Work Text:
Being away from prison for the first time in many years was something Robert had only dreamed of. But now he is away from prison working on a planet-saving project. He knew life beyond prison would be unpredictable but…this really wasn’t what he was expecting.
He knew before meeting her that Olesya Ilyukhina was truly alive and that she’d been well-behaved for most of her life so she was going to spend her last moments doing anything she possibly could. He also knew that if she liked you enough you’d be her friend and that meant you’d have to be alongside her and her mischief.
What he didn’t know was that if she really loved you, she’d adopt you.
Well he sort of knew. He knew it happened to Ryland and he knew Olesya had proclaimed him her “American Baby Brother” without another word about it. They were rarely apart since and Robert had honestly never questioned it. His colleagues’ relationships with each other had never concerned him.
That was until he was adopted by Olesya Ilyukhina and named her “Kiwi Older Brother” and dragged along the halls of Stratt’s Vat until he was in Ryland’s lab.
“Ry!”
Ryland turned around and moved his bangs out of his face. “Lesya? Uh, Bob?”
Olesya grinned happily, her fingers still around Robert’s wrist. “We have new big brother!”
“Hello?” Robert finally spoke, he was oddly enough only mildly confused and more surprised.
He knew she did this stuff…but him?
The fucking criminal?
Ryland didn’t even bat an eye.
“Oh okay!”
Olesya grinned and gestured her head outwards. Ryland stood up to follow as they began walking again, out of the lab and back into the hall.
“Come, Bob. We make cake to celebrate.”
“There’s cake mix on the ship?” Robert asked, who has enough free time to make cake? He assumed everyone was really busy…which wasn’t a false assumption.
“We’re stealing Carl’s.” Ryland explained with a shrug and his new younger siblings dragged him along.
The cake itself turned out good, it was edible and it was fun to make. They had to clean up a lot of flour, it was mostly him because Olesya and Ryland kept giggling and swiping icing onto each other's faces. Robert felt incredibly out of place and he sort of wanted Olesya to just un-adopt him because, again, why him?
Then Ryland swiped icing across his nose and on instinct Robert grabbed the piping bag and squeezed hard. He almost didn’t recognise the feeling of joy as all three of them started laughing and yelping.
The cake tasted really nice and the blue icing that they made themselves was delicious. Ryland mentioned it was one of his foster mom’s recipes. That was the first time he’s heard Ryland speak of his childhood but to be fair Robert doesn’t either…not that it was bad or anything it’s just he’s a good amount of years older than both of them and he feels like they’d compare him to a dinosaur if he mentions anything before 1990…which was two years before both of these two were even born.
“How many foster parents did you have?” Olesya asked, licking some cream off of her fingers. She was much closer to Ryland than Robert was so he was glad she had been the one to ask.
“Hm…I don’t know actually,” Ryland admitted with a shrug, thinking about the answer.
Robert decided to just ask, he was their older brother now or whatever so he might as well actually communicate with them.
“Did you ever settle with one?” He asked, looking over to face him.
Ryland hummed and shook his head. “Not really.”
“I should ask my parents to adopt,” Olesya said, now licking the spoon they used.
“I’m an adult, that’s not possible.”
“Possible,” Olesya insisted. “I love my parents, they were bit strict though. But now they always buy me vodka.”
Ryland hummed and finished up his slice of cake. His glasses were hanging precariously on one ear. Robert instinctively grabbed the frame and set it down on the table. Why does he wear them like that?
Ryland ignored him and turned to Olesya again. “What was it like for you growing up?”
“Hm...I was only child. My parents were always nice as long as I didn't get a C. B was okay, but A was good. We always had enough money, always had food. Mama worked in accounting, Papa was also engineer. Very normal family.”
She shrugged.
“I did my homework. Cleaned room. Never skipped school. If teacher said do something, I did it.”
Ryland frowned. “That sounds... pretty reasonable?l
“It was.” Olesya picked at the edge of her sleeve. “That is problem.”
"What?"
She sighed dramatically.
"There was never rebellion phase. Never stupid phase. Never wake-up-in-different-city phase. I went directly from responsible child to responsible adult."
A laugh escaped Ryland and Robert turned over to fully face them both.
"No, seriously!" she protested. "I studied. I got good grades. I went to university. I became engineer. Every life choice was sensible."
“Most people would consider that a success.” Robert commented.
“Yes, but then one day you are thirty and realize you've never done anything interesting.”
Ryland raised an eyebrow. “Interesting?”
“Something stupid.”
“Ah.”
She pointed at Ryland.
“You understand.”
“Unfortunately, I do.”
“So when the world was ending, I thought..." She hesitated. "Maybe I don't want to die as person who followed every rule.”
There was a brief silence.
“Not because I hated my life,” she added quickly. “I liked my life. I liked my parents. I liked my job. I just…” She searched for the words. “I wanted one story that would make Mama very angry if she found out.”
Ryland laughed so hard he nearly choked.
“Heroin?” he managed.
Olesya nodded solemnly.
“Very angry.”
Robert let out a snort and raised an eyebrow. “Is that why you broke into the Kremlin?”
Olesya grinned. “Yes, very exciting.”
They sliced up more of the cake and distributed each slice among the three of them (Ryland got a smaller slice and complained. Olesya commented that he ate too much sugar) and they went back to eating.
“Bob, what was your childhood like?” Olesya asked, her lips stained blue.
Robert didn’t need to think too much about his answer, his life as a child was pretty boring.
“Nothing too interesting I’m afraid. Dad was an electrician. Mum worked at a post office. I had a dog. I went to school…built modern airplanes. Yeah.”
“Why’d you start gambling?” Olesya asked and Ryland placed a hand on her shoulder.
“Lesya—”
“Nah, it’s fine.” Robert waved it off. “Didn’t stem from anything really. My parents were good, they told me not to get into shit like that but I did anyway. I just got older I guess.”
Olesya and Ryland nodded along, they decided not to push on the whole prison sentence or the embezzlement and continued eating their cake.
Robert used his shoulder to nudge Ryland. “You, Grace?”
“We’re siblings now, you can call me Ryland.”
Robert snorted but for some reason, the statement pleased him more than it had any right to. “Alright then. How about you, Ryland?”
The younger man thought upon that question for a bit before he decided to just say whatever came to mind.
“I guess it was more eventful than either of yours.” He said and continued. “My parents died in an accident, lived with my uncle for a bit before he passed and then I was bouncing around foster homes.”
“When did you have the time to do all of your little talents?” Robert asked, they’d recently discovered many things Ryland was oddly good at.
“Oh, yeah. The guitar was from my uncle, he taught me when I was still living with him. At one point I had really active foster parents so they got me to do sports.”
Olesya grinned and waggled her eyebrows. “And the right hook?”
Ryland groaned.
“Ugh. Stop bringing that up…I was a bitter kid, the foster system teaches you many things and how to fight is one of them. But enough about me, did you two do anything growing up?”
Olesya perked up and answered first, “I did football…and when I was kid I did ballet but I cried because the teacher called me too fat so my mama took me out.”
Robert placed his paper plate down onto the table in front of them and he wondered if all ballet teachers were mean because he’d really never heard a story of a nice one.
“I didn’t do anything.”
Ryland looked surprised. “Really? What did you do after school then?”
“Build a go-kart. Ride around.”
“Did you disassemble your family’s fridge too?” Olesya joked and Robert didn’t get it but he knew it was a reference to something.
“No, the radio.”
That got both the younger ones to giggle and he let a small smug smile stretch across his face as they cleaned up after themselves.
Turns out that little hangout wasn’t a one-time thing and Robert now had to deal with Olesya barging in, kidnapping him and dragging him away to do something. She also really liked jumping on his back and demanding he carry her because it was his job as “Kiwi Big Brother” to do so. He was not a young man anymore and it made his back ache but Ryland always somehow managed to soothe it by the end of the day with the weird massage gun he has.
Robert did enjoy their many conversations. Like his personal favourite:
“Everyone wants to have sex with Ry!”
“Stop talking.”
“Everyone except us and Stratt.”
“And Yáo, he’s a loyal husband.”
“I want sex with Yáo’s wife.”
“Lesya, he’s going to shoot you.”
Or his other favourite:
“Bob, I think Steve is lowkey in love with you.”
“He’s lowkey in love with you too, Ry.”
“Wait, why is he not in love with me?!”
“Lesya, you’re a lesbian.”
And finally, the most confusing conversation:
“Stratt and I are involved.”
“Like…romantically? I thought you didn’t like that shit.”
“No, they are QPR…I think.”
“Yes, that.”
“God, I’m too fucking old for these terms.”
“Awww, Bobby. It’s okay, we explain.”
So his life since the cake incident had gotten ever more confusing but that was fine. But now he had this weird thing where he felt cautious whenever someone came up to Ilyukhina and offered her a drink or whenever someone came to give Ryland a pack of sour skittles for “no reason”.
He doesn’t understand this feeling and decides to just ignore it most of the time.
Being stuck together on the Vat means they run into each other quite often. He works with Ryland the most considering they’re the ones dealing with the astrophage breeding. Well, they’re working on different aspects of it but Robert does need to consult the biologist often.
Olesya just does whatever she wants and somehow finds a way to spend time with them. He isn’t even sure how she’s up to date with all her work…or if she even is.
“Bobby, take me to the Sahara during next visit.”
“No way would Stratt even let me, Lesya.”
It was just them right now. Ryland was away in Japan with Stratt and that left them without their youngest brother for the next twelve hours.
They spent most of the time drinking vodka on the deck, Olesya said it was good for him to practice drinking it more. She said she’d done it with Ryland too and that’s how he’d gotten so used to their drinking nights.
“God, how long did it take for him to get so acquainted with this stuff?” Robert said with a pull of his eyebrows, putting his glass down.
“Two months,” Olesya replied and grinned. “I will bring so much vodka with me to space.”
That made Robert pause for a second. The reminder that Olesya wasn’t going to be with him and Ryland on Earth— that she was never coming back. That he only had a couple of months left with his Little Russian Sister who adopted him out of nowhere.
“Why’d you volunteer?” He decided to ask. “Surely it wasn’t just to make your life more interesting.”
For once, she didn't answer immediately. Olesya paused for a few seconds, setting her own drink down before chuckling.
“I don't know,” she said eventually. “Everyone always expects very dramatic answer.”
Robert waited.
“My parents are alive. I like my job. I have friends. Nothing tragic happened.”
“Right.”
She picked at a loose thread on her sleeve.
“I just…” She paused. “I like people.”
Bob barked a laugh. “You spend half your day annoying them.”
“That is how I show affection.”
“Christ.”
Olesya smiled faintly before looking back at the ocean.
“When I was little, my father used to take me into city on weekends. We would just walk around. Not for anything important. Just walking.”
She shrugged and continued.
“I liked watching everyone. Old women feeding birds. Children playing football. People arguing over nothing. Man selling flowers. All these little lives happening at same time.”
Robert stayed quiet, they were all rarely emotional with each other.
“One day I asked my father if all those people knew each other.” She laughed softly. “I was maybe six.”
“What'd he say?”
“He said no. But they still all share same city.”
The smile faded from her face.
“And I remember thinking that was amazing.”
The wind tugged at her hair.
“There are billions of people on Earth. Most of them I will never meet. Most of them are probably boring.” She glanced at Bob.
“But they all have favourite songs. Favourite foods. Someone they love. Someone who loves them.”
Her voice grew quieter.
“And none of them asked for astrophage.”
Robert looked over at her.
Olesya swallowed.
“I know it sounds stupid.”
“It doesn't.”
“I just kept thinking about it. Every time we got worse news. All those people trying to live normal lives while sky was slowly killing them.”
She looked down at her hands.
“I didn't volunteer because I wanted to be hero.”
“Didn’t think you did.”
Then she looked back at the water.
“I love Earth, Bob.”
The admission came out so simply that it almost hurt.
“I love the cities. I love the forests. I love stupid reality shows and football games and old museums and loud restaurants and people who stop in middle of sidewalk for no reason.”
“Those people are the worst.”
“They are." She nodded. "And I still wanted them to have tomorrow.”
She was quiet for a moment.
Then she shook her head.
“There is phrase in Russian.” She frowned. “I do not know how to say it properly in English.”
Olesya stared out at the water and pinched her eyebrows together. “'Мне не всё равно.'”
Bob raised an eyebrow. “Which means?”
She thought for a second. “'I care' is closest.”
The corner of her mouth twitched.
“But not exactly. More…” She searched for the words. “It means something matters to you. That you cannot just look away and pretend it is not your problem.”
She shrugged and took another breath.
“That is how I feel about Earth.”
For a long moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Robert cleared his throat. “That's disgustingly sincere.”
“Thank you.”
“You're welcome.”
They went back to drinking and Robert was starting to understand the appeal of vodka. He turned to her again though.
“You ever told Ryland that story?”
Olesya nodded and smile at the water. “Yes…he understood.”
They thought about their little brother who was probably suffering in a meeting when he could be shopping away in Tokyo.
“You think they’re going to try and assassinate them again?”
Olesya swatted him for that comment.
That assassination failed pretty miraculously. Ryland had told them that he had this weird feeling in his stomach and told Stratt, who also had an odd feeling, to stay back in their hotel room for a little bit longer. Security found two people with handguns just minutes after.
Turns out Robert really shouldn’t have said that because it happened again.
This time it was a small bomb that both Ryland and Stratt just narrowly missed. They were back via helicopter just moments after. The whole group was waiting by the deck…Yáo, DuBois, Shapiro, Lokken, Lamai, Leclerc and Hatch. Robert was standing with Olesya who was nervously chatting with Dmitri.
For safety reasons, they arrived in two separate choppers which Robert could guess they both didn’t want but understood. Stratt was off first with Carl and a few bandages on her face and she waved them all off as they all checked up on her, both her and Carl still nervously waiting for Ryland.
His chopper pulled in just moments later and they all let out a sigh of relief as they saw his mop of blond hair hop out. Robert and Olesya let Stratt run over to him first, they let them hug and assure each other before they both moved over to hug him— one with all three of them and then individual ones.
Robert hesitantly placed a hand on Ryland’s cheek and gently moved his face side to side. He was fine, a bandage over the bridge of his nose and a few cuts on his hand that were also bandaged but that was about it.
“Never do that again, you shit.”
“Sorry, will try to tell the next set of contracted killers.”
“Do not joke.” Olesya shoved him lightly and hugged him again.
When she pulled away Robert noticed a small damp spot on Ryland’s shoulder but he didn’t comment on it and just wrapped an arm around both of them and dragged them towards the group who were waiting to fuss on both of their top two.
Ryland’s room was the designated sleeping room that night. Everyone was there. Ryland and Stratt took the bed, DuBois and Shapiro were on the spare mattress. Lokken and Lamai had brought multiple pillows that they were both lying on and Hatch was already passed out on the couch and Yáo was sitting by the wall with his eyes closed.
Dmitri went to get them extra blankets but he was going to be next to Carl next to the desk who was sorting out the stash of snacks in Ryland’s mini fridge.
Robert and Olesya were also on the bed, Olesya on Stratt’s side because they were closer and Robert beside Ryland. He stared at all three of them as they slept and he let out a soft sigh before rolling over to rest on his back.
Maybe he finally understood that feeling