Мороз и солнце; день чудесный!

[balancedlight]

Who: Svetlana and Open!
What: October Catchall + House Calls. Feel free to get with me if you think your character would like a little check in from Doctor Nazarova
When: October
Where: Milton, usually, but a peek into Lakeside

Content Warnings: Nothing yet!

Comments

Пора, красавица, проснись: - Fraser

[balancedlight]

The dreams come so vivid during the auroras, but they’re never the same. She wakes up in brief fear, clutching the blankets around her tightly, searching for a warm body in the bed. Sometimes he’s there, solid and soft and stable, and she settles back down rather easily. Somedays, like the morning she wakes from a dream about ravens and airplanes, he’s not around, but she can hear the sound of his footsteps in the house. It’s equally as soothing, but she has little incentive to stay in bed.

She’s been trying to find a way to move out, to go to her own place, but on mornings like this, when the wind is blowing and winter is knocking and she can still feel the warmth of his place beside her - well, she’s less in a hurry.

She pulls the blankets around her shoulders instead of getting dressed and slides her feet into the first pair of shoes she can find on the floor.

“Ben?” she calls out softly, padding into the kitchen.

[maintiensledroit]

He'd woken early to a cold dawn from dreams of beached whales and a frozen shore, and been unable to get back to sleep. Rolling to the side, he'd kissed Sveta's warm shoulder and tugged the blankets up a little more snugly around her, then slipped quietly out of bed. As the coffee boiled, he'd worked quietly on sketching out and writing down the dream in the pages of the journal he'd picked up, before leaving the book open on the table to start breakfast.

By the time Sveta comes in, he's standing at the stove, whisking together ingredients for pancakes — or as close to them as he can get without eggs. Diefenbaker, sitting alertly nearby, barely glances at her as he watches Ben at work, hopeful of some batter or a pancake or two of his own.

Ben looks around, smiling when he sees her. "Good morning," he says, and dollops some batter on the sizzling griddle. "Pancakes?"

[balancedlight]

She spends a moment simply admiring him there in the kitchen, looking handsome and light, like nothing can touch him.

She's at a loss for words, so she simply nods with a smile, coming around the table to give Dief a scratch by his ears, speaking gentle Russian to him, promising him a bite of her own pancakes.

"Did you dream last night?" she wonders, glancing at the notebook quickly before glancing away.

[maintiensledroit]

Dief licks absently at her fingertips. His tail brushes over the floor as it wags, his gaze fixed on Ben there at the stove.

Ben nods, watching the cooking batter and waiting for bubbles to rise to the surface. "Yes. It was strange... very realistic. I almost felt as though I were there."

He slips the edge of a spatula under one of the pancakes, checking the bottom, then looks over his shoulder to her. "Did you?"

[balancedlight]

"I did. It was - strange. I woke up thinking I could hear the Moscow traffic out of the window. I could smell coffee and - and my neighbor Yulia had burned the dumplings."

She joins Ben at the little stove and slides an arm around him, inviting him into her little cozy blanket/robe.

"But my dream had been about ravens, isn't that odd?"

Открой сомкнуты негой взоры - Open/House Calls

[balancedlight]

Svetlana makes house calls on a daily basis. Sometimes, she ventures into Lakeside and will stay a few days there, but she doesn’t actually worry about where she’s living or staying. She will find friends, or she will find people, or she will insert herself into someone else’s life if she can help it.

When there’s enough sunlight to work, Sveta will make herself comfortable in the Community Hall to go over the notes that Hilbert had left her. She’s still working on translating them from Russian to English, though she sometimes does have to hand the English over to someone else to proofread.

But Hilbert’s findings after the glimmerfog are still fascinating, even now, and she doesn’t mind sharing what information she has.

[desperate_times_right]

The day after her party, Chloe makes her way to the community hall balancing a precarious tower of mismatched tupperware containers.

“Hey, Svetlana, I was hoping I'd find you here. Saved you some food.”

She peers around the pile.

“What are you up to?”

[balancedlight]

She looks up to her and sighs. "Chloe, what do you have?" She stands up and leaves the notebook on the floor so she can help her with the containers.

[desperate_times_right]

“Leftover food from the harvest party.” There aren't many people Chloe would let scold her like a misbehaving puppy, but Svetlana is on the list. “You’d better like the cake, because I had to lie to Ruby to save you a piece.”

[balancedlight]

"I don't want your immoral cake," she laughs. "If you had to lie to get it, then why bother?"

She is already looking through the containers, letting out a low whistle.

[ployboy]

Tim has grown to hate many things, which he's fairly certain isn't how things were supposed to go. Milton isn't a bustling city; he's run into pretty much everyone and has decided that, for his own sake (and he needs applause for this because doing something for his own sake is next to unheard of), he's called it Quits on learning names. He hates not knowing names.

But he does learn the people, the ones who stick around for a while. Their comings and goings. Their work. Their talents.

Rarely, both work and talent overlap.

And today, Tim's ducking his head in boyish greeting to the Doctor as he slips off his gloves after entering the Center, after finding her instead of Goodsir.

"Hey," he says. Eloquent as always. "Quick question?"

[balancedlight]

She looks up from her book, not quite startled but not quite at ease. He's a familiar face, one that she's seen, and she smiles in the slight recognition. She just can't relax, though, until she knows the reason for the visit.

"Of course. Is everything alright?"

Emergencies first.

[ployboy]

Good things come in twos. Tim decides that snooping on her choice of workbook is best left for a different time. He thinks, briefly, that he knows her because he knows Leslie. Of course that's just not how the world works. And besides, he and Leslie are barely civil (again) and being on the outs with someone like her shouldn't have been his plans but. Mice and men. Or something.

Still.

Tim tucks his gloves under a arm, and he brings up both hands to wiggle his fingers. "All good here," he says, although he's pretty sure he's hungry. But it's whatever.

There's a chair and Tim takes a seat; something something glitterfog, something lungs, blah and blah. With all of the nonchalance of a ne'er-do-well adolescent, he asks, "How's the stock of antibiotics? Do we even have one?"

[balancedlight]

She relaxes again, setting her notebook to the side. It's all in Cyrillic, and there are two different sets of handwriting on the pages. One, the main writer, and the other are Sveta's notes to the side.

His question gets a tilt of her head. "We do," she assures him. "Broad spectrum, but it's better than nothing. Why?"

Звездою севера явись! - Open/Misc

[balancedlight]

Maybe it’s a silly little thing. But the snow is falling again and Sveta is feeling - somewhat nostalgic for home. For the slick city streets and the oily puddles and the yelling and screaming of her neighbors at night.

It starts out after a rather productive snowfall. The next day, the sun is out and Sveta gets to work. By the afternoon, when she takes a break, there are no less than ten snowmen, women, and children all out in front of the Community Hall.

They all have names, they have stories, and they have families.

If they can’t have television, if she can’t have new novels to read, then she’s going to make her own entertainment.

[unsheathedfromreality]

The snowpeople hadn't been there when Illarion left the Community Hall at dawn. They make an odd, and oddly cheerful, little crowd in the fading afternoon light, as he's coming home from hunting. Novelty, here in Milton, is enough to pique his curiosity.

Though there's things to be done before he can satisfy that curiosity. He strides through the group with barely a sideways glance, disappearing into the building for long enough to stow his foraging pouch and rifle.

When he emerges again, it's with something clutched protectively in his right hand. He skulks over to the nearest snowman, peering into its face with a raptorial intensity. "Where's your maker," he demands of it, after a minute of staring.

[balancedlight]

The snowman doesn't answer, but Svetlana, currently on her knees arranging dilapidated shoes at the bottom of the snowman's wife, does.

"Ah! That is Pyotr, and he will not tell you anything," she warns him. "You see, he is too busy deciding if he would like to stay with his pretty wife, Agata, or with his sister in law, Miya." She brushes snow from her hands, beaming up at him.

[unsheathedfromreality]

He blinks at Pyotr, then turns to regard Pyotr's creator where she's kneeling in the snow. Someone else, perhaps, might find that explanation wholly mad; the man Illarion used to be would find it charming.

The thing he is now will just have to cling to it being new, and that keeping his mayfly interest engaged.

"Why didn't they both offer for him in the first place?" he asks--the first thing to mind. Pyotr and Agata and Miya were Steppes names; group marriage is a Steppes norm, even outside elves.

[balancedlight]

She tsks. "Oh, because the two are sisters and they would rather not share!" she teases lightly. "He must have courage and choose."

[meadqueen]

A very industrious little dog has taken up work beside her, carefully crafting a perfectly round snowball with her nose and then pushing it near the woman’s right foot, at which point she starts yipping, tail wagging.

Randvi knows these streets (and that bark) well enough that she isn't far behind.

“Ulfrùn! Gods, I apologize, she -” And it's at this point that she notices the snowy crowd around the square. “What’s all this?”

[balancedlight]

Sveta gives the dog a little pet as she continues on, grinning at the sound of Randvi's voice. "Ah! These are the newest members of the town of Milton!" she laughs. "They are - here for our entertainment."

[meadqueen]

“Oh my, you've been busy!” Randvi exclaims with a laugh. “Is this a first snow tradition or a special gift for Milton alone?”

[solitarysoul]

While he lives at the community hall, Levi usually spends most of the day away from it. So there's more than enough time for Sveta to build multiple snowmen before he returns. Its not what he expected.

He pauses and peers at them for a moment before looking to their builder. "Um. Having fun?"

[balancedlight]

"Ah!" she cries out, surprised by his appearance. She had been very into sculpting a nice sweater for one of the snowwomen.

"I am! Yes! Hello."

[solitarysoul]

"O-oh, sorry. I didn't mean to startle you. You, um, you're making snow people?"