An eye hung by a cord from the ruins of a face.
Still, Turov waved to his chief of staff. “Oleg! Get Yerik moving.”
One of the soldiers tugged the door open, exposing a firefight in the hallway. He stepped out to join the other men, but a spray of bullets struck him, drove him back into the room. He stumbled and fell, dead before he hit the floor.
The other guardsman knelt to the side and lay down suppressive fire. Shadows down the hall dropped into cells to either side. The only surviving soldier from the hallway used that moment to retreat into the room, taking up a position at the door’s other side.
Turov cursed himself for not coming better armed, for his overconfidence in the base’s security.
Oleg joined him, gripping a pistol. “Comms are down due to the flare.”
He nodded. The radios had been compromised for most of the day. They could expect no rescue. He doubted even the gunshots, muffled by the thick foundations of the church, carried very far through the snowstorm.
“Can’t stay holed up in here,” Turov noted.
The door into the interrogation room could only be locked on the outside, by dropping a bar across it. Like all the cells.
“Looks like they’ve got both ends of the hall covered,” Oleg said.
“But there are steps that lead up to the nave. Not far away. We’ll have more options up top.”
The stairs into the church were three meters down the hall to the right.
“On my mark, we unload on the bastards and make for those steps.”
He got confirming nods from the two men at the door.
He turned to Sychkin and Yerik. “Stay behind us. Don’t stop moving unless we do.”
The archpriest’s eyes were round with panic.
Good.
Yerik looked angry, not at the threat outside, but at being interrupted, thwarted from his efforts here.
Turov faced the door, waiting for another volley between their forces to end. As the enemy retreated out of sight, he barked at the soldiers. “Now!”
Both rifles sprayed into the hall, ringing off steel cell doors, sparking off stone walls. Turov headed out, pistol raised, flanked by Oleg. Sychkin and Yerik kept behind them.
They set off in a low run, rushing for the steps up to the nave.
One of the soldier’s weapon’s emptied out. He discharged the spent magazine and struggled to put in a new one. At the lull, one of the combatants leaned out and unloaded a burst of rounds.
Oleg hissed, skipping a step, tagged in the leg.
Turov shifted over and covered his deputy, returning fire, blasting rounds at the door, forcing the shooter back into hiding. With his free arm, he hooked Oleg around the waist and kept him moving.
The soldier finally managed to reload his rifle and lay down a barrage of cover. It was enough for them to reach the steps. They all clambered up. Once at the top, he held their group at the threshold into the church. Frescoes and gold icons glowed in the darkness, lit by a few candles near the altar.
To his left, the main doors had been left open by the intruders. Snow swirled into the church’s antechamber. Winds danced the candle flames.
The nave looked deserted.
Directly ahead, the doors to a sacristy lay on the far side. It was where the priest’s vestments were stored. Surely it had to have a lock on the inside. If so, it would offer them a place to barricade and wait out this storm.
That’s if it wasn’t already locked.
He turned to Sychkin, who occasionally held service here. “Do you have keys to the sacristy?”
