Chapter Nine
MIA
By the time Emil Varga finally came out of his apartment building in Augsburg the next morning, we had been watching the place long enough that I could have identified several of his neighbors by routine alone.
None of us had slept properly, so we had started rotating through short shifts in the back of the van, twenty or thirty minutes at a time whenever someone could afford to close their eyes.
Raven had two street cameras feeding the main screen while Wolf watched the building from the passenger seat.
I had spent most of the last hour comparing Varga’s known movements against the records from Haus Eberhardt, which had turned him from a forgettable face in a residency photograph into the man who collected documents and identities after Cerberus moved women through its holding sites.
ARC wanted to know where he took that material before anybody put a hand on him. If he led us deeper into the chain, we followed; if he ran, Wolf wanted him alive and whatever he was carrying intact.
Varga stepped onto the sidewalk at 7:21 wearing a navy jacket over a pale shirt, the same combination he wore in almost every photograph we had found.
A black leather messenger bag hung at his side.
He locked the building behind him and started east at an easy pace after a brief look down the street.
“He’s moving,” Raven said.
Jackal answered from somewhere outside our view. “Have him.”
When he stepped back into sight a moment later, he had stripped out of the tactical gear and changed into a black t-shirt and dark cargo pants, making a reasonable attempt to blend in for a man with tattoos climbing his neck and the general appearance of someone who had recently kicked a door in.
Jackal stayed nearest Varga on foot while Viper moved farther ahead. Bear waited with the second vehicle, and Hawk covered the roads that opened toward the station.
Varga walked past the corner bakery without going in, which disappointed Jackal enough that he murmured something in Korean before Wolf told him to stay off the channel.
After that, we followed in silence while Varga took a route that made less sense the longer it went.
He doubled back around a block before continuing south and paused once beside a pharmacy window long enough to study the reflection behind him.
I watched the line Raven drew across the map. “He’s checking for a tail.”
“Looks like it,” Raven said.
Wolf kept his attention on the windshield. “Don’t tighten on him.”
Jackal acknowledged the order, and his marker widened away from Varga before cutting back through a side street.
He never stayed directly behind him for long enough to become familiar.
By the time Varga reached a small square near the tram line, I understood why Raven had described Jackal as good at reading where people would go rather than simply following where they were.
Half the time his position made no sense until Varga changed direction and Jackal was already somewhere useful.
Varga stopped beside a bank and pulled out his phone. He read the screen long enough for his shoulders to tighten, then pocketed the phone and checked the street behind him. The coffee he had been carrying went untouched after that.
“Jackal,” Wolf said.
“Saw it.”
Varga crossed against the light and picked up his pace.
Raven enlarged the map. “South takes him toward the station. There are two parking structures before it.”
“Viper, move ahead,” Wolf said. “Do not close him yet.”
Viper answered once and disappeared from the route we could see.
I kept my eyes on Varga. “If he knows about Haus Eberhardt, why wait until now to run?”
“Maybe the message just reached him,” Raven said.
Wolf glanced toward the screen. “Maybe he saw something. Doesn’t change what we do.”
Varga made another sharp turn, and this time the change was enough to turn a fast walk into a run. He cut between parked cars and disappeared into a narrow pedestrian lane where Raven lost the nearest camera, forcing a cyclist to brake hard as he crossed.
“He’s running,” Jackal said.
Wolf opened the van door before the words were finished. “Stay on him. Don’t force the stop until we have the exits.”
He was outside a second later, moving toward the next street while Raven shifted through cameras and tried to pick Varga up again.
I stayed in the rear seat with the map across my knees, watching Jackal’s marker enter the same lane and then veer hard west instead of following the route Varga had taken.
“Why is Jackal turning?”
Raven looked at the map. “Jackal, confirm.”
His answer came through controlled breathing. “Varga won’t stay on the lane. It dumps him into the open square by the station. He’s looking for cover, so he’ll cut for the garage behind the apartments.”
Raven pulled up the satellite layer and found the passage Jackal meant. The garage entrance sat behind another row of buildings, connected by a service lane that Varga could reach without crossing the open station plaza.
Wolf’s voice came through comms from the street. “Viper, south garage exit. Bear, move closer.” Hawk was already holding the west road, so Wolf left him there.
The map tightened around the garage while Jackal cut across the route instead of chasing from behind. Varga reappeared on a camera for barely two seconds, running west exactly where Jackal had predicted, and by the time Raven said, “Garage, garage,” Jackal had already reached the other side.
The parking operator’s interior camera refreshed badly, but it caught Varga coming through the pedestrian access with the messenger bag bouncing against his hip.
Jackal entered from another aisle and slowed when Varga saw him, giving the man enough space to stop while keeping himself between Varga and the nearest exit.
Jackal yelled, “Emil Varga! Stop.”
Varga looked over his shoulder, then toward the ramp leading down.
“Don’t,” Jackal said. “Hands where I can see them.”
Varga hesitated long enough that surrender looked possible. His messenger bag slipped from his shoulder and hit the concrete, and Jackal eased his stance by a fraction, leaving him room to comply without being forced onto the floor.
Then Varga’s right hand went inside his jacket.
“Jackal,” Raven warned.
Jackal moved before Varga pulled his hand free.
They hit the side of a parked car hard enough to shake the camera, Jackal controlling the arm that had gone inside the jacket while Varga twisted his body between the door and the front quarter panel.
The car door blocked their hands from the camera until metal flashed near Jackal’s side.
“Knife,” Jackal said breathlessly.
Wolf answered immediately. “Break if you can. Viper is coming to you.”
Varga tore his arm loose and tried to run. Jackal caught the back of his jacket and yanked him sideways between two cars before he reached the ramp.
Varga turned inside the grip and drove the knife inward. Jackal made a sharp sound through the microphone as his hand went to his left side, and Varga stumbled away with the blade still in his hand.
“Fucking Korean,” Varga said in a deep accent.
Raven cut through. “Jackal’s hit. Left side.”
Wolf’s next order came without a rise in volume. “Viper takes Varga. Bear goes to Jackal.”
Viper came through the south stairwell at a run and caught Varga before he made the ramp. They went down beyond the camera’s clean angle while Jackal stayed upright beside the nearest car, one hand braced against the hood and the other pressed hard against his side.
When Wolf called his name, Jackal answered with a thin, weak “Yeah.”
“Sit down.”
“I’m good, boss.”
Bear came onto the channel from somewhere much closer now. “Sit your ass down before I put you down.”
Jackal gave a breath that might have been a laugh. His knees bent before he answered, and he let himself slide down the side of the car without taking his hand off the wound.
Viper called, “Varga secure. Knife’s clear.”
“Stay with him until Wolf gets there,” Raven said, already pulling the nearest trauma-capable hospital onto another screen.
Wolf came into the garage from the street entrance and went to Varga first. My first reaction was anger because Jackal was bleeding ten meters away while Wolf knelt beside the man who had done it.
The instant Wolf took control, though, Viper broke away and ran to Jackal.
Seeing Viper reach him made the choice clear because Wolf had freed the only other person close enough to help Bear without leaving Varga loose inside the garage.
Bear reached Jackal less than a minute later and opened the trauma kit beside him while Viper cut the shirt away from the wound. Blood had already soaked through the fabric and spread across Jackal’s hand, dark enough on the camera that I could see the size of it even through the bad image.
“Move your hand when I tell you,” Bear said. “Not before.”
Jackal nodded.
Bear packed gauze against the wound and replaced Jackal’s hand with his own pressure. Jackal swore once and tipped his head back against the car while Bear checked him. Viper opened another packet and passed it over without being asked.
Wolf asked for status, and Bear answered without looking up. “Still conscious. Bleeding’s heavy, but it’s slowing under pressure. I need transport now.”
Raven had already sent the request through the German coordination channel. “Medical team is staging two streets south. Garage access is too slow, so I’m routing you to the service exit.”
“Copy.”
Wolf looked toward Jackal from across the garage before returning to Varga. “Bear, tell me if he changes.”
“I will.”
“T-tell Varga to suck my Korean dick, bitch.” Jackal managed to blurt out.
Wolf let out a breath and asked about Jackal’s condition again before Bear reached the service exit, then kept asking for updates until the medical team took over.