CHAPTER 27: RED CIRCLE — Part 2
The first shot caught the distracted guard in the throat.
The suppressor muffled the sound to a loud cough—barely audible over the music. He dropped without a word, hands clutching at the red flooding down his neck.
His partner turned. Too slow. Two rounds center mass and he staggered back, knocking over a champagne bucket.
Two down. Ten rounds left.
Viktor's head snapped up. His eyes went wide—not fear yet, just confusion. Like his brain couldn't process what was happening.
The third guard was faster than the others.
He drew while I was still tracking Viktor's movement, and suddenly I was diving behind a leather couch as a gunshot cracked above the bass. Unsuppressed. Loud.
So much for quiet.
I hit the floor hard, rolled left. The guard's second shot punched through the couch cushion where my head had been. I came up shooting—three rounds, rapid fire—and caught him in the shoulder and chest.
He dropped.
But Viktor was already moving.
"Blyad!" The dealer scrambled toward the fire exit, knocking over tables, spilling drinks. His expensive shoes slipped on the polished floor.
Seven rounds left.
I vaulted the couch, ignoring the screams starting to filter up from the VIP patrons who'd finally processed the violence. The bodyguards' corpses blocked the main path. Viktor had chosen the fire exit—a dead end if I reached him before he hit the stairs.
The exit door was swinging shut as I rounded the corner.
I caught it with my foot, yanked it open.
Viktor was two steps down the metal staircase, fumbling with his phone. Calling for help. Calling for backup. Calling for anyone who might save him.
"Wait—" he started.
I didn't.
The shot took him in the back of the head. His body pitched forward, tumbled down the stairs, and came to rest against the landing. Phone clattered beside him, screen cracked, call still connecting.
[SIDE CONTRACT COMPLETE] [TARGET: VIKTOR IVANOV — ELIMINATED] [REWARD: 100 BLOOD COINS AWARDED]
Seven seventy-five total. Progress.
The fire escape led down to an alley I'd scouted earlier. I was halfway to the ladder when the sound reached me.
Gunfire. From inside the club.
Not the scattered pops of security responding to my work. This was different. Controlled. Rhythmic. Three-round bursts with mechanical precision, barely a pause between volleys.
He's here.
I froze on the fire escape landing, peering through the dirty window into the VIP section I'd just left. The view was obscured—bad angle, frosted glass—but I could see the strobe lights below had gone solid red. Emergency mode. And shadows were moving in ways that didn't match the music anymore.
The Ledger updated without prompting.
[ALERT: HIGH-VALUE TARGET DETECTED] [JOHN WICK — ACTIVE — RED CIRCLE NIGHTCLUB] [PROXIMITY WARNING: IMMEDIATE]
Move. Move now.
I took the stairs three at a time, metal clanging under my shoes. The gunfire intensified—that same controlled rhythm, punctuated now by screams and the crash of bodies hitting the dance floor.
He's on the main level. Working his way up.
The alley waited at the bottom. Dark, narrow, dumpsters providing cover. I hit the ground running, adrenaline spiking harder than it had during the actual contract.
Behind me, the fire door I'd just exited slammed open.
I didn't look back. Don't look back. I rounded the corner, put brick between myself and the Red Circle, kept moving until my lungs burned and my legs screamed.
Two blocks. Three. I ducked into the shadow of a loading dock, pressed my back against the cold metal, and tried to catch my breath.
The distant thump of bass had stopped. Police sirens wailed somewhere to the east. The Ledger scrolled updates in the corner of my vision.
[TARASOV SECURITY — RED CIRCLE: ELIMINATED] [CASUALTIES: 17 (ESTIMATED)] [JOHN WICK: PURSUING PRIMARY TARGET — IOSEF TARASOV]
Seventeen dead. In the time it took me to kill four and escape, Wick had slaughtered seventeen.
The stories don't do it justice.
I'd watched the movie. Knew the scene. But experiencing it—hearing the rhythm of his gunfire, feeling the building shake with the violence—that was different. John Wick wasn't just skilled. He was a force. Something beyond normal human capability.
And I was in the same building.
The realization hit like a physical weight. I'd been ninety seconds from crossing paths with the Baba Yaga. If Viktor had run the other direction, if I'd been slower on the fire escape, if I'd decided to check the kill instead of immediately exiting—
Dead. I'd be dead.
My hands shook. Not from the killing—I'd gotten past that weeks ago. From the near-miss with something far more dangerous.
The walk back to Queens took two hours.
I avoided the subway—too many cameras, too many witnesses, too much risk of being remembered as "the guy leaving from near that nightclub massacre." Instead, I walked. Through the Village, across the bridge, into the anonymous sprawl of the outer boroughs.
The Ledger updated every few minutes.
[IOSEF TARASOV: TERMINATED] [JOHN WICK: LOCATION UNKNOWN] [TARASOV ORGANIZATION: CRITICAL COLLAPSE]
Iosef was dead. The whole reason for Wick's rampage—the stupid kid who'd killed a dog and stolen a car—had finally paid for his arrogance.
Not that it'll stop Wick. He's not done.
My apartment was dark when I finally arrived. I locked all three deadbolts, checked the windows, peeled off clothes that smelled like gunpowder and nightclub sweat. The shower ran hot for twenty minutes.
Blood on my hands. Metaphorical this time—Viktor's end had been clean, no splatter. But I could still feel it.
Four more dead. My count's at fifteen now.
The number should have meant something. In my previous life, killing one person would have destroyed me. Here, fifteen felt like... progress. Professional development. A resume building toward something.
Is that what I'm becoming?
I toweled off, checked my weapons, counted my money. Eighty thousand from Sergei. One hundred Blood Coins from Viktor. The vulture was eating well.
The Ledger pulsed one final update before I collapsed onto the mattress.
[TARASOV WAR: PHASE 1 COMPLETE] [VIGGO TARASOV: STILL ACTIVE — PLANNING COUNTERMEASURES] [NOTE: ADDITIONAL CLEANUP CONTRACTS EXPECTED]
More opportunities.
Sleep came eventually. I dreamed of strobe lights and controlled gunfire, of a shadow moving through bodies like water through rocks.
In the dream, the shadow turned and looked at me.
I woke before I could see its face.
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