The order cut through the air like a blade.
"We will use the boy as bait."
For a heartbeat, the room stopped breathing. Even the flame in the small lamp seemed to hesitate. Pyotr and the other young revolutionary stared at Jake as though he'd spoken an unspeakable heresy. Fear flickered across their faces—fear and something else. Awe. This wasn't the hesitant, uncertain Soso they had followed hours ago. This was someone colder. Someone decisive.
Only Kamo moved. His gaze hardened, and in it burned a grim respect. He gave a single nod—the nod of a soldier recognizing another.
Then, a small sound broke the silence.
A gasp.
Kato stepped forward from the kitchen shadows, hands clasped as if in prayer. Her face was pale, her eyes wide with disbelief. "Soso," she whispered, trembling. "No. You can't mean that. He's just a boy."
The words hit Jake like a blow to the ribs. The part of him that was still Jake Vance screamed in agreement. He wanted to take the words back, to tell her she was right.
But he couldn't.
He turned away from her. If he looked too long, the wall of resolve he'd built would crumble.
"How do we do it?" he asked, forcing his voice into something cold and steady.
Kamo straightened, snapping into command mode. "Simple. We reach the street first. There's an alley across from Arsen's flat. We wait there. They move for the boy—we hit them from behind. Quick. Clean."
Simple.
The word twisted in Jake's gut. Nothing about this was simple. But even as he recoiled, his mind—sharp, trained by years of history and pattern—began analyzing. Seeing flaws. Weaknesses. Angles of attack.
"No," he said quietly. "It's not simple enough."
Kamo frowned. "What do you mean?"
"The Okhrana aren't idiots," Jake said, pacing to the table. "They'll have someone watching. A rifleman, maybe two, in a window. If we fire from one alley, we're boxed in. They'll have cover. We won't."
He grabbed a burnt stick of charcoal from the stove and a scrap of wrapping paper. Quickly, he drew. Two lines for the street. A square for the building. "We form a crossfire," he said, sketching another box opposite. "This roof here—it has a low wall. I'll take that position." He drew lines across the page. "Kamo, you take Pyotr and stay in the alley. We catch them here." He tapped where the lines intersected. "A funnel. No cover. No escape."
The room had gone still again, but this time it was focused silence. Kamo leaned closer, eyes gleaming with understanding.
Then Kato's voice broke through, sharp with grief. "Soso, listen to yourself." She stepped closer, her voice cracking. "This isn't you. The man I married wrote poems about the mountains, about freedom. He didn't—" She gestured at the charcoal map. "He didn't draw plans for ambushes."
Jake froze. The words tore through him. He remembered that man—the dreamer, the idealist. The one who believed words could change the world. But that man was gone. The world he was in now had burned him out of existence.
The charcoal snapped between his fingers. He didn't look at her. "Pyotr," he said instead, his voice taut. "You stay with Kamo. Do exactly what he tells you."
Pyotr nodded, pale but resolute.
The room came alive with motion. Kamo checked the cylinder of his Nagant, the metallic clicks echoing like a countdown. Pyotr was handed an old revolver, its weight too heavy for his shaking hands. The air smelled of oil and fear.
Jake stood still in the midst of it, listening to the sounds of men preparing for violence. Then, as he moved toward the door, a hand caught his arm.
Kato.
She stood before him, her eyes glassy with tears. "Don't do this, Soso," she said softly, pleading. "If you go out that door tonight, the man who comes back won't be the one I married. Please. Don't let them take what's left of you."
The words hit something deep, something buried. For a moment, Jake wasn't Stalin or Soso or a commander of men. He was a terrified teacher from another century who had stumbled into a nightmare and was losing pieces of himself one decision at a time.
He almost broke.
But then he saw Kamo at the door, watching, waiting. The room hung in the balance. Kato's safety. The cell's survival. His own illusion of control.
He reached up and gently pried her fingers from his sleeve. He couldn't look her in the eye.
"I'll come back," he lied.
And then he turned.
He crossed the room, each step heavier than the last, and opened the door. The cold Tbilisi night poured in, sharp and merciless.
He stepped through it.
The latch clicked shut behind him—a small, final sound that felt like the closing of a coffin.
The slate tiles bit through the soles of Jake's boots, the cold sinking straight into his bones. He lay flat against the rooftop, the rough surface scraping his chest, the wind clawing at his face. Below, the street waited—narrow, dark, and still. A stage. A trap. A grave.
The revolver rested against his cheek, its metal colder than the night. He could taste the fear on his tongue, metallic and sour, like old blood. His stomach churned. He was a teacher, not a killer. He used to get nervous speaking at parent meetings. Now he was lying in a sniper's perch, preparing to watch a child die by his design.
He risked a glance over the parapet. The alley below was pitch black, but he knew where Kamo was—an outline inside the shadow, still as stone. The man didn't shake. Didn't flinch. Violence lived in him the way music lived in a pianist's hands. He was waiting, patient, ready. A hunter born to darkness.
Jake's pulse pounded so loud it seemed to echo through the roof tiles. The minutes dragged, each one stretching into an eternity. He prayed, absurdly, that when the time came, his hands wouldn't betray him.
Then he saw movement at the far end of the street.
Giorgi.
The boy looked impossibly small from this height, walking alone down the cobbled street, his breath ghosting in the frigid air. His stride was brisk, purposeful, but it was the walk of a boy pretending to be a man. He carried himself with pride, unaware that every step he took led him closer to a nightmare.
Jake's throat tightened. This was his fault. He had sent him. He had smiled when the boy volunteered. Now he was watching that same boy walk toward death. He wanted to scream, to stop it, to call it off—but the sound stuck in his chest. This was his punishment. He had chosen this.
The boy drew closer. The street was too quiet. Too empty.
Then they appeared.
Four figures slid out from the shadows, their movements smooth and deliberate. Dockworkers, by their clothes. Predators, by their posture. They fanned out, silent, cutting off the street like a net drawing tight. No shouts. No orders. Just quiet, efficient menace.
Giorgi froze. The confidence drained from his small frame, replaced by terror so pure Jake could feel it even from above.
That was the signal.
Jake's lips parted. All he had to do was whistle. One small sound to summon hell. But his lungs refused. The human part of him—what was left of Jake Vance—held him frozen.
Below, Kamo tilted his head, a silent command. Now.
Jake forced breath into his chest. The whistle came out weak, trembling—barely more than a gasp.
But it was enough.
Gunfire erupted.
The street exploded into chaos. The sound wasn't sharp—it was thunderous, deafening. Each shot cracked against the stone walls and ricocheted back in overlapping waves. Orange muzzle flashes flared from the alley, lighting Kamo's silhouette like something carved from fury.
Two Okhrana agents dropped instantly. The other two spun and fired blind into the dark, their bullets screaming off the walls. The air filled with sparks and echoes.
Jake blinked against the muzzle flashes, forcing his shaking hands to steady the revolver. He found the shape of a target—one of the remaining agents—and squeezed the trigger.
The recoil slammed into his shoulder. The shot went wide, screaming into the street and sparking harmlessly off the cobblestones. He cursed under his breath.
Kamo didn't miss.
He moved out of the alley like a shadow given life. Two clean shots—boom, boom—and the remaining agents fell. It was over in seconds.
Silence crashed down. Smoke hung low in the air. Giorgi was still standing, trembling, eyes wide and unfocused, the revolver fire ringing in his ears.
Then glass shattered.
Jake's head snapped toward the sound. A window burst open on the second floor of the opposite building. A man leaned out—pale face, jaw clenched, pistol already raised. The fifth one. The overwatch.
Jake's stomach turned to ice. He had been right—but too late.
The man took aim, not at Kamo, not at Pyotr, but at the boy frozen in the middle of the street.
Jake tried to shout. His voice caught.
The shot rang out—a single, brutal crack that echoed through the alley and died away into the wind.
And just like that, it was done.