Chapter 33
Frozen Rain
"So. Tell me about your brother."
The first words Eduard had said to him after leaving the train station, as they had lied there in the dirty little hotel beds. Sleet fell outside. The constant lights of the city shone in through the thin curtains.
The air was cold.
Gilbert laid back, hands folded behind his head, and Eduard sat cross-legged on the other bed, staring over at him from behind his glasses with friendly eyes.
Ludwig sat down on the floor between the beds, resting up against the end-table and legs straight out before him as he hummed to himself, fingers drumming the carpet quite merrily. Gilbert looked down at him every so often, and Ludwig would just look back up at him, and smile.
'How's it goin', Gilbert?'
His heart hurt.
That glint of light and the burst of exhilaration had long since gone. The ache in his chest remained. They had just sat in miserable silence, until Eduard had finally tried to engage him a little.
"So. Tell me about your brother."
Efforts at making conversation.
Those words woke him up, for the first time in so long, and Gilbert was sure he was smiling.
When he looked down between the beds, Ludwig was a little kid again, awkward and gangly, legs crossed and eyes bright as he gawked up at Gilbert with a smile.
"His name's Ludwig."
Eduard smiled, a little, and let him speak as he would.
Oh. It felt so good to actually think about something nice. To remember Ludwig, and actually speak about him. To try and let someone else know how happy Ludwig had made him.
"He's still a kid, ya know. Just twenty-three. He's tall. Smart. He's so smart."
A kid—was Ludwig really still a kid? Seemed like yesterday he had given Ludwig his name. Guess to him, Ludwig would always be a kid, his little brother.
Eduard cast him a weary smile, and asked, "Blond and blue-eyed?"
Gilbert glanced at him with a quirked brow.
"How'd you know?"
Eduard shrugged a shoulder.
"Just a hunch."
Strange. One would have looked at Gilbert, fuckin' albino that he was, and wouldn't have instantly assumed his brother would be any different. A very observant hunch.
Gilbert shrugged off Eduard's odd tone, and carried on. When he started talking about Ludwig, it was hard to stop.
"Yeah, he's blond. His eyes are so pretty. That was the first thing I ever noticed about him." He felt his chest puffing in pride suddenly, as he added, "I named him, you know!"
Eduard's smile perked up a little.
"Oh, yeah?"
Gilbert rolled over onto his side, head propped up in his hand, and he knew that Eduard must have seen the way his teeth had come out from behind his smile, the way his eyes were suddenly crinkling, the way his brow was higher than usual, the way his face suddenly felt so much less tense.
The way Ludwig made him feel.
It must have been obvious, after this past week of nothing but depression.
"When you see him the first time, he looks kinda scary, you know, cause he's tall, and his voice is so deep. But when you talk to him, if you actually give him time and get to know him, he's just... He's such a sweet kid. Sometimes I can't even believe I raised someone so fuckin' nice. He's the opposite of everything I was. He's so nice. He'd do anything for anyone. He's a good kid. You'll like him. I know you will, when you meet him."
He was so absorbed in the memory of Ludwig, in that image inside of his head, that he didn't even notice the steady falling of Eduard's face. How sad he looked, suddenly.
"You raised him, huh? What happened to your parents?"
"They died. It was always just me and Ludwig."
When he spoke about Ludwig, in whatever instance or whomever to, it never really crossed him mind to mention that they weren't real brothers, because it had never once mattered to either one of them.
"You two must be close."
Close. That wasn't even the right word. There wasn't any way he could have ever described the way he truly felt about Ludwig. It wasn't anything that anyone else might have been able to understand. Beyond brotherhood. He couldn't explain it, but tried to anyway.
"It's like... When he's gone, it feels like I'm gone, too, you know? Like if you went outside all of a sudden and saw that the sun was gone. When Ludwig's gone, I don't even feel like doing anything. I can't even figure out why I bother. If I can't find him out here, then I don't— I can't live after, if I can't find him. The only time I was ever happy was when he was around."
He probably sounded stupid.
Eduard stared at him, and then gave a scoff, and reached over into his bag. When he spoke, his voice was a little thick.
"Ah, hell. You wanna drink?"
Eduard pulled his hand out, and a bottle of vodka came with it.
Drink. Oh, god. Did he ever. He couldn't—he'd promised Ludwig. If he had one, just one, the whole damn spiral would start again, and he'd keep goin' down. He'd never find Ludwig.
All the same, he didn't trust himself enough to open his mouth, so he just shook his head.
"Do you mind if I do?"
He shook his head again.
Below, Ludwig's humming had stopped, and he looked up at Gilbert from the floor, very much an adult again, whispering, 'Keep it up, Gilbert. As long as you can. You promised.'
He couldn't answer Ludwig with Eduard wide-awake, so he smiled at Ludwig instead, and rolled onto his back so that the sight of Eduard drinking wouldn't get too tempting.
They were quiet again, for an hour or two, as Eduard hammered back glass after glass with surprising skill, and when half the bottle was gone, he looked over at Gilbert again, and yet still seemed perfectly lucid. His voice held no slur when he spoke.
"You alright over there? You're awfully quiet."
It seemed like people out here had more vodka running through their veins than blood.
Gilbert stared up at the shadows that played across the ceiling, and muttered, "I'm fine."
He glanced down; Ludwig was gone.
Feeling a bit of panic, he looked around, hands tangling in the blanket, and was relieved to find Ludwig at his side on the bed, splayed out and looking quite content. They stared at each other, Ludwig's eyes bright in the dingy hotel room, and Gilbert found that no matter how many years passed, no matter how many times they had looked at each other, Ludwig still had the uncanny ability to take his breath away.
Strands of Ludwig's hair had come loose and fallen into his eyes. He'd've cut off his damn foot, then, if someone had asked him to, if he were only allowed to reach out and put them back in place.
Couldn't.
Eduard was still for a while, and then asked, suddenly, "What will you do if you can't get him back? If you don't mind me askin'."
Without hesitation, Gilbert said, honestly, "I'd jump in front of a train."
He almost had already.
Finally, Eduard cast him a rather sad look, and said, "You know that's it going to be a while before we get there, don't you? It's not like you're gonna spend a few days in Moscow and then suddenly find him in the streets and you get to go home. Where we gotta go...it's a long way."
He had had a feeling, but he had tried to be optimistic. How pointless—optimism broke the world.
Still, he asked, "How long?"
"Months."
It hurt to hear, and Eduard saw his dour look.
"Sorry, I really am, but you gotta understand how things work out here. We can go ahead and leave Moscow, sure, but we won't get too far. Out there, where we need to go, the roads are only useable for a few months. The ice and snow, you know. Once it starts melting, we'll be able to start out. We can't take the train. Driving is...well, it's pretty goddamn scary, but that's our only choice. I think we'll be able to start out in a month or two, but it might take another month to get there, depending on the journey. Maybe more. Once we're out there, there's no turning back. If we get lost, once, we're dead. If we start out in April, it might not be 'til July when we get there. And he goes out so much anyway that they might not even be there, if we make it. It's all luck."
Luck.
Luck had never been on his side.
"Why can't we just take the train?"
Eduard suddenly looked about as miserable as Gilbert felt.
"I'm scared," he finally admitted. "I keep thinkin'... What if he finds out while we're there? Where can we run, if we're stuck in place like that? If he sends someone out after us, how are we gonna get away if the only place we have to go is to the back of the cart? I'm too scared to take the train. At least in a car, we can try to run, if he catches us. He's been watching you, this whole time. He'll be looking for you."
He.
Gilbert knew who he was.
Blearily, he looked over.
Ludwig was sleeping.
Moscow, whatever else could be said about it, had a very vibrant nightlife. Loud and bright. As many people crowded the streets at midnight as they did at noon. Never quiet.
Going back to the hotel that first night, after the fires had burned, had been unpleasant.
Not for the reasons he might have once expected.
Ivan stripped down and made a run for the bathroom, and Ludwig had grabbed up the bundle that Ivan had set aside. When the sound of the shower running came through the door, he had rolled out the glossy, silvery-blue uniform that Ivan had given him, and stared at the drops of blood on the pant-legs.
Dried, now.
Help me.
As Ivan showered, Ludwig went to the sink, turned on the water, grabbed some soap, and tried to clean it out. Not because of the memory of the girl, as she had lurched up and spat blood, but because he liked that uniform.
He realized it irritated him more than it horrified him. Fuckin' uniform had been perfect the day before. Look at it now. Mud, blood, and ash.
Maybe it was still the agitation of everything, it could have been the way his chest was a little sore, or it could have been that glint of something he thought he had seen. Whatever it was, it was steadily befouling his mood.
He rinsed the pants, frowned, washed them again, and could feel the frustration mounting. Couldn't seem to get rid of it.
Blood-pressure rising. His head hurt.
A half-hour of relentless lathering, and still the stains remained. When Ivan came in, still damp and red-faced and messy, pressing up behind him and kissing the back of his neck, Ludwig was too damn frustrated to even acknowledge him.
Couldn't bleach it—that'd ruin it worse. What could he do?
Finally, Ivan spoke up, and asked, amicably, "What's the matter?"
A long silence. Frustration.
"I can't get the stains out."
Ivan pulled back, looked down at the uniform, and just said, simply, "Ah. Forget it. It's ruined. I'll get you another one."
That didn't seem to make the agitation go away. He kept on scrubbing, and he could feel Ivan's lips twisting into a smile against his neck.
"Mad?"
He nodded his head, brow scrunched and lips pursed. Because he realized that he was—actually, he was pretty goddamn furious. She had bled on him. On him. Bleeding on him was like bleeding on Ivan, and nobody bled on Ivan.
The audacity was exceedingly close to mind-blowing.
"What do you wanna do about it?" Ivan finally asked, lips warm on his ear, and the words came out of his mouth before he could really even think about it.
Hands ran up and down his back.
His answer was short, clipped, and honest :
"Hurt someone."
He had never once in his life lifted up his head and thought to himself, 'I need to hurt someone to feel better.' He did now, and he didn't know where that feeling had come from or why. It was there all the same.
Ivan smiled, and raked teeth down his neck.
"So," he finally said, "Let's go hurt someone."
That was how they had wound up in the foul Moscow streets, Ludwig smothered in Ivan's giant coat and Ivan back in his uniform, seemingly unfazed by the sleet that was battering the sidewalk.
The city was very much awake.
It did occur to Ludwig, at times, that his entire life went more smoothly when he kept his big mouth shut, but, on the other hand, he had been seeking a way to redeem himself. Hurting someone was probably the only way to do so. Still. A bit precipitous, on his part.
Well. Yeah, but why not plunge forward? That burst of light in the train station had only been in his mind. Nothing more. The only person on the face of the earth who even cared that he was alive was Ivan. Ludwig could hurt someone, for him.
He roamed the streets with Ivan, who kept him close to his side and scoured the streets for who knew what.
Looking for trouble.
No one could ever know what was whirring through Ivan's mind, but Ludwig was well-aware of the focus in his eyes, and the quick reflexes every time he turned his head. Observing. Ivan had been regretful about taking him out into that field so soon, and was no doubt looking for something 'easy' to break him in. He and Ivan had very different ideas of what was easy.
The twists and turns came and went, and when the buildings became less well-tended, when the crowds started looking a little shadier, Ludwig realized that Ivan was leading him into the bad side of town. Oh, they'd find trouble here, alright.
A few minutes of walking, as Ludwig kept straight as a board and looked around every so often to make sure there wasn't any danger, and a firm hand on his arm startled him. A jerk to the side had him nearly tumbling. Ivan had suddenly dragged him into a dark, dirty alley.
Stagnant water on the pavement.
His pounding heart slowed down when he realized that Ivan hadn't found something for him to do, and instead seemed to be seeking a personal moment.
...coulda picked a better place, though.
Cold water dripped down from the roofs above.
"Here," Ivan suddenly said, as he pulled him close. "I have something for you."
Coolness in his palm. He looked down, pulse racing, and tilted his head.
A wallet.
"Open it," Ivan prodded, and he did so without thought.
The smile was immediate.
His new I.D., staring out at him from behind a fold of plastic. His Russian driver's license, military credentials. Ivan had told him they were tucked safely away in that dresser back home, but here they were. Nothing in the world could have ever been as entrancing as seeing his face there, underneath Russian letters. His name.
Normal men carried all of these items around with them. He hadn't ever been normal.
An exhilarating sensation.
Ivan had no doubt had this one in his back pocket, so to speak, and had waited for the right time. Maybe if Ivan had given it to him the day before, he might have been able to keep it together in the burning field. He could have flipped it open, when his collar got too tight, and remembered that he couldn't choke because he was a soldier.
"I put some money in there, too," Ivan added, as Ludwig tucked the wallet safely in his pocket.
He didn't care about money—never had.
"Have I showed you the money yet? I don't know how much Marks are now, I gotta—"
The identification was all that mattered, and when everything was straight, he reached up, took Ivan's face in his gloved hands, promptly interrupting whatever the hell he was saying, and kissed him upon the lips. Fingers gripped his waist.
Not an appropriate thing, perhaps, for two uniformed officers to be clenching each other in some dirty alley in the middle of Moscow, in a land where no one was expected to be abnormal, but Ivan was hardly afraid of society. If anyone had noticed them in passing, then no one dared to acknowledge it, and when they stepped back out into the street, all was well.
With every step Ludwig took, with every corner they rounded, his uncertainty waned.
Even if he didn't do what Ivan wanted tonight, then it wouldn't matter. He might spend the night in the closet, but in the morning Ivan would still love him. He might go crazy at night, but when Ivan opened the door the world would make sense again. It was more frightening somehow, the thought that he would let Ivan down than it was to imagine the door slamming shut.
The streets grew dingier.
It never once crossed Ludwig's mind that, the farther they walked, he had steadily overtaken Ivan's pace and was walking ahead of him. Maybe some part of him was as eager to find trouble as Ivan was.
Sometimes, he felt strange.
The sleet that fell around them was hardly bothersome. Ivan's shoulders were soaked, but he looked quite content. At the end of every corner, Ludwig looked back, caught Ivan's eye, and they smiled at each other. He wanted to impress.
The sidewalk was slick.
They walked in silence, passing so many people and so many doors, and yet nothing. Ludwig was starting to let down his guard.
Too soon.
Ivan suddenly spat out something in Russian, and Ludwig turned his head in time to see two drunken girls come stumbling out of the door of a shop, drinks in hand. They staggered on the ice, and nearly crashed into Ivan, which might have been a death sentence, but at the last second they turned, sloshing their drinks. They may not have bumped into Ivan, but they spilled their drinks on Ludwig.
Anger.
He reached out, without thought, and grabbed the arm of the girl that had splashed him. Fur coat. Big hair. Kinda pretty. Not as pretty as that woman he had once known. From what flashes he could remember, at least; picturing her face in detail had become impossible.
The woman opened her mouth and started to curse him, at least until she caught the glint of the gun in his belt, and then her bleary eyes widened and she looked him up and down, comprehending the uniforms and the stature of the men she had crashed into. More importantly, the precarious situation she had found herself in.
Silence.
She stared up at him, terrified and pale, and he could tell by her tense expression that his grip was hurting her, even though her intoxication. Ivan stood back, silently, and just watched. He had wanted to hurt someone. The anger was still there, pushed down into the pit of his stomach. That odd feeling of aggression. He couldn't say why he choked again, and even though he could have slapped her across the face or startled her with the gun, he just gave a tighter squeeze of her arm, a warning, and then let her go.
He let her go.
She wasted no time in running off, grabbing her friend by the arm.
Ivan lifted up his chin in contemplation, and then just started smiling again. Didn't look disappointed. That was good. Didn't look so excited, though, either.
Why had he let her go? The most obvious explanation was a rather simple one. That she was, in the end, a woman. Just a woman. When he had said he wanted to hurt someone, he hadn't exactly had a woman in mind. Ivan started walking again, and Ludwig had to speed up to match his pace. He was so busy berating himself in his head (why had he let her go?) that he didn't even notice when Ivan had stopped. He should've scared her more.
Ivan's hand was on his arm again, forcing him back, and he felt himself being pulled to the side.
"There's a bar. Let's go."
—what?
The instant those words had fallen from his lips, Ludwig knew; Ivan had no intention of letting him get back to that hotel room until he did as he had so foolishly spoken of.
Hurt someone.
Ivan probably would have burnt Moscow to the ground to avoid stepping into some ratty bar on a normal day, and now he couldn't drag Ludwig inside fast enough.
The second the shoddy door was pushed open, the smell of smoke and beer was damn near overwhelming. Neon lights flickering overhead. Loud voices and louder music. Shifty people. He felt out of place. When they walked in, the chatter died down for a moment, and people turned to stare at them in surprise. Given the crowd that was in here, two well-dressed military men must have been a rather unusual sight. A good few of them shuffled to the door, after they went for a table, and made stealthy escapes. The people in here were surely dangerous and most of them were likely criminals, yet still, the second they saw Ivan, they cleared out.
Ivan had that effect.
A path was made for them as they walked, and if Ludwig hadn't been so nervous he might have enjoyed the fact that people were scared of them.
Even in the middle of this horrific place, Ivan still pulled out a chair for him. It took a long time for any of the workers to gather the courage to come over, and when they finally did, they were trying very hard to keep their eyes low and smiles polite. Out here, people seemed to fear their army rather than worship it. Ludwig saw no reason to change that up, and kept his posture straight and his face stern.
The bar was a strange experience. The last time he'd been in a bar (felt like a thousand damn years ago) that man had tried to push him in a corner and drug him. He hadn't ever had pleasant feelings about bars and clubs.
Still, when Ivan ordered him drink after drink, he took them.
Ivan stared at him the whole time they sat there, smiling every so often when Ludwig crinkled his nose at an unpleasant waft of smoke. When he felt so inclined, Ivan would reach over and place a hand above Ludwig's elbow, smiling away, but Ludwig could see that his eyes were always just above Ludwig's head, scanning the room constantly for something. Any kind of situation that he could turn into an opportunity.
All Ludwig could do was sit there and wait for Ivan to start a ruckus.
The hour ticked by without event. Ivan's constant vigil for mayhem was interrupted only when he stopped to plow through another glass.
With every passing minute, Ludwig felt himself relaxing a little more. It wasn't too bad in here. He could get used to this, as he got used to everything else. After a few drinks, after settling in with the dim lighting and the rather exciting air, the thought had suddenly crossed his mind to stand up, grab Ivan's arm, and pull Ivan into a dark corner. To be the one who instigated, for once. To be the one who was constantly in Ivan's mind.
He glanced over, trying to gauge Ivan's mood, remembered how irritable Moscow made Ivan and that Ivan was only here so that he could incite Ludwig into a brawl, and thought better of it.
Ah, hell. Not the right time. Feeling a bit agitated, he took another glass, and put it back. Maybe next time.
Finally, Ivan looked over at him, and spoke.
"You could have at least hit her."
He had known that this would come up before the night ended. A gentle chiding.
Ludwig looked down at his drink, feeling a bit abashed, and muttered, weakly, "It was a girl."
"So what?" Ivan asked, with a quirked brow of curiosity. "What, you can't hit girls or something?"
Ludwig shook his head. Couldn't remember who had taught him that, though.
'Etiquette, politeness, and poise are the backbones of society, and chivalry should always be kept alive—'
Ivan saw his silence and reluctance, and just gave a smile.
"You can hit girls, you know. They're just like everyone else."
Ludwig glanced over at him, seeing the very sure look on Ivan's face, and if he had been feeling a little more dangerous, he might have asked, 'Well, then why don't you ever hit Irina?' Hadn't hit Natalia, either, come to think. Sure had shot that girl, though, and that woman in the blue dress. Nameless. Irina was too real to Ivan. Natalia was too frightening. They didn't count, perhaps, as 'everyone else'.
Neither did he.
"You know what your problem is, don't you?" Ivan suddenly threw out, and Ludwig could feel the sharpening of his eyes as he looked up.
Bristling.
He didn't know why, but for a moment, he wanted to snip, angrily, 'I don't have a problem.'
Such an answer would likely have earned him a trip into the nearest closet (or hospital), and so he just bit his tongue, sent Ivan as close to a glower as he dared, and stayed silent. He wanted Ivan to admire him, not think him weak.
Ivan actually didn't seem to mind his foul look, and just smiled all the wider.
"Your problem," Ivan began, in a silky voice, "is that you still think there are rules."
A hand reached out and grabbed his chin, firmly.
Ivan's voice and eyes were stern as he said, lowly, "Look at where you are. There aren't any rules out here, except for the ones I make. If you can't figure out whether you should do something or not, you ask me. Don't think about if you can. Just do it. You do what I tell you, not what anyone else does. Rules don't apply to you anymore." The grip loosened a bit, and Ivan raised his fingers to brush them down Ludwig's cheek, fearlessly. "Once you figure that out, you'll be unstoppable, you know?"
Unstoppable.
Like Ivan. Ivan was what he aspired to be. To be even half as confident as Ivan was. To trust himself, to figure it all out. Unstoppable was a rather enthralling prospect. To truly belong in this world that Ivan had given him.
How did Ivan have a way of taking everything that confused him and making it suddenly so clear? Ivan could make sense of every garbled thing up in his head. Things he couldn't even grasp, Ivan could set down in front of him and link together.
Ivan gave his cheek a pat, reached down to take another drink, and resumed his scour of the room. Ludwig leaned forward, elbows on the table and face flushed, and kept playing that word over and over in head.
Unstoppable.
Another hour passed. People came and went. Shadows danced, as the lights flickered. Outside, the sleet was still strong. Ludwig zoned out for a while, contemplating Ivan's words.
A world with no rules. How strange. His entire life had been lived abiding by every rule that had ever been set in front of him. Someone had told him once that rules were meant to be broken, and that had seemed rather like insanity. Breaking rules? Not him. In this case, however... Well, if there weren't any rules, then he couldn't very well break them, could he?
No rules.
He thought he felt something brush against him, as his mind wandered.
A laugh made him glance up. Ivan looked up from his glass, cheeks red and hair coming loose, sent Ludwig a long, scorching look, and gave a lopsided smile.
"Missing something?" he uttered, and Ludwig started up a bit at his words, dizzy and disoriented.
It took a minute to understand.
Dumbly, he looked around, eyes squinted, and then looked back up at Ivan rather helplessly.
Missing?
"Your wallet," Ivan elaborated, quite easily. "Didn't you feel him take it?"
A flush of adrenaline woke him up from his tipsy stupor, and he pushed himself out far enough from the table to give himself room to pat down every pocket. Nothing. He couldn't find his wallet, no matter how many times he put his hands in his pockets. Missing, alright.
Somehow, it hit him hard. For a moment, it was as if the world had been sucked into a black hole.
Maybe it was the alcohol that tripped the wire in his head, or maybe it was everything that he had pushed down since he had come out here in Moscow. Maybe it was the lingering light of flames behind his eyelids. Maybe it was the fact that that man had crossed his mind in the forest. Maybe it was that godawful gleam of light that had led to nothing in the station.
Maybe it was just something that had always been there within him, but that had needed Ivan to come out.
Whatever it was that had done him in in that second, it did a damn good job.
Silence. Hardly any air. Time stopped.
The stillness that came when the water was being sucked back into the ocean. The beach stood bare. No wind. The lights in the bar seemed to dim. A distant roaring of gathering waves.
The tsunami came crashing forward soon after, washing away every bit of himself.
The anger that blazed up within him then took him by surprise. Fury, actually. Had he ever been so angry in his entire life? He hadn't ever known that being so angry was possible, not for someone like him. Acid. The closest thing to the biblical wrath that consumed the world in wars. Not that someone had dared to take something that belonged to him necessarily, but that someone had dared to take something that Ivan had given him. That someone had dared to attempt to take that license, when he had never had one before.
Within that wallet lied his very identity. Someone hadn't stolen his wallet; they had stolen his name.
He felt himself gripping the edge of the table to push the chair all the way back, the scraping of legs on the floor, and he leapt up, feet splayed and eyes wide as he searched the room. He didn't know what he was looking for, but, by god, when he found the son of a bitch—
A hand on his arm.
"He's outside already. Come on."
He didn't even wait for Ivan to lead him, bolting so furiously to the door that Ivan was nearly left behind. It was only because he didn't know who the hell he was looking for that he was forced to stop in the street, stalking back and forth furiously on the slick sidewalk.
Rage.
His fists had clenched so tightly that his nails would have cut into his palms if he hadn't had gloves on.
Ivan finally saddled up next to him, looked around a bit unsteadily, and started walking. Ludwig followed him. They turned a corner, passed a few alleys, until Ivan stopped suddenly, like a dog that had caught a scent, and turned his pale eyes towards a dark side-street on the opposite side of the road.
He inclined his head.
"In there."
Ludwig was so goddamn angry that he didn't even stop to really think about it, set his shoulders and feet square, and marched across the street. Didn't even look both ways—he assumed cars would stop, because no one would dare to actually run him over. Maybe that was true, because he made it across the way with no incident, and found himself bathed in darkness as he plunged into the alley.
That wallet was his. He'd bust down every door in this shithole to get it back. He'd tear the city apart, to get that license.
He hadn't lifted his hand the day before to stop a single atrocity that he had witnessed, but he sure was lifting it now. To be fair, they all seemed considerably less atrocious now that someone had picked his pocket. The massacre of the students seemed less horrifying than the fact that someone had dared to snatch what was his.
If he had suddenly been given the choice between saving that girl or saving his wallet, he'd have picked the wallet in a heartbeat. Didn't even know her name, and she had ruined his fuckin' uniform anyway. Nobody cared about anybody. He was tired of giving effort to those who made none for him. He just wanted his damn wallet back. His name. He valued an object over a life, and that realization didn't make him feel all that terrible, because, in the end, objects lasted longer than people did.
Who was he?
He reached the end of the alley in time to see a figure scaling a chain-link fence. Honestly, he was surprised at the reflexes that took over him, and he was surprised more at the fact that he hadn't been afraid when he leapt forward to grab a handful of shirt and yank the man back down.
He was in a foreign country, stuck in some godawful city whose language he couldn't even speak, out of his element and pretending to be something he was not, yet still he wasn't afraid when he tossed that man down onto the ground, straight into a pile of garbage. He was too fuckin' angry to be frightened. Or he was so frightened that he was angry. Honestly, he couldn't tell the damn difference. Sometimes they felt exactly the same.
In the darkness, he looked down at the man on the ground, and took him in. A young man, his age no doubt, lean and rather scraggly, and when he looked back at Ludwig, the terror was as evident upon his face as it had been on that girl's. She had gotten off easy—this man would not.
He felt his hand flying down, felt his fingers fumbling with the clasp on the holster, felt a weight within his hand, and when he saw the glint of the gun in the dim light, it didn't startle him.
The man clenched his hands on the bags of garbage, mouth open as he gasped for breath, and Ludwig saw him suddenly jump a little at the sight of the gun, and yank his hands in to start fumbling within his coat. Frantic, muttered words in Russian.
He wasn't even worried that the man was looking for his own gun; if no one would ever dare to shoot Ivan, then they wouldn't shoot him, either. The man finally pulled a wallet from his coat—Ludwig's wallet—and held it forward, hair drenched in the sleet and very clearly pleading. He lifted the wallet in the air, up and down, clearly trying to say, 'Take it! Take it!'
A long silence.
Ludwig found himself standing still, staring down from above the barrel of the gun. They were both trembling, although one in anger and the other in fear.
The only sound then was the sleet hitting the roofs above.
Ivan was next to him suddenly, appearing like a phantom as the gun shook in his hand, but there were no words of encouragement. Ivan didn't open his mouth to speak, and was content to keep his wrist still and see where the whole thing went.
The only voices in the alley were the ones up in Ludwig's head.
The man's eyes had gotten so wide that it was possible they could have popped out of his head. He was shaking as much as the gun was, knowing that his fate was very uncertain. Regretting, no doubt, that he hadn't taken someone else's wallet instead.
So angry. He was so angry. The acid was throbbing in his veins. The trigger was firm beneath his finger.
No rules.
Ludwig wasn't dumb. His head had been fuzzy as hell lately, everything had been misty, but he wasn't stupid. He knew what was really going on. Ivan had given him a wallet because he had known all along that Ludwig, as inexperienced and awkward as he looked, was a sitting duck for a pickpocket, and he knew that Ivan had been sitting there in that bar, waiting the entire time for this to happen. Ivan manipulated the chain of cause and effect as he saw fit. Ivan crushed the butterfly in one street and the breeze from his foot coming down caused the typhoon in the other.
He knew it.
And he realized all the same that he didn't give a shit, whether Ivan had set him up or not—that fuckin' wallet was his. That license within it was his. That identity was his. No one touched it. No one.
No rules.
And this time, after all of it...
After all of the nudging and prodding, after all of the persuasion, after running through dark forests, after coming face to face with armed students, after being very nearly shot, after all of that, somehow it was this man before him—this unarmed, terrified, frozen man—that finally made him pull the trigger. Because this man had held within his hand something that belonged to Ludwig.
No rules—
An explosion.
A thick silence, and then a shriek of pain. It took him a moment to realize. He looked down at his hand, and this time, there was a smoking gun within it. This time, he had taken the gun and aimed it. This time, he had pulled the trigger. Blood on the pavement. But he hadn't aimed for the chest, not like Ivan did. The blood was coming from the man's foot.
The wallet fell to the ground.
Christ, the sound of the discharge was still echoing in his ears, and he struggled to hear Ivan when he finally spoke.
Ivan turned to look at him, and asked, quite simply, "Are you going to kill him?"
The man had started crying, pleading in Russian and clasping his hands as he begged.
Kill him. ...huh.
Blood pooled out beneath him.
The whispers in his head were running rampant. Driving him crazy. Arguing with each other. Why couldn't they ever agree? That pain-in-the-ass voice in the back of his head that called itself 'reason' was fighting with a new voice.
Wrath.
"No," he finally said, with a tilted head, and he wasn't really sure why he smiled then. "Start with the feet. That was what you said." Placing the hammer back on the gun, he tucked it into his belt, jerking his head to the side as he said to the man, "Go on, get outta here."
Didn't need to be told twice.
The man pulled himself up, grabbed the brick wall for support, and started hobbling along. Ludwig let the man stagger away, watching him disappear into the side streets. Ivan watched, too, and when he looked at Ludwig again, the smile was bright.
"You remembered."
"Of course."
He had done then what Ivan had set him out to do. Because that had hurt, alright. Hurting, but not killing. In the end, the voice of reason had prevailed. Getting so much weaker, though.
He felt better, afterwards, as much as he had felt better after beating the hell out of the mouthy officer back in Lensk. The more he thought about it, though, the more he regretted not shooting the other foot. That audacity had earned at least two bullets. Ah, well. Too late.
He reached down, picked up the wallet, tucked it into his pocket, and pulled off his cap to smooth back his hair. Too much trouble. Ivan staggered, suddenly, and nearly fell into the pile of trash the man had previously occupied, until Ludwig grabbed his arm. Cans from the trash rolled across the asphalt. This was too much trouble, too.
"You drank too much," Ludwig said, and Ivan just gave a laugh and staggered again, this time hitting the wall.
"No such thing!"
It became increasingly apparent that Ivan was succumbing to the alcohol. What had he been drinking in the bar? A hell of a lot stronger than the normal stuff, apparently.
He grabbed Ivan to keep him steady, slinging Ivan's arm around his shoulders, and together they stumbled out of the alley.
Ludwig squinted his eyes against the sleet and wind, and looked around.
"Remember the way back?" came the quiet slur at his side, and Ludwig stood there for a moment, Ivan's heavy arm behind his neck, and shielded his eyes to look up at the buildings.
The street lamps lit up the falling sleet blue and grey. Puddles rippled in headlights.
He didn't know the way back, not really, but if he walked around long enough he was pretty sure he'd take notice of the hotel. It was really the only one worth looking at, so it stood out quite a bit. If nothing else, he could just walk around until Ivan sobered up enough to lead them back.
So, he nodded his head, dug his heels into the ground, and hauled Ivan upright with a grunt. Heavy as hell, deadweight that he was, but somehow Ludwig managed to start carting him along. It was a good damn thing this hadn't occurred months earlier; he wouldn't have been able to lift up Ivan's leg, let alone all of him. He was stronger now. Gettin' there. Soon, he'd probably be healthier here than he had been back there.
Ivan's clumsy feet dragged along the pavement. Every so often, he stepped on Ludwig's toes, and it was worth the dull ache in his foot when Ivan turned to him, kissed his cheek, and muttered, "Sorry!"
Sorry. Ivan could croon it with the best of them, but whether or not he could actually feel sorry was up in the air.
All the same...
Ludwig glanced at him, from time to time, as Ivan's bangs were coming loose from beneath his cap, and it occurred to him that Ivan was exceedingly beautiful. One of the most visually pleasing things he had ever seen in his life. Maybe to some people Ivan wouldn't have been all that attractive, but as far as Ludwig was concerned, it was perfection walking at his side. Hadn't been obvious at first, sure, but being lost in the dark had a way of taking something plain and making it astounding when the light came back.
Hard to focus on any war crime, when the war criminal was so goddamn handsome.
Walking and walking.
A thought struck him, as he sloshed through the wet streets, and he asked, "Did you pay back there?"
A low scoff.
"Pay? Pay! Remember what I said? You don't have any rules out here."
Oh. Right. Hard to adjust to a place with no rules.
They trudged along, Ludwig looking up every so often to try and figure out where the hell they were, and every time he thought he was getting close, it was only to round a corner and realize that he wasn't where he should have been. Ivan was so heavy. The going was slow.
People glanced at them as they passed, and maybe it was a little less than disciplined, for two soldiers of the Red Army to be wandering through street sludge, uniforms wet and disheveled, one drunk and the other not too far from it. If Ivan hadn't been a general, more than a few questions might have been asked by the army if they ever found out.
...way more than a few.
So many secrets.
Ivan's fantasy world seeped into the real one, and Ludwig's footsteps echoed there just as loudly as Ivan's did.
Ivan had made him someone.