but a strange light in the sky was shining right into my eyes

[singmod]

JANUARY 2024 EVENT

PROMPT ONE — THE AURORA: NASCENCE: Following the strange dream at new year, a three-day Aurora takes place. During which, Interlopers discover a possible ally in the mysterious woman heard in the static and heard in the dream — potentially earning new abilities.

PROMPT TWO — ADUST: The Interlopers find out what happened to the owners of long-destroyed Milton House in the form of hauntings.

PROMPT THREE — THE VISITOR: Interlopers find themselves with an unwelcome visitor — a shadow doppelganger here to make everything absolutely worse.

THE AURORA: NASCENCE

WHEN: January 13th - 15th.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: potentially disturbing dreams; dreams of being burned alive; some minor supernatural horror; some minor ‘ghost’ horror/hauntings; death of npcs in various ways including suicide, murder or exposure to elements.


In the middle of the month, it happens. A herald. The noise starts: faint at first, but then growing louder. An ethereal, high-pitched chorus of sounds difficult to place. There’s a kind of electrical buzzing with it all, a low, endless hum punctuated with cracks and pops. The sky is alive with sound, and with it comes the swirling streaking of colour against the inky black of night: The Aurora has come.

Much of what happened previously happens again: Streetlights, illuminating the town’s roads; lights in stores and homes will come alive, buzzing and flickering at times. Previously abandoned cars will turn on, their headlights blaring. Electronics that had previously seemed broken flick on — and whilst there are no broadcasts available on televisions, and the radio waves only drone on in static, both only occasionally blaring standard emergency broadcasts. Any computers and phones will turn on, but will have no internet or reception. Instead, Interlopers may find texts and emails — many of them unsent. The everyday lives of their users stored within, now readable.

There are still some instances of the ‘ghosts’ from the previous Auroras, but they are now only faint outlines, and far fewer in number. However, whilst the Aurora would usually only last until the next morning on sporadic nights over the month — this time it will last for a full three days. The world is plunged into darkness, a seemingly endless night with only the Aurora to light the skies.

On the second night of lights and noise, a voice calls out to you: static-like, and distant — as if someone speaks over a radio. A woman’s voice. It is the same one you’ve been hearing for a few weeks now, but finally it is far stronger than the scant whispers of name and the word ‘help’. She is far clearer now.

“You.” she says. She may whisper your name, too. “I see you.” You’re unable to speak back, the communication is only one way. She sounds upset, but there’s something more… a kind of wonder, perhaps.

”It’s not just a regular aurora borealis, but then you probably worked that out already, haven’t you? It’s so much more than that. Everything is… changing.”

”I don’t know how you can go back. But— but I can help. Maybe. Maybe I can make this place easier, somehow. I need help, but I’m stuck—” There’s frustration in her voice for a moment. ”It took from you. Took you away. It doesn’t always have to take. We can take, too. Sleep. I will help you take back. You will survive this. You will not go into the Dark. This is not the end.”

You have no idea what that means, for the most part. But you might just end up taking the chance and doing as the woman asked, even if it’s difficult with the noise and light with the Aurora. Sleep, and a dream may come to you.

FREE RUNNER: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape. You dream you are a magnificent stag, galloping through the snowy woods with ease. You seem to go on and on, never tiring, never slowing. You feel like the wind, or perhaps the very wind itself carries you. Not once do you stumble or fall, even when the snow is thick and deep, or the ground is shaky and uneven beneath you. You feel free.

When you awaken, you feel the most refreshed you’ve ever felt since you first came here. For the final day of the Aurora, you are bursting with energy and even when the lights in the sky fade — that revitalised feeling within you remains. There’s something within you that understands: you are the Free Runner. The ground will yield beneath you, your energy will not desert you, the wind will carry you.

LIGHT BRINGER: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape. You dream of sitting by a lonely campfire in the mouth of a cave at night, warming your hands. As you sit, a strange feeling comes over you, a desire to reach out to the flames. And so you do, reaching with both hands into the fire — gripping at the white-hot embers. It burns you, and for a moment there is blinding hot pain as the fire suddenly explodes around you, consuming you whole. But the pain soon stops. The fire doesn’t burn you. No, you have become the blaze — your body warmed. You burn bright enough that the darkness around you turns into day.

When you awaken the next morning, you feel warmed and comfortable. As if even the coldest of winters couldn’t reach your bones. The warmth remains even when the Aurora ends, and you are left with the innate understanding:you are the Light Bringer. The power of flame is at your very fingertips. You master the light, life, warmth.

AURORA CALL: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape. You dream you are standing in the very sky itself, at the Aurora’s height. Colour and sound twirls around you, within you — and you feel it curl into your body. Your head fills with noise, a chorus of voices calling out, snippets of conversation echoing within you. A woman’s voice calls to you, it is the same voice that spoke to you before you slept: “Don’t you understand it now? We are all connected. The Aurora connects us.”

And you do, you do understand it.

When you awaken, you feel connected to the world around you. To the very people who live amongst you. You feel less lonely, a kind of kinship with others. You have heard the Aurora’s Call and you have answered it, unlocked a connection with your fellow Interlopers. You will be heard.

NOTHING: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape, but only for a moment. The edges of your vision begin the blur with black, slowly closing in until everything goes dark and you fall into a deep, dreamless sleep. You awaken, and although you feel rested, as if the dreamless darkness has helped you feel a little more ready to take on the day — nothing else about you has changed.

ADUST

WHEN: From mid-month to month end.
WHERE: Milton House.
CONTENT WARNINGS: fire; house fire; death of a child/children; hauntings; ghosts; mental manipulation; illusions of burning/being burned; potential injuries via falling/unstable building collapsing.

There is a reason why it is advised to avoid Milton House other than the simple fact that it’s a miracle the house is still standing. Once one of the largest buildings in the town of Milton, it is now a former shell of what was once a fine and grand house. It has lain in ruin for many years, dilapidated and host to a great deal of fire damage.

While he is in town, Methuselah will not speak of the place, but he often looks sad when it has been brought up in conversation. “A great tragedy.” he will say before falling into a pensive silence. “A blackened mark on the town’s memory.” He does not wish to say much more of what happened: sometimes there are things that are just too painful. He will continue to advise the ruin is left alone, out of respect, and the fact that the place is a danger.

Of course, advice will not stop anyone from attempting to get into the ruins and exploring the house, even if it is in fact highly dangerous.

The sounds of voices and whispers may be enough to pique anyone’s interest. You're sure you heard something, maybe you should go to check it out?

It is true in the fact that the house itself is incredibly dangerous structurally: floors and stairs may give way and you’ll find your foot (and half of you) falling right through the floorboards. Damp and rot that have long since set in, and it will be dangerous to breathe in. But you’ll find that the house itself is pretty ordinary: this was once a family home. Just about the entirety of the house and its contents aren't salvageable, but you’ll be able to find out a little about who once lived here.

There are faded, half-destroyed photos that show a family of five: a father, mother, and three young children all under the age of ten. The father with warm, beaming smiles, the mother has kind eyes, the two oldest boys with toothy grins much like their father, the younger girl looks shy, wanting to hide against her mother. They look happy. Just a typical family. In a world where so many strange things are happening, it feels so strange to look upon these family photos and around this home to realise that they simply lost their home in a house fire.

But as you hold a family picture, or some half-destroyed trinket: a toy, a shoe, a book, a vase, you’ll find the item will suddenly catch alight, bursting into flames in your very hands. The flames do not burn you, and as you discard the item, it will fall to the floor as if nothing had happened.

Then, it comes to you. Here and there. Different sensations that stop and start suddenly: the house groans and creaks around you; the smell of smoke enters your nose; the sound of fire cracking and popping with a roar fills your ears; the sensation of heat against your skin; the clawing and suffocating feeling in your lungs that makes you cough and choke; the sounds of terrified shrieks of children echoing above you. Feelings flood you: fear, panic. When you next turn around, the entire house is aflame around you, and you can’t tell if this is real or if you’re reliving some terrifying memory.

You need to leave, get out of here. For some, it will be what comes naturally. You’ll have to fight through the flames and escape the house before it burns down completely around you. You’ll have to fight your way out, find an exit not already consumed by flames — through a window, perhaps. Crashing out of the house and into the snow, you’ll look back and see Milton House just as you entered it: nothing more than a half-burned ruin.

But for others, there will be another pull. You are drawn upstairs, to the screams of children. You need to get to them, to help them, save them. You will battle through the flames, heading towards the ruins of what was a child’s bedroom, or towards the bathroom. Inside either, you will find a figure cowering, engulfed wholly in flames: one in the bathtub or one in the closet. You recognise them as the two sons from the family pictures.

Mom. They will call you. Or Dad. They weep, terrified of the flames. I’m scared, I’m scared. I want the fire to go away. Help me. Stay here.

The tragedy of Milton House is before you. More than just a fire. What is more tragic than the death of a child? What silences voices? Breaks spirits? Leaves one helpless to act in the wake of such a passing?

There is something to be done here. You are not so powerless. Calm the child. Offer gentle assurances. They will get out. They are safe. You are there for them. You will stay. Embracing them will set you alight. Too hot. Too bright. It will hurt, but you won’t burn. But don’t let go; holding them will eventually calm them down enough for the flames to grow dim, to slowly ease their spirits to rest.

Soon enough, the flames will go out and the child will disappear, leaving you alone in a decaying, dilapidated room.

In the churchyard of Milton, there is a family grave by the name of Barker. Three lie within it: Thomas it reads, and his beloved sons, Patrick and Christopher.

THE VISITOR

WHEN: The month of January.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: erything absolutely worse.
THE VISITOR — CONTENT WARNINGS: supernatural beings; dream-related horror/disturbing dreams; doppelgangers; themes of depression; themes of self-harm; themes of isolation; potential themes of suicide.


It seems the dream of the New Year and the Aurora dreams are not the only odd sleep-related instances occurring this month. You first notice that something is off when a strange dream pulls you from sleep. The dream may feel like any particular dream you have, whether it be a usual nightmare or strange concoction your brain has conjured up for you this night. Maybe it’s a dream you’ve had before, maybe it’s a new dream entirely. But no matter the dream, there is one thing that is odd about it. In tiny moments within the dream, you notice that there is something different, something that feels out of place. Something is there that shouldn’t be.

A figure, tall and silent, entirely made of shadow stands lurking in the background. It looks human, but there is not much more that you can really describe further. It is a sad, unsettling presence.

When you awaken, eyes bleary from sleep, and you look about the room, to the bottom of your bed, for a half-moment you see that figure standing there silently. That unsettling sadness permeates the room, and after a few seconds of blinking and sitting up — the figure disappears. Perhaps it was just some trick of the mind, some half-awake illusion.

But the next time you sleep, it appears again. The same figure, the same emotions surrounding it. And when you awaken, it stands at the bottom of your bed once more. Only this time, it lingers, and you find yourself staring down the figure before it disappears once more.

Over the next several days, the presence continues to linger more and more. It stands silently in the corner of the room of your home; it hovers by the window, staring out into the snow; it stands in the middle of the road as you go about your business. More and more, it is there. Always standing, always watching — silent and sad.

No one else seems to notice it, only you. And over time, the shape of it seems to change — the vague, undefined shape of it slowly shifts into something you recognise. The same hair, the same height, the same way it holds itself: it is exactly like you. A perfect doppelganger, a second shadow. And with it, it exudes an oppressive sadness, a particular kind of loneliness. It is suffocating, bleeding into you.

It makes you withdraw from the world around you, from the people around you. Perhaps you stop spending time with others, retreating into solitude. You hide from others, keep to yourself. You find yourself not sleeping at all or perhaps sleeping too much. Perhaps what little you already eat becomes nothing. The shadowy doppelganger draws ever closer to you, close enough to touch you - ever hovering at your shoulder. Its presence bores down on you, making you feel small and more and more alone even with its ‘company’. No one else can seem to see it but you, mentioning it to others will earn odd looks, or even concern. It seems you and your double are alone together.

Hopefully, those around you will notice the change in you. How you stopped reaching out, how you’ve stopped taking care of yourself. Hopefully they will see something isn’t right and reach out. You are doomed to the doppelganger's company otherwise.

However, those around you can push the shadowy double away, and can break its influence and hold over you. Genuine care and concern for you will have it shrinking back. Perhaps it is a kind word, perhaps it is the gentle but insisting coaxing to eat. Perhaps it is an attentive ear to listen to your thoughts, to how the presence has made you feel. Maybe it is even the simplest of touches, an embrace or the holding of a hand, the grip of a shoulder. Continued connection with you will slowly have the visitor’s power diminish.

And hopefully it is done before it is too late, or it may be all too easy to fade into the Long Dark.

FAQs

THE AURORA: NASCENCE

1. Aurora Feats are now unlocked! Please see the following page for more information. Aurora Feats are completely optional.

2. Interlopers will only receive ONE Aurora Event. The only time this is available is this month. After January, players will have to wait for the next Feat round for another chance at an Aurora Feat.

3. This Aurora will last a full three days. It will be a period of only night.

4. For more information on the ghostly loops seen during the Aurora, see this previous event, under 'The Aurora: Aftershocks' prompt.

5. For new players who would like a little extra context regarding the woman can look at December's Tales From The Northern Territories, under the 'New Happenings in December' section.

ADUST

1. Characters will not be physically burned in the fire, but only feel as if they have been. The effects of this illusion will last a short time after they're out the house before they will fade.

2. The only real injuries characters can sustain will be from fall damage, or if the floor gives way and their feet go through, etc. whilst in the house.

3. The children cannot leave the house. They will be too scared to leave. In addition, they are tethered to the house, given that this is where they died. Simply being calmed/comforted is the best way to help them and they will disappear after that.

THE VISITOR

1. An Interloper's Visitor can't be seen by anyone but the Interloper themselves.

2. The Visitor can be spoken to, but it will not speak back. It cannot be interacted with and is intangible.

PLOTTING POST

Comments

cw references to child death, injury, etc

[m1895]

[ Vasiliy doesn't bring up that he's seen this before—that some of his calls have been screaming children, maimed in horrible ways. That he's seen a child go limp in the back of an ambulance before it reached its destination. It affected him; of course it affected him, just like this has, it's disturbing—but he's also aware of the fact that Konstantin is far more devastated than he, a mess barely holding himself together, and can't help but to think that's probably the reaction he should be having.

Where is the line between being able to function in a job like his and some lever in his brain being jammed in the off position? Konstantin is shaking. ]

Vasya, [ he corrects, quietly. The man is a cosmonaut, a commander in the armed forces, a Hero of the Soviet Union—but he feels like an equal right now, in this moment, and they've been living together for more than a month now. He's earned the right to casual address, and continuing to use each other's full names after this feels slightly ridiculous. ] ...They may have. Something happened here.

[sputnik]

[ The use of the diminutive surprises him, enough for his eyes to peel open again, looking over at the other man. It's a tether, something to hold onto — Vasiliy is here, Konstantin isn't alone, and just like with the dream, Vasiliy witnessed this too. The pair of them have known so much that's the same, right down to the very core of themselves, their native land, culture, language...

And this, too, is another little dose of familiarity. Vasya. Konstantin can't quite bring himself to smile in this moment, but something in his eyes clearly shifts, affected by the allowance. His teeth nudge against his lip, hesitating for a moment — there's so much to think about, to question. Just what happened? Why...?

But there's something else nudging against his heart, painful. Something he doesn't want to talk about, but needs to. ]

....There's something I haven't told you about yet. I have a son.

this tag was a JOURNEY. vasiliy on his delulu 'known you for a month, daydreaming about a family'

[m1895]

[ He's stunned, completely unprepared for the revelation—it stings; it's a disappointment. Vasiliy recognizes the absurdity of feeling dismay that a heterosexual man was, at one time in his life, involved with a woman, but he's not able to reason away the feeling as he was raised to do. (And it also threatens the already delusional—embarrassingly so—desire to just. Be with him, without the complications of living in their shared country of origin or a child from a prior relationship.)

Not that there's anything wrong with taking in a child with no biological connection to oneself; if anything, it's a noble thing to do. Plenty of people had done so during his own time, especially following the Civil War. He shouldn't feel so startled, so disappointed. It shouldn't be a disappointment, and it doesn't reflect well on his character that it is.

So he's a widower, or, less likely but still possible, divorced. Or he's referring to an illegitimate child—but that doesn't seem likely, with what he knows of the man.

He's not sure what the appropriate thing to say here is; it's a horrible thing, a parent pulled from his child to be here. At least he himself didn't leave behind anyone who would miss him terribly. ]

I'm sorry. How old-...?

I support him, your honour!!!

[sputnik]

[ It feels like a sin voiced, some dark confession. The guilt he already feels pools inwards, fills his heart up and overwhelms it; his chest aches. The fact he doesn't like talking about Aleksei is a guilt of its own. Like the poor child is... some dark secret, some shame, some shadow attached to him. (And isn't that exactly what he is? Konstantin burns with self-loathing.)

And even now..... the majority of the shame is because he is about to tell someone who has maintained such a high opinion of him, the truth about himself. Ever since their first encounter, Vasiliy knew what he was, what that meant. Konstantin has found a certain pride in that, a comfort, a happiness. At times, the other man's high opinion of him has been the only thing still making him feel connected to his old self. That someone could look at him and still see the Hero, the cosmonaut, not this... weak, useless, disgusting thing he's become now. ]

Seven. He'll be seven now.

[ So little. Konstantin's eyes drop to his hands, resting on the blanket that's draped over him. Here he lies, comfortable and warm while his son is in an orphanage all alone. ]

.....I've never met him. I don't even know what he looks like.

[ He's never even gotten to see a picture of him. ]

I didn't know about him. His mother... never told me. We weren't—..... We lost contact over the years. I only found out about him because of her death. They called me right before my last mission.

[ His voice darkens with shame. He knows the implication is clear. They weren't married, and they weren't involved in each other's lives after a brief thing, something that certainly never could have been considered love. The child is illegitimate. ]

....He's in an orphanage right now.

[m1895]

[ Vasiliy swallows, absorbing—he was never married, then. The child was born to a girlfriend, or some woman he slept with; either way, their time together would have had to have ended around the time of the boy's conception if he didn't know about it.

It would be a weighty thing, suddenly being informed he had a heretofore unknown son living in an orphanage. What would he have done had he not been pulled here? Retire, get a live-in nanny, place the child with an adoptive family? There's the possibility that even Konstantin doesn't know the answer to that question.

In a way, though, it's a relief, a return to a more comfortable backdrop: there is no woman in his life or on his mind. Just a son left behind in an orphanage, which is a terrible thing, but... not as much of a threat—not that there's anything to threaten. ]

...Oh. I'm sorry. Were you planning t..

[ It's an overly personal question. ]

[sputnik]

[ Divulging this may just ruin Vasiliy's opinion of him. Vasiliy, who just told him to call him Vasya. Who has become so much more than only a necessary source of assistance in this place, and a secure roof to stay under. He's become a friend, a companion. And after this.... he might look at him differently.

Yet Konstantin continues. Maybe he's needed this — to open up about it, let it bleed, no matter how ugly it is. No matter how ugly he is. And after what he'd seen in that house.... He doesn't think he can keep it inside anymore. He needs to tell someone. He can't imagine telling anyone other than Vasiliy. ]

Honestly, I don't know. [ It's voiced quietly, another confession all of its own. ] I was planning to... do something, but I didn't know what. It was on my mind through the entire mission. But then the crash happened, and I was.... kept prisoner, and— I wanted to get to him. To find him, save him from that place. My son shouldn't live like that. Suffering, for my own mistakes.

[ It's not a nice way to phrase it, but it is how he sees the incident with Aleksei's mother — a mistake. An accident. He never planned to become a father. ....Never wanted to be.

He sighs, running a hand up through his hair, letting the heel of his palm rest against his forehead. Everything aches. ]

But even if I could have reached him, what kind of life could I give him? His father is a monster.

[m1895]

[ 'For my own mistakes.' It immediately invokes the memory of standing in the kitchen of Lyudmila's apartment, the earth below him opening like a trap door, the nauseating dread at the possibility of being a father before he'd decided he was ready.

It hadn't been anything, in the end, but it could have been. She would have told him, if the verdict had changed; they'd still been together at that point anyway. But he still could have ended up in a similar situation to this one; he doesn't know, truth be told, if she'd been purged after his death. Her name hadn't been one of the ones they got out of him. It wasn't obvious, and there weren't documents tying the two of them together, even after two years—a point of contention with her parents which may have spared her in the end.

But if it didn't—it's not unthinkable that the child would have ended up in a children's home, as Natalia Yezhova did. As Konstantin's child did.

He refers to himself as a monster. He questions what kind of life he could give him and—he's right about that part. He's in no state to be singly responsible for a child, who might be in danger simply by being around him. Vasiliy chooses not to point out that he could probably find a good family for the boy, if he ever does return home; it feels out of line to suggest such a thing when discussing someone else's child with them, even if it is the obvious answer. ]

No. You aren't a monster. You are sick, you are injured, but it's in the line of duty. This happened because of your service. [ He reaches out without thinking, squeezing the man's upper arm and letting his hand linger. ] You wouldn't call someone who lost a limb serving the Soviet people a monster. A man who gets malaria in Afghanistan, is he a monster? His parasites are in the blood. Smaller. But still parasites. There is something horrible in him too.

cw: father abandonment things...

[sputnik]

[ The squeeze is a comfort, as are the words that accompany it — words he wants to hear, so desperately. But it's so hard to let himself accept those words, to give himself any leniency in them, with the guilt and horror swelling inside of him, throat uncomfortably tight, words strained with upset. He knows, logically, that Vasiliy is right about all of it. This happened to him because he was in space, on a mission, in the middle of his service — but.... ]

....It's my punishment, Vasya. [ The use of the diminutive for the first time, uttered softly, and he can't look over at him. Konstantin is no believer in the divine, in anything so overarching and powerful as that, but this... it's cosmic, it makes sense to his mind. The energy of the universe correcting itself. Whether that's actually true or not... to him, it has to be. To him, it is.

He tenses, before slowly sliding from the bed for a moment, crossing over to where he's stored his few supplies of things — the photograph, the X-ray, and... the nevalyashka doll. When he returns to the bed, he perches on the side of it, body turned in towards the other man, holding the little doll in his hands, thumb stroking its rounded side softly. ]

We used this, on our last mission. It was with me the entire time. [ Toys are commonly used to test microgravity; it had no sentimental value to him. It wasn't supposed to, anyway, but— ]

I kept thinking of him. I could barely concentrate on anything else. And it... has stayed with me since. It even showed up here.

[ What is he trying to say, with these words? Insinuating? That the universe continues to haunt him with this little doll that reminds him of his son? He doesn't know, but— the words come, and he's miserable as he stares down to it, mouth a deep, heavy frown. He's never said this to anyone. ]

I know what it's like to feel— to be abandoned by your father. It's an emptiness that never fills. You spend your whole life wondering why you weren't good enough.

[ A pause, a flutter of lashes as he draws a slow breath. He's spent his entire life shaping himself into something.... desirable and loved. How ironic that now he's doomed to be alone. He's become something disgusting, dangerous. ]

I deserve this thing inside of me.

[m1895]

[ When Konstantin slides away from him, freeing himself of his grasp and stepping out of bed, it feels like fission of his own body. He doesn't lie back down when he returns with the doll, only perches at the very edge of the bed, like he feels unwelcome, like he has no right to be there. Surely he doesn't think he'll be rejected for this, when it wasn't even his fault—he didn't know, and he had no way of knowing his mission would go so terribly wrong. He's a good man. Vasiliy doesn't doubt for a moment that he really would have arranged something for the boy upon his return, had he been able to. He's a good person. The fact that he feels so much guilt about the matter despite his lack of personal culpability proves that.

And then his mouth curves into a deeper frown, and he says something that Vasiliy can tell he hasn't often shared before, if at all. Abandoned by his father. Permanently. His stomach churns. ]

No. Kostya, no, you don't.

[ He pauses, worrying his lower lip with prominent front teeth for a moment, doing the mental math. He was born in 1985; the war in Afghanistan ran from '79 to '89. It's not a lie if he doesn't specify which war. He's managed to exist and survive by lying, even before his death and subsequent undeath; it's been something like breathing, a natural aptitude unveiled in the right circumstances. How strange, the way he would bend over backwards to avoid it on technicality when speaking to this man, like someday he'll find out and tally up all of the times he was more dishonest than he had to be. It's a dangerous, dangerous weakening of his own guard.

The words come out tentative, a little strained. ]

I know.

When I was four, my father—... [ It's painful, and difficult to verbalize, in a way that it wasn't when he rehashed the story to an audience that had experienced the same. It was normal in the thirties. Not so much any more. ] He fought in the war. I was too young to understand why he was leaving. Or why he was so angry when he came back. I thought it was something that I did, that maybe if I was better behaved he wouldn't have left. I think most children react that way. But he came back.

[ The father he knew before the war didn't. Some man in his skin came back. Loving, yes, but not the father he hugged goodbye. He remembers how much more emphatically Yegor spoke, the quiet anger he'd never seen before, the edge of bitterness to the conversations he eavesdropped on with his eyes closed, lying still and pretending to be asleep. It was scary, sometimes. He didn't understand. There were guns in the house after that.

He'd asked his father to tell him about it, once. When he was eight years old he'd asked what it was like to kill someone, and he'd been angry. Father was smiling in the family portrait they took when he was promoted to lieutenant in the Main Directorate of State Security. They'd celebrated when he was pinned with the Honoured Worker of the NKVD in 1940, even if half of it was because they thought it meant he would live. ]

I didn't hate him. I got older and I understood that it was never about me. Your son will understand.

[sputnik]

[ Konstantin looks up from the doll, body turned towards Vasiliy from his position at the edge of the bed, head turned that way too. He stares as he's given the personal information in response to his own, something deeply meaningful and deeply painful being shared between them. Little glimpses of childhood hurts, and the way they form who you become later on.

He's silent as he listens, large hands still cupping the small doll in his palms protectively. And there's a soft exhale, an empathetic knit of brows as he dips his head for a moment. ]

I'm sorry. That must have been very difficult for you.

[ To feel abandoned by one's parent — even if that parent does ultimately come back, the particular fear and confusion it breeds is formative, especially to a young child's mind. Vasiliy says it: he'd blamed himself, questioned if it was something he'd done, and Konstantin knows how that is. He has always maintained a stubborn resiliency, claiming that his own father's abandonment didn't ruin anything about his character now — in fact, that it made him stronger, but if he is very honest with himself (and Konstantin so rarely is), he would have to admit that it's been a wound that never healed. Something consistently open and wet and aching. He knows he leaves a thing before he can get left, first. He knows he struggles with letting anyone truly in. Putting on the persona he's fashioned for himself is safer. ]

You're right. As he gets older, he'll understand more things. ....I suppose I did, too.

[ There were stages of it: confusion, hurt, and then for a long time, an anger. Then he became an adult and understood things he hadn't been capable of in his adolescence. But it hurts, thinking of Aleksei going through those things. He'd never wanted to do it to a child. And that the boy's mother was raising him alone... just like his own mother had been. All of it is such a strange guilt.

And realistically, he knows the creature chose him by necessity, that Averchenko wasn't a suitable host with the illness festering inside of him. But.... it's so hard not to see this as punishment. Maybe he needs for it to be. ]

He'll always wonder about me. If I don't return to him, help him however I can.... he'll never know that I tried. That I was trying, for him. I don't want him to feel like he wasn't... enough to try for.

cw discussion of torture/execution/state terror/parental death

[m1895]

[ His heart twists in his chest, a deep, reverberating pain. There's not much to say to that—he's right, and he's right to want the child to know. ]

You're a good father. You never met him, but you're a good father. Responsible.

[ He stares at the wall beyond the other's body, the tiny pinprick holes in the old paint where nails used to hang framed pictures. He wishes he could hang the one he stowed away in the bookshelf in the living room, that he could look at it every night before going to bed and remember that they were real, that his mother and father were real, tangible people who loved him, once. Three years is barely the amount of time it takes to blink, when losing a parent is concerned. Sometimes he wonders if they stopped loving him, once they were in an interrogation room, facing the consequences of his actions in his absence, listening to one of Beria's Georgians rattle off their only child's abuses of socialist legality.

Did they tell them he was a torturer? They could have invented rape, looting, sadism, pulled any number of daily factual occurrences and transposed it onto his own file in addition to the crimes he did commit. There's no guarantee that either of them died with a clear image of the man he was—he'd never spoken to them about his work; why would he have? He signed a vow of secrecy, and they were safer if they didn't know anything, and it wasn't something, after the initial excitement of his move to the cadre department and subsequent appointment as interrogator, that he had much desire to talk about with the uninitiated.

They saw the uniform, and that was as much as he allowed them to see. He surrendered his right to the narrative they would have heard for no reason other than to torment them. Without realizing it, he worries the edge of one of the quilts in his hand, trying to turn his attention back to the cosmonaut's situation as opposed to his own.

(Did they die angry at him? Was his parents' last impression of him anger and not love at the time bullet severed brain stem?) ]

The state is good at finding family members. They'll track him down and make sure he's provided for with whatever you left behind.

[sputnik]

[ He doesn't truly believe those words. He can't — but oh, how he wants to. It's what he most wants, needs, to hear, and so they strike him like something sharp, piercing through a hard layer that he's so rarely allowed to be penetrated. He'd crumbled in Tatiana's arms not so long ago, face pressed against her, letting himself admit what he'd been carrying since it happened. The concept of punishment, of guilt — of monsterhood — for abandoning his son.

Some time has passed since then, but none of the ache has healed, and this place has only made all of it worse. He'd survived an injury that should have been fatal, has somehow, impossibly, gotten a second chance, and yet he cannot reach his child. It's like another layer of punishment, but he isn't the only one suffering. Aleksei hurts because of him. It's almost unbearable. He wishes he were a good father. Vasiliy tells him something he desperately wants, and maybe it matters for that fact alone; Konstantin swallows, looking over at the other man as a silence stretches between them, as both lose themselves for a lingering moment or two to thought.

Attentive, observant, his eyes drop down to the movement of the other man's slender fingers working against the quilt, but he doesn't address it. This conversation has obviously touched upon some deep dark places in Vasiliy as well, even if Konstantin could barely know the scope of it. He looks back up — mouth tugging into a thoughtful frown. ]

I wanted to take him to my mother's. In Moscow. Maybe she could take care of him until I.... got better.

[ A pause. He knows he's never mentioned the possibility of "getting better" to Vasiliy. ]

Before here, I was with a doctor. She wasn't like the others. She was truly trying to help me — she was even working with me to escape. We were going to find a proper hospital. See about getting help with this... About removing it from me.

If I could get back... I could still do that. And then it would be safe, for me to take care of him.

I can't let him go, Vasya. He's mine, my... responsibility. I have to save him.

[m1895]

I understand.

[ A pause—it's a big risk to suggest this, given that he doesn't know the exact nature of the relationship, but he gets the feeling he has a fair understanding of the overall dynamic between the two of them. ]

Did she know about him? His name, where he is? If you are gone, she will probably try to help him. Most people would. Maybe tell him what happened to you. If she wanted to help you, she wouldn't let him think you were a bad man.

[sputnik]

She did — she had access to my files, knew everything about him. More than even I knew.

[ Said with the softest tug at the corner of his mouth, but nothing humorous; the slight hint at a smile is pained. Until Tatiana told him the boy's name, Konstantin didn't even know what it was. ]

You're right, though. She would try to help him, if she could. If they didn't capture her first.

[ It's a concern, but he tries to remind himself that she wasn't a prisoner like he was. They couldn't keep her there, right? She may face repercussions for helping a patient escape, but... hopefully she's found freedom now. ]

She has my mother's number, too. I made sure to give it to her. ...She's tough. If anyone could reach Lyosha, it's her.