Zsomobor Bako
The Zombie.
One of Hungary’s most vicious gangsters, he had cut a path of blood and misery across eastern Europe. The eldest son of a poor family living in one of Budapest’s most deprived areas, he made his name as a killer by the time he turned twenty. Killed without emotion and without hesitation. They called him the Zombie because nothing affected him. When one of his victims’ families killed his parents in retaliation, Bako approached one of the most senior men in the Hungarian mafia and asked for permission to kill the family in revenge. The senior gangster asked Bako if he was looking for revenge for himself. Bako said that it was not about revenge. It was about showing that he could not be touched. There would be consequences for anyone who crossed him.
Within two years the senior gangster was dead by Bako’s hand. He had failed to learn the lessons of that first meeting. Had treated the Zombie like he would any other psychopath for hire. Failed to see the man’s ambition.
International effort across Europe appeared to do little to dent Bako’s organizations. He dealt in drugs, people, weapons, organs, whatever his clients could afford to pay for. Cross his palm with currency and anything was possible. When one of his many ventures was halted, another sprung up in its place. Through fear, intimidation and outright brutality, the Zombie absorbed others’ criminal enterprises, made them his own.
The man disappeared into modern legend. Like a wraith. A shadow. A ghost. At first the authorities had thought he was just another would-be kingpin who would disappear like the rest; a victim of his own overstretched ambition and greed. But the dead-eye certainty with which he had built his reputation served Bako well. He resisted the temptations and ego-fuelled mistakes that others might have made. He built his empire slowly. Carefully. Brutally.
The more power he gained, the more invisible he became. The police would often come close to finding him, only to have him vanish at the last second. Always leaving some little sign of his presence. Enough to taunt the authorities. Like the Cheshire cat’s smile, but the teeth were bloodied and rotten instead of gleaming and white.
In recent years, some of Bako’s organizations had tried to infiltrate Scotland the same way they had managed to gain a foothold in London and the South of England. Most of these efforts had been unsuccessful. But Bako was not one for backing down.
And now he was gunning for the old man.