The train's whistle cut through the night like a scalpel, slicing open the fragile skin of their triumph and exposing the raw panic beneath. In an instant, victory curdled into dread. The relief of survival was gone, replaced by the electric taste of terror. The searchlight's beam carved across the forest—a white, unblinking eye that turned trees to bones and shadows to traps.
"Leave them!" Murat hissed. His voice trembled, half command, half plea. "Leave it all! We run, now!" He took a step back, ready to flee.
"No."
Koba's voice cracked like a whip. Not loud—sharp. Absolute. "We did not bleed for nothing." He turned, his gaze finding Pavel and Ivan. "To the horses. Now. Move."
That single order broke their paralysis. What followed was chaos forged into purpose. They hauled the crates through the darkness, muscles screaming, lungs burning. The patrol train screamed again, closer now—a shriek that shook the air and the earth beneath them. The rhythmic thump of its pistons was a pounding heart, closing fast.
Every root caught their boots. Every rock threatened to betray them. The crates, once symbols of victory, had become anchors—unforgiving blocks of steel and wood that bit into their hands and shoulders. They heaved and dragged, driven by sheer will.
They reached the horses just as the searchlight swept the ridge above them. The world erupted in white. Trees and earth dissolved into harsh, blinding contrasts of light and shadow. The beam passed over their hiding place, close enough to bleach the ground at their feet.
They flattened themselves to the dirt, faces pressed into the cold soil. No one breathed.
The train thundered past, a moving citadel of steam and iron. The ground trembled with its passage. Then, slowly, it was gone—the whistle fading into the distance, the red tail lights dwindling like dying embers.
Silence fell. Not peace. The silence of men who had stood inches from death and still felt its breath on their necks.
They were alive. But barely.
Then came the next battle—the weight of their prize.
It took all their strength to heave the crates onto the horses' backs. The beasts groaned under the load, hooves sinking into the soft earth. The second crate made the first horse sag until its knees trembled. The second horse fared no better. Two animals stood where four had once carried them, their ribs quivering, their eyes wide and terrified.
Murat spoke first. His tone was quiet now, stripped of argument. "Planner," he said, gesturing to the struggling beasts. "It's impossible. They can't carry us. Not like this. Ten versts a day, maybe less. We'll never reach Vologda." His gaze drifted to the crates, bitter and cold. "The rifles are an anchor. They'll drown us."
The words hung heavy. The forest swallowed them. The victory had become hollow—a cruel joke written in iron and exhaustion. They had risked everything to steal power, only to find it too heavy to wield.
But Koba wasn't looking at the horses. He was on his knees, map spread open on the ground, tracing lines in the moonlight.
Jake:It's over. He's right. We can't carry them. We have to run.
Koba:Incorrect. The mission remains unchanged. The transport method is flawed. We adapt.
Jake:Adapt? We're in the middle of nowhere. You can't conjure a wagon out of thin air.
Koba's finger moved along the map. The main line—the one the patrol train had just thundered down—was useless. Too exposed. But there, near the edge of the map, were faint dotted lines. Small tributaries running deep into the woods. His eyes narrowed. A word in tiny Cyrillic print caught the light. Лесозаготовка. Logging.
A slow smile spread across his face—small, sharp, dangerous.
"Our plan hasn't failed," he said, his voice low but charged with energy. "It has evolved."
The others stared, too drained to believe. Koba tapped the symbol again. "A logging camp. A large one, judging by the spur lines. These are not peasant huts in the wilderness. They're operations. Industry. They have what we need."
He listed it, each word like a hammer striking metal: "Draft horses—stronger than these. Heavy sledges for timber. And this—" he tapped the faint line again "—a narrow-gauge railway. It connects directly to the Arkhangelsk main line. Their supply route."
Murat's head lifted slowly. "You're saying…"
"Yes," Koba said. "They'll have flatcars. Maybe even a shunting engine."
The realization rippled through the group. It wasn't escape anymore—it was theft on a new scale. Not survival, but conquest.
Koba folded the map with deliberate precision, then rose. The moonlight caught his face, and for a moment, his men saw what he saw: not the endless, freezing forest, but a path carved through it.
"Tonight, we took back our power," Koba said. His voice was quiet, but it carried the certainty of command. "Tomorrow, we take their machines."
He looked north, where the map's dotted line vanished into the trees.
"We ride for the camp," he said. "We ride to steal our future."
The men stared at him in silence. Then Pavel, slow and grim, nodded once. Murat followed. Ivan adjusted his rifle strap.
The pack was moving again—driven not by fear this time, but by the fire of a mad, impossible vision.
The night closed in around them. The forest swallowed their trail.
And somewhere far to the north, the whistle of another train echoed through the cold.