Polar Shift nf-6

  Polar Shift

  ( NUMA Files - 6 )

  Clive Cussler

  Polar Shift: it is the name for a phenomenon that may have occurred many times in the past. At its weakest, it disorients birds and animals and damages electrical equipment. At its worst, it causes massive eruptions, earthquakes and climatic changes. At its very worst, it would mean the obliteration of all living matter! Sixty years ago, an eccentric Hungarian genius discovered how to artificially trigger such a shift, but then his work disappeared, or so it was thought. Now, the charismatic leader of an anti-globalization group plans to use it to give the world's industrialized nations a small jolt, before reversing the shift back again. The only problem is, it can't be reversed. Once it starts, there is nothing anyone can do. Austin, Zavala and the rest of the NUMA Special Assignments Team have certainly faced dire situations before, but never have they encountered anything like this. This time even they may be too late.

  Clive Cussler

  Polar Shift

  (NUMA Files – 6)

  Prologue

  East Prussia, 1944

  The Mercedes-Benz 770 W150 Grosser Tourenwagen weighed more than four tons and was armored like a Panzer. But the seven-passenger limousine seemed to float like a ghost over the cushion of new-fallen snow, gliding with unlit headlights past slumbering cornfields that sparkled in the blue light of the moon.

  As the car neared a darkened farmhouse that lay in a gentle hollow, the driver gently touched the brakes. The car slowed to the speed of a walk and approached the low-slung, fieldstone structure with the stealth of a cat stalking a mouse.

  The driver gazed thoughtfully through the frosted windshield with eyes the color of arctic ice. The building appeared to be abandoned, but he knew better than to take chances. White paint had been hastily slapped over the car's sculpted black steel body. The crude attempt at camouflage made the automobile practically invisible to the Stormovic ground attack planes that prowled the skies like angry hawks, but the Mercedes had barely escaped the Russian patrols that materialized out of the snow like wraiths. Rifle bullets had cratered the armor in a dozen places.

  So he waited.

  The man stretched out on the spacious backseat of the four-door sedan had felt the car decelerate. He sat up and blinked the sleep out of his eyes.

  "What is it?" he asked, speaking German with a Hungarian accent. His voice was fuzzy from sleep.

  The driver hushed his passenger. "Something's not-"

  The rattle of gunfire shattered the glassy stillness of the night.

  The driver mashed the brake pedal. The massive vehicle hissed to a skidding stop about fifty yards from the farmhouse. He switched off the engine and snatched the 9 mm Lugar pistol from the front seat. His fingers tightened on the Lugar's grip as a burly figure dressed in the olive uniform and fur hat of the Red Army staggered out the front door of the farmhouse.

  The soldier was clutching his arm and bellowing like a bee-stung bull.

  "Damn fascist whore!" he bawled repeatedly. His voice was hoarse with rage and pain.

  The Russian soldier had broken into the farmhouse only minutes before. The farm couple had been hiding in a closet, huddling under a blanket like children afraid of the dark. He had put a bullet in the husband and turned his attention to the woman, who had fled into the tiny kitchen.

  Shouldering his weapon, he had crooked his finger and crooned, "Frau, komm," the soothing prelude to rape.

  The soldier's vodka-soaked brain failed to warn him that he was in danger. The farmer's wife hadn't begged for mercy or burst into tears like the other women he had raped and murdered. She had glared at him with hot eyes, whipped a carving knife out from behind her back and slashed at his face. He had seen a flash of steel in the moonlight streaming through the windows and had thrown up his left arm to defend himself, but the sharp blade sliced through his sleeve and forearm. He punched her to the floor with his other hand. Even then she had lunged for the knife. Consumed with white-hot fury, he cut her in half with frenzied bursts of his PPS-43 machine gun.

  As he stood outside the farmhouse, the soldier examined his wound. The cut was not severe, and the blood flow was down to a trickle. He pulled a pint of homemade vodka from his pocket and drained the bottle. The fiery hundred-proof liquor trickling down his throat helped numb the searing pain in his arm. He tossed the empty bottle into the snow, wiped his mouth with the back of his glove and set off to rejoin his comrades. He would brag that he'd been wounded fighting a gang of fascists.

  The soldier trudged a few steps in the snow only to stop as his sharp ears picked up the tick-tick sound of the car's engine cooling down. He squinted at the large grayish smudge in the moon shadows. A suspicious scowl appeared on his broad peasant face. He slipped his machine gun from his shoulder and brought it to bear on the vague object. His finger tightened on the trigger.

  Four headlights blazed on. The powerful in-line eight-cylinder engine roared into life and the car sprang forward, its rear end fish-tailing in the snow. The Russian tried to dodge the oncoming vehicle. The corner of the heavy bumper caught his leg, and he was thrown to the side of the road.

  The car slid to a stop, the door opened and the driver got out. The tall man walked through the snow to the soldier, his black leather overcoat slapping softly against his thighs. The man had a long face and a lantern jaw. His close-cropped blond hair was uncovered even though the temperature was below zero.

  He squatted next to the stricken man.

  "Are you hurt, tovarich?" he said in Russian. His voice was deep and resonant, and he spoke with the detached sympathy of a physician.

  The soldier groaned. He couldn't believe his bad luck. First that German bitch with the knife, now this.

  He cursed through spittle-covered lips. "Damn your mother! Of course I'm hurt."

  The tall man lit a cigarette and placed it between the Russian's lips. "Is there anyone in the farmhouse?"

  The soldier took a deep drag and exhaled through his nostrils. He assumed that the stranger was one of the political officers who infested the army like fleas.

  "Two fascists," the Russian said. "A man and a woman."

  The stranger went inside the farmhouse and emerged minutes later.

  "What happened?" he said, again kneeling by the soldier's side.

  "I shot the man. The fascist witch came after me with a knife."

  "Good work." He patted the Russian on the shoulder. "You're here alone?"

  The soldier growled like a dog with his bone. "I don't share my loot or my women."

  "What is your unit?"

  "General Galitsky's Eleventh Guards army," the soldier replied with pride in his voice.

  "You attacked Nemmersdorf on the border?"

  The soldier bared his bad teeth. "We nailed the fascists to their barns. Men, women and children. You should have heard the fascist dogs scream for mercy."

  The tall man nodded. "Well done. I can take you to your comrades. Where are they?"

  "Close by. Getting ready for another push west."

  The tall man gazed toward a distant line of trees. The rumble of huge T-34 battle tanks was like distant thunder. "Where are the Germans?"

  "The swine are running for their lives." The soldier puffed on the cigarette. "Long live Mother Russia."

  "Yes," the tall man said. "Long live Mother Russia." He reached into his overcoat, pulled out the Lugar and placed the muzzle against the soldier's temple. "Auf Wiedersehen, comrade."

  The pistol barked once. The stranger slid the smoking pistol into its holster and returned to the car. As he got behind the wheel, a hoarse cry came from the passenger in the backseat.

  "You killed that soldier in cold blood!"

  The dark-haired man was in his mi
d-thirties, and he had the handsome chiseled face of an actor. A thin mustache adorned a sensitive mouth. But there was nothing delicate about the way his expressive gray eyes burned with anger.

  "I simply helped another Ivan sacrifice himself for the greater glory of Mother Russia," the driver said, speaking in German.

  "I understand this is war," the passenger said, his voice tight with emotion. "But even you must admit the Russians are human, like us."

  "Yes, Professor Kovacs, we are very much alike. We have committed unspeakable atrocities against their people, and now they are taking their revenge." He described the horrors of the Nemmersdorf massacre.

  "I'm sorry for those people," Kovacs said in a subdued tone, "but the fact that the Russians behave like animals doesn't mean that the rest of the world must descend into savagery."

  The driver heaved a heavy sigh. "The front is beyond that ridge," he said. "You are welcome to discuss the goodness of mankind with your Russian friends. I won't stop you."

  The professor drew in on himself like an oyster.

  The driver glanced in the rearview mirror and chuckled to himself.

  "A wise decision." He lit a cigarette, bending low to shield the light from his match. "Let me explain the situation. The Red Army has crossed the border and blown through the German front as if it were made of fog. Nearly all the inhabitants of this lovely countryside have fled their homes and fields. Our valiant army has been fighting a rearguard action as it runs for its life. The Russians have a ten-to-one advantage in men and arms, and they are cutting off all land routes west as they race toward Berlin. Millions of people are on the move to the coast, where the only escape is by sea."

  "God help us all," the professor said.

  "He seems to have evacuated East Prussia as well. Consider yourself a fortunate man," the driver said cheerfully. He backed the car up, threw the shift into low gear and drove around the Russian's body. "You are seeing history."

  The car headed west, entering the no-man's-land between the advancing Russian juggernaut and the retreating Germans. The Mercedes flew along the roads, skirting deserted villages and farms. The frozen countryside was surreal, as if it had been tilted on its side and emptied of all human life. The travelers stopped only to refuel from the spare gas tanks the car carried in its trunk and to relieve themselves.

  Tracks began to appear in the snow. A short while later, the car caught up with the tail end of the retreat. The strategic withdrawal had become a full-fledged rout of army trucks and tanks that lumbered along through the falling snow in a slow-moving river of soldiers and refugees.

  The luckier refugees rode on tractors or horse-drawn carts. Others walked, pushing wheelbarrows piled with personal possessions through the snow. Many had escaped with only the clothes on their backs.

  The Mercedes rode up on the edge of the road, and its deep tire treads dug into the snow. The car kept moving until it passed the head of the retreat. Around dawn, the mud-splattered car limped into Gdynia like a wounded rhino seeking shelter in a thicket.

  The Germans had occupied Gdynia in 1939, expelled fifty thousand Poles and renamed the bustling seaport Gotenhafen, after the Goths. The harbor was transformed into a navy base, primarily for submarines. A branch of the Kiel shipyard was established to turn out new U-boats that were matched with crews trained in nearby waters and sent to sink Allied ships in the Atlantic.

  Under orders from Gross Admiral Karl Doenitz, an eclectic flotilla had been assembled at Gdynia in preparation for the evacuation. The fleet included some of the finest passenger liners in Germany, cargo ships, fishing boats and private vessels. Doenitz wanted his submarine and other naval personnel rescued so they could continue to fight. Eventually, more than two million civilians and military personnel would be transported west.

  The Mercedes made its way through the city. A bitterly cold wind was blowing in from the Baltic Sea, whipping snowflakes into clouds of icy, stinging nettles. Despite the frostbite conditions, the city's streets were as crowded as on a summer's day. Refugees and prisoners of war slogged through deep drifts in futile search of shelter. Relief stations were overwhelmed with long lines of hungry refugees waiting for a crust of bread or a cup of hot soup.

  Wagons piled high with passengers and goods clogged the narrow streets. Refugees streamed from the train station to join the throngs who had arrived on foot. Muffled under layers of clothing, they resembled strange snow creatures. Children were pulled along on makeshift sleds.

  The car was capable of speeds reaching 170 kilometers per hour, but it soon became bogged down in traffic. The driver cursed and leaned on the horn. The heavy steel bumper failed to nudge the refugees out of the way. Frustrated at the glacial pace, the driver brought the car to a complete halt. He got out and opened the rear door.

  "Come, Professor," he said, rousting his passenger. "Time for a stroll."

  Abandoning the Mercedes in the middle of the street, the driver bulled his way through the crowd. He kept a firm hand on the professor's arm, yelled at people to make way and shouldered them aside when they didn't move fast enough.

  Eventually, they made their way to the waterfront where more than sixty thousand refugees had gathered, hoping to get aboard one of the vessels lined up at the piers or anchored in the harbor.

  "Take a good look," the driver said, surveying the sight with a grim smile. "The religious scholars have been all wrong. You can plainly see that it is cold, not hot, in Hell."

  The professor was convinced he was in the hands of a madman. Before Kovacs could reply, the driver had him in tow once more. They wove their way through a snow-covered settlement of tents fashioned from blankets and dodged scores of starving horses and dogs abandoned by their owners. Wagons cluttered the docks. Lines of stretchers carried wounded soldiers brought in from the east aboard ambulance trains. Armed guards stood at each gangway and turned away unauthorized passengers.

  The driver cut in front of a passenger line. The steel-helmeted sentry manning the checkpoint raised his rifle to bar the way. The driver waved a sheet of paper printed in heavy Gothic type under the sentry's nose. The guard read the document, snapped to attention and pointed along the dock.

  The professor didn't move. He had been watching someone on board the ship anchored at the dock throw a bundle down to the crowd on the pier. The throw was short and the bundle fell into the water. A wailing went up from the crowd.

  "What's happening?" the professor said.

  The guard barely glanced in the direction of the commotion. "Refugees with a baby can get on board. They toss the baby back down and use it as a boarding pass over and over. Sometimes they miss and the baby goes in the water."

  "How gruesome," the professor said with a shudder.

  The guard shrugged. "You'd better get moving. Once the snow stops, the Reds will send their planes to bomb and strafe. Good luck." He raised his rifle to bar the next person in line.

  The magic document got Kovacs and the driver past a pair of tough-looking SS officers who were looking for able-bodied men to press into duty on the front. They eventually reached a ramp leading onto a ferry crammed with wounded soldiers. The driver again showed his documents to a guard, who told them to hurry aboard.

  As the overloaded ferry left the dock, it was watched by a man wearing the uniform of the naval medical corps. He had been helping to load the wounded on board, but he slipped through the mob and away from the waterfront to a maritime junkyard.

  He climbed onto a rotting derelict of a fishing boat and went below. He pulled a crank-operated radio from a galley cupboard, fired it up and muttered a few sentences in Russian. He heard the reply against the crackle of static, replaced the radio and headed back to the ferry dock.

  The ferry carrying Kovacs and his tall companion had come around to the seaward side of a vessel. The ship had been drawn several yards from the dock to keep desperate refugees from sneaking aboard. As the ferry passed under the ship's bow, the professor looked up. Printed in Gothic letter
s on the navy gray hull was the name Wilhelm Gustloff.

  A gangway was lowered and the wounded were carried aboard the ship. Then the other passengers scrambled up the gangway. They wore smiles of relief on their faces and prayers of thanks on their lips. The German fatherland was only a few days' cruise away.

  None of the happy passengers could have known that they had just boarded a floating tomb.

  Captain Third Class Sasha Marinesko peered through the periscope of the Submarine S-13, his dark brow furrowed in a deep scowl.

  Nothing.

  Not a German transport in sight. The gray sea was as empty as the pockets of a sailor returning from shore leave. Not even a stinking rowboat to shoot at. The captain thought of the twelve unused torpedoes aboard the Soviet sub and his anger festered like an open sore. Soviet naval headquarters had said that the Red Army offensive against Danzig would force a major sea evacuation. The S-13 was one of three Soviet subs ordered to wait for the expected exodus off Memel, a port still held by the Germans.

  When Marinesko learned that Memel had been captured, he called his officers together. He told them he had decided to head toward the Bay of Danzig, where the evacuation convoys were more likely to be found.

  Not one man objected. Officers and crew were well aware that the success of their mission could mean the difference between a hero's welcome and a one-way ticket to Siberia.

  Days earlier, the captain had run afoul of the secret police, the NKGB. He had left the base without permission. He was out whoring on January 2 when orders had come down from Stalin for the subs to sail into the Baltic and wreak havoc among the convoys. But the captain was on a three-day bender in the brothels and bars of the Finnish port of Turku. He returned to the S-13 a day after it was supposed to sail.

  The NKGB was waiting. They became even more suspicious when he said he could not remember the details of his drunken binge. Marinesko was a cocky and tough submarine skipper who had been awarded the orders of Lenin and the Red Banner. The swashbuckling submariner exploded in anger when the secret police accused him of spying and defection.