Rating:

Mature

Archive Warning:

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category:

Gen

Fandom:

Game Changers | Heated Rivalry - All Media Types

Relationships:

Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov & Irina Rozanova, Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov & Ilya Rozanov, Alexei Rozanov/Original Female Character(s)

Characters:

Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov, Ilya Rozanov, Irina Rozanova, Original Characters

Additional Tags:

POV Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov, Canonical Character Death, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Abusive Grigori Rozanov, Magical Realism, Non-Linear Narrative, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Angst, the burden of being the oldest in a broken household, Resentment, character study [kind of], when the only options are to be hurt or cause it and you've never been afraid of blood on your knuckles, the most fitting kind of pain is the pain you know you deserve

Language:

English

Series:

Part 31 of heated rivalry masterlist, Part 8 of ghostly ghouls get game

Stats:

Published: 2026-07-16 Words: 4,223 Chapters: 1/1

a white blank page and a swelling rage

Summary

He shouldn't—he's not supposed to call her that. He's seventeen. He's an adult. Mama is for children, for people who are idiots and emotional, for the soft and tender. Alexei is not soft. He is not tender.

He cannot be.

He knew something was happening, had felt the hum of earth under his feet, the rustle of warning in the birdsong of the orenda of the world. Moscow sings, Mama has—had—always said. Open ears will hear the truth of the world if only one will listen.

Still. He had ignored it.

OR: Alexei Rozanov grows up in a home that becomes a grave.

Notes

this is not a happy fic. alexei is not well or good or even okay. general warnings for everything tagged above and misogyny. enjoy reading!

The house is quiet when he gets in, the gray shadows of winter clinging like cobwebs. The iron gate creaks in greeting as he slips by, a prickle of unease settling over his skin.

He can't hear Ilya.

These days Ilya is alone in the kitchen more often than not, placated by Alexei's half-hearted attention some evenings, and an outright terror the others. The only thing that keeps him somewhat in line is the sword of judgment from their father, and the drawn lines of pain across Mama's brow.

He kicks his shoes off and shrugs out of his jacket, tossing it across the kitchen table.

The quiet presses in.

Under his skin, something shivers and turns to stone, as he creeps past the empty stovetop, the guttered fireplace, and stares at the gloomy stretch of hallway, the door to Mama's sitting room half-cracked.

Alexei steps forward, drifting in slowly, his hand extending, the whorls of his fingertips settling against the oak grain as he flattens his hand and pushes the door fully open.

Ilya is the first things he sees, on his knees, his head bowed as if in prayer, before the room reconfigures into—

Alexei blinks, refocusing, his gaze landing on Ilya again, unable to comprehend what he's—

He's curled up, head tucked into the soft curve of Mama's still ribs, her shirt splotchy and dark under him, soaked underneath his silent tears. His curls are mussed, his shirt collar all out of place in the back.

Alexei thinks, upon his first full step through the doorway, before he has understood, before his eyes have stopped skipping over that terrible, broken stillness, Mama would usually fix that.

He stands in the doorway of Mama's favorite sitting room and falters, eyes returning to that slump of body.

He blinks again, trying to understand, as jagged pieces of an enlightenment he never asked for burn into place in his mind.

Her hand is limp, pale, almost dragging on the ground. She's on the couch, her make up pristine. Her eyes are closed.

The room is cold. Ice cold.

He thinks, Mama is cold, too.

For a half a beat, he thinks, Mama needs a blanket.

He shouldn't—he's not supposed to call her that. He's seventeen. He's an adult. Mama is for children, for people who are idiots and emotional, for the soft and tender. Alexei is not soft. He is not tender.

He cannot be.

He knew something was happening, had felt the hum of earth under his feet, the rustle of warning in the birdsong of the orenda of the world. Moscow sings, Mama has—had—always said. Open ears will hear the truth of the world if only one will listen.

Still. He had ignored it.

Polina had been splitting her cigarettes with him, and Ivan had been spinning a web of tales that had made him laugh, and he had felt the shiver of the earth, the crack of some bone, and he had thought, if I go home, I will have to deal with it, and he thought, let me be selfish for once, like he always did, and he thought, Mama will be there for Ilya, and then he thought, I am getting soft, and Father will be displeased, and then he had stolen a lit cigarette from Polina and laughed at the burn against his skin.

He presses tight against the sharp crackle of red, the pain slow to come. He thinks, distantly, about nerve damage, about how it's always the scars that you never want to stay that cling.

He thinks something has been broken a long time. He thinks this has made sure that it will never be fixed, because why would this make his life easier, and he flinches, because he is a terrible son.

"Ilya," he says, but there's a yawning emptiness where his words should go, some ghostly wail that cannot be stopped, tucked behind a terrible reckoning that will come if he says what he needs to.

It's not peaceful, this frozen tableau. It's a battlefield, shaping up under his feet, a sword of cruelty made in a crucible of stern expectation. He will draw blood, if he continues.

He does not let that stop him.

"Ilya," he says, again, this time with real words, instead of that horrible keen. "Get up."

Kindness, he thinks wildly as his ears pop under some dense pressure, the bones of the house rattling under his words, is weakness.

"Ilya," he snarls, and there's venom in his mouth, and everything is wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, and Ilya cannot be dead, too; Alexei cannot be the only one left in this household with their father, and he is striding over to Ilya's body, and he's yanking him up, and Ilya is screaming, his fingers scrabbling for anything, for Mama, for some sort of purchase, and Alexei thinks, even in death she cannot have peace, and then he is furious as Ilya's hands latch onto her necklace that she has always worn, and all at once there is a cataclysmic noise, and Alexei is thrown backwards, slamming into the chair behind him.

When he looks up, Ilya has the necklace fisted tight in his trembling hands, and all Alexei can think is I always knew she loved you more.

***

"But, I don't want a brother," Alexei says, his hands fisted tight into his covers. They're blue, because Papa Father said that it was a fitting color for a young boy. Alexei doesn't tell anyone, not even Mama, but he likes yellow more. "Put him back."

Mama laughs, a soft, gentle sound that he only ever hears in his room, and he thinks, with muddled satisfaction, that he is everything his Mama could want; she doesn't need another.

"Rypka," she chides, leaning forward the smooth a thumb over his cheeks. Her touch is a balm against his skin, and he leans into it, shameless for more affection. "Don't you want a playmate?"

"No," Alexei says, shaking his head. "I have you."

Her hand falters for a beat, but it's okay, Alexei knows she's—well. He doesn't really know. He just knows that Papa Father is mad at her more often than not, and that the baby is making her tired, and that he thinks it would all be much better if she just stopped trying to give him a little brother.

He doesn't need one. He doesn't want one.

"Well," she says, her voice quiet. There's a solemnness to her voice that normally makes him feel like she's treating him like a big kid, but this time it just makes him feel small. "One day you may want more than me."

Unspoken but known, Alexei hears: I want more than just you.

***

The phone is hot in his hand, by the time he hangs up, though Alexei can't tell if it's because he's been holding it too tightly or for some other reason. Laughter rings in his ear. He told a joke, or, someone else did, or, no, his throat is vibrating. It must be him speaking.

Mila shimmers into being, her face smeared into a riot of watercolors, and Alexei blinks and then he is somewhere that is not here, some crystallized world of goodness, but he's still bitter, he's still always been bitter, and he does not know when his hands were not stained with rotten resentment, and he should call Ilya again, even though he just got off the phone with him. He should; he should tell him what he really thinks, how he really feels, but the phone is so heavy, and he doesn't want to yell at his little brother (again, and again, and again), but the world is so dense and cold and this is the only way to get warm, and doesn't Ilya understand that?

He's just trying to stay warm. Ilya doesn't have that problem. He was born warm, probably. Cradle-warm in Mama's lap. Blessed-warm in America. Protected-warm with Mama's necklace.

He hates him, he thinks. But maybe that's just how love is. Maybe that's how it's always supposed to feel, that edge of disgust, that sickening hollowness between them. They're certainly different enough for Alexei not to know what to do with such a useless brother.

Alexei is cold, like he's supposed to be, like a Russian is, like a real Rozanov is.

His heart races. The room dissolves at the edges again, and he's laughing, he thinks, but all he can hear is the tremor of his father in his voice, and he's different, he swears, he's not like him, he's not—he's not a monster.

He's not a monster. And he doesn't need to prove it, but it's true. He knows. He's sure of it.

He's just trying to stay warm. He needs this. And that's just how it is. He's not a monster because they both know monsters, because monsters are what made Mama have an accident and Alexei had no part in that.

He's innocent, he swears.

***

"What are you doing?" Mama asks, before she catches his hands as he reaches for the corner cupboard. He's standing at her side, a chair dragged in from the dining room. There's ingredients for sweets spread out across the counter, and he's been helping by being Mama's taste tester. He thinks he's been doing a pretty good job. "Alexei, no, we do not reach for that."

"I'm helping," he tells her, unfazed by the wrinkle in her brow. Mama doesn't understand yet, but he's a big boy, and he knows how to help. "You don't like it and I don't like it, so I'm going to clean it." He reaches for it again, even as Mama catches his hands once more, and feels tears prickles in his eyes before he forces them back.

Papa said, real men don't cry, and Alexei's pretty sure he's real. So he can't cry, even if he sort of wants too, because he doesn't like the cupboard that Mama hides things in, that tugs at him and beckons, a suffocating miasma that batters at his ribs.

Mama stares at him for a beat, and he unfurls his hand, showing her the flowers he plucked from the park on their walk this afternoon.

She reaches out, her fingers trembling and drags a hand over the swell of white petals.

"Rypka," she murmurs, a watery smile spilling across her face. "You are too sweet to me." Her face stills, seriousness reemerging. "You must never touch this cupboard," she says, and waits for his confused nod and scoops the petals up from his fist. "Thank you for the gift," she murmurs, leaning over to press a kiss to his hair as she slips them into her pocket. "I will treasure them forever."

***

The day of the wedding, Polina is silent, her mouth pressed tight, her lipstick perfect. She doesn't laugh anymore, Alexei has found, not since his father decided that she would do as his bride, her father another important man in the government. It's why she was on the approved list of his friends as he grew up, though, frankly, he's vaguely pleased he's not marrying her.

Leave her with his father. He's glad to still have a choice for marriage.

The city hall is quiet, the small group of them ushered in to a private hallway immediately. Ilya has been silent all day, a far cry from his usual stupidity, but Alexei doesn't stop glaring at him every time he fidgets.

"Stand still," he hisses, pinching the back of his arm and ignoring the glower Ilya sends his way, brave for all that he runs the risk of Father seeing. Alexei certainly would not want to attend this ceremony with a black eye or a bruised cheek, but Ilya has always needed a harsher touch. Mama let him get away with far too much. "Be presentable for once in your life and not a sullen little urchin."

"I hate you," Ilya whispers, as Polina signs the documents that will see her tied to them for the rest of her life. She hasn't said a word beyond yes today. "I wish you were gone."

Alexei grins, and pinches him harder. "Good," he says, and ignores the way Ilya's eyes fill with tears.

***

"Magic," Mama counsels, when he is thirteen and uncomfortable, his body an ill-fitting match for his soul. He's been listening to her answer a stupid question Ilya asked for the past three minutes, and has abruptly been roped in for some reason. "Is about the gifts you can give back to the world, at its base instinct." She presses a warm thumb against his forehead, dragging it down his cheeks, over to his chin. Her touch doesn't hurt, even when she ghosts across the skin that's acne-scarred and tight. "When magic has given us a boon, we do not say can we please have more, we say, thank you for the gift, and then we offer the best pieces of ourselves we can."

She drags her thumb up the other half of his face, a firm, steady pressure as she looks him in the eyes. "Do not mistake magic for something that can be caught and caged and forced, rypka."

Alexei squirms under her attention. He didn't even ask, and he knows all of this. "Can I go now? Misha and Lev got a new football and they wanted to play." He shakes off her touch, glancing outside at the spring growth that's sprung up in the last week, the final dredges of winter washed away. "I get it, Mama, magic is a circle that we can only take part in if we're careful. Please, can I—am I free to go?"

"Yes," she says, after a beat, and he's flying down the hall, shoving his feet into shoes and barreling out the door, before she can say another word.

***

—cannot be seen. The protection is for all kinds, and was entirely matrilineal until Alexei and Ilya. It will be a test to see if it can connect with one of them, though I have my suspicions and so do the scholars! But, it cannot be undone, once a heir is selected. I shudder to think of what would happen if blood were to be spilled over it. Once sealed, no one may remove it; it's not a curse, although it might be if—

Alexei rereads the torn out paragraph, his attention caught on the gentle loop of Mama's handwriting.

It's from her journal, one of the one's Father destroyed in a fit of rage last night, before abruptly commanding Alexei to deal with, as he puts it, your mother's mess.

His eyes catch on the protection is for all kinds, and again on the it's not a curse.

He scrubs at his face, sourness welling in his stomach. What sort of protection would ever read as a curse?

He sets the paper to the side, and begins to shuffle through the rest of the shit on her writing desk, faltering when he stumbles across a series of letters postmarked to the National Thaumaturgical Society in Saint Petersburg.

The pages are worn with age, yellowed and fraying at the seams, dated for three months after he was born. He tentatively unfolds them, wincing at the mess inside and begins to scan. Hazily, he realizes it's the first time he's felt curious since—

He shuts that train of thought down, and lets himself sink into the letters.

He'll be in trouble, if Father returns and he hasn't taken care of this. Ilya, he knows, has been absolved of this task, set free to do other things because he's too young and sniveling to manage his emotions.

But the letters are entrancing, a mother he never knew; one who was full of hope, who had plans for the future, for the universities she hoped he would get into—an offhand, flattering mention on the third page of how smart she thinks he is, already, even as a weak little thing.

Hidden within them, though, is the real reason she's reaching out: her necklace.

Ah! The reply finally reads, four pages in, after meandering explanations of terms and other bullshit that he really has no use for. Yes, this is sublime piece of enchantment, if you've described it as it sits, and you were correct—we do have the record for this piece in our longstanding archive so I am inclined to believe you! Yes, as expected, it is one that prevents all tangential harmings, and prevents any basic schoolyard curses, though it cannot prevent curseroots, yes? It's a very tangled thing—if you would excuse the vagueness—and it's fiendishly difficult to pin down.

Tangential harmings, are, of course, equally as vague. We know now that thaumaturgy decides its own rules, which makes any sort of preventative measure feel as though it's a game; of course, it can change on a dime, why wouldn't it be able to!

The biggest piece that I think we can unwind—though, as mentioned earlier, if you were to bring the piece in person, we would be able to test much more!—is that yes, this will be able to be passed down to your son. The matrilineal heritage it follows is a preference of the family, of the magic when wanted. It has no real barriers to inheritance, because the arcane will always choose to exist, rather than be snuffed out.

The other pieces we feel the spellcraft has worked in is the protection from the vague, aimless sweeping spells that get cast upon populations. Yes, we all know that the wards worked into the bedrock of our esteemed nation can swallow most of the harm, but this prevents any backlash from that. It almost functions as if a blanket, smothering the tendrils of the common world. Only those powered with deliberate, casted intent will be able to breach the general ward schema.

Alexei rereads smothering the tendrils of the common world, and flips back two pages, a headache creeping in as he squints at the tiny, cramped writing.

Common world witchery is as follows, in no particular order: charmbags, low-powered hexes, all garden spells, hedgework, general chicanery, typical water-based enchantments, hauntings, low-level fire spells aimed at worn clothes, scrying that is general to an area, dreamwalking, and most illusions that are powered through without a highly specialized occipital bone. Eyes, you see, are one of the harder things to unveil; people must be trained into visions, unless they are bound to a branch, and in which case, I wish them all the best luck! Tangling with prescience is a dangerous thing indeed.

Alexei freezes and reread the passage again.

Deep understanding strikes him, a poisonous sort of elation spilling in his veins. He can never let Ilya see what he's unknowingly agreed to in his desperation.

He has heard Ilya, in the dark, quiet moments of their house, whispering for a sign from Mama. He has heard the restless, helpless hope soaked into Ilya's voice.

He tells himself it's a kindness, and not a cruelty as he folds up the letters, before he sweeps all the sheathes of paper off the writing desk and into a bin.

Hope, he knows, can be as rotten as fear. But surely, it can't be as hard as the absence of it completely. He is being good and kind, for preventing Ilya from the truth: Ilya will never see Mama again, because Ilya will never be able to see ghosts.

Not after putting her necklace on.

By the time Ilya gets home from practice, a bruise on his face from some fight Alexei doesn't care about, all of her writings and correspondence are gone, its ashes spread across Mama's old flower beds.

***

They bury his mother, and three days later, Alexei thinks, at least Mama got to see me grow up, and throws up in a trashcan on his way home from work.

 ***

"I'm pregnant," Mila says, sour-faced and angry, like it's his fucking fault, like he didn't tell her to take fucking birth control, like she wasn't the whore who wanted it raw and bare three months ago for a week. "What the hell are we going to do?"

"Keep it," he says, unimpressed with her idiocy. He's almost tempted to ask if she's sure it's his, but he's sure. She's not that stupid. "Get married, I guess. You'll have to stop being such a slut."

She flinches at his words, and he could try to sniff it out—is she actually that stupid—but he's tired. It's been a long day, made all the longer by this terrible set of news.

Father won't stop calling him and asking for Polina, and Polina won't stop calling him and asking him for help, and he'd like, for one goddamn second, to not have to deal with all this bullshit.

Where the hell is Ilya's money? How the hell are they going to live like this without more fucking support?

"I'm going out," he says to his—fuck—fiancée, yanking out his phone and striding for the door. "Don't wait up."

***

When Father gets home, Alexei is already in bed, pretending he can't hear the low growl of his voice vibrating up the floorboards.

Sometimes, Ilya had said two weeks ago, his voice wavering as he talked to Mama, Alexei eavesdropping from the dining room, Papa sounds like he's a scary monster.

That's just his voice, solnyshko, she had said, but Alexei had heard the fear in her tone. But why is Papa sounding like a scary monster? Is he yelling at you?

Ilya had inhaled, but Alexei had rounded the corner, his gaze immediately finding Ilya's uncertain face, and watched as he blanched.

No, Ilya said, instead of telling the truth—that Alexei had tricked him into Father's office and that when Father had found out, he had struck Ilya square across the face before descending into yelling—he is just loud, at night, when he speaks with you.

Well, I will do my best to protect you from such loud noises, she had said, before she had descended into a quiet haze that is still happening now.

Father's voice gets even louder somehow, until the house is suffocating under his strident tones, the walls almost rattling.

Mama is still silent.

Alexei curses everything that has ever thought that little brothers were a good idea.

***

"This is Mila," Ivan says, grinning at him over the rim of his cup. "She's my cousin, so don't break her heart too bad."

She rolls her eyes and snatches the cup from him, downing the rest of his drink. The group of them cheer, except for Polina, who's been far quieter than usual, her face drawn and gray.

"Alright, losers," she says, and meets his gaze head on. His palms sweat, sticking to his glass. Everything suddenly feels flashier, like he's only been pretending to enjoy himself before this. He grins at her, and watches her flush. "Let's get this fucking party started."

***

It's a bad day.

Alexei can tell as soon as he steps back into their house, the shutters rattling ominously as he slams the door, the low gray clouds spitting out bits of snow behind him.

"Mama is having quiet time again," Ilya says, as soon as he enters the kitchen. He gestures at the stove, where a chair has been drawn over, steam curling from the spout of their well-used teapot. "I made tea but she didn't want it, and she didn't want me in the room, and—"

"I get it," Alexei says, and debates turning around and heading for the bar that's open past midnight. He eyes the mess strewn across the counters, and glances at Ilya. "Are you going to clean up?"

Ilya nods, his curls bouncing. "Father will be home at six." He squints at the ticking clock, hung in the corner. "An hour."

Alexei nods, and turns back around, heading for the front door. He can't be here for a second longer. "Clean up, Ilya," he calls over his shoulder, and slams the door again, before he can hear the response.

***

"Yes," he says. The voice on the other end of the call is brusque, unfeeling as it recites off all the information he needs to know. "I understand." He meets Mila's drawn face, and pinches his brow, rising up from his seat at the table. He cannot think in this fucking house. "Yes," he repeats, when they ask if he knows how he will pay for it. "I will make a call."

Neither of them say thank you before the call cuts.

He breathes in. He breathes out.

The phone is hot in his hand as he dials a number he wishes he did not have memorized.

It rings for almost too-long, before the call connects and noise crashes through.

"Bastard," he spits, because someone will bleed by the end of this conversation, and it will not be him, even as he hears the intake of breath. "Get back to Russia," he says, sharp and unapologetic, because this weight has been on his shoulders for years, and Ilya can play at being the heralded son, but Alexei knows what true fidelity is. "Father is dead."