Baba Yaga's Arc

Chapter 3 of 7

John walks four blocks before he stops to check his phone. The street is empty, delivery trucks parked along one side, apartments dark overhead. He needs to know if they're tracking him the same way they tracked the woman. His thumb hovers over the screen, then presses. The tracker app opens, still showing the pulsing dot two blocks from the motorcade. But underneath it, a new notification loads. Bounty alert. The photo that fills his screen is his own face, pulled from Table records. The timestamp says nine minutes ago. Posted while he was still standing over the burned van. He turns the phone over in his hand, thinking. The woman's medallion sits heavy in his jacket pocket. He pulls it out, runs his thumb over the engraved words. Blood debt. The kind that binds until death. She had one just like his contract, a promise of freedom that was really just a countdown. The Table issued his bounty before he even refused the job. They decided he was dead the moment they sent him the target's name. He slides the medallion back into his pocket and makes the call he's been avoiding for three years. The voice that answers is clipped, professional. Background noise filters through, the soft buzz of call center equipment, keyboards clicking. Pink-shirted workers in rows, processing contracts and bounties with the same efficient detachment. He's seen them once, years back, handling logistics for a different job. The woman on the line doesn't use his name. "Your status has changed." Not a question. He asks how much the bounty is worth. She tells him. The number is higher than he expected. High enough that every contractor in the city will be checking rooftops and alleys. He asks one more question. "How many others got the same contract I did?" Silence. Then: "Seven. You're the last." The line goes dead. John pockets the phone and looks up. Across the street, on the fire escape of an old brick building, a figure in dark clothes shifts position. The silhouette is too still, too focused. Watching him, waiting for the shot or waiting to follow. He doesn't run. Instead, he walks toward the building, one hand loose at his side, the other touching the medallion through his jacket. The figure pulls back into shadow, disappearing through a window. By the time John reaches the base of the fire escape, the window is empty. But on the metal grating above, a small radio transmitter blinks red. They've been tracking him since he left the intersection, maybe longer. The Table doesn't just want him dead. They want to watch him realize there's no way out. He crushes the transmitter under his heel and keeps walking, knowing now that freedom was never part of the deal. The only choice left is whether he dies running or turns the hunt around.