Dread.

His insides were choking with it.

He didn't notice that Vadim had pulled the gun away from his back. That he'd slunk into Gretkov's car, which had vanished quickly away from the kerb.

He had to get her back.

A car beeped loudly at him.

He stumbled blindly to the other side of the road while the man rolled his window down and cursed loudly at him in German. He didn't hear.

He had to get her back.

"Hey!"

He'd banged into a passer-by. It was a rather large woman, who was now looking at him, her flabby face red and irritated.

"Hey! Don't just walk away, dickhead!"

Her protests drew a small, interested crowd.

"Entschuldigung," he mumbled as he strode away.

He watched where he was going from then on.

You're no good to her like this, he thought harshly. Pull yourself together.

He kept walking while he punched in a few buttons on his phone.

"Code," a prompt female voice sounded.

"07871193."

There was a short pause.

"Agent Ivanovich. How can I help you?"

"I need a GPS track."

"Number?"

He gave the number.

Pause.

"The plate is registered to Yuri Gretkov, Agent Ivanovich."

"I know that."

Another pause.

"It may not be wise-"

"Just do it."

"Case?"

"Suspected kidnapping. Australian tourist."

"It would be best to leave this to the Australian embassy."

Kirill growled. "Do I have to get your superior?"

The female on the other end swallowed. "No, sir."

"Then do as I ask."

She swallowed.

"I can't track the car, Agent Ivanovich."

"Why not?" he barked.

"Orders, sir. Gretkov's vehicles are not trackable."

He fumed. "Find me all properties owned by Gretkov in Berlin."

"There are several."

"Warehouses."

Pause.

"There are four."

"Good. Give me the addresses."

She complied.

"You know I'll have to report this," she said a tad ruefully.

"I know," he said curtly as he hung up.

The warehouses were his best bet. They were out of the normal way of things. Large. Quiet. There wasn't going to be anybody around to pry or hear anything they shouldn't.

Not that it would get that far, he thought.

It wouldn't get that far.

He walked quicker anyway, and hailed a cab close to the Alexanderplatz.

The first one was empty. So was the next.

The third was on the east side of Berlin.

A familiar black limo was parked at the front.

He gave the taxi driver a few more notes and told him to wait.

When he turned the corner he drew the Walther from his holster, and attached a silencer to the end of it. Then he crept stealthily to the entrance.

There was no one outside. The floor was empty. A two storey modular office lay on the far side.

The top level's blinds were not drawn. He could see Vadim, and, behind the desk, tied to a chair, was Michelle. Her mouth was taped closed.

Kirill's jaw clenched. His blood boiled.

He sidled along the edge of the warehouse floor. He stopped just outside the door on the ground level. He could hear voices; two men. A shadow moved behind the blind. One of the men was moving towards the door. Kirill waited.

The man didn't even know he'd been shot. His body fell dumbly back into the office with a thud, his mouth gaping wide in a weird position. He opened the door. Two more shots. The other man went down just as fast.

Kirill checked the inside. Then he bolted upstairs. He knew Vadim must have heard the noise.

Vadim was ready for him, but he was quicker. The blonde fell to the floor backwards. His arms sprawled haphazardly beside him.

"Too slow, Vadim."

Kirill pocketed the pistol and came anxiously towards her. He unbound her- they'd used rope, and the knot was basic. He shook his head. Vadim must've been quite confident she would not make any attempt to escape.

He threw the rope onto the floor and looked at her.

Her eyes stared in horror. At him. Then the man on the floor.

When he gently peeled the duct tape off, she didn't speak, or cry out. He cupped her chin. She shook it away, her eyes fixated on the body.

"Did they touch you?"

She shook her head.

"Did they hurt you?"

Another shake.

Kirill give a sigh of relief.

Blood was dripping from the dead man's forehead. The bullet sat in a neat hole, embedded in the centre.

Michelle's head fell forward, and she retched.

Kirill found her knapsack nearby. He searched it for tissues. She retched a few more times. He found them and brought them to her hands. Her fingers took them without acknowledging him. Tears had started to form in her eyes.

"We have to go," he said gently.

A tear fell down a cheek. She continued to stare at the dead man.

He took a tissue from her hand and wiped the tear carefully. Then he cleaned around her mouth.

"We have to go," he repeated.

Somehow, he managed to get her to stand, to walk to the street where he sat her in the back of the cab. The driver looked at them strangely in the rear view mirror, but to his credit, said nothing.

They reached the Tegel airport without incident. Kirill gently got her out and walked her in. She looked like she was going to throw up.

He handed her the knapsack.

"Everything is still there- passport, wallet, phone, camera. Your clothes that you packed last night. I'm sorry about the things in the hotel. You can't go back."

She took it, glaring at him.

"Who are you?" She almost hissed the words out. Her eyes were angry, hurt.

A flicker of pain crossed his face. He wiped it away.

"FSB. I took a contract job. It went to the shit. Now I have to clean it up."

"Here."

He'd shoved a wad of euros into her hand. "Get yourself on a plane home."

"I don't- need your money…" she started to say indignantly, flicking through the paper, her eyes incredulous. "This is more than a plane ride."

Her eyes narrowed and her mouth grew tight.

"Is this hush money?" she said accusingly.

"No. Keep it. I won't take it back. Give the balance to the homeless, if you really want to. Just get a plane home. Now."

"What will happen to you?" she finally asked.

"Don't worry about me."

Her eyes looked worried.

"I'll find you," he said, whispered.

"How will you?" she said in a doubtful voice.

"I just will. I will see you again. Now go."

She fumbled as she stashed the money away in the knapsack he had given her, and started to walk towards a counter.

"I'm sorry."

He wasn't used to saying those words, and even when he said them they sounded insufficient.

She looked at him with a steely gaze. "I'm not."

Then she turned around and kept walking.

The office was cool and dim.

Yuri Gretkov sat at his desk, scribbling. His brow was furrowed. The clicking sound startled him momentarily.

"Ah. I should have known."

Kirill pressed the gun in harder.

"I'll finish the job," he said coldly. "But you leave the girl out of it."

Gretkov drummed his fingers on the table. He was seemingly oblivious to the fact he had a gun to his head.

"Done," he said. "But screw up again, and we go after her."

"That won't happen."

Kirill retracted the pistol back to its holster.

"I've never seen you like this Kirill."

Yuri's voice was amused. He casually laid one leg over the other.

"It's good to know something can make you crack."

Kirill glared at him. He was about to leave, when he heard the man call his name.

Gretkov swivelled around in his comfortable seat and pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

"You better do this. Or I'll do things to her that'll make your stomach bleed."

The pallor on Kirill's face was not visible in the darkness. Then he vanished out of the room like a ghost, leaving the bespectacled man sitting alone.

A black Audi stood parked in a dingy looking parking garage. The leather still smelled new. Kirill reached into the glove box and loaded his pistol. He placed the siren atop the car. Then he pulled out of the garage and onto the streets of Moscow.

He was here. FSB had picked it up. They hadn't reprimanded him yet for getting on the wrong side with Gretkov, and he wasn't going to remind them. His thoughts were focussed on one thing.

Bourne.

That son of a bitch.

How did he survive?

The question blared in his head as he drove, his fists clenched.

How could someone survive a shot to the head?

Nobody, he told himself. He must either be a god, or had a head made of fucking titanium.

His phone rang next to him.

He picked it up.

"Da," he said.

They'd found him.

He swerved recklessly around and drove furiously.

He was going to find this son of a bitch with a head of titanium, who'd put her life in jeopardy, and put a bullet in his heart.

He'd never hated anyone this much. It had never been personal. He killed, he forgot, and he was done. Except for his stepfather, of course. When he had watched his stepfather stab his mother with a kitchen knife.

His hands tightened around the wheel.

And then he saw him.

He almost disbelieved his eyes.

He was walking in plain sight, by the river.

He was limping.

Kirill pulled the car over immediately.

He fumbled with the handgun. It was a difficult shot, with that gun, from where he stood, but he was too angry to think. He was going to get that sonofa-

The shot was wide.

He swore.

Bourne staggered to one side.

And then he heard the sirens.

Damn. The politsiya.

He put his hands up as a gesture of well meaning. He shouted he was Secret Service.

"Gun down!" they kept shouting with their guns fearfully pointed at him. "Gun down!"

He put the gun down to appease them.

They weren't appeased.

He growled as he let them cuff him.

"I'm Secret Service!" he snarled. He looked over at the footpath.

Bourne was gone.

Fucking dumb shits, he thought, seething.

One of them must have grabbed his identification card from his pocket. He was talking to the others now, and their voices were hushed.

"We better let him go," the more senior of them said to the rest. He looked nervous. "Uncuff him."

They uncuffed him.

"Happy?" he snapped as he snatched his ID from the one who had it.

He took off down the footpath, leaving the police milling about in confusion as he grumbled quietly. He had had him!

He followed the bend. It came out to the main street.

He could smell him.

The thrill of the chase overtook him. His blood pumped hard through his veins, the adrenalin surging.

These were the moments he enjoyed best in his job. The moment before he caught his quarry. It gave him a rush, a rise of energy that burst through his veins.

He was almost an animal. He wasn't Kirill anymore.

He was a predator. All senses.

Sight, sound, and smell.

The underground pass, his mind thought automatically.

He made his way down the stairs, coolly pocketing his pistol.

His senses howled in triumph.

He'd been this way.

Excited, he walked through the crowd, seemingly oblivious of the people he bumped into.

He came out to another street, opposite a supermarket. People were exiting the building, voices crying out in alarm.

His eyes narrowed as he smirked and made his way there, jumping over a barrier without effort instead of walking around it.

He stepped into the mart, looking around curiously.

Then he saw the blood trail.

He almost bared his teeth into a grin.

He was close now.

So close.

The screech of tyres drew his attention. He drew out his gun, alarmed, and dashed out. Two policemen lay face down on the concrete. He saw a taxi leave, the forlorn driver standing by the side of the road. Two police cars squealed after it.

Fuck.

A woman sat stalled in a black Mercedes, watching the goings on. It was a G-Class, he observed. Robust. What he needed. He picked up a fallen policeman's radio and made his way towards it, waving his gun around.

"Ex machine, ex machine!"

He'd said the words curtly. She was scared of him. His animal side felt no remorse. He pushed her aside and got into the car. He had to get him. He had to end this.

He slammed his gun against the seat next to him and sped off down the road.

He listened to the radio carefully. Two cars already down. Bourne was still going. He heard a policeman radio for help from FSB. He stepped down on the accelerator.

He was going to get him first, he snarled. Bourne was his!

He drove up another street, intending to cut him off. Two police cars feebly followed Bourne, and he knew they wouldn't have any luck.

Kirill had a bad habit of playing with his food. This case was no different. He couldn't resist the temptation.

He bared his teeth and crossed the divider.

The four wheel drive clipped the side of the little cab, sending it sprawling.

Take that, bastard, he grinned.

He drove into a side lane. They were driving parallel now, on opposite sides of the river. A bridge lay ahead.

A tram stopped in front.

Bourne swerved recklessly around it. The police car behind him smashed into it. Kirill skidded neatly over the bridge and pulled to a halt on the other side of the tram car.

There was a moment their eyes met.

Bourne's eyes were wide, like he had just realised something for the first time.

And then the moment was gone.

Bourne sped his car forwards. Kirill had to reverse and turn around, and by the time he was in pursuit, the two FSB cars were in front of him.

There was a freeway ahead of them.

Bourne drove headfirst into the traffic.

Kirill stared in disbelief.

The man was fucking suicidal.

He was a maniac.

Turn back, a voice in his head urged him. Turn back.

The animal inside him pressed the accelerator, turning into the freeway. The two other FSB vehicles had been snapped up in the tide of cars.

You'll die here, the voice insisted. Think of her.

He hesitated one moment.

She'll die if I don't do this, he thought back. I have to get him.

He drove into the tunnel.

It was like a cat and mouse game, and after awhile, he was not sure who was who.

They drove in pursuit or elusion, unconscious of the cars that unluckily came between them.

He thought he'd had him.

He'd had the cab jammed up against the wall. He shot at him. Bourne ducked his head down.

Bourne had wriggled the car out somehow. In a flash, a second, the body of the cab was in front of the Merc, and Bourne was shooting at his tyres. Then the Merc was in front, the yellow cab pushing it forward.

The glass from both their vehicles was gone.

They aimed their guns at each other.

He saw the divider too late.