The Dragon and the Bear: The Choice That Changed Everything…

By Matthew W. Quinn

I know I said I'd write no more fan-fiction, but this dates back to before that promise. I posted it on a limited-access forum and now I'm putting it out here for all to see. Everything pertaining to the Draka belongs to S.M. Stirling and Baen Books…

"Somehow, out of nowhere, the Russians turned from being the most backward nation in Europe to becoming the nation that would actually take on the Domination in an actual war - and win. No-one knows to this day how the Russians pulled it off."

-Luis Juaperon, The History of the 20th Century.

General Lavr Kornilov sat in his headquarters, pondering what to do. The Tsar had fallen and the inept Provisional Government strode from disaster to disaster, neither winning battles nor responding to German peace feelers. He suspected the Bolsheviks, those German spies, were involved. They and their damnable Soviets, spreading their tentacles and their godless creed everywhere...

Meanwhile, good Russian boys died by the thousands, the Hun advanced closer to Petrograd, and far to the south, the abominable Domination of the Draka reached out its claws for Constantinople, the great prize the Tsars had sought for centuries. Most of the Ottoman Empire had gone under the Yoke and the Draka were already making inroads into Persia, creeping perilously close to the Empire's frontier. They were still on the same side as the Russians...for now. The Bolshevik takeover would give them the perfect excuse to move northeward from there into the heart of Turkestan, the home of his mother's people. He knew full well what would happen then...

His fist clenched. The Draka would violate the sacred soil of Mother Russia over his dead body...

Sept. 9th, 1917 AD-Kornilov's troops occupy St. Petersburg, ostensibly to preserve the Provisional Government against a Bolshevik coup. Leon Trotsky and other Bolsheviks imprisoned after the July unrest are shot and the Soviets are dispersed by force. Kerensky is enraged, but is quickly convinced to go along with it-after all, Kornilov has communiques from the capital suggesting that the Provisional Government was in danger.

Over the next few weeks, Kornilov's men hunted down and killed or imprisoned the escaped Bolsheviks and their supporters, killing thousands. In the meantime, Kornilov, hoping to ensure the loyalty of the Central Asian population in the face of possible nationalistic blandishments by the Turks, pushed Kerensky to grant the Central Asian populace all the rights and privileges of Russian citizenship, restored grazing lands taken by the government, and punished some officials who committed atrocities during the repression of a revolt there in 1916. In doing so, he made common cause with the Jadid reformers. Though this caused grumbling in the ranks of the Cossacks who supported Kornilov, Kerensky also abolished the remaining anti-Semitic legislation.

Meanwhile, Kornilov continued his efforts to restore the Russian army, whose discipline had weakened and which had taken severe damage in the recent years. This work, though difficult and often bloody, worked. He also pushed Kerensky to push for more food aid from the other Allied powers, citing the role food riots had played in the fall of the Tsar. Thanks to the entry of the United States, more and more aid came to Russia.

Using special shock formations, Kornilov retook Riga from the Germans, buying the Empire breathing space. By early 1918, Kornilov felt the army was ready for another great offensive. Under the command of himself and his deputy General Anton Denikin, the Russian army, stiffened with masses of new recruits, poured westward. The Germans were forced back; the Austro-Hungarians disintegrated.

Caught between the American-augmented Western hammer and the Russian anvil, the Central Powers disintegrated. Though Russia took back all occupied territory and even took Austrian Galicia and territory in Prussia and Silesia, the ultimate prize-Constantinople-fell to the Domination of the Draka. The Draka even managed to secure a large part of Bulgaria before Romanian troops, spurred on by the Russians, moved into occupy the rest. Huge numbers of refugees brought forth tales of horror-rape, impalement, and slavery.

Though many among the Allied powers thought this behavior was the exception rather than the rule, Kornilov and Kerensky knew differently. The Draka were no longer white supremacists-thanks to the devil-woman Elvira Naldorssen, they were Draka supremacists, and they would see all humanity in chains.

Russia would have to be prepared for when the Dragon decided to take its next bite...