Notes Taken by Samantha and Alastair Beadle.
Akula then recognises the technician (vaguely) as a student from the university, he thinks from the chemistry department. When asked his name the technician tells us it is Boris Feodor. He says that he heard Sirdar (the Afghan with the glasses) and WarWolf talking and they said the city would be destroyed in the next few days.
We examine the computer records and the papers we recovered. On the computer, Akula finds records on the drugs factory in which the villains were hiding (there are three main folders: 'Processing' - lots of information on what is made, how it is made, from what, and how it is cut; 'Accounts' - what money has come in, and where it goes; and 'Distribution' - the networks by which they drugs are distributed across Moscow and beyond). There is enough information here to put a big dent in the Moscow drugs trade.
There is also a folder entitled 'Misc'. Akula looks here first. It includes a number of things - information on new and experimental drugs, and cutting them; some of the notes that were stolen from the military archive. The notes, records of Nazi submarine movements from 1944-1945, are annotated. The notes say something only described as 'it' was landed in or near Moscow via the ship canal, but whoever wrote the notes (it is assumed Sirdar) doesn't seem to know an exact location.
The papers saved from the shredder tell of the relocation of the drugs factory outside Moscow in a town called Klin (some 40km north west of Moscow), where it will be safe. This is to be done in the next couple of days.
There are also some less than complimentary notes on the supervillians and their performance, also by Sirdar:
Searching the place some more, the party discover a windowless room draped in black with a complex circle-and-pentagram in blood on the floor, with an altar in the circle covered in blood. Large black candlesticks stand at the points of the pentagram. There is a book stand nearby (empty) and there are many strange occult symbols all over the place. Akula has a bad feeling about this place. The party leaves.
Boris tells us that the group were looking for something. They hadn't found it yet but it was what was going to destroy the city. Suddenly everyone, except Napalm, feels they are being watched. Boris starts to choke and go blue, clutching at his chest. Mother Bear grabs him and quickly leaves the building.
Outside, the police and medical services are approaching the block. Mirov grabs the other technicians, computer and papers and leaves the block via the window, turning in a big parawing. Akula and General Winter also leave the building, making their way down the stairs. Napalm is left alone and still cannot feel the presence watching her. She decides she needs a drink and flies off to a nearby bar to spend the cash she has.
The rest of the group explain to the police what has happened, and what they found here. They see Napalm fly off across the sky. Boris is given medical assistance; although he is not at all well, it looks like he will live. General Winter arranges for the structure of the block to be looked at (and fixed) after its little ice problem.
It is decided to go to police headquarters and go over the notes that Molinya recovered from the Lubyanka archive.
Upon arrival, it is discovered that Molinya has been suspended as a police officer, pending her court case. The group goes down to the archives where Molinya's papers are being stored; no-one has had a chance to look at them yet. In the archives, it is discovered that the man in charge (a big fat police officer in his 50's) is dead - from a heart attack or something similar, it seems - and lying on the floor. Other police are called for, and an investigation is begun. A forensics officer who is called in thinks the man has been dead for an hour or so. The papers from the Lubyanka are scattered around the room, but once they are collected up, the papers we need are still there and they are taken elsewhere to be looked at. The police look on resignedly as the heroes wander off with evidence, but don't protest. A microfilm copy of what was taken from the military archive has also arrived, and is taken along.
It is the early hours of the morning by now; some of the party are getting quite tired.
The party go to the Moscow State University library, which turns out to still be open at this hour, and use the microfilm readers.
From the microfilm copies of the Nazi records it is discovered that during the period we are looking at (from late 1944 to mid-1945) there were fifty times the normal amount of submarine movements in the Neva River area during March 1945 (and a commensurate drop in activity elsewhere). The Neva River flows into the Bay of Finland close to St Petersburg and it leads into the ship canal to Moscow. March would seem to be a good time for infiltrating something up the canal - it is late enough for the winter ice to have melted, but early enough for traffic to be sufficiently sparse to allow something to slip up the canal without being noticed.
The German records mention a Project Omega Six, and a Soviet report of a German sub being sunk in the area with lots of unidentifiable wreckage being recovered (which was handed over to military intelligence) is also found in the records. The records also show that a German submarine, code name U628, was missing around March 1945, and re-appeared afterwards.
From the NKVD records of that period (from the Lubyanka) there were a number of sightings of unidentified shipping on the Neva and of many killings in that area. This included two NKVD men. A German spy named Wilhelm Kreutz was also captured during this time; he was interrogated by military intelligence (the records do not say with what results).
Dawn breaks.
By now it is early morning. Akula is paged by Egor Subich, the student Akula asked to hack into the computer recovered from Mr Starukha. He has apparently cracked the password and wants to show Akula what he has found.
Napalm, showing huge self control, doesn't spend all the cash she has on drink. She just gets very relaxed, then contacts Mirov to arrange to meet up. Mother Bear and Mirov decide the next place to go is the Lubyanka to look up records of the interrogation of the spy. They arrange to meet Napalm on the way.
Akula heads out of the library to Egor's room. Upon arriving (it is a small breeze-block walled room with rock and roll posters and another student asleep in one of two beds), Egor shows Akula what he has found (once he stops raving about the laptop's performance).
On the computer there are details of the movement of the drugs factory outside the city, to Klin, general Mafioski re-location plans and parts of plans to take over the city (they look like just the parts Mr Starukha would need). It looks like the Mafia expect something to happen in Moscow which will wipe out the parliament, police etc, and then they will move in and take over.
Mr Starukha is in control of local and imported forces from the south-east of Moscow (perhaps from Chechnya and Afghanistan if their direction of origin is anything to go by) and they are building up forces in Vladimir (a city to the east of Moscow). Akula asks the student not to tell anyone what he has discovered. Egor agrees, but says he is leaving the city early this morning for a few days in the Crimea. Akula thinks he is wise to do so.
Napalm meets a large pink pogo-ing elephant (Mirov) in the centre of Moscow accompanied by Mother Bear, who runs alongside. They go to the Lubyanka. Here they tell the guard what they want and with very little hesitation are lead through a person-sized gate in the main gates, across the courtyard inside, and into the archives. They are met by a Federal Counter-Intelligence Service (FCIS) Captain named Sulko who will help them (the FCIS are based in the Lubyanka since the disbanding of the KGB).
Captain Sulko is told what the party want and after some searching he finds the files for them. Files on Wilhelm Kreutz, the U628 and Project Omega Six.
He looks very worried by the contents of the Project Omega file - the Omega projects are the giant sleeper robots of the Nazi's that have attacked in the past. One such attack occurred in 1958 - a 200ft tall humanoid robot broke out of bunker in East German and headed for Moscow, but was destroyed en route by a group of Eastern Bloc superheros. A second occurred in 1963 - a giant centipede-like robot emerged from Antarctica, near the remains of the Nazi base there which was nuked by US forces in 1955. It vanished underwater, but reappeared on the eastern seaboard of the USA, up which it rampaged before being destroyed by the Guardians. Both robots were huge, very tough, heavily armed with many weapon emplacements, and emblazoned with swastikas. The file does not specifically mention a Project Omega Six, but if it's another sleeper robot, it's a serious problem. There is much more information on the Moscow sleeper, as it happened on Soviet soil, but even so not too much that is useful, as it was quite thoroughly destroyed...
The U628 was a Nazi U-Boat, one of the most advanced at the time. It survived the war and was captured by the Russians. It was apparently used to ferry Nazi officials and gold to Antarctica. It was capable of unloading underwater and for the time was very stealthy. The file includes a picture of its last captain.
The Kreutz file indicates that he was captured close to the town of Klin. His mission remains unknown; he didn't crack under torture but was a dedicated Nazi and said that the Third Reich would get its revenge on the world. He is, surprisingly, still alive and is being held in the Lefortovo Prison, in the Zayauze district to the east of central Moscow.
It is decided to visit Kreutz to see what we can get from him. Captain Sulko phones the prison to tell them we are coming. He is also told about the idea of a sleeper robot hitting the city in the next few days. He will pass this on to his superiors to prepare for it, and also the towns of Klin and Vladimir will be checked out for the Mafioski and their forces who are being built up there.
General Winter is asked to get a van to transport things around for us - computer, papers etc. Molinya is paged by Napalm to meet us at the prison.
Mirov passes on the notes from Sirdar about the other supervillains to the press. They are very happy to print them; they should make the late morning edition.
At the prison we all meet up (including Molinya and General Winter) and it is decided that for the next few days we should stay together to deal with the super villains and robot if or when they turn up. Sensible.
We go into Lefortovo Prison, a depressing grey stone structure some distance back from the nearest main road, behind some houses (this is where the leaders of the abortive coup of 1991 were kept for a while after their capture). The party are let in through a person-sized door in the armoured main gates, and a guard shows them into an interview room. He asks us to wait. The prison seems to be almost deserted. Mirov pretends to be a chair.
Kreutz is brought in and is sat in the Mirov chair. He is an old man of 76 and is a bit of a mess. He wears an eye-patch; one ear is missing, the other is cauliflowered; his finger nails show signs of having been forcibly removed; he is stooped and walks with a limp and a cane. He looks even older than his years.
Mother Bear is hoping that he will have mellowed with age, and will no longer be a frothing Nazi. She talks to him about the Omega projects and asks him if he wants the Afghan's to take over the Nazi projects and destroy Moscow. He seems not to care what happens to a city full of 'untermenschen', and seems sure that the Nazi's will one day return.
Seeing that more brutal methods are about to be employed, Mother Bear, Akula and General Winter then leave to go and look at his records. Mirov, Napalm and Molinya start to torture him, initially by Mirov trapping him in the chair and driving wires up through his body (to cause pain but not serious injury). After a while they move on to using the same technique as before on Mr Kurevka (Mirov anaesthetises one arm and turns his head away so he cannot see, then he and Napalm yank and tug while Mirov produces fake blood, fingers and bits of flesh along with lots of helpful comments), only with bits of a fake arm being put before him.
In Kreutz' medical records Mother Bear finds that he is in fairly good health for his age and condition, that he is still a very dedicated Nazi and that he has never had a cell-mate. Mother Bear, Akula and General Winter then plan out where the robot could be and decide that it is probably in one of the lakes to the north of the city. They then suggest some truth serum be used on Kreutz.
As the serum arrives most of the group get the feeling they are being watched again so once Kreutz is injected with it, it is decided to move. The guard says he cannot let us take the prisoner but steps back does not try to stop us when the party leave with him. Sensible. The feeling of being watched stops after a kilometre or so.
The heroes go to Lake Tomolinsk to the north of Moscow, close to the Sheremetevo Airport and on the shipping canal which runs to the Northern River Terminal in the city. Mirov forms a boat in the centre of the widest part of the lake, more than a kilometre from the shore in all directions - this should allow whoever is making the feeling of being watched occur noticeable if they try again.
Mirov changes the boat to a U-Boat conning tower, and does an impression of the submarine commander whose picture he saw earlier. He interviews Kreutz as if he is briefing him for his mission, after a lot of training in resisting interrogation. Kreutz is well under the influence of the truth serum by now. Kreutz seems convinced by what he is told, and thinks he is still in 1945. He confirms that the sleeper robot is in this very lake, in the deepest part. When asked (with some badgering) he gives Mirov the access code - 22341805660100-Alpha - which must be typed into a pad by the door. However, he claims he cannot activate the sleeper - someone he refers to as 'the professor' is needed for that.
Mirov attempts to create a mock-up of the door, to get Kreutz to show more of what should be done, but no-one knows what it should look like - the door of the 1958 sleeper was where the superheros of the time got in, and so was utterly destroyed. Then he tries to convince Kreutz that 'the Russians are coming' and he must repeat back his mission directives right away. Even through the drugs, Kreutz is dubious. To help convince him Mother Bear, in human form bursts up on deck firing a Mafioski gun into the air; Mirov falls over, apparently shot through the head. This does not convince Kreutz to talk, though.
Kreutz is heaviliy sedated and the party return to a part of the shore of the lake away from any roads or habitations and the places where the ship canal enters and leaves. Mirov starts to search the lake. General Winter has a shipping chart of the lake couriered to us and the others rest or drink or eat as needed (as everyone has been on the go for more than 24 hours now). It is decided to keep Kreutz for the time being in case the supervillains try to capture him for the information he knows.
Swimming in the lake, Mirov produces a large magnet and swims close to the bottom on the assumption it will be attracted to the steel shell of the sleeper. He quickly finds a sunken barge, shopping trolleys and assorted other junk.
The map arrives and two deep sections of the lake are found. Akula goes and shows Mirov and the two of them search the two areas. The others stay in the van.