It’s a tale about damaging documents, Russia’s secret service, and the threat of death.

But this is no Tom Clancy book; it's a real-life drama unfolding right here in the nation's capital.

This story centers around a woman originally from Russia now living in Gatineau for the last few years and facing deportation in a matter of days.  It is a move that Dr. Elena Musikhina and many here in Canada believe could cost her her life.

Lake Baikal in Eastern Siberia is the world's deepest and holds one fifth of all the fresh water on the planet.

The lake was the focus of research by Russian university professor and scientist Dr. Elena Musikhina, who moved to Gatineau in 2015 with her husband Mikhail.

“We were forced to flee,” Dr. Musikhina told a news conference today in Ottawa, flanked by various politicians, her daughter and grand-daughter.

She claims she helped uncover information about environmental hazards and pollution caused by Russian military activity at Lake Baikal, along with vocalizing her opposition to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Dr. Musikhina and her husband now face deportation from Canada next Tuesday.

“My family lost everything and now you want to take away my life?” she said at the news conference, “You want to send me into the bloody hands from which I managed to escape knowing I've been always against Kremlin power?”

Musikhina says she offered those sensitive documents to Canada, once her son managed to get them to her.  A vocal opponent of Putin, Musikhina and her supporters say sending the couple back could mean their deaths.

Elizabeth May is the leader of the Green Party, “A deportation where someone is in the political sights of a regime that we know kills people,” she said.

They point to the case of former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, poisoned by a nerve agent in England.  Musikhina told reporters that several of her colleagues who were also aware of this data died under mysterious circumstances.

Former MP and human rights activist David Kilgour has championed her cause, “CSIS has been to see them (the couple) twice,” he told reporters, “because they are concerned about their safety here in Canada, so you can imagine how dangerous it would be if they went back to Siberia.”

The Federal Immigration minister Ahmed Hussen says the decision to remove someone from Canada is not taken lightly.

In a statement, his department wrote, “We are committed to ensuring that people being removed from Canada are not sent to a country where they would be in danger or at risk of persecution."

Musikhina and her supporters aren't convinced of that.

“Unfortunately the Canadian government seems to want to send us to waiting arms of Russian secret police,” she says.

The couple had requested asylum from the Immigration Refugee and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) in 2016, with the tribunal concluding that they didn’t qualify as refugees. 

The tribunal found that the couple hadn’t clearly demonstrated that they were in serious danger of persecution under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

They appealed and lost. Their appeal to the Federal Court was rejected. They applied to the IRCC for consideration on Humanitarian and Compassionate Grounds in September.

Elizabeth May admits stopping a deportation at this point is difficult.

The Canada Border Service Agency says once all avenues of appeal are exhausted, it must enforce removal orders as soon as possible.