The air in the Vyborg district didn't just smell like coal smoke; it smelled like angry iron.
Every face Jake passed was hard, etched with soot and suspicion. This was not a place for theories or pamphlets. This was a place where revolution was forged in furnaces and hammered out on anvils.
Sasha, the student revolutionary, looked pale and out of place, his thin coat no match for the biting wind or the hostile glares. He led Jake not to a hidden office, but to the roaring, deafening heart of a massive steel works.
The heat hit them like a physical blow, a wall of scorching air that made the world shimmer. The roar was constant, a symphony of groaning machinery, hissing steam, and the percussive crash of giant hammers.
They met Alexander Shliapnikov on a narrow iron catwalk, high above the factory floor. Below them, rivers of molten steel glowed with an otherworldly, malevolent light.
Shliapnikov was not a politician. He was a part of the factory, his face grim, his hands thick and calloused. His eyes, weary from lack of sleep, were as sharp and dangerous as broken glass.
He dismissed Sasha with an impatient wave of his hand. The student scurried away, relieved to be gone.
Shliapnikov looked Jake up and down, his expression one of pure, undisguised contempt. He saw soft hands. He saw clothes that were too clean. He saw an outsider.
"Sasha tells me a demon threw gold at the Cossacks," Shliapnikov said, his voice a low growl that still managed to cut through the factory's roar. "I see only a man with a German accent in his Russian."
He took a step closer, the catwalk vibrating under his boots. "Who are you?"
Jake knew in that instant that words were useless. Speeches about the proletariat, promises of loyalty—they would mean nothing to this man. He was a creature of tangible reality.
So Jake offered him something impossible. He didn't offer gold. He offered the future.
"I am the man who knows which way the wind will blow," Jake said, his voice steady. He had to shout to be heard over the noise.
"The Tsar has ordered General Khabalov to crush the uprising," he continued. "Tomorrow morning, he will send his most loyal troops, the Volinsky Regiment, to fire on the crowds at Znamenskaya Square."
Shliapnikov scoffed, a harsh, grating sound. "Every regiment has been ordered to fire on us. That is not a prophecy. It is a weather report."
"No," Jake said, shaking his head. "You don't understand."
He leaned in, his voice dropping, forcing the other man to listen closely. "The Volinsky won't fire. They will hesitate. Then they will shoot their commander, a Captain Lashkevich. A Sergeant-Major named Kripichnikov will lead a mutiny, and they will be the first regiment to turn their guns against the Tsar and join the revolution."
He locked eyes with the steelworker. "It will happen before noon tomorrow."
Shliapnikov stared at him. The roar of the factory below was the only sound for a long, tense moment. This was either the raving of a madman or something else entirely, something dangerous and valuable.
He saw a tool. A potential weapon unlike any he had ever known.
He decided to test the demon's claim.
"Words are cheap," Shliapnikov growled, his face a hard, unreadable mask. "You want my trust? You want to be a part of this fight?"
He gestured out at the fiery, chaotic factory floor. "Then your prophecy is not enough. You will be there. You will go to the Volinsky barracks tonight."
Jake's blood ran cold.
"You will make contact," Shliapnikov continued, his voice relentless. "You will speak to this Sergeant-Major Kripichnikov. You will confirm his intent."
He was not just testing Jake's knowledge. He was sending him on a suicide mission. To walk into a loyalist army barracks, filled with thousands of armed and nervous soldiers on the very eve of a mutiny, was insane.
It was a test designed to get him killed.
Shliapnikov leaned in, his face inches from Jake's. The heat from the furnaces below washed over them, the air thick with the smell of hot metal.
"Fine, demon," he said, his eyes glinting in the firelight. "You want to be a soldier in our army? Go get me some soldiers."
He straightened up, his expression pitiless.
"And if you are wrong... your body will be just another one in the street."