Валерий is creeping on your memories (tipofthetongue) wrote in invol_rpg, @ 2013-01-08 23:27:00 |
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Entry tags: | ! log, ! plot: kidnapping, sadie thompson, valya zhiglov |
WHO: Sadie Thompson and Valya Zhiglov
WHAT: Meeting at the wall/memorial
WHEN: Tuesday evening.
WHERE: The administrative building, memorial-side
WARNINGS: None
STATUS: Complete!
Everyone was back, and the empty campus was full again: full of people, full of their emotions. Sadie had started regularly checking up on the wall where she'd carved the names - partly out of paranoia after she'd been pulled into that same administrative building and scolded for her act of rebellion (they'd said they'd let the names stay up as a memorial, but she didn't trust them), and partly out of morbid curiosity. Who would come to the wall? Who would leave flowers and trinkets? A small collection had started at the base of the wall already. As she strolled casually around the corner of the building this evening, Sadie wasn't expecting to see anyone, not really. It seemed everyone else had made their visits earlier, and then moved on to the Student Council vigil plans, or grieving and comforting privately. So when she turned the corner to see a familiar figure, she stopped short in surprise. Surprise, and something an awful lot like guilt; her eyes tracked from Valery Zhiglov to the name she'd etched deep into the brick, the rest of her frozen like a deer in the headlights. Oh. Valya stood some distance away from the wall, studying his brother’s name. It wasn’t his true name, and for whatever reason, Valya was slightly bemused by that. Nearly all Russian names had more than one form - there was the full, formal name given at birth, and then an affectionate, diminutive form used by family and close friends. The usage wasn’t like other countries’, where people shortened their names out of preference or simplicity. To shorten a Russian name shortened the social distance between two people. Alyosha was the name for a brother - for a friend - and to see it carved into clay distinguished him in a way Valya doubted the others understood. It wasn’t just a given name; it was a tender name. Not Aleksei -- IVI student and Vol -- but Alyosha. Someone who meant more. The candles he’d brought back from Poland were at the bottom of the wall, wax cups snug in the sand. He’d lit each one with a silent prayer, the one for his brother last and longest. Valya glanced down at them to make sure they were still burning and then turned to go. It did not matter what the others thought; according to his faith, it was right to pray. For all he kept quiet over the IVI student network, stewing in disgusted silence, he would not keep quiet if someone said something about it directly to him. He had assumed he might run into someone. He’d prepared himself for that, in fact, but seeing Sadie gave him pause. He’d heard - he couldn’t remember how, or from whom - that she was responsible for the “defacement” of the administrative building. He recalled the memory of a funeral he’d seen, vastly different from the one he’d just attended, and felt some solace in the fact that she understood grief. And she’d already caught him praying over the sleeping body of his brother. The differences between that encounter and this one resonated deeply, but not enough for him to keep silent. “Sadie. Hello.” He wasn’t going to ask her how she was. Those kinds of questions were reciprocated, and not anything he felt like answering. There was an awkward beat and then he cleared his throat gently, nodding towards the wall. “You did this, yes?” "Hi." The greeting was automatic, and it broke the spell she was under, frozen with doubt and sadness. Automatic, too, was the motion she made to brush her bangs out of her eyes, though since Laurel and Lana had taken their shears to her head, she no longer hand bangs long enough to brush out of her eyes. She settled for tucking her shortened locks behind her ear. "I did..." she said, still uncertain, staring at the candles Valya had placed. When she'd carved the letters into the wall, she'd been angry. Faced with Alyosha's brother, she was lost for how to feel, what to say. At the very least, she knew what not to say. Their shared understanding granted her at least that. She settled on the truth. "I didn't want them," a pebble kicked hit the corner and resonated like a shot, "To forget. To have to face their names every day they come here, running our lives." Ruining their lives. She glanced up at Valery again, and forced herself to hold his gaze when added, softly, "I didn't want to forget, either." He took her in during that moment of hesitation. The shortened hair and revamped wardrobe were noted, but Valya didn’t register it as a declaration to the world. It was a change, obviously, but just one of the many he’d encountered since he’d returned to IVI. He might’ve even said something, but the situation and expression on her face caused him to hold his tongue. Instead, he listened as she spoke and let out a soft sigh. What he wouldn’t give to kick and hit things, too. To carve his misery into stone. “They won’t forget.” He didn’t mean to defend the school, and wasn’t defending them. IVI was new; policies would be created and amended and dissolved after what had happened. Every decision IVI and IVF made would be scrutinized based on their failures. It was true that Alyosha, Marine, and the others could become faceless names thrown about in opportunism, but if he could help it, Valya wouldn’t let them forget, either. He manipulated memories. He would push memories of Alyosha’s laughter, or Mal’s unhappiness, or the exhaustion Marine had felt as she aided them with George Cooper directly into the forefront of each official’s mind if he was given the opportunity. And if he wasn’t, he’d take it. He was oddly unprepared for Sadie to admit that she didn’t want to forget, either. It was a sentiment he understood all too well, leeching onto every memory of Alyosha he had. Memories faded depending on significance and time - he knew that from experience. But while Sadie might worry about not being able to recall a tone of voice or an exact piece of dialogue, Valya was worried about mistakenly altering them. “We’ll never forget, either,” he added, though his tone lacked intensity. “Memories fade but they don’t disappear.” Only the people disappear, he thought, shifting his gaze from her to the landscape behind her. Sadie was silent for a long moment, lips pressed together as she tried to sort out what to say next. She wasn’t sure she believed that, not entirely. From her own experience, she knew she’d lost so much of her father already, and what stayed was blurry and distant, hard to recall. Faded, yes; but what of all the other memories? The little ones, the insignificant things - where did they go? And would Robbie remember her, and how she didn’t want to go? Or would she just be an abstract presence, never really there? People liked to reassure her that Robbie wouldn’t remember, and she’d be back before he reached that stage in his development, but how could she be sure? Without words, Sadie resorted to action and closed the space between her and Valery, standing by his side and looking up at the names she’d carved. “Yeah,” she said, finally. “It would be really hard to forget him.” Up close, a sudden fear struck her, and she reached up, just barely able to brush against the indentations in the brick. “I spelled it right, didn’t I? I... wasn’t sure.” He snorted gently - a noise of assent. “Yeah,” he echoed, wanting to smile the way you were supposed to when you had a fond thought of someone and not quite achieving it. He lowered his head and raked the hair at his temple back with a hand. It was hard to be without him, much less forget him. They had a formative history -- so much of what Valya was was due to Alyosha. It was weird to think that he would have to go on without him. “His name?” Valya shook his head slightly, clearing his thoughts. “Yes. Yeah, it’s right. Alyosha is a nickname for Aleksei. It’s what friends and family called him.” He paused, thoughtful, then glanced sideways at her. “It doesn’t seem like much of a nickname when it’s as long as his given name, but the meanings are different. In Poland he is remembered as Aleksei.” He tried a faltering smile again. “I like Alyosha better, but I’ve also called him worse.” Sadie had known that, at one point, or so she thought vaguely. Still, she nodded like this was new information, letting her hand fall from the wall and her shoulders relax. “I like it, too. Also I’m pretty sure I would have fucked up spelling Aleksei...” The joking self-effacement fell flat on its face as she faltered over the pronunciation; not because it was foreign on her tongue (no more so than ‘Alyosha’, anyway), but because there was no one here that would answer to that name again. She wondered, for the first time, if it pained her grandfather to call his great-grandson by the name he’d given his own son. “I liked him a lot,” she said, reining in her own sad, wandering thoughts. “I would’ve liked to had the chance to get to know him better.” Instead, she’d found herself shy in his presence, where if he’d been an American boy, back home maybe, they could have been fast friends, unburdened by all the baggage Sadie’d been cocooned in. “But I guess God had other plans.” Again, she shrugged and looked up at Valya. “That’s what everyone said for my dad, anyway, but... maybe you could tell me more about him, sometime? If you want.” His mouth twitched back at one end. “You did.” It didn’t surprise him to hear that Sadie had liked Alyosha. His brother was -- had been -- a good deal more outgoing than him, always ready to provide entertainment or make a joke. Valya had gotten glimpses of various girls with his brother through memories, but Sadie had not been one of them. “I’m sorry everyone is being deprived of that chance,” he told her frankly. Especially, and selfishly, himself. He wasn’t quite sure what to say when she mentioned God’s plans. He very much doubted it was God’s plan for bigoted terrorists to murder his brother and Erik, Marine and the others, but that didn’t mean He wouldn’t embrace and comfort their souls. Valery ended up pressing his lips together and bobbing his head, not willing to disagree in case Sadie found some comfort in that thought herself. And it was hard for him, too, to determine if she was just being nice or if she truly wouldn’t mind hearing stories about Alyosha. Valya could even show her, but who would that benefit, really? Was he the only one who wanted to sit through memories and watch them like film reels? Could he offer to do the same for her? Commiseration and remembrance? “I can tell you a lot about him. Good and bad. I’m not a bad listener, either, if you want to share stories.” He caught her eyes, trying, like he was always trying lately, not to be too grim. “Thanks, by the way. For this.” He lifted his chin indicating the wall. “I hope they didn’t give you trouble over it.” “I’d like that,” Sadie said, keeping Val’s gaze and offering a full, real smile of her own. “Hearing about him, and maybe sharing, too. People were always afraid to talk about my dad around me, and my mom didn’t want to, so it was just...” Just her and Sam, later, when she’d been allowed to come home, in the brief moments when he wasn’t off testing his powers and training. Not nearly enough to keep her own memories strong. “Anyway, that’d be nice. If you don’t mind,” she finished, shaking away thoughts of her brother. She’d tried to forgive him, but they just ended up fighting all over again. She was grateful to move her attention back to the wall. “Nothing I couldn’t handle, and they let it stay. Not that I would have let them take it down,” she added fiercely. He nodded. It had only been a little over a week, and he’d already had similar experiences, if people made eye contact with him at all. Shitty. And sometimes a relief. And maybe that had not been what she was going to offer, but he thought it suited. “I don’t mind.” He wasn’t sure how they both managed to come together during bleak times, but he didn’t mind bumping into Sadie. He liked her for what she said and what she didn’t say, and although he was preoccupied with his own memories, it didn’t mean he’d forgotten hers. “Good,” he said, finally managing the shadow of a smile. “It doesn’t hurt to remind them that we have our own thoughts and feelings about current circumstances.” Following the herd only led you to slaughter. They wouldn’t be at IVI forever and Vols were no mere sheep, however shepherded they were at the moment. "My thoughts exactly," Sadie's smile was steady, now, as if she could power his with hers. Without thinking, she bumped her elbow briefly against Valya's, a sign of affection usually reserved for Sam and other close male friends (not that she had many now). "I should go," For all her rebel cries and colors, she still kept to a semi-regular schedule for phone calls and video chats home. "But you know how to find me, yeah?" Valya felt gratified by Sadie’s small gesture. It was something Alyosha might’ve done, though with less force and no smirk to accompany it. “I’ll find you,” he promised. “See you later, Sadie.” When she was gone he turned back to the wall, quietly reflecting and more than a little wistful. |