
Then I remembered the photograph attached to Petrov’s personnel summary in our mission briefing.
A medal ceremony.
The date printed beneath it had marked his promotion to commander of Volkov.
I entered the six digits.
The screen paused.
Then the launch menu opened.
Petrov stopped laughing.
