A/N: Yes, I understand that currently Russia uses rubles, but this is the Golden Age and rubles don't exist anymore. There is an intercolonial standard bill that most of Russia, China, and Europe refers to under the slang term 'djenii' or 'jennies'. Other colonies and countries refer to the currency with their own slang terms, such as 'jacks', 'd-bills', 'djens' or 'jens', 'anas' (as in 'analog'), as well as the usual: dough, bucks, cash, etc. They also have their own forms of currency that are good only in the respective colony, but can be exchanged for the standard if cross-colony purchases are needed.
There is also a digital form of the currency that is far more often used, but folding cash is still fairly common in certain circumstances, especially if one is military.
Also, a little bit of a crudity warning for this chapter. Someone has a lewd mouth.
"Goddamn but it's cold!"
Minerva smirked as she turned on the steps of the pub, holding out her hand to move Yevgeny Denosovich to one side and out of the way.
"Hold on," she said. "Clear the way for the poor frozen American!"
Mike Collins didn't even offer her the usual look he gave whenever they called him an American, nor did he give the usual correction of 'Actually, I'm from Mars'. Shuddering badly despite his sealskin coat, Mike hurried up the stairs and ducked in through the door of the pub, eager for its warmth. A cheerful bell sounded overhead.
Yelizaveta Yesipova snorted a cloud of white and laughed as she followed Mike past Minerva and Yevgeny as well. "Five djenii says that he tolerates vodka just as well as he tolerates the cold," she said as she stepped in. Yevgeny hurried to follow her.
"Make it ten and you're on!"
Minerva rolled her eyes. Geny had been trying to get into Veta's pants for a month now, and for some reason thought the best way to woo her was to one-up almost everything she said.
She followed her friends into the pub, ducking a little out of habit as she did. She had been just tall enough since the age of sixteen that she'd played roulette with doors of every kind. Most times she did not smack her head, but it happened just often enough that she always hedged her bets.
The warmth was certainly welcome as it swallowed her in. The faint hint of beer hung in the air. A gilded archway made of dark wood was overhead, and cold sunlight glinted off the iron-wrought windows. It wouldn't last. Already the sun was starting to sink, and mists were gathering in off the river.
Mike stood in the center of the room, stomping his feet and rubbing at his arms. His ears and nose were both bright red. Veta was already at the bar, ordering a round of vodka to 'warm up the poor American!'
"I'm not American, for Pete's sake!" Mike said, rubbing his gloved hands in front of his mouth. "I'm from-"
"Mars!" Minerva, Geny, and Veta all said in concert.
Veta laughed as a waitress moved away from a cluster of booths in the corner, heading for the bar with a tray of empties and food-smeared plates.
"Well, I'll have you know-" Mike took a step backward, intending to take off his coat and perhaps hang it on the rack beside the door, where Minerva and Geny were already stripping out of theirs. He stepped right into the waitress. With a dexterity almost bordering on the paranormal, she managed to keep the whole tray from tipping and spilling its contents but one of the glasses managed to fall, striking the ground with a satisfying smash of broken glass. She cursed.
"Oh my God I'm so sorry!" Mike said, and started to crouch awkwardly to help clear up the glass.
"No, sir, no, it's ok," the waitress said. "I'll get it."
"Come on, Barishnikov," Geny said, catching hold of him and pulling him aside. "Let's get you sitting down before your grace costs us more than just a glass."
As he steered Mike toward a booth Minera was already unfolding some djenii. She reached the bar at the same time as the waitress, who put her tray down before grabbing a towel to help clean up the glass.
"For the glass and your time," Minerva said, dropping the djenii on the tray and giving the waitress a wink. She tossed down another couple of bills in front of the bartender as Veta gathered up the vodka.
The bartender made the bills disappear and eyed her. "Grill?"
"Not just yet," she said, tucking the rest of the djenii away again.
"Don't wait too long," he said. "Dinner crowd coming in, and with Arrival tomorrow the place will be mad. We've stocked up but no guarantee how long it'll last."
"So long as the vodka keeps flowing, I'm happy," Veta said, carrying the selection over toward the booth that Geny and Mike had taken up.
Min turned to follow. The booths had not yet filled up, but a handful of people were enjoying drinks, or food. At the far end of the bar sat a woman with dark red hair, a book in hand and stirring idly at a bowl of stew that looked almost finished. Something about her looked familiar.
She paused a moment, trying to place her, before going to join her friends.
Mike was sitting on one side with Geny, Veta having taken a seat on the opposite side of the table and starting to hand out the glasses of vodka. As Min approached, however, Veta didn't get up to let her in, or slide over to give her room. Instead she smirked at Minerva and held up a glass to her.
"Go on," was all she said.
"What are you talking about?" Min asked as she took the vodka, confused.
"We saw you checking her out," Geny said with a faint smirk. "Even the American-"
"Martian!" Veta and Mike said at the same time.
"-noticed and he's as thick as lake ice."
"I thought I knew her from somewhere," Minerva said. "I just can't place her face."
"Under your ass if you're lucky," Mike said with a smirk, then a yelp as Veta pitched a napkin at him.
"Disgusting!"
Geny was craning around un-self-consciously, trying to see the redhead better. Then he laughed and turned back to the table.
"I know who she is," he said.
"Who?" Min asked.
"She's-"
"No cheating!" Veta said.
"Come on, Veta. You know too?" Min asked.
"Yup," she said.
"Well one of you tell me! It'll bother me all night if you don't."
The three just grinned at her, and she scowled. "Don't make me make it an order."
"Oh, the PFC is going to pull rank on us?" Veta said to Geny. "On leave?"
"That's it," Geny replied with mock exasperation. "We're court-martialed. Might as well drink even more."
"See if I buy you any more rounds," Minerva said, turning away from the table and heading over to the bar. As she neared, the redheaded woman glanced up from her book and turned her head to look at her.
"Sorry to bother you," Min said. "I was just…I have a feeling I've seen you before. Have we met?"
The woman folded the book down, keeping her thumb tucked into it so as not to lose her spot. She draped her arm over the back of the chair a little and regarded Minerva with an appraising look that seemed to come out in Min's favor. "No bother at all, Miss…?"
"Minerva," she said, and offered her hand. "Minerva Anasova."
"Minerva," the redhead gently took her hand, and gave a winsome and slightly flirtatious look. "Pleasure to-"
"-…shoot herself before?"
"Never," Gen said, the world starting to break apart into smears of color and light. "She's experienced those flashbacks before, however. Several times."
"Mini! Don't you ever-…! What were you thinking?"
Some of the color coalesced into Kalina, who was bent over her, holding her shoulders and looking shocked. A sharp throb pulsed behind Minerva's eyes but it was fading quickly.
Ikora stood behind Kalina with Gen, both still little more than blurs as the pain started to dull and her eyes to clear. Shifting a hand, she moved to sit. Instinctively, her hand went up to the side of her head but Kalina caught it before she could make contact.
"Don't, there's still…in your hair-…," she said. "What the hell possessed you? Why did you do that?"
For a moment, Minerva couldn't answer. The displacement was so strange and disorienting. Looking around a little she saw a fan of blood, bone, and tissue on the ground beside her. On her other side, her pistol lay on the floor.
"You're all right, Titan," Ikora said. "Take it slowly."
Drawing her knees up, Min hugged her arms around them a moment, taking deep and even breaths. She could still smell beer in her nostrils. It wasn't like a fading dream, or even a memory. She felt as if she had somehow been teleported from that pub here to this floor, the sights and smells and sensations as real as if they had just happened.
"How are you feeling?" Gen said. "Did it work?"
"Give her time," Ikora warned, but Kalina was rounding on Gen.
"Did what work?"
Min lifted her head, her eye sight now clear and the pain in her head gone. Lev was fussily giving her another scan, just to be sure.
"Yes," she said to Gen. "Yes, it worked."
Kalina turned back to Minerva, angry confusion in her eyes. "What worked?!"
"Hunter," Ikora said gently, touching Kalina's arm, but the confusion was already clearing in her eyes.
"You did this because we were talking about Thanatonauts the other night," Kalina said, realizing. "You were trying to see-…Jesus, Mini! You could have warned a girl first!"
"Let's get her to her feet," Ikora said, and both Kalina and Gen took hold of Min's arms and pulled her upright. Lev, mumbling to himself that he would also have liked some warning before Min just decided to air her skull out all over the Tower floor, was cleaning up the blood and mess.
"I'm all right," Min said as she got upright. Kalina had picked up the pistol but didn't immediately hand it back to her.
"Are you up for talking?" Ikora said. "It is best in these situations to speak on them immediately- they are not like dreams but they do fade with time, and important details could be lost."
Min didn't feel much like talking at all, but Ikora was right. Any detail she could recall about what just happened might just move her that much further along in remembering completely, figuring this mess out before it drove her out of her mind.
She bobbed her head, but before she could speak Ikora looked at her Ghost. "Record this," she said, and then looked at Lev as he returned to Minerva's shoulder, the floor now pristine again. "You as well, if you wouldn't mind."
Lev bobbed a nod as well that was remarkably similar to his Guardian's. Min wiped her fingers over her lips, silent a moment.
She was no longer cold, her heart no longer racing. Other than the disorientation and the shock of what she'd seen, she felt a decent bit better.
"I was walking into a pub," she said. "There were four of us, and it was cold outside. We were-"
"As many details as you can," Ikora said gently, but firmly. "Who was with you? Names, if you can remember them. The name of the pub as well, if you saw it?"
Min thought intently. The people were easy, but had she seen the name of the pub?
"I don't think I saw the name of the pub," she said finally. "There were two men with me, and a woman. Her name was Yelizaveta Yesipova. Black hair, dark eyes. One of the men, he was-"
Yevgeny. It was just on the top of her tongue to say this but she suddenly realized that the dark-haired young man had gone by 'Geny' among his friends. Was it a coincidence that his nickname was so similar to the name of the Exo Warlock member of her fireteam? She wasn't sure, but deep inside she didn't think so.
"-Denosovich," she said instead, and that was technically true. If any of them noticed the momentary pause before saying the name, they said nothing. "Black hair too, and blue eyes I think. And the other man, he had chestnut hair and green eyes, kind of a scrawny build, big ears. He was Mike Collins."
"Mike." Kalina and Gen exchanged looks.
Minerva nodded. "He was from Mars. A colony. We used to tease him that he was American, because it had originally been an American colony. I'm not entirely sure why he was there. I think we'd known him for a couple of months- a transfer to our unit maybe?"
"Your military unit," Ikora said. "You are certain that the other two- Denosovich and Yesipova?-were part of your military unit?"
Minerva nodded. "We were on leave. I was a PFC; it was mentioned. The others had to be just privates because they accused me of trying to pull rank as kind of a joke. It was nearly evening, and the next day was something called Arrival? A holiday of some kind. And we were on leave. The bartender warned us the pub would get packed soon, because of it."
Ikora's eyes were twinkling a little. "Go on."
"Mike nearly knocked a waitress over by accident, broke a glass. I paid for it, paid for the first round of drinks. Vodka. I was just starting over to the booths when I saw someone sitting at the bar. She looked familiar-"
"Who was it, do you know?" Ikora asked, and Min shook her head.
"I couldn't place the face. The others kind of teased me about going over and speaking to her. They seemed to know who she was and thought it was funny I couldn't place it. So I went over to ask. She was reading a book, I didn't…did I see the cover?"
She thought, and realized that she had. Just for a moment. Then something clicked and a realization dawned that she hadn't been conscious of during her 'flashback'. "It was St. Petersburg! We were in St. Petersburg. The book she was reading was White Nights by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. I didn't see the title but I recognized the cover."
"St. Petersburg? You are certain?"
"Yes," Min said. "Yes, absolutely. The novel takes place in St. Petersburg, and remembering the cover reminded me of the city name where we were on leave. We were in St. Petersburg, on leave for three days for Arrival."
"Do you remember your unit number? Where your unit reported, or to whom?"
Min tried, but was met with only blank black. "No, there's nothing about that."
"You don't remember who the woman was?" Ikora asked.
Min shook her head. "No. She was just about to tell me her name when I was suddenly back here. I knew her face, but we hadn't met before, I don't think. I get more the feeling she was someone…famous? No, not quite famous but…but known. I'd seen her before but we hadn't met, hadn't ever talked."
"Can you describe her?"
"Red hair? A little tanned, and her eyes…dark, I think? Dark brown. She was about thirty years of age, maybe slightly younger. Shorter than me, I-"
Min blinked and looked down at herself as she realized something else. "I'm taller!"
"Yes, we're all taller than people who are shorter than us," Gen said dryly, and she gave him a look.
"I mean I'm taller now than I was in the…whatever that was. My former life. I was tall then too, but I am taller now. Maybe not as many as six inches but at least four or five."
"Some small physical alteration is usual after one is Lightborn," Ikora said. "It is part of the genetic enhancements that come along with being a Guardian. Titans tend to be a bit taller than before. This is all you can remember?"
Min wracked her mind a little, but nothing else came. She shrugged helplessly.
Ikora regarded her thoughtfully a moment, then said, "It was clever of you to try to bring your past memories to the fore how you did, but I'm more surprised that it seems to have worked. I have only ever encountered warlocks who are Thanatonauts. I wonder if there will come a time where the oddities that surround you cease to surprise me? That day may wait in the future, but it is not today. This information will be helpful in our search for your past, Minerva. Gen mentioned you have had such flashbacks before- if one happens again and your surroundings are conducive, I highly encourage you to repeat this action. It may yield even more fruit. For now, I will fill in the rest of the Vanguard on what we have learned here. I suggest you take some rest. Zavala will be in touch regarding the next venture to the moon, probably far sooner than you would like. Take the time while you can."
Minerva gave her a half-nod, half-bow in thanks, and Ikora bid them goodbye, before heading back into the Archive. Almost the instant she was gone Kalina's fist was slamming into Minerva's shoulder pad.
"Don't you ever do that in front of me again, especially without any warning!" she said, then shook her fingers out. "And don't you ever let me hit you like that again either, those pads are like rock. Ow!"