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There was very little Mitya detested more in life than the feeling of losing control. Thus, he created three rules for himself and adhered to them as piously as one would worship an archon.
Immaculate, neat workspace. Not a tool out of place. Documents appropriately filed away at the end of each day; floor swept clean of metal shavings and screws; one last look in the mirror before leaving the laboratory to ensure that his collar was straight and his coat lay unwrinkled.
Trips around Snezhnograd supplemented his pursuit of knowledge, but never hindered it. Some of his best ideas came to him whilst dozing off in a theatre chair during the intermission. These trips were not necessary, merely helpful. More importantly, he used them to exert his freedom. As long as the work was ultimately completed, he was capable of handling his own schedule.
Touch-averse with most everybody. Exceptions exist to every rule, as all good scientists know, but for Mitya this principle governed his life very strictly and he preferred it as such. He was a man who valued the notion of keeping to oneself. If humans were meant to connect then why were they born as individuals? Mitya believed that there was a time and place to disturb the natural order; this was no such time.
Many years into his career, he found his research funnelling towards an exciting, momentous conclusion. The answer to the energy dilemma in Snezhnaya, the weapon with which to challenge the Heavens, and all necessary advancements needed to support the nation’s people after the world was changed.
Then, he began to forget large chunks of his days. His schedule became increasingly filled with blanked-out sections.
He was losing control.
“Tell me you feel it too?” he asked his companion one day, voice a whisper. He stared straight ahead as the theatre darkened and the famous ballerina Odette took to the stage. His hand curled into a weak fist atop the armrest.
“You’ve always had a stellar memory, Mitya,” Valeriy muttered in response. “As for me, the days merely blend together. Between observing you at work in the Palace and chasing you through the city, I can’t say much has changed.”
“Of course not.” Sighing, Mitya rifled through his waistcoat and pulled out his notebook. “Silly me for asking.”
Valeriy grunted quietly in acknowledgment and Mitya knew that he would be staring off into space from that point onwards. With the confusion of the past few days and his memory gaps, there was at least comfort in knowing Valeriy’s consistent habits. He never was one for the arts. To each their own.
Mitya put pen to paper as refinements for Mistilteinn fitted themselves into place in his head. On the stage, Odette began the performance. Valeriy sat silently beside him.
Then, he died.
And as it turned out, this was only one death in a series of many. The revelation broke the dam on Mitya’s memories and suddenly he became an expert in dying. A startling pain accompanied the very moment his heart stopped. In death, he was aware of nothing: a vexing paradox. And resuscitation, which came naturally but relieved none of the pain or disorientation, filled him with helplessness. Each time, in a vague stupor, Mitya would pick himself up from the floor. His thin body was covered in bruises for which he could not trace the history. Wracked with tremors, he would check his most recent notes: nothing. He would check the clock: hours passed. Doing what? Being dead. He had no control over when he died or how long the curse would last.
Death was a setback and an unfortunate byproduct of advancement for the ultimate good. His research was forcefully slowed until it grinded to a halt, all by the design of a higher power. Dying brought with it suffering. Mitya refused to let his professional life become affected by the sudden and pronounced decline in his quality of life.
The mask shall never slip.
His throat was raw.
He had been screaming in his sleep again. Groggily, Mitya sat up in bed and fumbled for the lamp switch. In the dim light, he examined the old bruise splattered across his hip. He rubbed at his cheeks and sighed. He straightened out his bedsheets, as it was uncomfortable to sleep when his legs were tangled up in the heavy blankets. He doubted he would sleep again that night, but he might at least try. He was beyond exhausted and not afraid to at least admit as much to himself.
In light of the setbacks of the curse, it had been his hope that moving into the barracks of the Armory Palace would cauterize all unnecessary distractions from his schedule. He wasted no time on a commute, his laboratory was within arm’s reach whenever he was struck with inspiration, and the food was so bland that mealtimes took no time at all. But he had failed to account for the nightmares and how horrendously disruptive they proved to be. His dreams were filled with death, dying, and being dead.
“Mitya.”
With a start, Mitya looked up. He had not noticed his door opening, nor the man who took the liberty of entering his room without permission. Now that man stood at the foot of Mitya’s bed, wearing thin nightclothes and an expression not unlike that of a gutted fish.
“I was wondering whose soft voice that was,” Mitya croaked, smiling wearily. He leaned back against his headboard and watched as Valeriy approached and took up residence in a chair by his bedside.
“And I was wondering who was screaming.” Valeriy knew well that Mitya disliked being touched. He held out a handkerchief for his damp, tear-stained cheeks, making no comment on his dishevelled appearance. “I apologize for entering without first knocking. When the screaming stopped, I… I suppose I thought…”
Mitya took the handkerchief and dabbed at his eyes. “What? You thought I died?”
Valeriy nodded impassively, staring at a point on the wall past Mitya’s head. Perhaps the bulletin board covered in scrawled notes and scraps of research journals was interesting to him, or perhaps he simply refused to acknowledge his vulnerability. Mitya knew his companion well and knew it was the latter.
“If I had died, I would have taken you right along with me,” Mitya said with a hint of bitterness leaking into his tone. He stared down at the handkerchief, knotting it around his fingers until they turned blue.
“Don’t do that,” Valeriy said sharply.
“Right. Sorry.” He dropped the cloth onto his bedside table and sighed. “Sorry to worry you, Major.”
“No use in apologizing. I merely dislike seeing you in pain. It is a measure of the poor excuse of a bodyguard that I am.”
“How can you possibly protect me from dying?”
Mitya watched Valeriy’s gaze as it roamed over his body. His trained, careful eyes took stock of Mitya’s pale wrists, the unfastened top button of his collar, and the dark bruise on his hip peeking out from under the hem of his shirt. Valeriy traced the tilt of Mitya’s exhausted posture and carved a path down the outline of his lanky legs reclining under the bedsheets. His eyes at once snapped back up to meet Mitya’s questioning look.
He had not physically made contact with Mitya even once since entering the room, but Mitya felt touched in a way that very much transcended skin. His hands shook and he swallowed thickly.
“You might ask anything of me,” Valeriy said, “and I’d have no choice but to comply.”
“I don’t have that sort of power over you,” Mitya muttered. Expressive subtlety had never been his strong suit. He was known to talk himself into unfortunate social corners and then expend far too much energy trying to ameliorate his image. He could go as far as to confidently say that he disliked the public and most interactions with them. All he needed was his research.
“You do.”
Correction: he was currently in need of emotional clarification.
Mitya broke one of his three sacred rules and reached his arms out. “Protect me from nightmares, at least.”
Valeriy looked at his outstretched arms with doubt-filled eyes, then tilted his head slightly. “I…”
Immediately exasperated, Mitya wiggled his arms. “My weak arms grow tired without a strong man to hold onto…”
Valeriy raised an eyebrow, then braced his arms against the bed. His shirt was unbuttoned by more than just one button, allowing Mitya an unhindered view of his rather broad chest. “Fine, then, but tell me if you regret it.”
“You might sound a little more excited to hold the lead scientist of the Energy Commission,” Mitya huffed.
Valeriy climbed into Mitya’s bed and the two of them lay down in a heap of intertwined limbs. Valeriy clasped Mitya securely against his chest, while Mitya wrapped his arms around his torso. He slotted one of his legs between Valeriy’s, ignoring the hitch in his breath at the motion.
As it happened, Mitya had never shared in intimacy with another person before. The intense proximity was foreign to him, but strangely he found that it was far from unpleasant. In this position, he could press his ear against Valeriy’s chest and hear the steady heartbeat safeguarded within his ribcage. He felt the rise and fall of Valeriy’s body as he breathed. He felt Valeriy’s comforting warmth. He ran his fingers over Valeriy’s bicep and felt real muscles beneath the skin.
These were all biological signs that Valeriy was alive and tangible. No matter how many nightmares Mitya suffered, the truth of the matter was that they remained a mere component of his imagination.
“I’ve experienced dreams as well,” Valeriy admitted suddenly, as if reading Mitya’s thoughts. His chest rumbled with the bass of his voice.
“I don’t hear you screaming. Clearly you can handle it better than me,” Mitya said ruefully.
Valeriy delicately brushed hair from Mitya’s forehead. When he wasn’t wearing all his armour and badges, he seemed for all the world just a regular man. In fact, it would be more accurate to say that he had always been one.
“I handle it a little more quietly, maybe. Not better.” Valeriy hesitantly touched Mitya’s cheek. “I don’t have many memories, but I dream of you dying.”
“Really? I dream of the same thing. Of you dying.”
And Mitya knew for certain that his nightmares were constructed purely from memories. Beyond the wrenching sensations of dying and resuscitating, he would never be able to forget the sight of Valeriy dead before his eyes. While living through the moment, Mitya had believed it to be real and permanent. He had truly thought that Valeriy dropped dead in the night, so rigid and orderly even in the afterlife that he remained sitting upright in his chair. And in that moment, he had been so full of grief that it partially informed his decision to walk out into the fatal blizzard.
Each nightmare was a reliving of that day accompanied by the pain of death. No wonder Mitya’s throat was dry from screaming.
“If I died,” Valeriy countered, “there’d be nobody left to catch you when you run away. It won’t be happening. I take this task more seriously than you might ever imagine.”
“I know,” Mitya whispered. For all his false bravado, he was scared at the prospect of losing anything to the curse of death. His life, the lives of his fellow researchers, the life of his closest companion. He would take a thousand bruises over the permanence of true death. He was afraid that, soon, true death would be on the table.
He clung tighter to Valeriy, which silently signalled his wish for rest. Valeriy complied and reached over to shut off the lamp. He pulled the covers up over them both and allowed his hands to roam over Mitya’s body until they found comfortable handholds. Mitya pressed his cheek against Valeriy’s heartbeat.
“Rest well, Mitya,” Valeriy said softly, pressing an unexpected kiss atop his pale head of curls. It made Mitya’s breath go shallow. “For it is imperative that you do.”
“For the future of Snezhnaya,” Mitya agreed.
“No. For my own peace of mind.”
“… Is that right?”
Focusing on the solid warmth of the man in his arms, Mitya drifted back to sleep. Dimly, he realized that Valeriy was stroking the back of his head in a calming, steady rhythm. It must have been past three in the morning and still he remained vigilant until Mitya fell asleep. Only then could he relax and join his scientist in rest.
The result of the experiment arrived alongside the morning sun: no further nightmares were inflicted upon Mitya’s psyche. In fact, he slept more soundly in Valeriy’s arms than he had in months.
Scientists observe outcomes and adapt parameters based on their conclusions. With a scholarly confidence, Mitya began pulling Valeriy into his bedroom each night. (With a puppy-like willingness, Valeriy went.)
All in the name of advancement. And all in defiance of the curse of death!