Roman had been inside the Sokolov estate long enough to know when something didn't belong.
The inner residence corridor was too quiet.
There were no shifting guards at the far end. Even the air felt tighter, like the building itself was holding its breath.
Roman slowed.
"Where's rotation three?" he asked without turning.
One of the guards behind him hesitated. "They were supposed to report in five minutes ago."
Roman didn't respond.
That was already wrong.
He continued forward, boots silent against polished flooring, gaze locked on the dark wood door, reinforced with a heavy frame and secured by a biometric lock, marked access to the inner residence which was reserved strictly for the Sokolov family and high command
Roman stopped a few steps away.
His expression didn't change but his hand moved slightly toward his side.
"Has anyone been cleared for maintenance here today?" he asked.
"No, sir," a guard replied quickly.
That was the second wrong thing.
Roman exhaled once through his nose.
Then stepped forward.
That's when he saw him.
A man stood near the door wearing a Grey uniform with a staff badge clipped neatly to his chest.
Roman watched the 'staff', he wasn't doing anything
Just… facing the lock panel.
Roman's eyes narrowed slightly.
"Step away from the door," he said calmly.
The man didn't react immediately.
That delay was enough.
He turned too fast
Roman moved instantly.
He crossed the space in seconds, grabbed the man's wrist just as it dipped toward his coat, and twisted hard.
A blade flashed out but hit the wall instead of flesh.
Metal rang out through the corridor.
The man slammed into the wall, breath forced out of him.
Roman didn't loosen his grip.
Not even slightly.
Behind them, footsteps started rushing in.
But Roman's focus stayed locked.
Senior enforcer of the Sokolov estate wasn't a title for show.
It meant he dealt with things before they became problems.
Roman didn't loosen his grip.
The man was pinned hard against the wall, shoulder pressed into the frame of the restricted door, breath already uneven.
Security footsteps echoed closer, but Roman didn't turn.
"What is your name?" he said calmly.
No response.
Roman's eyes sharpened a fraction. "I won't ask twice."
A shaky breath.
"…Artem," the man finally forced out.
"What are you doing here, Artem?"
"I said what the hell are you doing here!" Roman repeated a bit aggressively this time
Artem's throat bobbed as he swallowed. His eyes darted, trying to find something an exit, an advantage, anything but there was none. Just Roman, steady and unmovable, and the weight of the wall behind him.
"I—I was just checking access points," he stammered.
Roman didn't react.
"That's not an answer," he said quietly.
Artem flinched at the tone alone.
Roman stepped closer, forearm still locked across him, voice lowering. "Try again."
Artem's breathing picked up.
"I-I work with systems," he rushed out. "I was told to evaluate internal security, they said it was a routine assessment."
Roman's gaze didn't change, but something in the air did.
Routine assessment didn't bring people to that door.
"I didn't do anything wrong," he said quickly, too quickly.
Roman tilted his head slightly.
"Take him to the interrogation room" Roman said to the guards
The interrogation room was too bright.
Artem noticed it the moment they pushed him inside.... The walls were pure white with a harsh overhead light. There were no windows, yet the room was as cold as ice. A metal table bolted into the floor. One chair on his side and three on the other.
The door shut behind him with a heavy click.
The lock engaged.
That sound made his stomach drop.
"Sit," Roman said.
Artem hesitated.
Ilia didn't move, but his eyes lifted slightly enough.
Yegor, leaning against the wall, didn't even bother hiding his impatience.
Artem sat.
His hands were already shaking.
He tried to hide them under the table but failed miserably.
Roman opened a slim file folder in front of him but didn't look at it yet.
"What's your full name?," he said.
Artem swallowed. "Artem Kuznetsov."
Roman wrote it down anyway.
"Age?"
"…Twenty-seven."
Ilia shifted a fraction closer to the table.
"Do you understand where you are?" Ilia asked.
Artem nodded too quickly. "Yes."
Then corrected himself. "I mean-yes Sir."
Yegor exhaled lightly.
Artem's throat tightened.
Roman finally looked up from the file.
"You're a free lance system technician" Roman said
Artem nodded fast. "Yes-that's what I do."
Roman closed the folder slightly.
"Who contacted you."
"I don't know their names," Artem said immediately. "It was anonymous, The messages were encrypted, I never saw a face. I swear."
Yegor exhaled through his nose, Annoyed.
Roman didn't react.
"Did you come alone?" Ilia asked.
Artem hesitated.
That hesitation was enough.
Yegor noticed it instantly.
Artem shook his head fast. "Yes-I mean, no-yes, I came alone. They said it was a solo diagnostic run."
Ilia tilted his head slightly.
"so you're not sure," Ilia said.
"I am!" Artem said quickly, then immediately lowered his voice again. "I am-I just mean… I didn't see anyone else physically."
Roman studied him. "Do you think this is a joke?"
His breathing started to shake.
"No, but I didn't do anything wrong," he said suddenly for the umpteenth time, voice cracking. "I just needed the money. My mother is in treatment, she needs it, I didn't steal anything, I didn't hack anything—I just followed instructions—"
The chair scraped loudly as Artem flinched back instinctively.
Yegor grabbed the edge of the table and leaned in just slightly.
Not enough to touch him.
Enough to make him freeze completely.
"How much were you paid?," Yegor said.
"₽400,000 Th-They said that I would receive 5 times the amount at the end of the job" Artem said
Ilia's eyes stayed on him for a moment longer than usual.
Then he spoke.
"How did you get past the outer guards?"
Artem blinked rapidly.
"I-"
His voice cracked immediately.
"I didn't- I didn't fight them properly."
Yegor tilted his head slightly. "You're saying you walked past trained Sokolov security?"
Artem shook his head fast.
"No, no-I didn't- I had something."
Roman's gaze sharpened a fraction. "Something? We don't have all day!"
Artem flinched and swallowed hard.
"They gave it to me," he said quickly. "Before I came in. They said it was for emergencies. Just in case someone stopped me."
Ilia's tone didn't change. "What was it?"
Artem hesitated.
That hesitation was immediate enough to answer the question before he spoke.
"…A stun device," he admitted. "An electric zapper."
Yegor exhaled once, almost amused.
"So you didn't take down trained men," Yegor said flatly. "You shocked them and walked through."
Artem nodded quickly, shame and panic mixing in his expression.
"Yes-I mean, I only used it when they tried to stop me. I didn't want to hurt anyone, I swear-I just panicked."
Roman leaned back slightly in his chair.
Studying him.
"What's the effective range?" Roman asked calmly.
Artem blinked. "I… I don't know exactly. But I got close to them before I used it. They said it was only for self-defense situations."
Ilia's eyes flicked briefly toward Roman.
That detail mattered.
Not because Artem was dangerous-but because he was equipped.
Roman spoke quietly. "So they didn't just send him in blind."
Artem shook his head fast. "No-no, they gave me everything I needed. The badge, the uniform, the instructions, the device-"
His voice broke again.
"I thought it was legitimate."
Yegor stepped closer this time, just enough that Artem instinctively shrank back in his chair.
"You didn't think," Yegor said. "You obeyed like a damn dog without asking any questions"
Artem's lips parted, but no sound came out.
Roman raised a hand slightly.
Yegor stopped. Not fully retreating.
Roman's voice stayed even.
"Someone didn't need him to fight your way in," he said. "They just needed him to get close enough."
Artem went still.
For the first time, he looked less like a scared man defending himself
and more like someone realizing what he had actually been used for.
"Phone," Ilia said simply.
Artem blinked, like he didn't understand the word at first.
"My-my phone?"
Yegor let out a short breath, impatient. "Do you see another one of you in here?"
Artem's hands started shaking again.
He reached into his pocket slowly, like the movement itself might get him in trouble, and pulled out a cracked smartphone.
Ilia took a step forward and collected it without hesitation.
Artem's fingers lingered for half a second longer than they should have, then dropped away.
He looked immediately smaller without it.
Ilia didn't even glance at the screen yet. He just turned it over once in his hand.
"Laptop?" Roman asked.
Artem swallowed hard. "At home."
Roman's eyes lifted slightly. "You came into a restricted Sokolov facility without your primary device."
Artem nodded quickly. "They said I wouldn't need it on-site. Just the diagnostic unit they provided."
Yegor scoffed under his breath. "Of course they did."
Artem flinched at that again.
Ilia finally looked down at the phone.
"No laptop," Ilia repeated quietly, almost to himself. " We are going to need your address."
Roman leaned back slightly in his chair, watching Artem now with more focus than before. "Flat 18, Building 9, Zvezdnaya Street, Saint Petersburg, 196158. I-uh, I-live alone"
Yegor wrote it down swiftly.
Ilia unlocked the phone.
Artem's breath caught immediately.
"Please," he said quickly. "There's nothing—I didn't delete anything, I swear, I didn't even"
"Quiet," Yegor cut in.
Artem stopped instantly.
The silence that followed was heavier than before.
Ilia began scrolling slowly.
Artem watched every small movement like it was happening to him directly. His throat felt tight, his chest worse. He could feel sweat gathering at his temples, cold and humiliating.
Roman's voice broke the silence again.
"How were you paid?"
Artem blinked, trying to keep up.
"They-," he said quickly. He earned a slap at the back of his head because Yegor just had a feeling he was about to start rambling
Ilia didn't look up from the phone.
Yegor stepped a little closer.
"Show me," Yegor said.
Artem hesitated. "I-I can't. It was transferred through encrypted channels. I don't have full access logs, just confirmation messages."
Yegor tilted his head slightly.
"Of course you don't," he said flatly.
Artem's lips parted, but nothing came out this time.
"Did you hack anything?" Roman said finally.
Artem shook his head quickly. "No. I didn't- you caught me before I was able to."
The room had gone quiet in a different way now.
Not the controlled silence Roman usually held it in.
This one felt… stuck.
Ilia stood by the table, arms folded tighter than before, eyes still on Artem Kuznetsov's phone like it might suddenly start talking on its own. Roman hadn't moved much either just watching, thinking, piecing things together in layers Artem couldn't see.
While Artem sat still shaking and trying his best not to spill a tear.
Yegor was the first to break.
He exhaled sharply through his nose, like he'd been holding it in too long.
"This is going nowhere," he muttered.
Roman's eyes flicked slightly toward him. "Control yourself."
But Yegor didn't.
He pushed off the wall.
Artem noticed too late.
"What are you-" Artem started, voice thin.
Yegor grabbed him by the front of his shirt and hauled him up from the chair in one sharp motion.
The chair scraped violently across the floor.
Artem let out a broken gasp.
"Please-I didn't-I'm telling you everything I know-"
Yegor's grip tightened.
"Everything you know?" he snapped, voice rising now. "You walked into a Sokolov inner passage with a fake job and a toy device and you're telling me that's everything?"
Artem's feet barely touched the ground properly.
His hands went up instinctively, not to fight, just to protect himself.
"I didn't know!" he choked out. " I have a sick mother, I just needed—"
Yegor shook him once, hard enough to cut the sentence off.
"Stop using that as an excuse," he said sharply.
Ilia moved immediately.
"Yegor," he warned.
Roman's voice followed, colder. "Put him down."
Tension stretched as tight as a pair of school trousers after harmattan buffet season
Then Yegor finally let go.
Artem dropped back into the chair like his body couldn't decide whether to collapse or run.
He immediately curled slightly forward, hands shaking violently now, trying to steady his breathing.
Yegor stepped back but didn't calm down.
He ran a hand through his hair, pacing once, agitation still visible.
"This is useless," he said again, but quieter now, controlled anger replacing explosion. "We've got a scared kid who got paid to walk through our front door and he doesn't know anything useful."
Ilia's eyes stayed on him. "He's a vector, not a source. We are extracting what we can."
Yegor stopped pacing.
Turned slowly.
His expression changed-not louder, but sharper.
"You think we have time for 'what we can'?" he asked.
Roman didn't answer immediately.
That silence made Yegor's frustration deepen.
His voice dropped, but it carried more weight now.
"If we don't get something useful out of him," Yegor said, looking between Roman and Ilia, "then we're all as good as him."
Artem froze. what does that mean
Yegor's gaze flicked briefly to him.
Then back to the others.
"Dead," he finished flatly.
The word landed hard in the room as Artem let out a quiet sob
Ilia didn't react outwardly, but his posture shifted slightly, his attention sharpening.
Roman finally spoke, in a firm voice.
"Watch your tongue and calm down Yegor!"
Yegor laughed once, humorless. "Calm down? Roman, someone walked a probe into our inner residence and you want me to Calm down????"
Artem's breathing had gone uneven again.
He looked between them, terrified now in a different way.
Not just of Yegor anymore, Of what this meant.
Ilia stepped in slightly, voice steady. "Guys, We can't let this get to us"
Yegor laughed sarcastically
"And if command asks what we got and we say 'nothing useful,' then we're already compromised." he said.
Roman's gaze held steady.
"Then we don't give them 'nothing,'" he said simply.
"Okay, Great. We don't give them 'nothing'. Why didn't I think of that?" Yegor said in a whisper
"Report everything, The Entry method, Equipment, Payment vector and Identity source ambiguity."
Yegor exhaled slowly, still tense, but no longer escalating.
Roman turned slightly toward the door.
"Send it to Malcolm," he said.
The name again changed the air.
Artem didn't understand it but he understood enough to know it wasn't good.
Yegor looked at him one last time,
"Sit your ass here until someone comes for you."
Yegor's voice is flat, almost bored. He doesn't even look at Artem properly when he says it.
He leans back slightly, eyes narrowing. "And when they do, I hope they're faster than your excuses." Artem flinched at his words
Ilia began typing a letter to Malcolm