"We don't know what they know."
Pyotr's words hung in the air, heavy and suffocating as a shroud. The cell was compromised. Not just by the capture of Mikho, but by a ghost in a box—an unknown piece of intelligence now in the hands of the Okhrana. They were blind, running from a hunter whose position and capabilities were a complete mystery.
Kamo began to pace the small room, his heavy boots making the floorboards groan. He was a caged bear, radiating a furious, frustrated energy. "A box. A box! What could we have been so stupid to leave behind?" he snarled, slamming a fist into his own palm. "A ledger? Old pamphlets? It could be anything. It could be nothing."
"Or it could be the one thread they need to unravel all of us," Jake said, his voice quiet but firm. The history teacher in him was piecing together the tactical nightmare. Uncertainty was a weapon, and the Okhrana had just deployed it perfectly.
"We can't operate like this," Kamo declared, stopping his pacing to fix Jake with a hard stare. "Scrabbling in the dark. We need to gather the core members. Arsen, Goguia, the others. We assess the damage, figure out what they have on us, and we make a new plan. We have to regain the initiative."
"Gather where?" Jake asked, his mind already racing ahead.
"Fikus's tavern," Kamo said without hesitation. "The cellar is deep, the walls are thick, and he keeps the police happy with free vodka. It's the most secure spot we have left in the city."
The name hit Jake like a physical blow. Fikus. A cold dread, colder than the Tbilisi night, washed over him. He felt the blood drain from his face. Fikus. He knew that name. It was buried deep in a dense academic monograph he'd read on Tsarist counter-intelligence operations. "Fikus" was the codename for one of the Okhrana's most valued and successful long-term informants in the entire Caucasus region. The man had been feeding revolutionaries to the secret police for years.
The tavern wasn't a safe house. It was a slaughterhouse.
This was it. His first real test. This wasn't a reactive decision made under duress, like condemning Mikho. This was a chance to use his impossible knowledge proactively. A chance to step in front of the bullet, to actually save people, to do the good he was sent here to do.
But how? He couldn't scream, "He's a traitor! I read it in a book from the future!" They would think he'd finally gone mad from the stress. They might even think he was the traitor, trying to sow discord. He needed a lie. A plausible, solid lie that would steer the speeding train of the revolution onto a different track without anyone realizing he was at the switch.
He took a slow breath, forcing the panic down. He met Kamo's impatient gaze and arranged his face into a mask of grim certainty. He had to be Stalin now. Not the monster, but the calculator. The shrewd, paranoid strategist.
"No," Jake said, his voice low and firm. "Not Fikus's place."
Kamo's eyebrows shot up. "No? What are you talking about, Soso? It's the only place secure enough."
"It's not secure," Jake countered, inventing the lie as he spoke, praying it would hold. "I saw him. Two days ago. In the market, by the cathedral." He paused, letting the silence build. "He was talking to a man. A man in a police officer's greatcoat, but trying not to look like one. They passed something between them. A slip of paper."
He looked from Kamo to Pyotr, letting his gaze linger. "I thought nothing of it then. A bribe. A family matter. But now… with Mikho taken so cleanly? With this mysterious box? No. We can't risk it. The place is compromised."
The room fell silent. Kamo stared at him, his shrewd eyes boring into Jake's, searching for any hint of deception. Jake held his gaze, his heart hammering against his ribs, but he forced his expression to remain as cold and hard as granite. He was channeling every documentary he'd ever seen, every photograph of the impassive, unreadable dictator.
Finally, Kamo grunted, a low rumble of grudging acceptance. "The bastard," he muttered. "After all the party has done for him. Fine. Fine! You were right to be suspicious, Soso." He turned, his mind already moving on. "Then where? We can't meet on the street."
Jake's own mind was already working on the next step. The "Jake Vance" solution. "Kato," he said, turning to where she stood by the stove, watching them with wide, frightened eyes. "Your cousin, the baker. The one who lives behind the Church of Saint David. Is his cellar deep?"
Kato looked confused. "Mikhail? Yes, Soso, very deep. He stores his flour there. But he is a man of God. He wants nothing to do with… with this."
"He wants nothing to do with the Okhrana either," Jake pressed. "He is your family. He would not turn you away. And the Tsar's dogs… they would never think to look for atheist revolutionaries in the cellar of one of the city's most devout bakers. It's the last place they would suspect."
It was a good plan. A clever plan. A plan that used human connection and psychological misdirection instead of brute force. It was a Jake Vance plan. And for the first time that night, he felt a flicker of hope, a sense that he might be able to navigate this bloody maze without losing himself completely.
Kamo considered it for a moment, stroking his thick beard. "It's… unorthodox," he admitted. "But he's right. The audacity of it… it has merit." He nodded slowly. "Alright. The baker's cellar it is. But we need to warn Arsen first. He's the most exposed."
He turned to the young runner. "Pyotr, you're exhausted. You stay here." His eyes scanned the room and landed on another boy who had come in with Pyotr, a quiet, dark-haired youth who had been standing silently in the corner. "Giorgi," Kamo barked. "You are the fastest. Do you know where Comrade Arsen is staying?"
The boy, Giorgi, stood up straighter, his chest puffing out with pride at being chosen. "Yes, Comrade Kamo."
"Good. Go to Arsen's flat. Tell him the old plan is cancelled. Tell him Fikus is a dog. The new meeting is at the baker's cellar at dawn. Tell him to come alone and take no chances. Avoid the main streets. Can you do that?"
"Yes, comrade!" Giorgi said, his eyes shining with revolutionary fervor.
Jake, feeling a surge of confidence from the success of his Fikus gambit, nodded his approval. He was focused on the big picture, on the victory he had just snatched from the jaws of a trap. "Go," he ordered the boy, his voice carrying the weight of command.
Giorgi gave a determined, crisp nod to Jake and Kamo, and then slipped out the door and into the night.
A wave of relief washed over Jake. He had done it. He had used his knowledge to save them. He watched the door close, a faint smile touching his lips.
It was then that Pyotr, the first runner, who had been whispering with another comrade in the corner, suddenly went pale. He looked as if he'd seen a ghost. He rushed forward, his eyes wide with a new, more immediate terror.
"Soso," he stammered, his voice cracking. "The box. I… I just remembered what else the dockworker said. I just found out what was in the box the Okhrana found at the warehouse."
Jake's stomach plummeted. "What was it?"
"It wasn't a ledger," Pyotr said, his whole body trembling. "It was a spare coat. It belonged to Comrade Arsen. And in the pocket… there was a letter from his sister. A letter where she congratulated him on his new lodgings… a letter mentioning his new address."
The words struck Jake with the force of a physical blow. He froze, the entire world narrowing to a single, horrific point of realization. Arsen's flat wasn't safe. It was the one place in the entire city the Okhrana were certainly watching.
He didn't just send a runner with a message. He had just sent a trusting, eager young boy walking straight into an ambush.
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