The office of the Deputy Minister of the Interior in St. Petersburg carried the weight of empire. Dark wood panels. A map of the Caucasus pinned like a wound. A silence so stern it made men stand straighter. Pyotr Stolypin stood by the frost-lined window watching carriages drift through the snow. He liked order. And lately, the Caucasus was nothing but disorder.
His aide, Colonel Sazonov, slipped inside, precise as a blade. He held two folders.
"Two priority reports from Tbilisi, sir. They appear… connected."
Stolypin took the first. Clipped phrasing, clean as a scalpel.
During the chaotic retreat of the Bolshevik expropriators from Erevan Square, our agents successfully apprehended a high-value target. Subject: Luka Ivanovich Mikeladze, associate of the Bolshevik cell under the operative known as 'Soso.' Subject secured and under interrogation.
A neat victory, Stolypin thought—a rare clean note amid the discord. He opened the second file. This one was a decoded message from their prized inside source: the man known only as The Accountant.
As he read, Stolypin's eyes thinned.
URGENT OPERATIONAL UPDATE.
A CRISIS HAS DEVELOPED.
MY LEADER, SOSO, HAS UNCOVERED A TRAITOR WITHIN HIS INNER CIRCLE: LUKA MIKELADZE.
EVIDENCE SUGGESTS LUKA WORKED FOR THE MENSHEVIKS. A SECRET TRIAL AND EXECUTION IMMINENT. I HAVE BEEN ASSIGNED TO GUARD THE PRISONER. THIS WILL GAIN SOSO'S COMPLETE TRUST.
Stolypin reread the name. Luka. The same man his agents had seized hours earlier.
Sazonov cleared his throat. "Sir, the report can't be accurate. This Luka is in our custody. 'Soso' must be misleading our source."
Stolypin didn't answer. He placed the two reports side by side and studied them the way a mathematician studies a contradiction. Where others saw error, he saw a pattern forming.
"No," he said finally. "The message was sent before our capture report. He couldn't have known. Which means…"
He paced, thoughts slicing forward.
Possibility one: coincidence. Ridiculous.
Possibility two: the asset had extraordinary access. Plausible, but tidy.
Possibility three: "Soso" had anticipated Luka's capture and planted a narrative in advance—poisoning the prisoner's words before they were even spoken.
A rare smile touched his lips. "This Soso is dangerous. A strategist."
He turned to Sazonov. "Send word to Tbilisi. Continue the interrogation. Use every method. But treat every word as deception. I want to know not the truth, but what lies this Soso wants us to believe."
In Tbilisi, truth was bleeding on the floor.
Luka hung by his wrists, body purple with bruises. He had lasted two days before something inside him cracked.
"All right," he gasped. "I'll talk."
The interrogator leaned in. "Start with your leader. Soso."
So Luka told them everything. Every desperate detail he believed might save his life. He spoke of Soso Jughashvili's ruthless discipline, the execution of Orlov, the informant Fikus. He described "the accountant" who was no spy but a double agent. And, most damning, he told them Soso saw the world like a machine—predicting events like a man from the future.
The interrogators wrote every word down, then ignored all of it. Orders were clear: assume deception.
By the time Luka finished, teeth chattering, he had damned himself. His story, wild and tangled, looked exactly like the lie Soso had predicted he'd tell.
That night the interrogator's report was brief and cold.
The prisoner Mikeladze has confessed to an absurd conspiracy. Testimony considered unreliable. Relevant only as insight into revolutionary propaganda.
In St. Petersburg, Stolypin would nod with satisfaction.
In Tbilisi, Luka would die with the truth unheard.
And in the shadows, Jake Vance—now Soso—had just crafted his cleanest lie.
The message reached London on a damp, grey morning. Jake sat alone in his bare room, the city's noise dulled into a distant fog. He decoded the packet with slow, practiced hands.
Handler is pleased. Highest commendation. They captured the "Menshevik traitor" Luka. His confession was judged fabrication. Testimony disregarded. Our position is secure. Trust is absolute.
Jake read the words twice, then again. He had won. He should have felt triumph. Instead there was a hollow quiet inside him.
He saw Luka in his mind: quiet eyes, furrowed brow, steady presence in meetings. A loyal man. A good man. Jake had sent him into the Okhrana's hands. Luka's truth—dragged from him under torture—had been twisted beyond recognition.
Jake had taken a loyal comrade and turned his last words into a stain.
He sat on the edge of the thin mattress. The ledger in his mind shifted. Numbers grew faces. Strategy became something sharp.
And then he realized: Luka was still alive.
He should have been harmless now—discredited, dismissed, ignored. But as long as Luka breathed, risk remained. A perceptive interrogator. A stray document. A change in orders.
The old Jake would have lived with the fear. But the man who now wore Soso's name could not tolerate a loose thread in the fabric of a revolution he meant to control.
Luka had to die.
He couldn't involve Kamo. Couldn't alert comrades. The fewer hands, the safer the secret. The only logical solution was to make the state finish the job.
Jake opened his cipher book. The guilt that had seized him a moment earlier hardened into ice. He wrote the message with slow, precise strokes.
URGENT AND HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL.
INTERNAL SITUATION IN TBILISI UNSTABLE AFTER LUKA'S CAPTURE.
MENSHEVIKS CLAIM HE IS A MARTYR.
MY LEADER, SOSO, FEARS A RESCUE ATTEMPT.
I HAVE LEARNED HE IS PLANNING A RAID ON THE PRISON TO SILENCE LUKA PERMANENTLY.
Jake reviewed the lines. Clean. Logical. Deadly.
Tell Stolypin a rescue was imminent, and the Okhrana would eliminate the prisoner preemptively. No trial. No transport. Quiet efficiency.
Jake folded the message. Rain streaked the window, turning the city into a blur. For a moment the weight of what he was about to do pressed on him—signing the death warrant of a man who had trusted him.
Then the feeling receded like a tide.
Clarity took its place.
Loose ends could not remain.
Jake sent the message.
And somewhere between St. Petersburg and Tbilisi, the empire sharpened its knife—unwittingly, perfectly—according to Soso's design.