Chapter 10- Monotonous tasks

Present day - February

Rose POV

It was after dinner, and I was alone in the kitchen cleaning up. I longed for my bed. Meredith was in the Infirmary, which meant a better night's sleep for me. We were sleeping next to each other in the single beds closer to the window, while the younger girls had the bunk beds. Meredith snored quite a bit, and it wasn't like earplugs were easy to come by. Although I still had the pair Igor had given to me. Igor was one of the few nice guardians. I would of course never refer to him as anything other than Guardian Sidorov in front of others, but he wanted me to use his first name when we were alone.

Naturally, we weren't friends. You couldn't be friends with a guardian. But he treated me nicely and he never hit me. If he found out I did something I wasn't supposed to do he mostly joked about it and made sure I wasn't caught. I didn't trust him, but I wasn't terrified of him. He would sometimes spend some time with me, teaching me a bit of Russian or giving me treats. Igor hadn't been here for that long, he was transferred here a couple of years ago from another Institution. He seemed to be in his mid twenties, maybe a bit older. He was one of the few here that were not entirely evil.

Guardian Alto was the other exception. He was never friendly towards me, but he always treated me with respect. The only time he would physically punish me was when Moore made him do it. The same thing couldn't really be said about the others. In addition to Igor, Alto and Moore, there were three other guardians plus Eddie and Mason. If I followed the rules and kept to myself, they would mostly leave me alone. But they never treated me with the same respect Alto did, and they for sure never showed me any kindness like Igor sometimes did.

"Would you like some chocolate, Rose? It's almost Valentine's day after all."

I hadn't heard anyone come into the kitchen and I was startled. I recognized Igor's voice but my heart was still pounding in my chest. I turned around and leaned against the sink as I tried to collect myself.

He looked apologetic. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you. I was making my rounds and I missed dinner, so I came here to bribe you with chocolate to make me something to eat."

"You know you don't have to bribe me for that," I said dryly. It's not like I had a choice.

"Are you really saying no to chocolate?" Igor asked with an amused face. I rolled my eyes and walked over to him with my hand in the air. He dropped a chocolate bar in my hand. My fingers closed around it and I started to turn around, when I felt him grab my wrist. He didn't grip me hard, but the touch made me uncomfortable. He didn't seem to notice and smiled while he said "You forgot to say the magic word."

I looked at him puzzled, unsure of what he wanted. "You forgot to say thank you," he clarified.

I wanted to roll my eyes again, but I refrained. "That's actually two words."

He chuckled and released my wrist. "Don't let anyone see the chocolate or they'll ask unnecessary questions."

"Is a sandwich okay?" I asked, and he nodded before I continued "if anyone sees the chocolate I would have to share it, and I don't plan on sharing a single piece of it."

"Not even with me?" he said, and it felt like his stare burned through me. I was getting increasingly uncomfortable, not entirely sure why. I turned towards the refrigerator and took out all the sandwich supplies. I tried to ignore him while I made his sandwich.

"You know, I don't have a date for Valentine's day this year, and I'm fairly certain the same goes for you," he purred.

I stilled. I didn't like when he acted like this. Was he flirting? Lately he had been acting more and more like this, and I wanted us to go back to the casual interaction we used to have. This felt wrong, it felt like he was starting to expect something in return for his nice gestures.

"I hope I didn't make you uncomfortable. It wasn't my intention," he said after I remained silent. I turned around and found that his eyes roamed my body until they met mine.

I shuddered slightly. "We don't have any ham, only turkey. Is that okay?"

He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes, and nodded.

Dimitri POV

Weeks later and we still hadn't found anything. I wasn't sleeping well, growing increasingly frustrated with our failure. I couldn't keep the nightmares at bay, and every night I was dreading going to sleep. It felt like I was fourteen all over again. Here I was, so close, and failing someone who needed me again.

"I brought you some Valentine's day chocolate as you seem to be my date this year" Spiridon announced after returning to our camp.

He was really getting on my nerves and I felt that it was more and more difficult not to react to him. "Did you at least bring the stuff I asked you?" I asked him.

He looked guilty. I felt my control almost snapping, and I took a deep breath. "If you can't remember a simple thing I ask of you, I'm going to revoke your shopping privileges."

He grinned and threw a bag at me. "Just joking, like I could forget your precious apple slices. You've been eating this shit since forever." It was one of the things my mama always made sure to pack down before I went back to St Basil's. She had dried the slices herself from the apples from our garden, but this particular brand tasted almost the same. It was nice to be reminded of home.

I stood up and scanned the ground for a rock that would be heavy enough to challenge me. We had become rather creative in finding ways to work out. We would spar against each other and do pull-ups from a tree branch. We were used to body-weight exercises but a heavy rock would allow me to do a variety of moves, offering some diversity. I started warming up after I found one that looked promising. As I was warming up and working through my body I tried to think about what we were doing wrong.

After Yuri had provided us with a more detailed map of the area we had decided on a thirty mile radius with the village as center point, as we didn't think our targets would travel further than that when they visited the village. The area was then divided into different slots, and each day we had investigated one of these slots. We had almost made it a full circle, and we were starting to doubt we would find anything. We had been more than thorough, investigating every building that could hold an Institution. In addition to that we had hiked through the areas to make sure we didn't miss anything, and to lower the risk of getting spotted.

Somehow, I trusted the baker and his observations. My hunch told me that we were on to something. But that didn't mean we weren't frustrated. We were still camping out in our tent, moving locations as we worked through the area. We would stop in bigger towns to get more proviants, and sometimes we'd find a gym where we could shower. We didn't want to do a real workout at any of the human gyms since it would attract too much attention, so we mostly ran on the treadmill for a while before hitting the showers. We still got our fair share of both admiring and grudging looks, so we never went to the same gym twice.

Yesterday we had reported back to Arthur and the three of us had agreed that it would be best to be stationed at the village for a while if our search didn't give results. We still had maybe ten days worth of search left to get through first. The selfish part in me just wanted to sleep in a real bed for once, and I continued my workout daydreaming of white linens and a space to stretch out my entire frame.

But more so, I kept thinking about Rose, wondering what she looked like and if I would even recognize her.