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Chapter 15 - The Unraveling Thread

The new safe house was a step down even from the cellar. It was an abandoned ice house on the industrial outskirts of the city, a brick-lined cavern that smelled of rot and stagnant water. The cold here was a permanent resident, a damp, penetrating chill that no amount of human warmth could displace. This was where they would bring the traitor Fikus.

Under the dim light of a single lantern, Jake laid out the plan for the abduction. He stood before his new, hand-picked team—Kamo, the ever-loyal Pyotr, and two other hardened revolutionaries named Levan and Davit. They watched him with an intense, focused reverence. In the space of a single night, he had transformed in their eyes from a respected comrade into a master strategist, and they hung on his every word.

Jake's planning was meticulous, a world away from the frantic, reactive chaos of the Okhrana ambush. He was drawing on a century of knowledge he didn't even realize he had, absorbed from history books, documentaries on military strategy, and even spy thrillers. He spoke of concepts that were alien to them.

"This is not a street fight," he explained, sketching a layout of the tavern and the surrounding alleys on a crate with a piece of charcoal. "This is a surgical extraction. Levan, you will be containment, here, at the mouth of the main alley. You do not engage. Your only job is to make sure no one enters or leaves once the operation begins. Davit, you will be our overwatch, on the roof of the tannery here. You are our eyes. You will signal us if any patrols are near."

He was assigning roles with a clarity and professionalism that left them speechless. "Kamo and I will be the extraction team. We move only when Davit gives the all-clear. Pyotr, you will have the cart ready a block away. Once we have the target, we are gone in under a minute. We move in silence, we operate in silence, and we leave in silence. Is that understood?"

They all nodded, their faces grim and determined. Kamo, now Jake's most fervent believer, reinforced the orders. "You heard Soso. You follow his plan to the letter. No mistakes. No improvising."

The execution was as clean as the plan. As the city's clocks struck midnight, the diversionary fires set by Orlov's men began to cast a faint, orange glow against the clouds on the far side of the city. The distant sound of bells and whistles confirmed that the police patrols were being drawn away.

From his rooftop perch, Davit gave the signal. The street was clear.

Jake and Kamo melted into the shadows of the alley behind Fikus's tavern. They waited. Minutes later, the back door opened, spilling a rectangle of yellow light into the alley. Fikus appeared, a heavy bucket of slop in his hands. He was a portly man, his face slick with sweat from the tavern's heat.

He grumbled to himself as he emptied the bucket into a fetid bin. As he turned to go back inside, Jake and Kamo moved. They were on him before he could make a sound. Kamo's massive hand clamped over the man's mouth while Jake's arm wrapped around his chest, pinning his arms. Fikus's eyes went wide with terror, his body rigid with shock. There was a brief, muffled struggle, but it was hopeless. They dragged him into the darkness, a coarse burlap sack was thrown over his head, and he was bundled into the back of Pyotr's waiting cart.

The entire operation took less than thirty seconds. It was a masterpiece of silent, brutal efficiency, the polar opposite of the chaotic, bloody gunfight that had shattered Giorgi.

Back in the freezing ice house, they threw the terrified tavern owner onto the dirt floor. When they ripped the sack from his head, Fikus's eyes were wild with panic, darting around the cold, damp room, at the hard faces illuminated by the single lantern.

Kamo cracked his knuckles, a menacing grin spreading across his face. "Now," he growled, "we can begin." He reached for a length of rusted chain.

"Wait," Jake commanded, his voice calm. Kamo stopped, looking at him with surprise. "We need his mind, Kamo, not his screams. A man will say anything to make the pain stop, true or not. We need the truth." He turned to the others. "Leave us. Let me talk to him first."

Kamo hesitated, but then gave a curt nod. He trusted Soso's methods now. The others filed out, leaving Jake alone with the trembling informant.

Jake pulled a crate over and sat down, a few feet from Fikus. He didn't threaten. He didn't raise his voice. He began to speak, his tone conversational, almost gentle, which seemed to terrify Fikus more than any threat could have.

"Your Okhrana handler is a Sergeant Volkov," Jake began, inventing a name based on a common Russian surname. "You meet him on Tuesday afternoons behind the fish market. You are paid fifty rubles a month for information. Last month, you were given a ten-ruble bonus for identifying the new location of the railway workers' reading group."

He was reciting details directly from the dead agent's notebook, presenting them as his own knowledge. Fikus's face went from terrified to ashen white. To him, it was impossible. This man knew everything. He was not just a revolutionary; he was omniscient.

"How… how do you know this?" Fikus stammered.

"We know everything," Jake said, his voice a quiet, chilling whisper. "So, you can tell us what we already know, and this can be easy. Or you can lie, and I will leave you with my friend Kamo. He is not as patient as I am."

The tavern owner broke. Tears and sweat streamed down his face. "I'll talk! I'll tell you anything! Yes, yes, it's all true! I told them things! But not the big things! Never the big things!"

"Tell me about the bakery," Jake said. "Tell me how you gave up Mikho."

"No!" Fikus cried, scrambling backward on the floor. "No, I swear on my mother's grave, it wasn't me who gave them the bakery! I didn't know anything about the bakery!"

"You're lying," Jake said, his voice still calm.

"I'm not! I swear!" Fikus sobbed, his mind racing, desperately searching for a way to save himself. He needed to give them something valuable, something bigger than himself. His terrified eyes latched onto a name, a big name, an untouchable name. A name that would surely prove his worth. "It wasn't me! It was… it was Comrade Orlov! My handler, Volkov, he told me to stay away from that one! He said the bakery raid was Comrade Orlov's operation! He said Orlov managed the high-value assets himself, that he didn't want small fish like me interfering!"

Fikus was lying, of course. It was a classic informant's ploy—invent a wild story, deflect blame onto a powerful figure you know your captors can't touch, and make yourself seem more important than you are.

The door to the ice house burst open. Kamo stood there, his face a mask of thunderous rage, his revolver in his hand. He had been listening.

"Lies!" he roared, striding into the room. "The dog is lying to save his own worthless skin! He dares to slander a hero of the revolution!" He raised his pistol, aiming it directly at Fikus's head.

But Jake moved with startling speed, stepping directly between Kamo's gun and the terrified informant. He held up a hand. "Wait."

Kamo stared at him, his chest heaving with fury. "Get out of the way, Soso! I'm going to finish this lying worm!"

Kamo heard a desperate lie. But Jake, with his cursed future knowledge, heard something else entirely. An accidental, convoluted, and utterly perfect truth. Orlov hadn't just given up the bakery; he had managed the intelligence, keeping other informants away to ensure the credit and the success were his alone. Fikus, in his pathetic attempt to save himself, had just handed Jake the perfect weapon.

He looked from the cowering Fikus to the enraged Kamo, his mind racing, a new, far more dangerous plan forming with terrifying clarity.

"Don't kill him," Jake said, his voice low and intense, charged with a strange new energy.

"Why not?" Kamo demanded.

"Because he's more useful to us alive," Jake said, a slow, cold smile spreading across his face. "And he's just given us the rope we need to hang a much bigger man."

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