Russian Roulette

govn'uk- bastard (govn'uky is the plural form of this word)

shavala- whore/slut

more Russian Slang of the same color can be found at www.notam.uio.no/~hcholm/altlang/ht/Russian.html

Sovjetski Drustvo Earovnik (or S.D.E)- (to answer Moon's question, Sovjetski Drustvo Earovnik isn't Russian, its Slovenian. I don't speak either language, but I have a friend that has a Slovenian to English dictionary (god knows why :O) ), and I figured it was the nest best thing. The literal translation is the Soviet Society of Sorcerers) the Soviet Equivalent of the Ministry of Magic

Sasha- is a guy's name in Russia

SURGEON GENERAL'S WARNING: Falling in love with the wife of your worst enemy is hazardous to your health. Not recommended for those with a history of broken hearts.

inSIRIUS'swords:

don't read this.

c'mon. there has to be something better on the telly. go watch Anne Robinson hand out #100,000,000 sterling. or better yet, read the encyclopedia. learn something and make something of yourself. you aren't getting any younger. I'm not handing out any bloody diplomas here.

there aren't going to be any absolutions. any reparations. any apologies... any smiles. this is one goddamn trail of tears.

in case you're bloody slow today, I'll repeat it: don't read this.

you don't wanna hear a sob story from a poor little boy who got his sad-ass heart broken 1500 miles from your cozy little fireplaces in the middle of a club that was boiling, a city that was freezing, and a way of life that may be already dead.

go away. for your own good. I'm not making any allowances. 13 years in living hell killed all of my forgiveness and any of my vestigial hope in the human race.

maybe Charles Darwin was right. maybe all we are is animals. it's dog eats dog, baby. and only the strong survive.

I may be strong with you. put on the pretense of not giving a knut. telling you that no matter what, in spite of everything we try, nothing will ever be ok again.

I know how wrong I am every time I hear her lie echoing in my head.

a bitter lie. a sweet lie. a lie that try as I might, I can't ever let go:

i love you.

Chapter One-- Things Have Changed

The price of a memory is the memory of the sorrow it brings.

-The Counting Crows, Mrs. Potter's Lullaby

Moscow, Russia

December 31, 1996

For the first time in his life, Sirius Black hesitated. His fingers brushed against the dark wood of the door, its slick grain sliding harmlessly across his glove. He bit his lip. Even now, he wasn't sure if he was doing the right thing' if there even was a right thing.

"You goin' in or not, sir?" the doorman said in heavily accented English, his breath freezing into little puffs of white with every new word. He looked particularly frozen and hence irritable in his too-big glasses and threadbare penguin tuxedo. "Govn'uk," he whispered under his breath, shooting Sirius a particularly dirty look.

Govn'uk. Bastard. Sirius may not have been to Russia for twenty years, but if there was one thing he remembered, it was his curses. He wheeled around to face the doorman, ready to give the man a few govn'uky of his own. Then he paused. The porter wasn't any older than a kid, younger than Sirius himself had been when he had first come to the Russian Roulette. He was shivering, his frozen freckled nose just barely illuminated by the half-light of Moscow's street lamps. So instead of cursing the porter to kingdom come, Sirius gave the kid a sympathetic glance. If he was 16 and freezing his ass off while some old fogie hesitated in front of a door he wished to anything he could enter, he'd at least call the customer a govn'uk, if not worse, he thought remembering his own youthful misdeeds. "Yeah," he said, inhaling the freezing night air. "I'm going in."

The Porter wiped his nose on the sleeve of his tuxedo and then said his favorite English word. "Tip?"

Sirius had the strong inclination to sock the Porter in the jaw, but there was something in his teenage gawkiness, a hint in the way his too-big glasses slipped down his frozen nose, a the touch of defiance in the kid's eyes that made him pause. In a way, the Porter hearkened back to Sirius's memories of James. Of himself. They had been so young then. What had happened' where had their youth gone?

Sirius reached into his pocket and pulled out a 200-ruble note. The kid needed it more than he ever would. "Buy yourself a coat," he said, slipping it to the Porter, knowing perfectly well that the kid would spend his newfound wealth on booze or hash. Then, before the kid could respond, he strode into the relative heat of the Roulette. And stopped.

This is what he had been afraid of.

The old club of his memories was gone. While he had been rotting away in Azkaban, the Roulette had reinvented herself from a seedy whorehouse to a posh restaurant, now oozing tangible wealth and respectability. He stared in unabashed horror at the chintzy chandeliers, fluffy red carpet, and sateen banner proclaiming Le Club de la Russian Roulette. He was betrayed.

Steps halting, Sirius cursed the foolhardy notion of even returning to the Roulette after all these years. He should have known better, should have known his old club was no more when he saw a doorman and a red carpet outside. In the old days, the Roulette had been an underground club, trying desperately to hide herself from the authorities. Heart in his throat, Sirius took another step forward. They had all left him now: first Narcissa, then James, and now' now even the Roulette, the playground of his youth in those days when he had the freedom to be free and the carefree inclination to forget all responsibility, was only a fleeting memory. Those had been the days before prisons, before cells, before bars. The days when things still made sense, when there still seemed to be a method to the madness. The days when he had still been alive.

It was just foolhardy to even begin to believe that he could gain access to his youth, his innocence, by returning to the club that had shattered everything. This was the brothel where he had first tasted betrayal, the bitter liquor that would govern most of his adult life. Its taste still lingered in his mouth.

"Can I help you, Monsieur?" A stuffy maitre'd asked in affected French, grabbing Sirius's shoulder and shaking him from his reverie. The waiter's pencil-thin moustache twitching with every word.

Sirius hesitated, half in the mind to just walk away from it all, from the new club, from the bitter taste of betrayal lingering on his lips, but mostly he just wanted escape from his own memories. But if Azkaban had taught him one thing, it was that the past never sets you free. "I want a table," he finally replied, purposefully in Russian.

"We don't serve locals," the maitre'd replied, his moustache vibrating irritably. Sirius's disgust at the maitre'd was almost equal to the head waiter's apparent revulsion towards him. By locals, the maitre'd meant anyone not rich or powerful enough to gain entrance to the prestigious Le Club de la Universal Elite, a society of croquet matches and charity dinners, ruled over by those such as the Malfoys and the Rockefellers. By excluding locals, the Russian Roulette was turning her back on the dregs of Muscovite society, a rag-tag and threadbare group to which she had been a temple a mere twenty years before.

"I'm from England," Sirius said, again in Russian. Five years ago, it would have been death to openly admit his nationality in what was then the Soviet Union.

The matire'd gave Sirius a look of pure disgust and replied in his heavily accented French. "Do you have a reservation' Monsieur?" The Monsieur was not a title of respect, but so dripping in sarcasm that it was an underhanded blow at Sirius's dignity.

Sirius ignored it. He wasn't in any mood to start a fight. "No," he said flatly, a smirk forming on his lips.

"I'm afraid I can't admit you them," the matire'd said smugly. "If you'll just step this way, I'll show you to the door--"

"Wait a moment!" Both Sirius and the matire'd spun around at the sound of the new voice. Sirius felt an instinctive wave of dread pass over him at the sight of the portly figure in a pinstriped suit and lime green bowler hat. "Mr. Black will dine with me, I insist."

"Of course, Monsieur," the matire'd bowed respectfully though he his moustache twitched in a most rattled fashion. All in all, the waiter looked as if his Christmas had been cancelled. Sirius was pleased to see a definite sulky note in his retreat to the interior of Le Club de la Russian Roulette.

"Mr. Black! I daresay, what a surprise!" Sirius found himself being spun around by the shoulders and forced into the grasp of a rather pudgy old man wearing expensive cologne. Sirius coughed hoarsely as the man let him go, trying to clear his head from the stench of the perfume. Sirius was again reminded of the veracity of James's old adage: Never trust a man who wears cologne. "What a splendiferous surprise!" the pudgy man guffawed again, chuckling at his non-existent wit.

"Quite," Sirius said through a pained smile, trying to dodge another hug from the Minister of Magic. "What an... honor." Sirius had marginal respect for Cornelius Fudge, and an even smaller skill at hiding that fact.

"Oh... what, what, Mr. Black! I daresay!" Fudge blustered through his moustache. "Congratulations on your recent acquittal. Pettigrew!" he gave a shallow laugh. "Who would have known! When was your trial, two months ago?"

"Three and a half," Sirius corrected tersely. And if I remember correctly, you stormed out of the courtroom in a huff when the jury read their not-guilty verdict, Minister. An uncomfortable silence ensued as both Fudge and Sirius remembered their old enmity. Sirius would never be able to forgive the Minister for his time in Azkaban. Even after his acquittal, most wizards kept a safe distance between themselves and the ex-convict. For the first time in his life, Sirius could understand how Remus felt as pariah.

"So where's your date, Mr. Black?" Fudge made another stab at resurrecting their quickly dying conversation.

"I'm alone," Sirius said, running his finger through a hole in the pocket of his overcoat.

"Alone?" Fudge chuckled. "At the Russian Roulette?" It was all Sirius could do to keep himself from laughing aloud. Who was Fudge to trounce around and act he knew anything about the Russian Roulette, to pretend he knew everything there was to know about the beast of a club. Because the Roulette hadn't just a posh nightclub, it had been a way of life: unabashed freedom, reveling in the sheer joy of her decadence. Her motto: Live fast, die young. And this notion, this mantra, was as alien to Fudge as the new Roulette was to Sirius.

"Alone at the Russian Roulette," Sirius echoed, trying to keep the disgust out of his voice.

"Well," Fudge blathered. "Quite, quite, I say. I'm looking over the wife of a friend," he gave Sirius a conspiratorial wink. "He had important business to attend to and suggested that I take her out. She insisted upon the Roulette, so here we are!" he finished, clapping his hands together. "Or rather... here I am, she's fixing up her hose or powdering her nose, something of that ladylike wishy-washy nonsense, I daresay. Never quite saw the point of it myself. If you ask me, women spend more time getting ready to go out than in the actual going out at all. Must be horribly frustrating, I think I'd go mad if I spent all that time staring at myself in a mirror, what what? One's reflection can only hold one's interest for so long and then it becomes outright ridiculous. Don't you agree, Mr. Black?"

"After 13 years in prison, I don't like mirrors much," Sirius said quietly, well aware of and well pleased with the discomfort he was causing the Minister.

Fudge coughed nervously. "She won't keep us waiting long' she should be returning any moment, I believe"

Sirius rolled his eyes. Fudge was probably with the wife of some rich diplomat, a spoiled little ninny who had heard about the Russian Roulette through scandalous rumors, and wanted to stare at Moscow's underworld like a rare specimen. She'd see it as "exciting", like a little theme park, and she'd pretend, through her Prime Rib, she had experienced the Roulette, telling all her rich friends that she's slummed it in Moscow's most "scandalous" nightclub. Well let her keep her sugar-coated notions of the club.

The Roulette he knew was dead, and she was reveling in its demise. And she didn't understand. She couldn't understand. It made him sick.

Sirius gave Fudge a disgusted glance. The Minister was smiling vapidly, sweat glistening on his sagging jowls. Sirius didn't reply.

Fudge didn't get the hint. "So what brings you to Moscow, Mr. Black?"

"Oh you know me," Sirius said sarcastically. "Selling nuclear secrets to the Soviets." Sirius was actually in Russia on business for Dumbledore, but he'd be damned if he told Fudge that.

"Well," Fudge smiled blandly, the true meaning of Sirius's words escaping him. "I heard those nuclears were all the rage nowadays"

Fat hypocrite. "What brings you to Moscow, Minister?" Sirius interrupted suddenly.

"Er..." Fudge pulled at his collar nervously, then lowered his tone to a whisper. "Well I can't quite go into it with all these Muggles around, but it is' Ministry business, of course. The Russian Gnomes are demanding most favored race trading status and of course we can't give it to them, the little blighters, they don't understand how upset the Danish Merfolk would get. But here's the real ticket," he blathered, "the blasted little gnome buggers are threatening to cut off all of the oil again like they did in the 70s. They have me in quite a fix Ah!" Fudge broke off, looking relieved. "What's this I see? Back from the mirror, powdered and primped! Well, Mr. Black, here she is!"

Sirius spun around, expecting to see the pampered spouse of some aristocrat, reeking of perfume and glowing with reverse aging spells.

Love

The sides of his mouth twitched. Fickle, fickle fate, how she loved to play games with mortals. This night was irony incarnate.

its not the easy thing

It was her. Her features: chipped of ice, her blonde curls: floating around her head like a halo. Her cold blue eyes didn't even register recognition. The sides of his mouth twitched even more. He knew that inside, his little ice princess was melting.

He got a sick sort of satisfaction from that. Last time it had been her that had torn his heart into shreds.

the only baggage you can't bring is

Fudge remained oblivious. He drew the woman towards him and gave her an affectionate pat on the shoulder. Sirius saw her flinch as Fudge's hand wrapped itself around her waist. "Mr. Black, I don't believe you've met Narcissa Malfoy."

Sirius laughed. Fudge looked somewhat unnerved by his reaction. Narcissa didn't so much as twitch, her polite smile seemed to be pasted on.

love. it's not the easy thing.

"No," Sirius said, his voice little more than a hiss. "We haven't met." His eyes flicked towards to Narcissa, gauging how she would react to the lie. Her face was blank, her dead eyes stared at him without really seeing him at all. "I knew someone like Mrs. Malfoy once though," he said, his voice a forced calm. "She's dead now."

"I' I'm sorry to hear that," Fudge blustered.

"Not as sorry as I was," Sirius whispered. "But you can only grieve so long."

"How true, how true," Fudge chuckled, rocking back and forth on his heel nervously.

"How odd," Sirius said, addressing Narcissa for the first time in eighteen years. "You look just like your husband."

She didn't move.

Like the Roulette, Narcissa seemed only a shadow of her former self. Cleaner maybe, more respectable yes, but still a poor imitation of his memories.

the only baggage you can bring is all that you can't

Standing there, staring into her cold empty gaze, Sirius wondered why he had even returned to Le Club de le Russian Roulette after all these years.

Then it hit him.

He had never really left.

leave behind.

 

----

'and if the darkness should keep us apart'

Moscow, U.S.S.R

December 31, 1979

Once upon a time, in Moscow, there was a floo-port.

The nicest adjectives that can be applied to this transportation hub were "gray" and "well-used". On very very good days "barely-tolerable" was also applicable.

The floo-port had first been built in the mid 1930s, when Josef Stalin suddenly decided to construct facilities for his people. Maybe he thought he could save his soul if he punched off a couple of hospitals, office buildings, and floo-ports. Stalin was wrong. It would take a heck of a lot more to keep him from hell.

The Josef Stalin Memorial Floo-Port oozed the essence of the motivation used to build it: absolute futility. In the barest physical rudimental, the floo-port was an eyesore: an incredibly ugly, utilitarian, gray rectangle with thousands of fireplaces lining its walls. On every fireplace's mantle was a small, framed, and state-funded photograph of the floo-port's namesake, and, in all actuality, the only man who had gotten any pleasure from it. The floo-port's staff purposefully ignored how often these portraits were defaced.

Wizards from Bulgaria to Burkina Faso passed through the gray and well-used confines of the Josef Stalin Memorial Floo Port, jumping out one of the many fireplaces, and as quickly as they could, up the next. No one liked to stay in the Memorial Floo-port very long. In fact, nine out of every ten visitors to the port reached the same conclusion about it.

They said, quite firmly, that it was the scab of the universe.

A scab is something thoroughly ugly, repulsive, and dirty, but sadly enough, inexcusably necessary. But this damnable usefulness doesn't make one accept the scab any more. One just wants to pick at the bloody thing and get it off of one's skin A.S.A.P., but if one does succeed, one's cut reopens and the whole horrid scab-process repeats itself, much to one's chagrin.

This ugly, repulsive, and dirty Muscovite floo-port was the scab of the universe.

In other words, it was damnably necessary.

James was the sort of person who read a book on the toilet seat. And not just any book, he sat there for hours on end, memorizing the encyclopedia. He often said, to any one who would listen that his goal was to learn two new facts every day, but to Sirius it seemed like Prongs memorized at last twenty. James was full of useless information, from the name of the official currency of the small island nation of Vanuatu (the vatu) or the exact genus name for the common garden chipmunk (sciuridae).

Lily often got jealous, accusing James of never having any time for her because he split his days exclusively between the Quiddich field and the encyclopedia.

James would laugh and say there were only so many hours in the day.

And his laugh was so beautiful that somehow Lily managed to forgive him and let him sweep her off her feet, encyclopedia fixation and all.

It wasn't any wonder that Lily got swept off her feet so much. James was everyone's favorite: Lily's, Peter's, Remus's, and even Sirius's. It was the way that he smiled at you, like you were the only person in the world, it was the way he was never complicated or angst ridden or filled with hidden motivation. It was the way that he was utterly comfortable in his own skin. James was James, what you say was exactly what you got. He was like a slice of warm apple pie, epitomizing all that was good and wholesome and right with the world.

James brought out the best in everyone he met, and they all loved him for it.

And then' there was Sirius.

Tall, dark, and undeniably handsome, he was the king of wicked barbs and mercutial sentiments. One day late in the seventh year, Professor McGonagall had been particularly rattled after being put through her paces by the Marauders for the umpteenth time that year. Her strict face red with fury she had snapped, "Mr. Black-- you have a line for everything!"

Sirius had just smiled coolly and nodded his head. "Thank you, Professor."

He had gotten a detention for that one, but it didn't really matter. Trouble followed Sirius around like a shadow and he was more than used to his mischievous bedmate.

Sirius brought out the worst in all of the people he met. He got them in touch with their own darker natures.

And they loved him for it.

James and Sirius, arguably alter-egos, and yet and inseparable as twins. One was the son of the Minister of Magic, bred in a world of privilege and wealth, the other a fast-talking muggle-born whit from the slums of Liverpool.

Sirius used to say that his first cousin was Paul McCartney. It was pure poppycock, but he managed to convince the half of Hogwarts that had actually heard of the Beatles. They pressed him almost daily for signed photographs and countless questions like: "Wings is all well and fine, but when will the Beatles be getting back together? That will be the day, eh?"

Sirius answered everything with a smile. It was the general consensus that he could convince anyone of anything if they stood still long enough. Lies were his business.

Maybe that's why James's father hated "that Black boy". He was the arrogant little snit that led his saintly son down the primrose path into the thousands of scrapes that made the Marauders legendary in the hearts of Hogwarts pranksters.

Sirius was a bad influence on James, he himself bragged of it often, but neither of the boys cared. James made Sirius fell good and Padfoot made Prongs feel bad. Each gave the other a little of what he lacked within himself.

And they loved each other for it.

So that's why Sirius, whining outwardly, dropped all his business in England and followed James half way across the world on his harebrained mission to Russia without so much as a second thought. It was for James that he put up with Harold L.'s brainless scheme, for James that he traveled 4,000 miles from his home, and for James that he was now standing in the middle of the Josef Stalin Memorial Floo-port.

Not that James was in any sort of mood for thanking Sirius today. He was even in no spot to think about opening the encyclopedia, when the cold hard fact was that he couldn't even get his trunk out of the fire.

"We're being watched."

"What?" James was less than enthralled by Sirius's drivel as he began trying to tug his trunk out of one of the many too-small fireplaces in the Josef Stalin Memorial Floo-Port. On the other hand, Sirius leaned casually against the mantle, doing nothing in particular. The skin on the back of his neck prickled as if thousands of eyes were focused on him and him alone. He shivered.

"We're being watched," Sirius repeated, taking a long drag of his Señor Skaavara's Smokeless Cigarette (the easy way to quit!). "I can feel it."

James made a noise not unlike the moan of a wounded hippogriff as he gave his trunk a particularly futile tug. It didn't so much as budge. "You're going to be feeling something else if you don't lend me a hand."

Sirius pulled halfheartedly at the trunk. Almost instantly it fell free of the fireplace and onto James's foot, causing him to let loose a string of quite colorful and creative curses.

"You're gonna be feeling something else if you mess with me," Sirius paraphrased, as he smirked at his irritated friend. James heaved the trunk off of his floor, shooting Sirius an incredibly dirty look all the while. "What?"

"Give me that," James said, pulling Sirius's smokeless cigarette from his mouth.

"Why?" Sirius said as James stuck the fag between his teeth. "You don't even smoke."

"I'm going to start trapped here with you," James growled as he gazed around the dirty floo-port with a look of utter disgust. "Is all of Moscow this goddamn ugly?" Snorting angrily, James tossed the cigarette onto the port's already littered floor. It burned itself out on the graying linoleum, dissolving into a tiny, resentful puff of ash.

Sirius didn't respond to James's question. The trunk incident had put James into a volatile mood Sirius would rather not provoke by volunteering an answer to Prong's rhetorical question about the beauty of Moscow's main public floo-port. James wasn't really expecting an response anyhow. "Who do you think that is?" Sirius asked, swiftly changing the subject. He jerked his thumb at a photograph hanging over their fireplace. It was of a stiff looking man with a bottlebrush moustache that made him look rather like a walrus. The photograph's bulbous nose twitched angrily under Sirius's piercing stare.

James gave Sirius a look of utter disgust. "You're kidding me."

"No, seriously," Sirius said, making a particularly rude gesture at the man in the picture. If looks could kill, the photograph would have struck Sirius dead where he stood. "Who is it?"

"And you say my father doesn't know anything about Communism," James made an exasperated noise. "That's Josef Stalin."

"Who?"

James rolled his eyes. "Didn't you pay any attention in History of Magic?"

"To my knowledge, Prongs," Sirius said, sticking his hands in his pockets. "Limited as it may be, you and Moony are the only ones who ever listened to anything Professor Binns had to say."

"C'mon," James shook his head, but Sirius was relived to see the trace of a smile on his lips. "The guards are staring at us. We better go through Customs before we're arrested."

"Oh don't worry about that," Sirius said blithely, smirking at his friend. "Your father could bail us out."

"Bail me out," James corrected pointedly. "After you blew up his office I doubt he'd be too eager to fork it out for you."

"It was an accident," Sirius smirked at the memory. It had been one of his finer moments...

"You know as well as I do that it was completely intentional," James said, noticing Sirius's grin. "Where's your bag?" he said suddenly, noticing for the first time Sirius's lack of luggage.

"I don't have one. I thought I'd just live out of your case," Sirius gave James's trunk an appraising glance. "You pack enough for both of us."

"Mooch."

"Mummy's boy."

"Ouch," James said sarcastically, pulling his wand and pointing it at the trunk to levitate it. "Wingardium Levosia--"

BOOM! A noise like the crack of a whip jarred Sirius almost completely out of his skull as he found himself rushing quickly through the air. The Josef Stalin Memorial Floo-Port dissolved into nothingness as he slammed face-first into a long wooden table. Dazed, Sirius lifted his head up to find himself seated in a very old, ugly, nondescript office with no visible windows or doors. James, looking equally battered, was beside him. A sudden pain between his eyes made Sirius gingerly reach his hand to his face. His nose was bleeding freely, twisted at an odd angle.

"Welcome to the Sovjetski Drustvo Earovnik," a voice barked from behind them. "Congratulations. Its your first day in Moscow and you've already managed to piss off the S.D.E. You sad little govn'uky," wheeling around Sirius saw a tall thin man with the exact grin one would find on a crocodile leaning over their table. He tried to leap out of his chair, but his feet were magically chained to the legs of the table. Angrily, Sirius bit his lip so hard that it bled.

"Excuse me?" Sirius said. The Lingus charms that allowed him to speak Russian were by no means perfect, and he didn't recognize the word govn'uky. There was something about the way the stranger said it that led him to infer that govn'uky was no compliment.

The Soviet chuckled to himself. Sirius didn't seem to find their situation remotely funny. Neither, it seemed, did James. "Just who do you think you are?" he yelled angrily in accented Russian, leaping from his seat as far as his chains would allow. "What right have you to take us away from the floo-port! Where is my luggage, and for that matter where are we--"

The crocodile man smiled nastily. He gently placed a knarled hand on each of James's shoulders and pushed him hard. With a slight cry James allowed himself to be placed back into his seat. "No charms without authorization," the stranger hissed, removing his hands from James's shoulders and wiping them on his robes as if he had touched something nasty.

"What are you talking about?" James spluttered, looking particularly like his father.

"No charms, potions, hexes, spells or magical enchantments of any sort are allowed without written authorization from the State." Something about the way the word State ran across the stranger's lips made the capital S quite clear. "They are a potential danger to the unity and stability of Mother Russia, not to mention discriminatory to the common proletariat."

"Discriminatory?" James looked as if he had swallowed his broomstick. "Spells?"

The stranger looked down at James over his long, thin, crooked nose. "The mutation that allows magic is not universal among the people of Mother Russia. If magic is encouraged, the unity of our State will be threatened. We cannot allow such splintering between the mutated and the common proletariat to occur."

"Bullsh--"

The stranger cut him James off, extending his hand. "I am going to have to break your wand."

"What?" James looked almost purple.

"Be thankful that's all I will do. Second time offenders do not get off so easily," the stranger hissed, his crocodile grin fading. "No more talk!" he abruptly barked, "I need your wand, unless you have authorization papers."

"Now just wait a bloody moment--" James began.

"The papers?" The wizard cut in, drumming his knarled fingers on the hard wood of his table.

"And where are your papers, Comrade?" Sirius said slowly, taking his hand from his bloody nose and leaning over the table. He couldn't quite say what made him challenge the Soviet, maybe the fact that James looked angry enough to commit first-degree murder. Perhaps it was the nasty patronizing glint in the Russian's eye that spurred him on. But, most likely it was his utter scorn for anyone telling him what to do. He'd beat the stranger at his own game or be damned in the process.

The Soviet's eyes narrowed as he lowered his wand hand. "What?"

"That was a blatant and shameful charm bringing us here," Sirius sneered, trying his best to look imposing. With blood dripping down his lip, it wasn't too hard. "A transport spell, I believe?" Sarcastically he added. "If I don't see your authorization papers, I'm afraid I'm going to have to break your wand."

"You have no authority," the wizard hissed angrily.

"See, that's where you're wrong, Comrade," Sirius said smugly. Silently, he thanked Remus for his long mind-numbing lectures in Soviet ideology. "Expressly stated by Karl Marx in the Communist Manifesto is that in a communist society just like this one, everything is owned by the state and shared equally between its people. Therefore," he took a breath, "your authority is my authority, since as good comrades, we all share."

"Sirius..." James hissed in a warning tone.

"What nonsense is this?" the wizard said dangerously, his face blowing up like an overgrown puffer-fish.

"And," Sirius continued, leaning over the table. "Going in that same train of thought, your authorization papers are ours also, since they don't really belong to you in the first place. Therefore no wands need to be broken and we can all go free." He gave the Soviet a hopeful smile.

"You're in way above your head, Limey." the stranger hissed in a most unfriendly fashion. "How about, your life is mine to dispose of... freely."

"I think," Sirius said, meeting the Soviet's murderous glare. "You're just trying to divert the conversation to avoid showing us your non-existent authorization papers."

A nasty smirk hovered on the stranger's lips as he reached into the pocket of his robes and pulled out a packet of papers. Wordlessly, he threw them across the table towards Sirius and James.

Sirius didn't move. Seeing the tiny mess of forms, with their official looking red seal and curly calligraphy, he knew Padfoot and Prongs were royally screwed. So he sat frozen as James reached forward and gripped the Soviet's documents, deftly flicking them open. Sirius was amazed at how cool he seemed, mere seconds from impending doom. "Your name is Vladimir Ulyanov?" James said suddenly to the Russian, his glasses sliding down the bridge of his nose as he stared at the documents.

"Yes," the stranger hissed, his pinched face contorting. "You are questioning the authenticity of my documents, no?"

"No, no," James said hastily, pushing Ulyanov's papers away. Sirius was surprised and a tad bit alarmed to see a smile on his face. "My father told me to keep an eye out for a man named Vladimir Ulyanov who was a British Informant in the S.D.E. He said you were expecting us." At the blank look on Ulyanov's face, he continued. "We're the Aurors. From the British Ministry of Magic'"

"How can I trust you?" Ulyanov hissed, his pale gray eyes narrowing in suspicion.

"How can we trust you?" Sirius said coolly, leaning back in his chair. He felt a sort of subtle satisfaction now that Ulyanov was on the defensive and they held all the dice. "You could be double-crossing all of us."

Ulyanov's haggard face broke into a sudden grin. It looked as unwelcome on his features as snow in the Sahara. "Very good," he said, smiling so that all of his teeth showed. "You have no illusions about my trustworthiness. Very astute."

"We also have no illusions towards your flattery, Mr. Ulyanov," Sirius said quietly, the sides of his mouth twitching into a small smirk at the look of shock on Ulyanov's face.

Ulyanov held his hands up in mock defeat. "Touché, as the French say, eh?"

Sirius didn't laugh. Neither did James.

Ulyanov dropped his pasted-on smile, and almost instantly his face reverted to its nasty smirk. "Which one of you is the Minister of Magic's son?"

James opened his mouth to respond, but Sirius was too quick. "Me," he said, shooting James a look. He flashed Ulyanov what he hoped was his best sheepish grin as he flicked a strand of black hair from his eyes. Unlike James, he wasn't blind to the hungry glint in Ulyanov's stare. He saw the way that the informant looked at them, like a cat at a mouse, and he instinctively knew that British spy or not, Ulyanov was not to be trusted. If Ulyanov was going to go after anyone it would be the son of the Minister of Magic, and he wasn't about to put James at that kind of risk. "I'm Sirius Potter," he said broadly, extending his hand.

Ulyanov didn't take it. He gave Sirius a cold stare as a patronizing smile curved across his face. "Well, lets hope you're here on merit and not just your name, Mr. Potter," he sneered. Sirius never thought he had heard anyone fit so much scorn into two syllables. "Who are you?" Ulyanov barked, turning to James.

"I'm James' James Black," James said, shooting Sirius a venomous glance. He wasn't about to contradict his friend, but he still looked a few shades north of livid. Sirius knew he'd have hell to pay next time he was alone with Prongs.

"Welcome to Moscow," Ulyanov said, laughing hollowly as he gestured around the dank S.D.E. office, cobwebs hanging from every corner, paint peeling on the walls, the very air infiltrated with an aura of distrust and despair. "A ghost town of nine million. So much," he shot Sirius a look, "for Communism, eh?"

"Is the whole city like' this?" James said, staring around the dusty office. His voice was filled with palpable disgust.

"What a welcome, hm?" Ulyanov said, leaning over the table towards the fledgling Aurors. "And, for future reference, the S.D.E would really break your wand for performing magic without a permit. It's your luck that I was on duty at this moment. Who knows? Maybe you're meant to succeed here." Ulyanov said it in such a tone that made it quite clear that he did not believe this himself.

"Why would they break my wand?" James said, his face twinged with a sort of naïve disbelief.

Again, Ulyanov laughed hollowly. "Why?" he spat. "Why not? They'd break it because they can. They'd break it because it would make them stronger than you, even just for an instant, and to them, that means everything."

"This isn't the sort of place that welcomes visitors," James said quietly, meeting Ulyanov's calculating gaze with his own sincere one.

"No, it isn't," Ulyanov said, his voice barely a hiss. "Not unless you know where to get a welcome."

"And where is that?" Sirius said, unable to keep the scorn from his voice.

"Oh'" Ulyanov closed his eyes slowly, and a funny, drugged look slid across his features. "Oh' let me take you to a place where the drinks are stronger, the nights are longer, and the girls just a little bit looser. A place that can give you a welcome, and a place that helps me forget' everything."

Before Sirius could open his mouth to agree or protest, or even decide on either of these options, Ulyanov extended one gnarled hand and for the second time that day, Padfoot's world turned upside down. Sirius felt an abrupt, merciless lurch as the ugly cold Soviet office dissolved and then reformed into something completely' different.

"The S.D.E.'s gonna screw you over for that transport spell," Sirius hissed as his feet hit solid ground, his hands clutching his stomach as he doubled up.

"Ah, but you forget, Mr. Potter, I have authorization papers," Ulyanov said, his face etched eerily in neon strobe light. "Welcome," he said, his piggy eyes glinting with excitement. "To the Russian Roulette." Ulyanov turned his gaze away from Sirius to tip his hat at a man sheathed in leather nonchalantly against the back wall. "Hey Joe, whadda ya know?" he said. The pimp nodded back. After that, everything seemed to happen at once.

Sirius would have classified as it as an explosion, except this bomb was not one of gunpowder, but legs and arms and lips, all lusting after their counterpart on him.

A slim blonde with red streaks in her hair twined her arms around his neck. "Voulez-vous couchez avec moi, ce soir?" she purred.

"Stay away from Lady Marmalade," a smoky voice slid into his ear. Sirius turned around to see a tall Spaniard wearing knee-high leopard boots and blue plastic pants slide her hands into his hair. "Take me out tonight," she positively howled, sounding more like Remus in his wolf state than any kind of seductress.

Alarmed, Sirius started to back away slowly, the blonde wench still whispering nonsensical French into his ear. He gazed around the Roulette, mouth hanging unabashedly open. A couple was snogging in rhythm in the middle of the dance floor. The people around them seemed completely unfazed, grinding to the loud beat of techno synths.

Sirius's eyes lingered upon two men, one reached into his cocktail and pulling out an olive which he slipped into his companions mouth. The other mans lips lingered upon his friend's hands a little too long and Sirius couldn't tear his eyes away as the two's lips met. No one else even seemed to notice.

A woman, tattooed head to foot, was standing on a raised dais on the far side of the club. The wall behind her was covered with random strips of neon light, arranged into what looked like a fluorescently-radioactive Jackson Polluck painting. As for the tattooed woman herself, she was leading the club in a new year's eve treat: her own disco rendition of Auld Lang Sin, with lyrics to match its altered title. The clubbers stopped grinding long enough to cheer her on.

This left only one through firmly ingrained in Sirius's mind: This was no Three Broomsticks'

"Kiss me, Mein Herr, just don't tell momma," a brunette in a top hat snarled, her Cockney accent catching him by surprise. Before he could even begin to react, she had elbowed the blonde out of the way and latched her mouth onto his.

"Sally!" Sirius tried desperately to catch his breath as Ulyanov pulled the Cockney brunette off him. "Its far too early for that my dear."

"Vlad," she smiled, running a painted finger over his lips. "It's never too early to have a little fun."

Ulyanov shook his head slowly, and Sirius was amazed to see a small smile on his lips. "Don't scare the Englishmen, Sally, as a personal favor to me. That goes for you too, Roxanne!" he barked at a girl who had James halfway under the nearest table.

James for one looked rather disappointed as he crawled out from under the table, his glasses askew and the top few buttons of his robe undone. "What?" he said at Sirius's smirk.

"Just thinking how Lily would react," he smiled, grin widening at the look of horror in his friend's eyes.

"Sirius! You wouldn't!" James said angrily, pushing his glasses up onto the bridge of his nose.

"Nah' she'd flay me alive too," he said, winking at a girl in a red catsuit. She peered over the shoulder of the man she was dancing with to get a better glance at Sirius.

"Oops, you've done it again," James smirked as the girl returned Sirius's attention with a suggestive smile.

"Potter!" Ulyanov's hand reached out of nowhere, aborting Sirius's plan to pursue catsuit-girl. He practically dragged them across the club towards the bar, pushing Sirius and then James into stools. Ulyanov nodded at the bartender, an scruffy old man who couldn't have looked more out of place in the young, vibrant Roulette. "Sasha, give me two of the house specialty. And use Smirnoff, I don't want any of that Stoli shit" Ulyanov snapped. The bartender gave Ulyanov a tired smile and before Sirius could so much as blink Sasha slid two cocktails towards them. "Stay here, I don't want you to get lost. " Ulyanov barked, turning back to Sirius. He was about to make some snide comment about not needing a baby sitter, when Ulyanov pushed one of the cocktails under his nose, while handing one to James "Screwdriver, sans orange juice," Ulyanov said. "Drink." The command in his voice left no room for argument.

The liquid slid down his throat, burning at first, then turning into a full out fire. Almost instantly Sirius knew that whatever he was drinking, it wasn't vodka. But by that time, he was too far-gone to care. His world began to swim before his eyes as his lids slowly drooped. After one sip, he had the undeniable feeling of being completely plastered. Vaguely, Sirius heard Ulyanov's voice from above him, sounding very far away. "Should keep them out of the way' watch them, Sasha' Diablo will hear' photographs'"

He sensed Ulyanov moving away from the bar, and felt Sasha's sympathetic hand on his head. "You're properly plastered there, my friend," he said, sounding perfectly amicable. "How about another drink, eh?"

 

----

'and if the daylight feels like it's a long way off'

Cordoba, Spain

December 31, 1979

The Minotaur snorted, its nostrils flaring as it pawed the ground in angry excitement, tiny clouds of dust swirling about its bare feet.

Minotaur-fighting is believed to have originated circa 2000 BC, in the grand palace of Knossos at Crete. After the fall of the Cretan civilization, wizards from around the surrounding islands shipped their beloved sport all across the Mediterranean, where it was embraced by the Magical peoples of Greece, and then Rome. Finally Minotaur-fighting making a home for itself in Spain, where bullfighting, the Muggle version of this sport, was already a national obsession. [excerpt from: Quidditch to Quodpot: A Brief History of Wizarding Sport]

But the wizards gathering in the whitewashed amphitheater just outside Cordoba, Spain, couldn't give a hippogriff's tail feathers about the history of their beloved national sport. They had just come to watch a match between the Minotaur, starved for days so that it its murderous instincts were amplified by hunger, and a legendary matador known only as Diablo.

What was there to be said about Diablo? He was more than a mere Minotaur fighter, he was a hero' a messiah. No one knew where Diablo came from, he had just appeared in the ring one day in a traje de luces, the traditional embroidered suit that was as much a part of bull and Minotaur-fighting as the infamous red cape. Of course there were thousands of rumors about Diablo's origins. One legend said that he was abandoned at birth in the wilds of Crete, and he had been reared by the wild Minotaurs there, only to turn on his foster family when he was old enough to hold a sword. Where else but from the Minotaurs themselves, the Spanish wizards whispered, would Diablo learn the merciless bloodlust that he was famous for in the ring. Other stories spoke of a childhood in a jail cell, born to a mother on Death Row. Surrounded by Dementors from the first moment he opened his eyes, the young Diablo had not learned the meaning of the word emotion, and was therefore able to slay countless Minotaurs without feeling a thing. The most popular of all of these rumors, however, was that Diablo was not born at all. The wizards of Spain whispered that he was the devil in physical incarnation, ready to bring about the Armageddon. Devil, convict, or orphan the wizards watched Diablo nonetheless, fascinated and repulsed by his murderous actions in the Minotaur ring. He killed like no matador before him, relishing in the blood and carnage he created, often decimating and mutilating the corpses of the Minotaurs he slew in front of the horrified crowd. And, not knowing quite why themselves, they loved him for it.

Truth be told, there was no solid truth about Diablo, he defied all reason. He came out of nowhere, killed with cold detachment, and then disappeared into thin air as soon as the match was over.

The Minotaur snorted, its nostrils flaring as it pawed the ground in angry excitement, tiny clouds of dust swirling about its bare feet.

Diablo entered the ring, his boots digging into the duty surface of the arena. He commanded the ring like a deity and try as they might, the watching wizards were unable to wrench their eyes away from the matador. An overwhelming cheer rose from the crowd squeezed into the tiny whitewashed amphitheater.

A portly wizard serving as the Master of Ceremonies held up his hands for quiet. "Silencio!" he bellowed in his magically amplified voice. Even so, it took several minutes for the crowd to stop shouting Diablo's name. As for Diablo himself, his face was chipped of ice. The king of matadors stood there, impassive, not even hearing the cheers of his fans. The portly wizard cleared his throat at turned to the wildly expectant crowd. "!En el nombre de Jesús Cristo, deje la lucha comenzar!" Diablo spat on the ground at this appeal to the Almighty. This sudden gesture was enough to send the crowd into wild screeches: some of anger, some of adoration, and some just for screeching's sake.

Scornful and aloof, Diablo ignored them and turned his view to the Minotaur. He licked his lips.

The Minotaur was truly a disgusting beast, its bull's head twitching in what appeared to be some sort of frenzied seizure its bloodshot eyes nearly popped from its skull. Diablo wouldn't be surprised if the monster was rabid. Beneath the Minotaur's bovine head was the body of a man, muscles rippling like liquid steel under tanned skin. Despite its vaguely humanoid appearance, the Minotaur was truly a beast, lacking the capacity for human speech and civilized interaction. Diablo saw it as his solemn duty to rid the world of such half-blood filth as the Minotaur, so close to humanity, and yet so far. Besides, he liked the feeling of sliding his sword into warm flesh, watching the pained look in beast's eyes as his cursed life ebbed away.

Slowly, Diablo reached a hand to his shoulder, unfurling the red matador's cape he had draped across his back. With a deft flick of the hand, he extended it, waving it just in front of the maddened Minotaur's view. The Minotaur lowered his disgusting head, froth and spittle dripping from his hairy jowls, and charged.

Just in time, Diablo twirled the cloak away, spinning on his toes like a ballet dancer as the Minotaur breezed past him, his horns lowered. They gleamed like twin daggers in the hot Spanish sun.

By now, Diablo was oblivious to the screams of the crowd. He dropped the cloak on the dusty arena floor, pulling a sword from the scabbard at his hip. Light and flimsy, his blade looked as if it could do little harm to the enormous Minotaur, though Diablo had proven this postulate wrong on many an occasion.

The Minotaur growled, a long unearthly sound that originated in the bottom of its throat and seemed to personify every ounce of anger and pain that had ever passed through this godforsaken world in its 4 billion years of existence. The cry would have brought weaker men than Diablo to his knees. But he just laughed it off, twirling his sword between his pale white fingers. They didn't call him the son of the devil for nothing.

Beast or not, the Minotaur seemed to understand this insult to its dignity. He dug his heels into the ground and rushed at Diablo, his horns lowered. The beast's vulnerable torso wasn't anywhere in range of his sword so Diablo dropped it on the ground, and instead of running in the opposite direction, took a hold of the beasts horns.

The Minotaur let out a cry of fury as Diablo vaulted easily onto his back, like the Cretans so many thousands of years ago. Doing a flip, he wrapped his hands over the animal's eyes, pressing the sides of his knees into the beast's temples at the same time. Furious, the monster dropped to the ground, bucking and screeching in a futile attempt to rid itself of its unwanted passenger. Long bands of spittle swung from the Minotaur's lips like lassos. Diablo ignored its hysterics. Calmly, he let go of the Minotaur's head and reached into the pocket of his jacket, pulling out a smile knife that was no larger than his thumbnail. Fitting the blade carefully between his fingers, Diablo bent down over the terrified beast, digging his knees flush against its head.

"Adiós," he whispered, as he dug the blade into the soft flesh of the Minotaur's throat. The animal opened his mouth to let loose a death cry, but his vocal cords were severed and all that came out was empty air' and blood.

Diablo smiled as he ran his fingers in the warm liquid, the soft flesh just a hairsbreadth away from life.

He laughed. Not bothering to wipe off his dripping fingers, he reached over to where his sword lay abandoned on the dust and picked it up, driving in deep into the Minotaur's exposed torso. The crowd screamed in delight as their blood boiled. A wash of adrenaline had buried their natural revulsion towards violence and gore, causing them into the mindless destruction of another living creature. And Diablo was the gateway to these darker feelings. Diablo was the key.

He smiled to himself. The mob was shouting his name. How quaint.

"Señor!" A lone figure was hurrying across the floor of the amphitheater; his black wizard's robes making him stick out against the pure white of the arena like sore thumb. "Señor Malfoy?"

A wave of excited whispers rushed over the rapt crowd. Their hero, the mysterious Diablo, finally had a name.

Diablo whirled around, his silvery blonde hair gleaming white under the Spanish sun. He recognized the figure in black as one of his many butlers, a terribly thin man with an aquiline nose and a penchant for trembling. "What?" he hissed at the quivering servant who had dared to enter his ring, his sanctum, his temple of death and destruction.

"There'" the man's voice quivered as he paled under Lucius Malfoy's piercing gaze. "There is an urgent messenger from Moscow waiting in your office. You must meet him immediately."

"Who are you to tell me what I must and must not do!" Malfoy yelled, pulling his bloody sword from the corpse of the Minotaur.

"Please sir' I'"

Raising the blade, Malfoy struck his servant across the face. The man fell to his knees and lay quivering in a tiny pile of limbs and robes and blood. For the second time that day, Malfoy spat in disgust. Kicking the corpse of the Minotaur, kicking the terrified form of his servant, he stormed out of the ring, cries of "Malfoy! Malfoy!" following him all the way home.

 

----

 

'and if your glass heart should crack'

9.1 meters.

That translates into 3 meters square--

which is roughly equivalent to:

1. a small bathroom

2. one of the earliest computers

3. > of a sportscar

Chapter One-- Things Have Changed

The price of a memory is the memory of the sorrow it brings.

-The Counting Crows, Mrs. Potter's Lullaby

Moscow, Russia

December 31, 1996

For the first time in his life, Sirius Black hesitated. His fingers brushed against the dark wood of the door, its slick grain sliding harmlessly across his glove. He bit his lip. Even now, he wasn't sure if he was doing the right thing' if there even was a right thing.

"You goin' in or not, sir?" the doorman said in heavily accented English, his breath freezing into little puffs of white with every new word. He looked particularly frozen and hence irritable in his too-big glasses and threadbare penguin tuxedo. "Govn'uk," he whispered under his breath, shooting Sirius a particularly dirty look.

Govn'uk. Bastard. Sirius may not have been to Russia for twenty years, but if there was one thing he remembered, it was his curses. He wheeled around to face the doorman, ready to give the man a few govn'uky of his own. Then he paused. The porter wasn't any older than a kid, younger than Sirius himself had been when he had first come to the Russian Roulette. He was shivering, his frozen freckled nose just barely illuminated by the half-light of Moscow's street lamps. So instead of cursing the porter to kingdom come, Sirius gave the kid a sympathetic glance. If he was 16 and freezing his ass off while some old fogie hesitated in front of a door he wished to anything he could enter, he'd at least call the customer a govn'uk, if not worse, he thought remembering his own youthful misdeeds. "Yeah," he said, inhaling the freezing night air. "I'm going in."

The Porter wiped his nose on the sleeve of his tuxedo and then said his favorite English word. "Tip?"

the amount of living space granted to each person living in the Soviet Union. (NB- Even this was not granted. As late as 1979, in some parts of the USSR, as many as 60 people were forced into tenement homes built for 10.)

your entire world.

3 meters square.

"Working men of all countries, unite! You have nothing to loose but your chains. You have a world to win!"

-excerpt from the Communist Manifesto

 

----

 

'and for a second you turn back'

Moscow, U.S.S.R.

"Which one is he?"

Ulyanov grabbed the disinterested girl by the chin. She was halfway through pulling off her fake eyelashes and gave a disgruntled cry of pain as he pulled her away from the bar. "That one you little shalava!" Angrily, he pointed across the club to where the son of the Minister of Magic sat, nursing a vodka martini, and laughing at something his spectacled friend had said.

"Easy, Vlad, easy," she scowled, wrenching her chin from his grasp, "Do I play the Romonov act?"

"No," Ulyanov said after a moment of consideration. "This one is a real prick. He wouldn't even know what the hell you were talking about."

"Fair enough," she said, flipping her blonde hair from her eyes. "If he's such a prick, why are you going to all this trouble?"

"Because he's a useful prick," Ulyanov said cryptically, eyeing the Minister's son from across the club.

The shavala gave Ulyanov an appraising glance. "Who are you working for this time, Vlad?" she said, the faintest trace of mocking in her tone.

Ulyanov's eyes narrowed. "Don't ask questions."

"You know my fee," she said, running her foot up his leg suggestively.

Ulyanov gripped her wrist, wrenching it hard. "No games. Not now, this is all too dangerous, too delicate! One wrong move and it will all come toppling down, poppet. Toppling down on you."

She wrenched her wrist from his grasp; smile wiped clear off her face. "What's in it for me?" She growled.

"If I play my cards right, Diablo will be paying us a visit tomorrow," Ulyanov whispered, leaning towards her.

She looked away from him, her gaze traveling to the Roulette's single window, where a single sliver of night-sky was visible. "He can give me what I want," she whispered, her voice barely audible. "What I want'"

"If you give him what he wants," Ulyanov countered, breaking her reverie to pieces. "Strong believer in quid pro quo, Mr. Malfoy."

"Don't make me do it," she said quietly, her voice franticly trembling. "Vlad, don't make me, I'll do anything else, I--"

"I've waited too long," he said , gripping her chin and forcing her too meet his gaze. "I've waited far too long for everything to be thrown to pieces by a terrified little child," he spat, his breath stinking of vodka. "You're a puppet, Narcissa, learn how to let me pull the strings!"

Trembling in his grip, she let out a quiet sob.

Instantly, Ulyanov's manner changed. "Oh poppet, poppet," he said, letting go and drawling her into an fatherly embrace. "Don't cry, you'll spoil your makeup." He gripped her by the shoulders, more gently this time, and met her wavering gaze. "This will be your ticket out of here."

Narcissa ran a finger under her eye, trying to wipe away all traces of her tears. "Just get' get me the visa, Vlad," she said quietly, her voice still on unsteady legs. "Get me the visa and I'll do whatever you want."

"You'll do that anyway, poppet," he said quietly.

Narcissa closed her eyes, and shrugged hesitantly. She knew the truth in Ulyanov's statement. Suddenly, she stood up, squared her shoulders and met his mocking stare. "The visa," she repeated, her voice quavering. "I'm fucking desperate, don't take any more advantage of that than you absolutely have to."

"I'll do anything for you, dear," Ulyanov sang, tipping his fur hat at her. She slunk away through the crowd towards the Minister's son. Smirking to himself, Ulyanov reached his hand into his pocket. Mercifully, the camera was still there. Though he had not told his little shalava, this tryst was also his ticket out of this hellhole.

 

----

 

'oh no, be strong'

Cordoba, Spain

It was Ulyanov.

Lucius Malfoy gave him a disgusted glance as he sunk into a leather armchair by his fireplace. "You interrupted me at a most inconvenient time," he said coldly as he eyed Ulyanov's head in the fire, his gray hair not even singed by the flickering flames. What a pity. "You know better than to intrude upon my private amusements, Mr. Ulyanov," he hissed.

"But' the'" Ulyanov stuttered nervously, his disgustingly Russian accent grating at Lucius's frayed patience. "The' Aurors have arrived from the British Ministry, sir'"

"You know better than to intrude upon my activities," Lucius repeated, his voice little more than a dangerous purr as he unfastened the clasp to his matador's jacket.

"But'" Ulyanov was quickly loosing all of his marginal self-assurance, resorting to sniveling like an idiot.

Lucius didn't even bother to hide the absolute disgust in his face. "You told me to contact you when they arrived'" Ulyanov whined sulkily.

Lucius said nothing, playing suggestively with the edge of his bloody matador's sword. Ulyanov visibly swallowed. "I should have known better, Master, I'"

"You are an idiot and a fool and will pay the consequences when we next meet," Malfoy drawled, tapping his knuckles on the flat of his blade. "Which, unfortunately for me, will be all too soon."

"Master, I--"

"Now that you have so rudely interrupted me," Lucius cut him off silkily. "Kindly state your business and remove yourself from my fireplace' in the greatest velocity."

"With the greatest velocity," Ulyanov began. "You can't be in a velocity--"

"Obviously do not value your skin, overmuch" Lucius prodded, smarting from being corrected by an imbecile whose first language was Russian.

"The Aurors' have arrived," Ulyanov swallowed as he realized his mistake. He shook his head, inanely and nervously, causing the flames to flicker.

"You're disrupting my fireplace, Ulyanov," Lucius said warningly.

Ulyanov's head instantly stopped twitching. "I've taken them to the Russian Roulette, which will keep them occupied and oblivious until your lordship makes time to deal with them accordingly," he said, sounding remarkably coherent for the first time in his disgusting existence. "The plan has already been set into action."

Lucius stroked the rich velvet of his matador's jacket, considering. He would have liked to spend a few more days in Spain, but Ulyanov had created an opportunity too good to pass up. Not that Lucius would ever give his miserable creature the satisfaction of knowing that fact. "Very well," Lucius finally said, sounding quite the put-upon. "Tell Miriken to expect me tomorrow night, and Ulyanov?"

"Yes, sir?"

"Wash before I arrive," Lucius sneered. "I can smell you all the way from Moscow."

Ulyanov's head disappeared without another word.

Growling disdainfully to himself, Lucius thrust his sword into the fire and stirred the flames, trying to rid them of any vestigial

traces of his disgusting subordinate. He would not allow himself to become contaminated by that filth.

"You poor, poor man," Lucius didn't so much as move as a woman sidled up behind him and began to massage his shoulders. "Pobrecito' Usted necesita un poco de mi amor ?verdad?"

Lucius groaned as he took a hold of the woman's hand. It was Consuelo, one of his many personal "assistants". Unlike the bumbling Ulyanov, Consuelo had the gift of knowing exactly what to "say" at exactly the right time.

She began to cluck sympathetically as she sidled up beside him. "I know not how you tolerate such' what is the word? Here in España, we call them putas."

"Prostitutes," Lucius filled in disdainfully as Consuelo chuckled, her enormous gold hoop earrings tinkling as she shook her head.

"You are a great man, Señor Diablo, to tolerate so many putas."

Lucius laughed at that, because in her own sensual way, Consuelo was as much of a puta and hanger-on as Ulyanov. They all wanted a tiny bit of his glory. The only difference between the two putas was that his "assistant" was intelligent enough to know she meant nothing to him, whilst Ulyanov had to be constantly reminded of his own worthlessness. "I pay you well, Señorita," Lucius said as Consuelo's painted red lips curved into a self depreciating smile.

 

----

 

'walk on, walk on / what you got they can't steal it, nah they can't even feel it / walk on, walk on / stay safe tonight'

Moscow, U.S.S.R

Two hours and twenty drinks later, Sirius was, if anything, even more clueless.

Light! Heat! Twenty heartbeats all meshed into one rumbling, tumbling never-ending tidal wave of passion and pleasure'

it seemed that all of Moscow was dancing, strangers united in one common quest: to forget.

'to forget the pain'

'hardship'

'cold'

'hopeless disintegration of their lives'

'the Roulette brought this much needed reprieve, and as the frenzy of light, heat, drink, and love united a city divided'

'the dance intensified, the lights grew brighter, and the escape came closer'

'if they couldn't have a visa, at least they could paint the goddamn town red'

This was the heart and soul of the Russian Roulette.

But, for once, Sirius was immune to the growing frenzy behind him. As Ulyanov wandered off to God knows where and James spun across the dance floor with one of the Roulette girls, he found himself hovering on the fringes of the crowd, doubt clinging to him like a burial shroud.

Ever since the trio had stepped foot inside of the swanky club, an ominous sense of foreboding had been gnawing at his mind. Something he could not begin to understand. If Sirius believed in divination, he would have high-tailed it out of the club. But he didn't, and writing off his ill vibes to being too sozzled to think straight, he collapsed next to the bar with the half-baked idea of finding good ol' Moony. Never mind that Moony was 2,000 miles away, he had to be around the Roulette somewhere. Prongs was already too lost in the crowd to pursue. Glancing around the bar, Sirius shook his head. Not only was Moony gone, but the bartender as well, undoubtedly swept up in the roaring celebration taking place behind him.

Sirius groped at the counter as he almost slid off of one of the barstools. His head was spinning wildly from all of the booze Sasha had pumped into him. He'd have a splitting hangover the next morning. What made Sirius feel all the worse was that normally he relished moments like this. He rode drunkenness' smoky sensuality like a pro, throwing himself completely into the high. But now all he wanted was to be able to think straight, and this unusual pensiveness was more than alarming to his live-and-let-die side.

Behind him a great scream erupted as someone set off a small bomb, showering the club with sparks. Sirius watched as some hit the bar, sizzling as they landed in an abandoned cocktail. Glancing around to see if anyone would notice, Sirius furtively reached for the drink. He wasn't going to get sober anytime soon, and knocking himself out a bit more couldn't hurt...

"I wouldn't drink that if I was you," a woman's voice said from the shadows to his left.

Sirius spun around, but the speaker was veiled in darkness. "You're not me," he said hoarsely as he raised the glass to his lips.

"Well spotted," the stranger said, leaning a little closer to Sirius. Her face was still cloaked by shadow.

"In that case ," Sirius shrugged non-committally at the stranger as he took a giant swig of the cocktail.

The woman's voice was touched by amusement. "The drinks are spiked."

Sirius sputtered, setting the cocktail down with a clatter. "With what?"

The woman waited a second before replying, "Potions," She drew the word out across her tongue like a viper, savoring every syllable. "Potions of Zvana Miriken's own invention. Potions to addle the mind and numb the senses. Potions that increase the Roulette's earnings by at least 20% every night." She reached one perfectly manicured hand out of the shadows to trace the line of Sirius's jaw.

"How do the... Potions do that?" he stammered, beginning to understand why he couldn't think straight.

"Drunk men are not picky," the woman purred.

Sirius knew there was a catch in this conversation somewhere. "Are you always so cynical?" he spluttered, taking another swig of the cocktail. Potions or not, he was too addled to care.

She gave a small laugh. "Only at work."

"You... you work here?" Sirius asked, beginning to put two and two together. He tried to get to his feet in order to get a better glance at the woman, but instead, he fell flat on his face, stumbling out of the stool and slamming his chin against the bar.

Her tone instantly grew gentler. "You better come with me. Don't speak," she whispered, holding one delicate finger to his lips. "No words at all. Not now. Not here."

She took his hand, sweaty and dusty and rough in her own. She could feel his pulse beat against her wrist, where her own lifeblood flowed, in veins so delicate.

So fragile.

She led him through the mess of people, all their hopeless dreams boiling themselves away into one huge dance, a frenzied orgy of despair.

"I am in the winter of my life," she whispered as he pushed her up against the wall, her hands groping at the peeling plaster as his fingers found handholds on her back, her thigh, the hollow of her throat'

He pressed his thumb against her neck, feeling the vibrations of her smoky voice. "I am in the winter of my life'" she whispered again. "It won't be long now."

"What's your name?" he whispered slowly, his breath sliding across her sweaty face.

"I told you not to say anything," she said in a sing-song voice, twining her fingers through his hair. "Besides, you won't remember in the morning."

"I--"

"No words," she repeated, slipping her hands about his neck. "No words at all--" She turned away from his kiss to stare longingly out the open window. "We are such stuff as dreams are made of," she whispered quietly, oblivious to his touch, his breath, his heart beating beside her own. Slowly, she closed her eyes and swayed to the rhythm of the club. "This is all a little dream to you," she said as he worked his way down her neck. "Forgettable' ah--" She heaved a breath as his lips fluttered towards her tiny chest. "Oh' I am in the winter of my life," she repeated her mantra as his fingers tightened their grip on his hair. "And it won't be long now'" Her gaze shifted mechanically from the open window to his sweat-streaked face, barely visible in the wild strobe lights of the club. Moving for the first time, she ran one finger over the top of his forehead, tracing the bridge of his nose, finally lingering upon his lips. They stayed like that for the longest while. Neither one could moved, heartbeats entwined, as the club pulsed around them, through them, pumping into their veins. His breath caught in his throat when she finally broke the silence.

"Let's get down to business." She took his dirty hand in her own and placed it on the inside of her thigh. "I'm all yours, Joe."

"Sirius," he corrected quietly.

"You're all Joe to me."

And he lost himself in the taste of her lipstick and the mystery of her cheap perfume.

 

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Up Next Time in Of Mice and Mensheviks- Let there be Lupin!

Thanks to- CLS and Rowena especially for beta-ing,, without either of them, this fic would not be up here.

Thanks to everyone that reviewed: Robyn, Katie Bell, Juliana, NS, viva paire, Misao, Marsisbright, Viktor'sGurl, leanne, aslan, stickpegasus, puzzler, choclate fireguard, arthur's merlin, kali ma, kelly, tia'rahu, ceitlin malefoy, moon, netshark, lauren vork, amanita lestrange, silvertounge, sorceress, meitora, kneazle, aragog, trinity day, and last but by no means least, trepidatio

Also thanks to- William Shakespeare, whom Narcissa quotes. Kurt Vonnegut, whom I am under the influence of, and Baz Luhrmann (that name is synonymous with God in my world :O). I have seen Moulin Rouge, and though I started this fic before I did, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't influenced :O).)

Kudos to all that can place Ulyanov's name and Roulette gals (and guy) references

Once again thanks, peace, please read and review and'

If someone asked you to play Russian Roulette, what would you say?