The reactor’s hum vibrates through the long, complex channels of the K-829 Sibirsky  Medved: the Siberian Bear. Its large steel body groans under the immense, crushing pressure of the Arctic Ocean.

Aboard, the Bear carries 160 members of the Northern Fleet of the Soviet Navy. Among them stands Starshiy Leytenant Mikhail Sergeyevich Antonov, the fleet’s head sonar officer. He sits comfortably at his post with his morning zavarka. By now, he is used to the growls and roars of the submarine that holds him.

The space smells of oily machinery and the worn, thick leather boots hanging on the wall to his side. In front of the senior lieutenant, the sonar panel blinks and pulses in a rhythmic beat every two seconds. Sometimes the beep moves quickly, signaling something approaching the underwater mechanical machine.

Above him, Mikhail can hear the soft murmurs of the cabin crew and, periodically, the shouting of Kapitan 2-go ranga, Commander Petr Volkov, far above him in the main command room. Close and coming from his right, he hears the naval radio crackling with familiar static. Suddenly, a voice returns, the same one he hears every single morning, that of Iosif Stalin, the founding father of the USSR. He repeats words of iron will, emphasizing the ideology that shaped the motherland.

“Товарищи, граждане, братья и сёстры...
Comrades, citizens, brothers and sisters…”

Just above the sonar control perches a nailed-framed painting of Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker, protector of all sailors. Below Mikhail, stored in dark and terrible silence, lie the true weapons of the Sibirsky Medved. Twenty-four R-29RM intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads are packed deep under the hull, each ready to be launched with authorization from the homeland and the turn of a key by the Bear’s captain.

Currently, Mikhail finishes the last of his morning zavarka and scratches another mark beneath the desk of the sonar table—the one hundred fifty-sixth mark. Just as he empties his cup, the radio crackles again. This time, it is not Stalin but a loud beep that sounds not just from the radio but across the broadcast speakers of the entire submarine.

“Внимание... всем стратегическим единицам. Подтвержденный массированный ядерный удар по территории Советского Союза.
Attention... all units. Confirmed massive nuclear strike on Soviet territory.”

Mikhail listens closely. Could it be?

“Повторяю. Подтвержденный массированный ядерный удар. Выполните протокол Д-5.

Repeat. Confirmed massive nuclear strike. Execute Protocol D-5.”

He stiffens—the words seem unfamiliar. Then the warning lights turn red, and all around him the sound of running boots, shouting, and a cacophony of alarms swirl and collide.

He is on his feet now and opening the hatch. When he does, the pandemonium from the other side rushes in. He steps into a loud corridor when a comrade grabs his shoulder.

“Lieutenant, Captain Volkov wants all high-ranking officers to report to the command room. Now!”

Mikhail rushes up to the main section of the fleet, where the scene is worse. Twenty-five or so men are packed tightly in the command room with Captain Volkov in the center. Deep below them, through the decking, he can hear the metal cranks and rotating gears of the missile-loading mechanism. He doesn’t need to look; he knows that the crew in the missile deck prepares the warheads to launch. Captain Volkov speaks individually to the ranking officers, and when Mikhail catches his attention, Volkov redirects his orders.

“Lieutenant Mikhail, return to the sonar control room and look for possible enemy fleets.”

With no time wasted, he is back downstairs and greeted by an assistant officer holding a black metal box. This is the same box typically stored in a glass cage behind Captain Volkov's desk. Inside sit the launch keys for the warheads. He realizes this is happening.

Below the main deck, the alarm buzzes continuously; there is no light in the radar deck except for the constant flash of crimson that washes onto Mikhail’s face, making him feel sick. But before he can get to the main radar room, the radio switches again; the operator speaks firmly through the static:

“Выполнить протокол D-5. Требуется немедленный ответ.
Execute Protocol D-5. Immediate response required.”

Every man in the room knows what it means: the enemy has struck the Union, and Mikhail imagines the motherland and Moscow in flames.

Volkov’s voice cuts through the decks below: “Missile report. All tubes one through twelve are loaded. We now load tubes thirteen through twenty-four. Prepare for the first launch.”

Mikhail can feel the hydraulic press of the big red button above him, zooming down into the missile loading room. Yet nothing changes. He stands there for a moment; he thinks the signal has failed to reach the warheads. Then suddenly he hears several bolts slam below, and the compressed hissing of gas.

The screeching of the tubes and the gas slam the first missile up, followed by the second and the third. Each departure leaves a deep metallic roar echoing across the submarine.

Somewhere above him, he imagines plumes of white vapor erupting through the calm, frozen waters as the missiles burst through, the flames of the engines the only light to illuminate the Arctic night.

Back beneath the frozen water, less than a minute passes. Then a large boom crashes through the vessel. The radio announces that something is happening above the waters. The hull begins to creak under pressure. A low rumble rolls through, growing louder. Mikhail closes his eyes, now sitting on the floor, his legs wobbly; he cannot hear a thing but the loud rumble.

Five more seconds pass, and a sudden cold shiver runs through Mikhail's body. The shockwave has hit the Bear, and the black, ferocious Arctic water rushes in and swallows everything: the control room, the radar systems, the missile that has not yet fired.

Mikhail holds his last breath. Everything goes dark.

He is back in the radar room, the zavarka warm in his hands.

The radio crackles: “Товарищи, граждане, братья и сёстры...”

The sonar beeps, slow, steady, rhythmic. He can still feel the submarine vibrating, although it currently appears to have returned to its original calm. He can also taste the frozen Arctic seawater that had swarmed him... yet he is not wet, and there is no water here.

He tries to reason with himself: Moscow burned in flames—the motherland was destroyed, right?

Mikhail looks around, and everything seems the same, but no. He remembers. He remembers the captain’s order, the launch tubes firing, and his own death. He thinks, again, of the motherland in flames. What happened above the waters? Why did the Bear explode hundreds of meters below the frozen Arctic? And why is he back here, alive, with the zavarka, as if none of that had happened?

The words repeat in his head:
Moscow is in flames;
Moscow is in flames;
Moscow is in flames.

He looks at the hanging picture of Saint Nicholas, the saint of all sailors. Has he done his job? Has he saved the motherland?

Suddenly, the radio glitches, and the broadcast speakers ring out across the submarine.

“Внимание... всем стратегическим единицам. Подтвержденный массированный ядерный удар по территории Советского Союза.
Attention... all units. Confirmed nuclear strike on Soviet territory.”

Mikhail is struck by the same sirens and blinded by the red light flashing in his face. Didn’t this already happen? He waits for no orders this time and runs past the officers to the main command room, where Captain Volkov is giving orders to his fellow officers. Volkov orders Mikhail to return to the sonar room and scan for possible enemy fleets...

Mikhail stands there and contemplates the captain for a beat. Volkov recognizes the delay in his comrade.

“Antonov! What are you doing? Get down there and check the radar! NOW!”

Mikhail looks at the captain. “Captain, we cannot launch the warheads.”

“What do you mean?”

“Moscow will be in flames; we need to stop the launch to know what's going on.”

“Stop the launch? Obey the motherland’s orders? Moscow in flames? Antonov, what are you talking about?”

“Sir…” He turns his back, realizing now that logic won’t work here. No matter how he explains what he knows to be happening, no one will believe him.

Suddenly, an epiphany grabs him: the black box. The black box holds Captain Volkov’s keys, the ones needed to initiate the launch. He finds the officer below deck and, without a word, snatches the metal box from his unsuspecting hands.

“Brother, do you realize what you are doing?!” But Mikhail does not look back to answer the source of this shouting. Instead, he runs.

Thinking himself clear of the nuisance behind him, Mikhail’s spirit shrinks when he runs into two officers. With little regard for the panic he displays, they rip the metal box out of his shaky hands and escort him back to the radar room.

“We will deal with you after this matter,” says an officer, locking the door behind him. Mikhail is stuck inside the radar room; he knows he has lost his chance.

He sits in his usual chair and sighs at the tepid zavarka on his desk. He looks at the radar; nothing changes, just the same old pulsating beat every two seconds. For a moment, relief settles upon Mikhail. But that, like everything else, appears to be short-lived.

The warheads fire. Imprisoned in his space without any way of freeing himself, he begins to fixate and panic. He watches the clock—tick, tick, tick—and the seconds pass over him like a snail through treacle. All the while, he can hear the pressure and the shockwave that hits the submarine, hidden deep under the Arctic Ocean.

Mikhail feels the crash. Enveloping him now are the screams and shouts of his fellow crewmen as they succumb to the treacherous water that has breached their safety.

The submarine rumbles, shaking the radar room, and the locked door, no longer strong against the pressure of building water, breaks. Freezing seawater undulates.

The zavarka spills and splashes onto Mikhail while the painting of Saint Nicholas falls to the ground, shattering. The water swallows it all again. Mikhail turns around, and in his final seconds with water rising above his shoulders, he sees a small dot on the radar. Its accompanying beep pulsates faster and faster.

Beep
Beep
Beep

Mikhail opens his eyes once again.

The radio crackles, and the same voice of Stalin resonates into the cramped space: “Товарищи, граждане, братья и сёстры...”

“No. Not again...”

He grips the zavarka harder as the pressure builds around his body. Despite hot steam spreading from his cup across the dim radar room, he’s given up on enjoying any warmth from it.

Beep
Beep

Mikhail remembers the dot on the radar. He wonders if something could be around the vessel, or whether this is just a sophisticated trick of the enemy.

All he knows for sure is that he cannot disobey the motherland. He has to stop the launch first, or he will never make it. And when he goes to let himself out of the radar room, he is not surprised to discover that it is, of course, unlocked, because he has not been escorted back here yet, and he has not been locked in by the officers.

He has a sense of knowing. He needs to look deeper into the submarine.

This time, the hall that awaits him beyond the door is quiet, and his comrades greet him in such a way to suggest that nothing whatsoever has worried them.

Mikhail walks faster. Every so often, sudden growls and hums of the nuclear reactor vibrating through the channels interrupt his pace. He heads to the room that houses the reactor. As he works his way down a narrow stairway to the weapons bay and the dark, loud reactor room, he recognizes the dim, fading sounds coming through the speaker—the same ones that now haunt him.

“Внимание... всем стратегическим единицам. Подтвержденный массированный ядерный удар по территории Советского Союза.
Attention... all units. Confirmed massive nuclear strike on Soviet territory.”

Mikhail sees a light opening at the end of the stairs, and he picks up his pace.

Vrmmmm…

The ship shakes, sending Mikhail rolling down the stairs.

“Careful, comrade! First time down here? Don’t worry. It’s always like this on the stairs. You’ll get used to it.”

Dizzy, Mikhail thanks him and looks around the weapons bay. Around twenty soldiers are stationed around the weapon dock with its complex tubes and channels.

An officer opens a shell, and from that small opening of the tube, Mikhail can see the red tip of an R-29RM warhead for the first time since loading day, one hundred fifty-six days earlier.

Mikhail takes a step back and looks closer at the men. Something feels amiss. They move in sync, like robots. Their footsteps echo the same.

He takes another step back.

An officer passes him carrying a screwdriver, and a few moments later, the same officer passes him again from the same direction, carrying the same screwdriver.

Impossible.

He looks closer: they all have the same, lengthy, tall figures and are all looking in the same direction, repeating the same moves, over and over.

“Товарищи, граждане, братья и сёстры...” (Comrades, citizens, brothers and sisters...)

The voice of Stalin roams around his head, but no radio is to be seen.

Across the room, he sees a sailor bump his head on the pressure indicator. The sailor turns and feigns a slight, eerie smile at Mikhail. The sailor’s face twitches, glitching as the same eerie smile fixes on Mikhail. When Mikhail blinks his eyes—the sailor is suddenly gone. Stumbling backwards, colliding with the wall, he hits his head on the iron-plated deck. His body trembles.

“Fire!”

“What?”

Mikhail wakes on the deck of the weapons bay. Has some time passed?

He sees the same fate again; the missiles are fired. Mikhail lies there watching as the smoke and pressure from the shells explode on the floor while the men load another warhead.

“Are you okay, comrade?”

Mikhail looks up to find the same officer from before. Mikhail grabs his hand, but suddenly a static force shocks him, and the officer’s face glitches. Mikhail watches in horror as the same eerie grimace looks back at him. He tries to pull his hand free, but the grip grows firmer, harder.

Mikhail kicks the officer.

The shockwave of the next fired warhead hits Mikhail and he trips, this time falling straight down below decks. He tries to get up, his body unable to move. He hears booms and explosions near him.

The officers on the below deck surround Mikhail with the same eerie grimaces.

“No...”

Mikhail goes unconscious and is swallowed by water again.

Mikhail awakens to Stalin’s radio, once again back where he started—the one hundred fifty-sixth day. He sets the zavarka down. He hears the same old radio, but this time louder and clearer.

“Comrades, citizens, brothers and sisters. Death is the solution to all problems. No man, no problem.”

Mikhail stares up at the framed picture of Saint Nicholas. This time the picture is crooked, and the saint’s eyes have gone red.

He sits thinking, quiet and motionless. The alarms arrive—the sirens, the shouting, the rush of boots running up and down the hallway follow. But this time Mikhail doesn’t panic, he doesn’t beg. He waits until, suddenly, all goes quiet in his mind. A sort of knowing. Mikhail gets up, unlocks a cabinet to reveal a fully automatic machine gun. He loads it and heads for the radar room door.

A momentary pause causes Mikhail to look back. “In the Soviet army, it takes more courage to retreat than to advance,” comes from the radio. He shoots the speaker, hearing Stalin's voice fizzle out, and then heads up to the top.

When Mikhail storms into the command room, Volkov opens his mouth: “Lieutenant Mikhail, what do you think—”

But Mikhail doesn’t budge. He pulls the weapon from his back and fires. One shot after another, the men fall, screaming.

Volkov stands there in disbelief, his words still hanging in the air. Mikhail doesn’t answer; instead, he fires again, and this time the captain falls, stone cold, to the metal floor.

Turning from the carnage, Mikhail grabs the unlocked black metal case, his hands shaking. He jams the key into the slot and turns it. The static monitor glows and lights up, and he slams his hands onto the controls.

He aims not at any enemy but at Moscow, Leningrad—at the motherland itself.

The submarine shudders as the missiles fire, the same crackles and sounds Mikhail had listened to constantly before, but this time aimed at the motherland.

“Yes! The enemy will be crushed! Even if the enemy is us!”



And just as he exclaims to justify his moves, the submarine tears itself apart in the aftermath. Water rushes in, and the steeled beast splits open in a final, definitive sigh.