Perhaps had anyone, anyone at all ever said to him that the words of the others were false, he might have stood a chance. Believed even for a second that no, his father's shame would not hang over him until the day he died. No, there was no obligation to repay Mother Russia for having chosen to spare him. To take pity.
But he and a thousand, ten thousand other children like him had not been born to live in such kindness. Such softness would not come to children who numbered in the millions within Russia's borders and lived and died under its command.
Violence inside its State schools served a purpose. Thinned out the weakest of their numbers. Ensured those who did survive would remember what came of those who betrayed their glorious leader. Failed the whole of their society.
He stares down at the boy's hand but does not take it. Lifts his eyes in question over what has become an alien gesture (at least when offered to him), only for his stomach to twist as he moves to follow. Hoping the name he carries will be unknown to the German boy. "My name is Illya Kuryakin."
no subject
But he and a thousand, ten thousand other children like him had not been born to live in such kindness. Such softness would not come to children who numbered in the millions within Russia's borders and lived and died under its command.
Violence inside its State schools served a purpose. Thinned out the weakest of their numbers. Ensured those who did survive would remember what came of those who betrayed their glorious leader. Failed the whole of their society.
He stares down at the boy's hand but does not take it. Lifts his eyes in question over what has become an alien gesture (at least when offered to him), only for his stomach to twist as he moves to follow. Hoping the name he carries will be unknown to the German boy. "My name is Illya Kuryakin."