The Warsaw freight yard was a frozen moment, a tableau of unspoken threats under the cold, indifferent gaze of a Polish moon. The air was thick with the scent of coal smoke and the invisible, humming tension of a standoff. Yagoda, the Party's slick and confident courier, was utterly frozen, his face a pale mask of shock. He was a man who trafficked in secrets and threats, but he was a messenger, a subordinate. He had just walked his prize asset directly into the jaws of a lion, and he was completely out of his depth.
Pavel stood behind Koba, a silent, immovable mountain of a man, his sheer physical presence a counterweight to the German's cool authority. Murat and Ivan had shifted their positions subtly, almost imperceptibly, their hands now tucked inside their long coats. It was a gesture of pure, suicidal instinct. They knew a fight here would be their last, but their loyalty was to the planner, and they were prepared to turn this cold corner of the yard into a charnel house before they allowed their leader to be disarmed.
Herr Schmidt's ultimatum hung in the air, as stark and unyielding as the steel rails beneath their feet: Surrender the ledger.
Koba's mind was a raging firestorm, the desperate, pragmatic voice of Jake Vance screaming against the cold, inhuman logic of the Koba persona.
[Jake]: Give it to him! For the love of God, it's just a book! Our lives, Pavel's life, all of it is worth more than a damned book! This isn't Timur the loan shark or some backwater foreman. This is a representative of the German Empire. He could have a dozen riflemen in those shadows. We survive this, we get to Lenin, we live to fight another day. Don't be a fool! Don't let your pride get us all killed!
[Koba]: Emotional response logged. Fear of state-level actors is a predictable but flawed variable. The analysis is incorrect. The book is not 'just a book.' It is the physical manifestation of our power. It is our credibility. It is the scepter that makes us a king. To surrender it is to surrender our status. We would arrive in Zurich not as the powerful allies Yagoda described, but as his cargo, as disarmed supplicants with nothing but a story. Status is everything in the coming negotiation with Lenin. The German's objective is to neutralize the threat posed by the ledger. We will achieve his objective for him, but we will do it without surrendering our leverage. We will not choose between his two options. We will create a third.
Koba met Herr Schmidt's cold, expectant gaze. He did not reach for the satchel containing the ledger. He did not speak of the demand. Instead, his expression became one of almost academic curiosity, his voice calm and conversational, as if they were two merchants discussing a point of mutual interest.
"The shipment on August 14th of last year was particularly interesting, Herr Schmidt," Koba said, the words cutting through the thick tension. "Are you familiar with it?"
The German's eyebrow twitched, an almost imperceptible crack in his mask of professional composure. The non-sequitur had momentarily thrown him off his script. "I am not at liberty to discuss specific shipping details."
"Of course not," Koba said with a thin, knowing smile. "Allow me to refresh your memory. Six crates, delivered from the Krupp Works in Essen. Their manifest, signed by a Herr Müller at your end, listed them as 'precision machine tools.' They were delivered not to the main Kronstadt yards, but to the quieter naval warehouse at Libau, to avoid the eyes of the French naval attachés. Payment was authorized by Russian Admiralty order 77B, for the sum of three hundred thousand gold marks."
Koba paused, letting the weight of his own detailed knowledge sink in. He could see the flicker of genuine surprise in the German's icy blue eyes. This was not the rambling of a cornered thug; it was the precise recitation of classified intelligence.
"The most interesting part," Koba continued, his voice dropping slightly, "was the payment method. The funds were not transferred to the corporate accounts of Krupp AG. They were routed, through a proxy bank in Copenhagen, to a numbered, private account at the Swiss Bank Corporation in Basel. Account number 227. An account, I believe, intended to keep the transaction off the official books of both the Russian Admiralty and the Krupp corporation itself."
He had done it. He had just recited, from memory, a specific, deeply compromising detail that proved he had not just glanced at the ledger, but had inhaled it, absorbed it, made it a part of himself.
"The contents of those crates," Koba said, delivering the final, intellectual killing blow, "were, of course, six sets of the latest Zeiss optical rangefinders, complete with their mechanical calculation engines. The most advanced naval fire-control system in the world. The key component for the main batteries of the Tsar's new Gangut-class battleships."
He fell silent. The freight yard was utterly still save for the distant hiss of a steam engine. He had just demonstrated, with brutal efficiency, that he was the information. The physical book was merely a container, a symbol. The real weapon was inside his head.
"You want the ledger to ensure this information does not become public," Koba stated, shifting from recitation to negotiation. It was no longer a question, but a simple statement of fact. "A sensible precaution for all parties involved. But you should know that my own precautions are already in place."
This was the lie, the audacious gambit forged in the crucible of this very moment.
"Detailed copies of the most compromising pages, along with a full explanatory letter detailing their strategic significance, are currently in the possession of a trusted comrade in a neutral country," he said, his voice a mask of utter conviction. "He is a simple man, a watchmaker. He has very simple instructions. He is to receive a coded telegram from me every month, on the first of the month. A simple message confirming my continued health. If he does not receive that message, for any reason, he is to deliver the entire package to his most talkative customer: the chief foreign correspondent for the Le Temps newspaper in Paris."
Koba let the threat hang in the air, as cold and sharp as an icicle. "My silence, my convenient disappearance, or my unfortunate death in a railway accident, will trigger the very international scandal you are so meticulously trying to prevent. You cannot neutralize the threat by neutralizing me. In fact, you would guarantee its release."
He had turned himself from a package to be delivered into a live bomb with a dead man's switch. The German stared at him, his face pale, his mind clearly racing as he processed the new, terrifying variable Koba had just introduced into his neat, orderly operation. He was being comprehensively, utterly outplayed.
Now, Koba offered him a way out, a way to save face.
"However," he said, his tone shifting again, becoming magnanimous, "I am a reasonable man. I have no quarrel with the German Empire. My business is with the Tsar. I am willing to offer a gesture of good faith. A sign of our mutual interest in discretion and stability."
He reached into the leather satchel at his side. For a heart-stopping moment, his men tensed, thinking he was capitulating. But he did not pull out the entire ledger. He brought out the book, opened it to a specific section, and with the small, sharp knife from his boot, he carefully, surgically, sliced out two specific pages.
He held them out to the German. "These pages," he explained, "detail the cash payments made to the corrupt Russian port officials at Libau and the customs inspectors in St. Petersburg. A purely domestic Russian affair. Deeply embarrassing for Stolypin's anti-corruption campaign, but there is no mention of Krupp, Essen, or Germany anywhere on them. Take them. Report to your superiors in Berlin that the operation was a success. That you have secured and contained a portion of the leak. That you have acquired physical evidence. Your report will be truthful. You will have a victory to present."
Herr Schmidt stared at the two proffered pages, then at Koba's calm, unflinching eyes. He was being offered a partial, symbolic victory that was, in reality, a total strategic defeat. He was being allowed to retreat with a trophy, while leaving the true weapon in his opponent's hands. It was an elegant, humiliating, and perfect solution.
After a long, tense moment that seemed to stretch into an eternity, the German diplomat, the agent of an empire, slowly reached out his gloved hand and took the two flimsy pages from the Georgian revolutionary.
The standoff was over. Koba had won.