nextgenerationmarvel | Getting to Know You (Ilya)

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Getting to Know You (Ilya)

Dolemeck had just met Ilya, and they bonded quite quickly. The two just seemed to work well with one and other. Each complimenting the other, and making up for the other's faults when it came to their powers and control. It was strangely natural, and appeared to make Dolemeck less anxious, and Ilya more calm.

Today, Dolemeck asked Ilya to join him on a picnic. He wanted to talk more with him, hold hands, and just spend some time with him. A picnic was a good way to do that, and the two cold share more about their lives privately.

Using his powers, he set up a checked print cloth on the grass of the mansion grounds. He had picked a spot in which they could see the lake, and yet have some privacy. He managed to get out of his chair and sit on the cloth. the picnic basket by this side. This was going to be a wonderful day.

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Ilya had to admit that he had utterly lost track of the time. That had never happened to him before. It was just so easy to get wrapped up in Dolemeck and finally relax after all this time that he didn't remember to check the time. Somehow despite all his normal issues with talking to someone, he found it so easy to talk to Dolemeck it was like they'd known each other all their lives.

Maybe that was why Dolemeck trusted him to push his wheelchair. It was humbling, in a way, and at the same time extremely endearing. He tried not to blush too much.

He tries to collect his thoughts and explain things in a way that makes sense in English. Having to do a Chukchi to Russian to English translation of concepts can make for some very odd sounding conversations. "It's complicated. People are born on days that certain spirits rule over, and they have a bit of that spirit in them, pushing them to have a little of the same personality - both the faults and the good qualities. Being born under one of Raven's days is rare. He's the most important of the spirits along with Auk'knyuga, and the more powerful a spirit is, the less connected they are directly with humans. In a way. I - I am not equipped to explain this without thinking about it first.

Most Chukchi parents give their children something to remember the spirit they were born under. In my case, I was the first person born under a Raven day in my community for over a decade. My pendant was an heirloom from another family. It was precious, not just because of the metalwork, but because it was a reminder of where I was from and who I was born under, and what power I supposedly had inside from Raven. I don't know if I actually have those good traits, but it was the only piece of home and my tribe that stayed with me through the darkness and the ice. Sometimes I would lay awake at night and hold onto it and feel like there was a presence nearby watching me. Not really guarding me, just observing, encouraging me to press on.

...I know all of that sounds crazy. I get that a lot. Which might be why SHIELD took it from me."

"I see nothing crazy about it." he admitted. "It is a part of who you are, and as I said earlier... I want you to get that back. It is all you have left of your Mother, and of the memories of her. Well, not just her, but your whole family and culture."

Dolemeck showed nothing but respect for Ilya and his heritage. He was quite open to learning Everything Ilya told him, and never told him once it was silly or stupid. Because it was not. It had a beauty to it, and Dolemeck had honestly hoped that getting Ilya to open up more about his heritage, he would be less nervous in speaking about it.

"Is it possible that SHIELD took it because it was contaminated by whatever was on the train with you? Perhaps they were going to clean it up before you got it back?" He pondered. It made no sense to him. Why would SHIELD take something of religious value from Ilya? That was just cruel! "Either way, we need to speak with Headmistress Ramsey and see if she can do anything."

A smile soon graced his face, as he turned his head to look up at Ilya.

"You said you wished me to teach you to sew, Aye? Perhaps... we can work on a memory quilt together? It is some traction that early American Settlers started. Each month or year, they would sew a patch to make a quilt... and each patch had a picture of something that stood out at the time it was made."

"I'm not sure what it could be contaminated with. But then again, I don't know what else was on the train being transported to Moscow along with me. It might've picked up some radiation from working in the uranium mines but I'd think that after fifty-nine years, that would've faded from it. I know they gave the Headmistress my full file, though, and I'm pretty sure there's something on there they're not telling me. So maybe she knows."

Dolemeck is, through no fault of his own, a modern person, a British one and a white person, and therefore can never truly understand the heaviness of being mixed race in Russia in the 1940's-1950's. It was a different era with a vastly different culture and white people who had no interest in the Chukchi outside of what profit could be made from their hunting grounds. People who even stopped to talk about anything Chukchi without the intent to convert them were an oddity. Things have changed even in Russia since Ilya was there, but for him the memories are recent, their ramifications still felt in full and the walls still high and strong between himself and the rest of the world. He'd seen the looks on SHIELD Agents faces, like he was a backwards barbarian, the way they glanced at each other when they thought he wasn't looking with barely concealed laughter. It had been humiliating and the worst part was waking up, reaching towards his neck for his oldest source of comfort, and grasping only at empty space. A lot of tears had been shed at night. Sometimes, they still were.

"I guess I could work on a memory quilt. With you there to help me I wouldn't make any mistakes so bad they'd ruin it, so... I'd just need to figure out what to put on it." A bunch of hearts would be... less than subtle. "What were you thinking we could do for this month?"

"Well, we could sew a mansion and have a Raven flying over head it, and a wheelchair in front of the mansion." It might be too intricate for Ilya, but he could help when he needed it. "It would symbolize your arrival to the mansion and meeting me."

No, he could never understand what it was like for Ilya. He was pure white, despite being a mix of British and Scottish. He could easily gain more privileges than Ilya. But he was also a mutant, and gay. Those itself would bring about discrimination that Ilya had not faced, yet. While his mixed race status could easily be looked past in modern day society... everything else would be like an old wound reopening, and then starting to fester.

The Xavier Mansion was a little slice of heaven in a cruel world outside of it's gates.

"Unless we sew in a dragon instead of a wheelchair. Dragons are cooler looking..."

"No dragons. That'd be too complicated. Besides, the guy I love owns a wheelchair, not a dragon," Ilya says, pausing in his pushing the chair to lean down and kiss the top of Dolemeck's head.

On some level he knows that the true trials and tribulations have yet to come, but Ilya can't see that far into the future. He can't picture the future past the next few days, not anymore when this sense of uncertainty has been forced into him by how his life fell apart completely twice before out of the blue. It's dangerous thinking, to plan for a future he doesn't know for sure he'll have.

He'll settle for each day with Dolemeck, each little moment, and that'll be enough. "I don't want to put any of my old memories on there. So no rivers, mines or trains. Just new memories, and the important things and people in them."

"Alright. No dragons..." he gave a cute pout. "The point of the memory quilt is for new memories to be remembered. Meaning when something happens that is special to us, we make a patch for it. So no rivers, trains, or mines. Just... current events we both wish to always remember."

Dolemeck went back to smiling.

"I wonder how big of a quilt we can make here at this school. Perhaps enough to cover a Queen Sized bed, perhaps?"

"Dolemeck. You're talking to me, remember? I don't know what the difference in bed sizes is. Given how cold it was back home, if a blanket or quilt was big it would just be folded up so it could provide double the warmth." He's learned to prioritize some information. Modern politics and getting his education up to modern levels are important, for instance. Bed sizes are not.

"Where will we get the fabric for this idea anyway?"

"I have a lot of fabric in my room, and if I need more... I can just order it." He smiled, then allowed it to fade when he forgot that Ilya did not know bed sizes. "What we sleep on at the mansion is considered a "full size" bed. A "Queen size" bed can fit two people comfortably on it, and a "King sized bed" can probably fit four... though I have no clue why anyone would own a bed so big!"

"Do I get a say in fabrics? I'm kind of curious on how much variety there is nowadays." He pondered over the question of the giant bed and after a moment, concluded, "Giant beds give people an excuse to make bigger quilts. Or at least, that's the best reason I can figure out."

"No one makes their own clothes or quilts anymore. Most clothing, bedding, quilts, well... most of anything is now massed produced. There is no real heart in it, anymore." He hated to be the one to tell Ilya that. "I try and make my own when I can. And aye, you can have a say in the fabrics we used. Maybe we can go off campus one day to the fabric store! I can show you around, as there are now so many varieties."

He smiled at the thought, realizing that Ilya had never been shopping before.

"It will be fun! The fabric store has such wonderful people running it!"

"Only you could make shopping sound fun," he says fondly. The truth is, shopping is a bit of an overwhelming idea. SHIELD had been intimidating enough and there weren't nearly as many people on a SHIELD base as there were in a standard city or town. But who knows? He didn't have Dolemeck then, and SHIELD's staff were always watching anyone who wasn't SHIELD like hawks. "But I'm curious enough that I'd kinda like to go. You'd have to lead the way, though. I have no sense of direction - in cities. In the wilderness I'm fine. Comes with living where I did with a mother who hated being in the house as much as mine did, I guess."

"Well, there is a small shop at Salem Center I like to go to. It is in a not so terribly crowded part of the city. Certainly nothing like New York City." He continued to smile as he spoke. "We will need one of the teachers to bring us there, and I promise not to let you get lost! After-all, if you got lost, what would I do? I would panic, that is what I would do!"

It was true, if Ilya got lost somewhere, he would panic. He was new to this area, and even more new to this era. It would be frightening for the both of them.

"Oh! Maybe we can go to the fishmarket, too? Pick up something to make together for dinner one night?"

"I'd be more concerned with you getting lost. I'm the one who can and has lifted and thrown things much heavier than hostile anti-mutant people in the past." Once again, it's not the wheelchair that makes Ilya worry for him, it's the rest of the world. SHIELD had painted a picture of anti-mutant sentiment that made Ilya wonder if they were deliberately trying to scare him.

He brightens at the mention of the fishmarket. "That'd be nice. Maybe I could talk with the cook, see if she'd be willing to make some fish pirozhki or something. It'd be nice if you could try some of the food I grew up with. Which is another reason I need to learn to cook."

"Trust me, it is VERY hard to lose me." He grinned. "As big of a world as it is out there, I cannot imagine many black haired, green eyed Brits about."

"Aye! You can ask Hana to make almost anything, Kayla too! I am sure they would be more than happy to help teach you how to cook!" He was happy Ilya wanted to try so many new things already. Sure, the other teen could have holed himself up from the world, but now he seemed inspired to try new things. "I think Hana would love that! She loves anything about cooking, even teaching it!"

"True. The accent would give you away even if I couldn't find you visually, and the same can be said for me, probably, though SHIELD gave me list of places in New York with large Russian communities." He's not ready to go to any of those places, not yet. It's too much. But maybe in a month or two, with Dolemeck and some poor teacher dragged along, he might be willing to try, if only once.

"You make me want to learn new things. You've taught yourself history and sewing, and those aren't easy things. So, maybe, I can learn to cook. It might be hard without any recipes to read, though. My parents and grandparents just cooked out of memory and looked at things to guess how much of different ingredients they needed."

He still wants to hide away, a little. But if he takes it little by little and doesn't think of things as immense and terrifying as the far future or what he'll do with his life ultimately, then he can manage.

"We can look on the internet for certain recipes you remember. See if we can find how to make them. Or perhaps look in our school's library!" He once again looked up at Ilya. "It is rather vast and I am sure we could find books on just about anything there!"

He always tried to be modest when Ilya complimented all the things he had learned. It was how his brother raised him (thankfully).

"Well, I just have a lot of time on my hands. if I am not busy doing or learning something, I will just get bored. I-I mean when I am not about with you, of course, Ilya!"

Yeah, that was smooth.

"That sounded bloody horrible. I am sorry."

"It's okay. You look... well, cute, when you're flustered." What a dumb thing to say, but it's the truth. Ilya smiles at him, shrugging slightly. "I knew what you meant, anyway. You're easier for me to understand than other people."

"I am still a bit shocked at that. I happen to be the most awkward person at the school!" He went back to chuckling. Already, he could see the mansion coming back into view. "I now wish the day could last just a bit longer. Just a little bit... so we could have more time without school or training. Just... us time."

"To me, you're the nicest person in the school," Ilya told him without pause, not needing to think about it. He sighed, looking at the mansion. "So do I. I really like being with you. I feel like I could be with you all the time and never get tired of you. But if we can get to be room mates, then we won't have this problem. Um, if you're still okay with that idea, I mean."

"Why would I have a problem with that? It is not like we are going to do anything that will get us into trouble, right?"

That's right, because they are good students. Good students who follow the rules! Hell, Dolemeck has never been late for class since he started attending, and often handed in assignments earlier than expected. They would not let something like raging hormones and a budding romance ruin all of that, right?

"Aye! No problem there!"

"It's not that, it's just... you know. The nightmares, flashbacks, things like that. I won't be a perfect person to live with, you know? And I won't know as much as a different room mate might about the world."

Please, in order for anything inappropriate to happen they'd need a good twenty hours scheduled in just for all the time Ilya would spend asking if this was really happening and if every single action was okay. And that would assume he could work up the courage to start anything more serious than cuddling up to Dolemeck. (On purpose. On accident... nothing is certain.)

"Sometimes I have these nightmares I'm trapped in the gulag but it's this big maze of tunnels, and I can't get out. Or that I'm in some kind of room made of ice and these horrible sounds are echoing everywhere. It's not all the time, but it happens."

"If I have nightmares, it is always of a car coming at me, and I have nowhere to go. Not as bad as your own, but I understand how bad they can be." He pointed out. "Besides, the majority of the time, I am unconscious from my pain medication. It puts me in a deep sleep... enough that Bobbi now has an art collection consisting of drawings of me asleep."

He laughed at the last part, trying to help ease Ilya up on being so serious.

"Stop being so negative! You would get to see the small work space I made in me room for my sewing machine... and the bedsheets I made for me-self..."

"I think yours is worse, actually. I came out of everything physically fine. What happened to you is much more permanent and a lot less fair." He wonders if pain medication is supposed to do that, but he's not an expert on medicine that isn't herb based and Siberia at that, so he'll trust the doctors know what they're doing. "I'm not being negative, I just don't want to bring anyone down. It's been on my mind ever since I realized I was going to get a room mate."

"You will not bring anyone down." He reached over to pat Ilya's hand. "If you need to, speak with one of the doctors in the school about your concerns, or even Headmistress Ramsey. We have counseling, you know? It might help to start attending."

After-all, Dolemeck attended up to three group sessions a week. It was helping him out greatly. Perhaps it would help Ilya as well.

"Or you can speak to me, and we will work our way through it together. Granted, I may not have a doctorate... but I am always willing to listen."

"I'm not sure about counseling. SHIELD counselors didn't give me a good impression of that profession. But... maybe it'll be different here. I'll think about it."

He took Dolemeck's hand and squeezed it gently. He loves how Dolemeck gives him options and choices. Even at SHIELD there was this constant feeling of being pushed and directed at all times. There's just a respect Dolemeck inherently gives him that can't be put into words but means everything. "Thanks. I know I can talk to you, and I just hope you know you can do the same, Dolemeck."

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Getting to Know You (Ilya)

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