#jamesgros

moderation has never been her strongest virtue. ( she has never viewed it as a virtue at all. she is all fire and blood and raw hunger wrapped in finery, painted pretty the best Nikolai could to keep the dimmer men who dealt with her off balance when she flipped a table and started shooting. )

here, her hair smells like war and it’s bloody and tacky, and it’s all so familiar. ( here, German, some poetry for you, some poetry you’ll understand, at least. here, German, her heart, fresh from hell and still screaming. ) she is dead, or was, or supposed to be, but she is solid and burning battle bright and glorious. 

Nikolai Kuznetsov has come for the girl in the window. ( her brother is with her and he will not let her go alone. the tsar smiles his sharp smile and lets them both come. the journey is hard and in their fevers, she feels him die, he feels her die, they are going it alone. Nikolai could not have them stay together, but he will have them, he will have them. ) 

She is more of a warrior than he could have guessed. ( he asks her to marry him each night, his teeth in her neck, in her heart, in her thigh. she says when the war is over. the war is going badly. I will be your war prize, Kolya. Earn me. and he tries, bless him, his hand in her hair, between her thighs, his voice all shimmer and silver against her soul. )

her hand in his, his on the small of her back, she did not know he would be here, but she is a fool, and he is a fool, and she can still make little jokes in German in his ear as they glide around the floor. “Du hättest mir sagen sollen dass du hier bist — “ you should have told me you were here, informal, informal, — “Ich könnte Ihre Fliege fixiert haben.” I could have fixed your bow tie. She swears she sees him smile, though it could just be a trick of the light, it could just be her wanting it so, but if it was, then it would be the first time, and her heart is breaking, if it was, she knew she was in too deep, if it was — 

THIS IS NOT HOW IT ALL BEGINS, BUT; 

@beautxfulbeautxful

The Girl is small enough to hold in her arms, small enough to twirl around the office with a view of the East River behind her desk. “If you want to lead, you can lead next time, alright, lapushka? Never let anyone tell you you can’t lead or be in charge.” She spins around quickly before dipping the toddler dramatically. “It just means they’re afraid of you.” 

@allpurposebogeyman

Mr. Liu has briefed her on Mr. Kasun. ( briefed might be too formal. Danny Liu and Genevieve Bauer are partners, but also friends, but also tired of running, but also lionhearted souls twisted into something else, something awful, but something that is very good at surviving. Danny Liu is not here today, he’s busy meeting her representative to London, which is to say, he is busy trying not to brain Eric Lane with his own bust of the queen. ) Sgt. Madame Bauer has her hands extended to Mr. Kasun and a little smile in place. There is a song playing on the radio, old and slow, and she would like some company, and she would like to know how terrible Mr. Kasun’s range of motion in his arm is getting. No business, not now, just a break right before the sun rises, before the world begins to fall apart once more. 

@physixian​

THE WAR IS OVER ; 

It is good to see the Good Doctor outside of an exam room. It is good to see the Good Doctor this side of the Atlantic, away from --- well, there are things buried by the War, you know. ( she has yet to learn they always come back. ) There are no words as she comes up to his side and slips her hand around the crook of his arm. A look up, her smile falling to show the expression she wore for five years in Germany, in France, in the USSR, Little Jack, too serious for his age, his size, gone in a flash. “It didn’t close properly until ‘45,” she whispers as she moves in to kiss his cheek in parting. To erase any doubt of who she once was. ( Doctor’s orders, before going to Doc, were bedrest. Obviously, not an option in France in 1943. A small little hospital, a man Alexi trusted, and quiet words in Serbian. “Možete li da naučiti mog brata kako ga pravilno očistiti? Nikad ne sluša kada ga uputim.” Could you teach my brother how to  clean it properly? He never listens to me. A soft laugh as pain shoots through Jack’s body, pain enough to make his strong little hands shake. “Ohn vas voli.” He likes you better. ) 

@jamesgros​

He is not hers, but her head is on his chest as they move slowly about the room, his humming matching the music, his heart keeping time. It’s alright to pretend, sometimes, isn’t it? It doesn’t mean anything, the way she leans into him, the fact that there is no one else around for this show, that it’s just them in a hotel room, with a half empty bottle of whiskey, with their bloodstained clothes in a trash bag, with the smell of sulfur not quite washed out of her hair. But it’s alright, they’re alright, and she swears she feels his head rest on top of hers as she closes her eyes, maybe it’ll be alright, maybe this won’t end with his pistol pressed against her sternum. ( she will remember how little it all meant. ) 

@physixian​

Francis is not one for dancing, not unless there is a purpose, a distraction, a gnawing in her chest to touch something that will stain her hands and there are no paints around. There are men who would like to dance with one or the other of them, women, too, and Francis is Tired and Cold. The Good Doctor and his Dear Heart are Not Friends, but she sleeps in his bed and knows the sound of his pain seeping through the bandages he administered himself. They are Not Friends, but she’d kill for him, if he needed it, if there was no one else around, if it’d please him, isn’t that funny? They are Both Tired, but the dance goes on, so they might as well dance together. 

@beautxfulbeautxful

It goes back to the woods. ( To where they met, her bow drawn, the breath knocked from her lungs at the sight of him. Enemy colors, his hand on his sword, but neither makes the choice to go forward. They part, when they have properly memorized the other, when their breath comes back, when they would have even more regrets if they had stayed, their arms being laid down, words spoken, not possible, not possible, they have work to do. Not a word was exchanged, but she was shaken to her core. She should have killed him then; it is perhaps her greatest regret, and she has a fair number as far as he is concerned. ) It is one of the statues that her sister made, had to be, with its honesty and semblance; one of the statues that the pilgrims avoid, with his unrepentant eyes and dust, and dust. ( She knew him, when he came to her court, not hers, not hers, but on bended knee, but there for a time. What good is a mercenary to a queen? Heartache, she learned. ) The question of why had never been there. Even the question of why she loved him to begin. It is the same reason she breathes; because she must, because there is no other way, because there is something inside her that reacts to the thought of what once was what could have been what was almost what was never and unthinkable and grieves, and grieves. If the statue was him, it would know. But forgive her, she wants to hear his voice, even if it is from something that is not him. (Or if it is him, he wants to hear it from her, her shame and her weakness, and who is she to deny the man who left her broken, shattered to dust.) “It is this or die myself.” To stop eating, to waste away, to die in her sleep like the broken little bird she is, heart stopping from the effort and slipping from the world like a shadow in dawn. Her eyes are closed. She does not need to see him, has never. The statue was meant to be a joke, to herself, but others took it, ran with it, burn effigies and pray for his soul, his statue guards, now, isn’t that funny. Does belief grant power? She hopes not, if only so he could rest for once, without the torment of others’ needs. What else can she, should she say? There are no words between them. No words but destruction. Because you are half my soul and I have forgotten how to speak with your bones in the earth. Because the sky mocks me with its color on bright summer days and I want to weep when I feel the sunlight on my skin. Because there is no air. Because I hate you for not killing me. Because I love and love and love and you are gone but my love only grows.“And you did not want me to die.” You are cruel enough for that. But give her permission... ( Isn’t that funny? A man with no volition, with no say of his own, withholding her death from her. What use is a mercenary to a queen, Nikolai had told her once. But to kill her? It is a shame she had wanted his hand around her throat from the moment she laid eyes on him in the woods. What a sweet death it would have been for his blade to pierce her heart, to slit her throat, for her soul to bleed out onto him. ) 

Name: Eloise Agnes Bauer (Ellie)

Gender: Female

General Appearance: She radiates. Bright blue eyes and freckles, she is obviously--- well, theirs. (if they see her with the bear, of course it is him, with her sharp smile. the statue, well, the eyes are hard to miss. the dove? it’s the freckles.) She does not favor one parent; blue eyes, light hair, freckles, defiance in her shoulders, pride in her jaw, steady strength in her step. The rest of the world bends around her, away from her, rolls off of her like water down a cliff face. Taller than her mother by the time she was ten, she tops out at 5′8″. Lean muscle, a strong core, and calloused hands. ( my, little girl, what sharp teeth you have. )

Personality: Distractedly present; in the past she would have been a witch or a saint or something much worse. In the now, she is otherworldly, too harsh and critical, too grounded in reality. She was raised by spies, and worse; mass murderers, and worse. Monsters held her in their teeth, the still hot blood of their enemies keeping her warm. Her cradle songs were the hushed tones of organizing burials, of discussing disposing of the bodies, of how to stop the world if it needed to cease. ( her mother hand hands like flower petals, as fragrant and gentle. Kolya carried her everywhere, even when she outgrew her mother. he taught her how to throw a knife when she was six, how to fire a gun when she was eight, how to clean blood stains from carpeting when she was eleven. and Papa. well. she remembers falling asleep on his chest, of rumbling noises and safety like nothing anyone else could imagine, could ever know. she tries to be that for others. in another life, she has brothers, younger, who are half a foot taller than her but heel at her command, and they know she would never let anything hurt them. ) Kind in her own way, it is overshadowed by her force of will and solitary nature. 

Special Talents: Finding trouble; making sure it is not trouble for very long. Knowing when her bonehead brothers need her to rescue them. Making friends; keeping allies; distracting people who can’t be won over. Charismatic, good at reading situations. Six languages. 

Who they like better: James. (Nikolai knows. Nikolai does not like to be reminded of this.)

Who they take after more: A tie between James and Nikolai, with Ginny’s good alignment thrown in to counteract their respective “neutral” and “evil”. ( though she’ll stray into neutral occasionally. )

Personal Head canon: She is not an operative in the way her parents were, but she is entirely capable of handling herself. Technically, she works as a consultant for civic planners, though it’s a little funny that she works mostly in Central Asia and Chechnya and the Middle East, isn’t it?

Face Claim: Caity Lotz

      Nikolai is, well, a difficult man. Massive, imposing, violent even when his hand and lips are still. There he is, now, sitting at Genevieve’s kitchen table, going over documents with her, while The Child is sitting on The German’s knee across the table, attempting to draw something with clumsy hands and a too serious expression. Genevieve spares them glances, and Kuznetsov catches smiles(of a sort.) exchanged between the two. How lewd. How indulgent. The Child sighs like she’s out of breath and looks up to her father, a mess of languages all tangled up in her mind as she attempts to express herself. She chooses German, and Bosnian, with a Russian influenced syntax. Genevieve laughs, her hand covering her mouth, sweet words in Bosnian coming out after The Child glares at her mother, gentle hands reaching out to brush back blonde curls. ( it’s funny. they all learn this new language of Ellie’s childhood. ) The Child remembers The German rumbling a bit, an affirmation, a hum, she doesn’t know, she just remembers the vibration at her back, the strong hands keeping her from falling over, and the icy eyes from The Russian.