D.C. al Fine [Feb. 23rd, 11:47 AM] [ATTN: Anyone who loves violin music]

[krasnogorje.livejournal.com]

Time was a very precious commodity. Finding himself with hours to spare, Iosef immediately gathered his violin and bow and set out for the hallway outside of Volgin’s office in the Main Wing.

Io went the first time to tempt the Colonel’s temper because he found it altogether thrilling in ways he could never hope to understand. He returned the second time for the quiet praise that the first impromptu serenade had received.

What started as an attempt to annoy and provoke had somehow switched gears in the flame solder’s mind. He felt something akin to remorse for the provocation as he stood in the deserted hallway once more.

The Blue Danube only brought secretaries to come and stare with awe and approval, and gasps of delight, and much appreciated applause. No one came forth from Volgin’s office; not for the Blue Danube, or the Gimn Sovetskovo Soyuza, or even for Eine Kleine Nachtmusik.

Io spent a good ten minutes scowling at the door from behind his respirator, as though sheer force of will alone would bring the Colonel out from hiding. There was nothing, the lights were off, and Yevgeny Volgin was certainly not home. It was foolish to think will alone could coerce him to appear on command.

So Iosef eventually retreated to the yard, disappointed with the world, and left the office workers to their dull paperwork.

It was a beautiful spring day, clear and blue. The snow had all but melted away, and the illusive promise of warmth drifted on the breeze.  The sun was pleasant and gentle on his face. 

A seemingly abandoned truck was all the invitation he needed. Climbing onto the hood with violin and flamethrower was a difficult task, but one that was overcome with ingenuity and creative wiggling.

A pair of GRU regarded the gas-masked violinist with hesitant curiosity, until he began to play for them. A sweet melody to match the kind disposition of the early spring day.

Ode to Joy seemed to match the mood set by the clear, light hearted day. It translated well to a solo piece he thought, shutting his eyes as the notes flowed from the violin, took flight, and fluttered away on orange and black butterfly wings.

It wasn’t long before he had another crowd gathered around. Among them, he recognized the German Major, but there were others who were unfamiliar to the flame patrol Lieutenant.

It struck him just fine, and he smiled.  Strangers were always welcome to listen.

Comments

[leshovik.livejournal.com]

Leshovik turned around, brows raised, lips twitching.

He plucked the cigarette from Niotkuda's gloved fingers and stuck it in his mouth.

"Yeah, we're assholes," he said, shaking his head. "It's official."

"I don't think there was any doubt," Aryol added.

"Probably not."

Leshovik regarded Niotkuda for a moment, then broke into a slow grin.

"I still don't have a light, comrade," he said, and flicked his gaze down at the cigarette pressed between his lips.

[parabellum-p08.livejournal.com]

Krauss couldn’t help eavesdropping on the conversation behind him, for he made it his personal duty to know everything about everyone.

He glanced over his shoulder at the strange trio, sniper, sniper, Ocelot, and offered a warm smile.

“Comrades… you wouldn’t want her anyway, she’s absolutely frigid.”

[andrei-isaev.livejournal.com]

Isaev pulled out his lighter, smiling wryly.

"Does this mean I'm going to have to follow you around for the rest of your life?"

He flicked the tab and a flame licked up.

He held it to the tip of Leshovik's cigarette.

"What's with the violinist? He's not bad."

Andrei had seen a lot of virtuosos in Leningrad. His sister played passably well, but hadn't preferred performing. This guy looked like he lived for it.

Sort of at odds with the flamethrower parked beside him.

When Krauss spoke, he looked up.

"Major," he acknowledged, with a brief salute, pocketing the lighter. "I take it you've struck out."

[leshovik.livejournal.com]

"Only as long as you keep giving me cigarettes, comrade."

Leshovik grinned around the cigarette and leaned forward, tilting his head to angle the tip into the flame.

He pulled back slowly, taking in a long drag, closing his eyes briefly, savoring the burn.

"Thanks. Christ, that's good," he murmured.

He tilted his head in the violinist's direction.

"That's Lieutenant Io," he offered. "That's all I know."

Leshovik turned to look at the older man with the German accent who had joined them, nodding a greeting.

It had taken a while, but he'd gotten used to not having to salute superior officers anymore.

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Aryol looked the German major up and down.

"Nice coat," he said, blithely.

[parabellum-p08.livejournal.com]

“Ach. Numerous times.” Krauss answered dryly. “Come to think of it, most of the women on this base are frigid. Some sort of prerequisite for being stationed here. I don’t know.”

Aryol’s comment caught him off guard and he laughed to himself, pleasantly surprised. “Very good. At last, Moscow sends us someone with good tastes. Thank you.” The polite thing to do was shake hands in greeting and introduction, but he kept his mangled limb tucked away in the pocket of his fur coat. “I’m Major Krauss, but please, call me Johann. If there is anything you require during your stay...anything at all… I would be more than happy to oblige.”

Krauss nodded to Aryol, then to Leshovik in turn, but it wasn’t long before his ice blue gaze flickered back to the younger of the pair and his lecherous smile returned again.

“And what shall I call you?”

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

Metaphors amused The Sorrow, as did the equation of death with nonexistence.

The music had summoned a conclave of disparate elements into the open air to bind them loosely with strings of momentary coincidence. Somewhere, The Sorrow thought, the hollow ground where his heart lay warmed.

These were new men to this cold separate land, brought on an errand that the scent of unconsummated death clung to.

"If you were a ghost," he whispered in the ear of the dark laughing man, "you would know."

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Aryol smirked at the German, a ready reply on his lips, but suddenly his smile faded and he turned to look around, distracted.

His eyes were sharp, like a raptor's, dark and seeking, narrowed.

He was wholly focused on something else for long moments.

Finally, he shook his head slightly and pulled his gaze back to the German.

"Call me Aryol, Johann," he said, with a slight and knowing smile. "Everyone does."

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

"But that's not your name, is it?" The Sorrow murmured. "That you hold in another place in your heart."

The Sorrow existed as a drop of water suspended in the mingling oils of a living world. Corporeal eyes slid across him, chivvied past at the behest of forces they cared not to understand.

It was a rare one with the senses to catch the current amiss. The coal-eyed cub fledgeling sharpened the claw of his attention to probe at perception's still surface.

Certain dangerous minds did such a thing by instinct inborn, only slightly more common by ability ingrained.

"Someone has taught you." The Sorrow drifted, circling his perimeter. "To look for what is there, not only what you see."

[parabellum-p08.livejournal.com]

The world had grown a few degrees colder, all of a sudden, and Johann shivered.

Scolwing, one of the German's brows crept upwards into a graceful arc, and he watched the boy...this...Aryol... seem to drift in and out of reality.

"Ah..ha. Yes. I think you'll fit in at this great and glorious military base just wonderfully!"

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Aryol glanced around him.

He kept catching something just out of the corner of his eye, a faint pattern, like a heatshimmer.

Distractedly, he nodded to the German.

"That's very kind of you, Johann. But if you could excuse me? There's someone I need to see."

Aryol flashed a brief but sly smile to Krauss, then nodded to Leshovik and Niotkuda.

He withdrew, but tried to not keep glancing around him obviously.

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

How interesting. The Sorrow could feel the boy's eyes and mind following him, tracking him like the path of fresh footsteps in snow.

His voice made no impact, that he could see, whisperthin wisp as it was.

Perhaps...

Notion became motion, signal - sign.

The Sorrow produced a flat square of material and wrote for a moment, held it up in the path of the boy's searching eyes.

-HELLO-

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Aryol's eyes went wide.

He thought he saw -

He looked around him quickly, just to make sure no one was watching, but everyone's attention was still fixed on the violinist.

Aryol ducked around the side of a truck.

"Hello?" he said aloud, tentatively.

Quietly, so his voice wouldn't carry further than it had to.

He stared straight ahead, focused on nothing, but something was there. Something in between light and dark. The shadows of reality that he'd been trained to see, though nothing like this had ever happened before.

"Who are you?" he whispered. "Why don't you say anything?"

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

The Sorrow smiled.

He felt the motes of his memory migrate into the patterns of a man, himself as reflected in the boy's dark eyes.

"I say many things."

His voice dissipated like tendrils of mist under morning sun, the last inflection gone long before reaching a band the boy would receive.

The spirit gestured to his throat, a graceful movement like a spider's shrug, and smiled.

He turned the slender slip of corrugated communication back to himself. It was the first thing that had come to mind and hand, and in its form obscurely pleased him. He swept words away like mice and replaced them, twisted the squre of space to face him.

-I AM THE SORROW-

Spin. Scrape. Scribble. Present.

-WHO ARE YOU?-

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Aryol's smile brimmed wide and slow.

It was getting easier now that he knew what to look for; what had started as a faint shape glimpsed out of the corner of his eye gained substance now, though not quite solidity. A man. High forehead and swept-back hair. Glasses. Older. Not unhandsome.

He wore a black woolen military sweater and dark fatigues. Aryol wondered if he was in Black Ops.

He looked down at the placard the man-who-wasn't held.

"Oh. I'm Aryol. It's nice to meet you, Comrade Sorrow."

Aryol paused.

"What are you?" he asked, more carefully.

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

Simple to ask though none before had, difficult to answer. The Sorrow was caught flat afloat. He had yet to consider his lack of opacity as anything but self-explanatory.

-HELLO ARYOL-

The young man showed no fear.

What are you?

A scavenger of thought and memory. A wave of feedback that touched the palpable. A complex of complexes pale of complexion. All would be difficult to fit on a square of cardboard.

A phrase struck The Sorrow's mind and made him smile. He wrote it.

-SPIRIT SOLDIER-

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Aryol's eyes lit up, and he nodded, knowingly.

There had been people who could astrally project back at the facility where he'd trained to use his own abilities. Astral projection and remote viewing were actually somewhat similar, but Aryol had never seen anyone's spirit before. He guessed it meant when he looked for someone, it was more than just the physical shell that he saw, which was interesting to realize. That was why his gift was limited in some ways. He'd never been able to see an inanimate object, and now he knew why.

The Sorrow had a nice smile, he decided.

"I understand," he said, and cocked his head.

"So, are you on a mission? Is there something you need?"

Aryol paused, thinking.

"Or can you not tell me? I'd understand, if that's the case."

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

The boy was unafraid and in fact unsurprised, the attention radiating from him without waver in a high, clear color direct as sunlight.

The Sorrow himself had shared friendship with the dead from a young age, never knowing until he was told that they might be feared.

This Aryol held something akin to that gift, then, as well as a one for difficult questions straightly phrased.

The Sorrow opened a transparant hand, gathering the courtyard, its denizens, and beyond it into a double meaning.

-ONLY LISTENING-

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Reconnaissance.

Aryol frowned as he thought about that. He should have known, of course - no soldier with the Sorrow's kind of talent would be sent here for no reason.

It begged the question, though, who the Sorrow was working for, and what his mission objective was. For all Aryol knew, he could be the opposition.

Aryol almost felt obligated to report it to Lynx - only he wasn't supposed to reveal his abilities to anyone, and explaining this to Lynx would be impossible without some mention of how he knew there was a soldier who could astrally project prowling around Groznyj Grad. That was a problem.

He felt a small pang of regret. It would be sad if the Sorrow and he found themselves on opposite sides, as enemies, now that they'd found each other, and had something in common.

Solemnly, Aryol nodded.

"I understand, comrade."

Maybe there was hope, he thought. The Sorrow didn't have to contact him, after all, and could probably have continued to flit past the edges of Aryol's perception with Aryol none the wiser. Maybe it wasn't adversarial.

Maybe if they refrained from talking shop, they could still be friends.

He brightened a little.

"The music is nice, isn't it? It's been a long time since I heard live music. It's a lot nicer than the radio."

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

The signal streaming from the boy hitched and turned. What had been curiosity and goodwill was still apparent, but, for a fleeting moment, doubt intervened.

Of course. Allegiance. It was easy to forget, here in the between places, where spirits flickered and bled.

-DONT WORRY-

He swept the shape of words in a plain, sweeping hand.

-I AM NOT
YOUR ENEMY-

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

Aryol brightened.

His smile bloomed wide and his eyes shone, gleaming and reflective.

Maybe there really wasn't a good reason to trust the Sorrow at his word, other than the fact Aryol wanted to believe him, felt a certain kinship with a man who was different like he was. Even so, the carefully-drawn message struck something inside him. Maybe the affinity was enough. Maybe he had no proof and could only take the Sorrow at his word, but that was all he needed, because that was the meaning of trust.

"Okay," he said, softly, though he knew it wouldn't matter, and the man would hear him regardless. "Because I'd like to be your friend."

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

The sentiment stunned The Sorrow, so accustomed to existing on the shore where reality washed against something else.

The scent of death and whispers of ghosts clung to the boy, incorporated into his magnanimity without thought or regret. One would have thought he would repudiate sorrow.

Acceptance was a heady drug to one who was himself little more than emotion distilled. Moreover, one who would dispense it to such a non-being was intriguing.

The Sorrow smiled.

-I WOULD LIKE THAT
ARYOL-

[eyes-adrift.livejournal.com]

"Well, it's settled, then," Aryol said, with a decisive nod. "I'd shake your hand if I could."

It had been a while since he'd been around anyone that was like him. Anyone with psychic abilities, that was. Aryol hadn't realized that he'd missed that kind of camaraderie.

The Sorrow had an air of serenity about him, a wisdom that made him seem much older than his phantasmal appearance suggested. Early forties, Aryol would have guessed from the Sorrow's appearance, but the vibrant economy of his words made Aryol think of the sort of man who had already richened with age and experience, like a fine liquor.

The Sorrow knew things that other men didn't, but wasn't in any hurry to divulge his secrets, either.

Aryol smiled.

"So...can you stay a while?"

He didn't know how long the Sorrow could be away from his body, or how much effort it took. But as long as the violinist continued playing, it might be nice to enjoy it.

Aryol tilted his head in the direction of the crowd.

"Want to go back and listen?"

[elyseexpatriate.livejournal.com]

The Sorrow's smile was gentle and wry. The boy had seen him without prompting, and that was intriguing. He was not surprised, and that was more so. A friend to the uncanny, then, and perhaps a participant. Time would tell, depending on who asked.

-I HAVE NO
PRESSING APPOINTMENTS-

Let it be said that a dead man's time is unquestionably his own.

In the most unexpected places one could find kindred spirits.

The Sorrow floated beside Aryol to listen to the beautiful music.