The meeting dissolved slowly, men drifting out in pairs and small groups, their murmurs charged with Jake's prophecy. The war theory—that was what they were calling it already. He had upended their strategy in one night.
As the last of them left, Lenin motioned for him to stay with a flick of his fingers—quiet, sharp, absolute.
The room felt smaller now, heavier. The smoke hung low like a second ceiling. Lenin lit a new cigarette, watching Jake through the haze with the cold focus of a craftsman studying a strange new tool.
"Your analysis of Europe is… unorthodox," he said.
Then the interrogation began.
For the next hour, Lenin dissected Jake's theory piece by piece. He wasn't arguing—he was pressure-testing it, slamming it against every angle of dialectic and probability, looking for a single weak joint.
"This inevitability you speak of," Lenin asked, eyes narrowed. "It's rooted in economic determinism? In the struggle for colonial markets?"
"Partially, Comrade Ulyanov," Jake answered carefully. "But it's more than economics. It's the instability of the old empires. Austria-Hungary is a prison of nations held together by rust. The Ottomans are dying. And in the Balkans, the fuse is already lit. Serbia, Bosnia, the Slavs—each is a spark in a powder room watched by giants."
He translated modern knowledge into Marxist logic—railway expansion, naval tonnage, imperial rivalries, and alliances that were really nooses. He painted 1914 not as prediction but as inevitability, and Lenin listened like a man watching the gears of history grind in real time.
When Jake finished, Lenin leaned back, silent for a long moment. His eyes gleamed with something that looked like grim admiration.
Then he changed course. "Tell me of your 'iron broom,'" he said. "Tell me how you dealt with the traitor."
Jake recounted the story of Orlov. Not theatrically—just the facts. The discovery, the danger, the execution. He described it as procedure, not vengeance. No emotion. No apology.
"The party was weak," he said. "Too sentimental. They protected traitors in the name of camaraderie. I removed one to save the rest."
Lenin smoked quietly as he listened. Then he nodded once, slow and approving.
"The party is full of talkers," Lenin said, voice low, hard. "Men who write about revolution but faint at the smell of blood. You are not one of them, Comrade Stalin. The revolution needs men who understand that mercy is counter-revolution."
The words hit like a seal pressed in wax. A quiet anointing.
He gave Jake his new mission for the coming Party Congress. "You will not speak on agrarian theory," he said. "You will enforce discipline. The Bolsheviks must vote as one. Manage the delegates. Persuade, cajole, intimidate—use the same skills you used in Tbilisi. Zinoviev and Kamenev are theorists. You are not. You are a man who does."
Jake nodded. "Understood."
He had done it. He had earned Lenin's trust. He was no longer a provincial operative; he was Lenin's enforcer.
He turned to leave, his mind spinning. He had survived the test—and won a place in the inner circle of history.
But as he stepped outside into the fog-drenched London night, someone was waiting.
Trotsky.
He looked different now. The smugness was gone, replaced by curiosity—the wary respect one predator has for another.
"A fascinating theory, comrade," Trotsky said quietly. "Catastrophic, but fascinating. You see the world in… final terms."
Jake's voice was flat. "The world is a final place."
Trotsky gave a thin, humorless smile. "Perhaps. But your vision leaves no room for poetry, for the human spirit. A revolution built your way—what kind of world would it create?"
Jake met his eyes. "One that survives."
For a moment, neither spoke. The fog curled between them, thick and cold. In that silence, something formed—an understanding deeper than hatred. Two men who would never truly coexist.
Jake knew exactly how this rivalry would end. Mexico City. An ice pick. The final page of a book not yet written.
He walked past Trotsky without looking back, the fog swallowing him whole.
London's streets stretched endlessly ahead, slick with rain and coal smoke. He kept walking, head down, thoughts burning. He had won Lenin's trust, earned Trotsky's enmity, and placed himself at the core of the revolution's future.
Then, out of habit, he stopped by a newsstand.
A headline caught his eye. Black letters. English words.
He could make out enough.
PRIME MINISTER STOLYPIN ANNOUNCES NEW ANTI-TERROR MEASURES.
CREATION OF CENTRAL POLITICAL INTELLIGENCE DIRECTORATE.
Jake bought the paper, scanning the lines under the dim gaslight.
All branches of the Okhrana consolidated under a single command… new international reach… coordination across Europe… suppression of revolutionary organizations abroad…
The words blurred. His hand trembled.
While he'd been in London building power, Stolypin had been doing the same—quietly, efficiently, ruthlessly.
The chessboard had just changed again.
The revolution had found its prophet.
The state had found its god of fear.
And their war was only beginning.
The Brotherhood Church in Hackney smelled of damp stone and old hymnbooks. Its pews had been ripped out and replaced with rows of unsteady wooden chairs. The house of God had become a battlefield of men.
Three hundred delegates packed the space—Bolsheviks, Mensheviks, Bundists, Poles, Latvians. The air throbbed with noise, with Russian, Yiddish, and German shouting over one another, with the haze of cigarette smoke so thick it stung the eyes. Jake sat near the back with the delegates from the Caucasus, feeling a dizzy rush of disbelief.
Just months ago, he had ruled a cellar in Tbilisi. Now he was inside history itself.
On stage, Lenin was in full fire. Small, intense, eyes burning, he called for a disciplined, centralized party of revolutionaries. His sharp voice cut through the chaos like a knife.
Across from him, Julius Martov rose to reply—his rival, his mirror. Martov's words were smooth, eloquent, calling for democracy, inclusion, and debate. To Jake, it was the same fatal softness he'd seen destroy movements back home.
But Jake wasn't here to debate. Lenin had given him another mission.
He was the whip.
While the ideologues shouted about purity and principle, Jake moved in silence through the corridors and smoky pubs. His task: to keep every wavering Bolshevik delegate in line. Especially the soft ones from the provinces, the ones who might get charmed by Martov's speeches.
It wasn't work for a thug. It was work for a chess player.
His first target was Borodin from Odessa—weak chin, weaker will, and a ruinous love for cards. Jake found him at a pub table surrounded by empty glasses.
"Comrade Borodin," Jake said warmly, sliding into the seat beside him. "Rough night? These London gamblers will skin a man alive."
Borodin's face went pale.
Jake smiled, casual and friendly. "The party understands comrades sometimes face… temporary difficulties. There's a small fund for emergencies. We can help—so long as we all keep helping the cause."
The meaning was clear. The vote was bought.
Next came Gusev from the Urals—vain, pompous, still sulking about not getting a speaking slot. Jake caught him near the church doors, watching the crowd like a man who felt unseen.
"A powerful speech yesterday, Comrade Gusev," Jake said smoothly, referencing some rambling comment Gusev had made earlier. "I spoke with the editors of Proletary. They said your remarks on the factory councils deserved publication. I could mention your name again."
Gusev's back straightened instantly. "Ah. Of course. Anything to serve the central line."
Another vote secured. No money this time. Just ego.
The harder ones were the honest ones—the thinkers.
Jake sat beside a young delegate from a textile town outside Moscow, a man torn between Martov's ideals and Lenin's discipline. His eyes were bright, sincere. Dangerous.
Jake didn't argue Marx or Engels. He told a story.
"In Tbilisi," he said quietly, "we had Mensheviks on our committee. Honest men. They believed, like you, that every voice mattered. That decisions must be made by consensus."
He paused. "While they debated, a traitor named Orlov sold our secrets to the Okhrana. We found out the night before a raid that could've killed us all. They wanted to talk it over. I didn't."
He leaned closer, voice low. "They wanted democracy. I wanted survival."
The young man said nothing. He didn't need to. Another vote turned.
It became a pattern.
By day, Martov inspired them with grand words about democracy.
By night, Jake haunted their conversations, whispering about the price of hesitation, the bodies left behind.
Martov sold them a dream. Jake sold them a chance to live long enough to see it.
The crucial vote came on the third day—something dull on paper, a procedural motion about the agenda. But everyone knew it would decide the balance of power for the rest of the Congress.
Jake spotted two of his provincial delegates near the aisle, whispering with a Menshevik. He moved immediately, calm as a man fetching tea.
He placed a hand on each shoulder. "Comrades," he said softly. "A word."
In the corner, he spoke gently, almost kindly. "I just received a message from home," he said. "The Okhrana released a new list of wanted revolutionaries from your district. Your names aren't on it. Let's keep it that way, yes? The party protects its loyal men."
The words were soft. The meaning was not.
The delegates nodded mutely and returned to their seats, pale and shaking.
The vote began. Each ballot folded, dropped, counted. The hall was thick with dread.
Then—the result.
Lenin's motion passed.
By three votes.
The exact three Jake had secured.
From the stage, Lenin met his eyes and gave the smallest nod. Nothing more. But Jake knew what it meant. He had delivered.
The Congress roared around him, cheers and curses mixing into chaos. Jake just sat there for a moment, breathing slow. He'd done the work that no one would thank him for—and the party had won because of it.
As he was leaving, a young courier intercepted him—nervous, out of breath. "From Tbilisi, comrade," the boy whispered, pressing a folded note into Jake's hand. "Marked urgent."
Jake slipped it into his coat pocket. The paper felt heavier than gold.
Two worlds—Lenin's London and Stolypin's Russia—had just collided again.