Chapter 1: Consequences ̶d̶o̶n̶'̶t̶ Accompany Choice
…I never knew how to start these things.
But you know that already, don’t you? After all, you know everything about me. All my flaws and weaknesses, willingly laid bare for you to exploit. Even now, one sentence runs through my head:
“My name is Mihaela Rebreanu, and I caused the end of the world.”
Those are the words you had me remember, forced me to engrave them into my memory, for as long as continued to live. This sentence you delightfully taught me, that I would always face what I had done whenever I would close my eyes. And you know the worst part is? That it’s true. That despite everything you did, you never once told an outright lie.
So what’s left to do now? What’s done is done. If the future is in the stars, then you must’ve put us on pause. All that’s left is to look through the past. And that’s what I’ll do. It’s not like you have anything better to do than listen to my story again, you said yourself as much. So let’s start… right at the very beginning, why not?
My name is Mihaela Rebreanu, as previously stated. According to my parents, I was born on the 1st of January, one year after the World Wide War ended. For most of my childhood, I lived in this teeny-tiny village called Sângereni, somewhere in the Carpathian Mountains. It was rather isolated; I don’t think that in its ‘rich’ history its population ever exceeded 300 people. My family was rather well-off, with my father, Vasile, having been the local priest. My mother, Ileana, spent most of her day tending to the land and animals we obtained through the church.
Personally, I couldn’t say I got along too well with any of my neighbours, minor or major. I wasn’t the most communicative, so often I would just sit in the back of the garden, playing alone instead of going with the other kids. My parents often lau ded my socialisation attempts, but I think their concerns lay less with the idea of me growing maladjusted from loneliness, and more with the fear of their toddler falling into the well that just so happened to be located in her playing area. Thankfully, I wasn’t that restless as a child, but I can still imagine the dread looming. You can guess they wouldn’t want me falling back in.
Although from how I describe myself, I may appear to be a completely isolated specimen of a kid, I did have one friend growing up. The boy living just across the street from me. Well, ‘street’ is a rich word; it was more like a road wide enough for one horse to comfortably squeeze through. The villagers had to make do with what the geography gave them. I don’t exactly remember what the circumstances of our first meeting were, but I can confidently name why I broke my hermit streak: I felt pity.
No, I’m serious; that’s it. I felt sorry for him. The other children were avoiding him like the plague, which most of them already had a mild strain of, avoiding him and disbanding whenever he approached. They snickered behind his back, coincidentally always within his hearing range. I even remember one time when he was trying to climb the plum tree in front of his own house, and a few boys started throwing rocks at him. They were still children, so most of them missed, but one of them did manage to hit him in the head, causing him to fall. Thankfully, kids are surprisingly durable, so besides a small contusion, he was fine.
His home life wasn’t the greatest, either. Every evening, all his parents did was shout. They shouted at him; they shouted at each other; they shouted at God for the miserable life they were living. Every single fight involved something breaking. It wasn’t even just the small stuff; one time I heard what I can only presume to be the table snapping in half. I became accustomed to the sound of fighting as I drifted off to sleep.
My parents weren’t the most agreeing of my friendship with this kid, with the boy’s out-of-wedlock birth, but I think it was mostly out of fear for my safety, on the off-chance that I would get involved in his parents’ disputes. Still, they eventually caved in, but I can’t remember if it was because they had a change of heart or because I was unwilling to have one.
My ‘bustling’ social life struggled, as you can imagine. The same mockery thrown at the boy was now aimed at me, too, for the crime of being nice to the weird kid. I would be the coordinator of our games, and he would just be the player, happy with just being included, no matter how small the role. And what he lacked in backbone or standing for himself, I didn’t. The stone-throwing children returned one day, having learned of a new target, but what they couldn’t have possibly taken into consideration was how much my hand-eye coordination had developed compared to theirs. I can only imagine the horror on my father’s face when multiple townsfolk came to the church door, demanding justice for their sons, who had been struck down by the priest’s daughter. And with a population that small and tight-knit, word took less than an hour to reach the entire village. He didn’t say anything about it back home, though, possibly thinking nothing would really change all that much. I was already being avoided by the other children.
You might’ve noticed I overlooked the boy’s name up to this point. I am under the presumption that you might’ve figured out who I was referring to from my recollections alone.
…
…Victor. The boy’s name was Victor.
Later that same evening, we were having dinner, and by that time Victor occupying the fourth seat at the table was treated as an ordinary occurrence. But word of my actions had reached even his drunkard father’s ears. The man came to ours, knocking on the door as if to break it down. But he decided that the time between his knocking and my mother opening the door was too long to wait. He burst in, the smell of slivovitz filling the room. The drunk bastard had demands, under the guise of the concerned father wanting what’s best for his son, that his beloved child not spend any more time with the violent girl across the street, lest he be influenced by her and lead him into a heathen’s life. All the while dragging Victor across the room, almost scalping him.
My father didn’t exactly accept the words thrown toward his family, and even less those unspoken that were thrown toward him. I don’t remember the exact details, as my mother had made me cower under the table before the two men got into an all-out fight. But I assure you, the one who usually wins in this sort of situation is the one with the higher pain tolerance. And who could have a higher pain tolerance than someone with more alcohol in his veins than blood? I remember my father’s unconscious body, the blood flowing from his brow and down at my feet, and my mother, crying and barely holding her anger as she patched him up.
That night was the loudest Victor’s parents ever fought. I had grown accustomed over the years to the sounds of shouting, but this time it was different. Previously, I could make up at least a word or two, but now I had no idea what they were saying. I knew, however, the exact argument that started this fight. And suddenly, I jolted awake. Not because they got any louder, but because it all went quiet. For one of the first times in my life, the crickets chirping outside my window weren’t drowned out. But that silence was more deafening than anything I had heard before. I waited. A minute. Two. Five. Ten. Thirty. An hour. I couldn’t take it. I had to go, make sure Victor is alright. But as I left the bed, my mother grabbed my arm and pulled me back into bed. My father then rose and left the house. A second, deeper scream followed, and all my mother could do was hug me tighter. A minute later, my father returned, holding Victor in his hands. It was only in the morning light that I noticed the dark red stains decorating my father’s clothes.
A week after that, we moved from Sângereni. My parents had enough connections to the outside world, be it through different relatives or higher-ups in the church, to send Victor and me to the big city. They were, however, unwilling to leave that house behind. Only now can I fully understand their reasoning for this manoeuvre. I had always thought they just wanted us gone, to remove the two troublemakers from the picture whilst washing their hands of whatever might happen to them, all to escape others’ ire. But after learning more about them, about myself… about you, I can see that what they wanted was to protect me, to have an ordinary life.
But as you know, the definition of ‘ordinary’ differs for those like you and me. It is within our very nature to be at the top of the list, and the lingering resentment instilled in me the desire to lean into that compulsion I had from birth. What that list actually represented didn’t actually matter; I would spread myself in every direction, fill every single vacant spot.
In school, I would be the teacher’s pet. At charities or community work, I would raise the most funds. Marathons, always first place. Hell, even music contests. Each month, the city’s conservatoire held contests, and each month, I would present myself with a different instrument, and each month I would receive standing ovations. It was easy, yes, both because of my innate impulse and because I was still unknowingly relying on my parents during this time. I never stopped to question why we never had to worry about things like bills or pocket money during this period.
All of my activities drew attention to myself, both wanted and not. Higher-ups at Academia Claudiopolitana, the best university in the country, caught sight of my overachievements, deeming me a prodigy, a once-in-a-lifetime savant. If it were up to them, I would’ve been a student there at 13. But as much as I would’ve wanted to accept the offer, I couldn’t for a single reason: Victor.
Victor always paled in comparison, not because he had any… deficits, but because he was average. The peak of mediocrity, the apex of the bell curve. If I were the teacher’s pet, he would be that kid that does well enough to pass the grade without issue, but not enough to actually be remembered by the teacher at the end of the year. But that didn’t stop me from dragging him along with me. He was a participant in all of my endeavours, because I didn’t want to leave him behind. And neither did he want to leave my side. He struggled to even be on the same page of the list, but I was always there, always lending a hand to make sure that wherever I went, Victor went too. I wish I could’ve told him just how much that meant to me.
My Academia spot was never occupied, and so, a few years later, after we both properly graduated high school, I made a bargain with them: I would become their student, on the condition that Victor would also get a spot. They caved in immediately. And there, among the best of the best, was also where I first met Radek.