Title: Lyedyanoy
Author: DK
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Hinted domestic violence and to put it bluntly, paedophilia.
Disclaimer: I do not own the Demolition Boys or Mr. Dickenson; they are property of Aoki Takao. I do not make profit with fanfiction writing.
Summary: Svetlana left Tala, and never got over it.
A/N: I haven't written an angsty fic in ages. Tala's childhood, father becoming an alcoholic, he beating up Tala and his mother, mother's take-off without him and Tala meeting Bryan in the streets are all true and canon.

Ледянóй – Ice cold

When I held you in my arms for the first time, I should have loved you more. When you said your first words, I should have listened to you. When you took your first wobbly steps, I should have caught you. When you saw snow for the first time, I should have dressed you in even warmer clothes. When you were hit for the first time, I should have taken you away.

Hit after hit, hurting word after another, I just couldn't take it anymore. You cried after me, you broke my heart. Still I kept going, not looking back for the second time. I only would have seen your teary blue eyes and the broken bottle of vodka your father used as a weapon.

I had lost everything. Myself, my husband, my home and the worst, my child. The Soviet had fallen, everything was flipped upside down and the soldier I married, loving man and father, changed just as drastically, as everything around us. He became bitter, worthless drunkard who beat his wife and little son.

And I ran like a coward. I ran instead of protecting you from the blows, like before, I left you at the threshold of our home. I was a fool. Fool and afraid. I'd want to explain it all to you, but I know it wouldn't help.

I saw you now and then on the streets. You shivered in the thin clothing that did nothing to protect you from the freezing wind; you wandered the streets of Moskva and looked desperately for food. You begged for anything from the friendly babushkas, who might give you something little. I cried every time, when those bright eyes of yours would light up from the friendly words of the babushkas. When they were around the corner, the light would dim and you dragged your feet forward, looking for another friendly face.

Once I saw you with another boy. He was just as pale and malnourished, as you. Lavender hair refused to stay beneath the woollen hat and the eyes of the same colour were happy when he met you. You started walking together, sometimes with a little older girl, the sister of your friend. She went her own ways to beg, but you two were adorable. You became closer than brothers and I tried to approach you, but every time I tried, there was a force stopping me and drifting me off. Sometimes it was the mother of my new boyfriend, sometimes just the rush hour.

And that bitter morning when I could see no hair nor hide of you two. The little girl ran up and down the street, shouting out for you. I hurried across the street and kneeled before the girl. I was terrified. Where were you? The girl said that you two didn't come home for the night; perhaps something had happened to you. A door opened nearby and a babushka stepped out, robe tightly around her. She took her in and I was left to my boyfriend's home. We looked for you. He wished to meet you, take you home as his son.

I tried to look for you from our old home. The door was open. My boyfriend and I ran in. Heaps of snow, empty bottles of vodka and empty boxes of cigarettes littered the hallway. You weren't there. Only my drunkard husband, lying dead in the corner, bottle tightly held in the frozen hand. I gathered the little belongings I had left there and called the police to come and get rid of that drunkard. You weren't home anymore. I was happy in a way, but worried sick.

Years went by; I remarried, changed my name and had children. But you were still missing from our family. Every year around your birthday, I went out, walking down the streets you used to, the same streets we both used to take when everything was still fine. I ended up working in the same place where my new husband was working. On the outside I was still the same, scarred, happy and gentle, but inside I was in pieces. I had failed you.

I worked; I was a photographer for the Beyblade magazine in Russia, if the country would get fame in that new sport. And it started to gather fame all over. The first team of the Balkov Abbey won two championships. Then they vanished. Without a trace. But I didn't know to expect the next team that would take the title.

You led your friend and two others to the stadium. Your eyes were cold and calculating, there was no trace of that curious and adorable little boy. Nothing was left. I stood before you with my camera and you all glared at me, told me to take the pictures that were necessary and take a hike. You didn't recognize me even though I was standing right before you. My eyes are almost as blue as yours, my hair just as bright red than yours, our facial features are alike. But no. I had lived on empty hope. I wasn't mamenka. I wasn't Svetlana Valkova anymore. I was Svetlana Ivanova and you were Tala Valkov. Not Yuriy Valkov. Tala.

What had they done to you? You were so cold. Cold, full of anger but so empty at the same time. I tried to look for information, but they were minimal. I didn't know should I laugh or cry, you were so close yet so far away. Your sisters became your fans. They followed your every move, watched your every battle. So did I. Grigory was proud of you and wanted to call you his son so badly. To call you the heir of the Ivanov-family. I had a son six months before the championship battle you lost. You lost for the first time.

That was when I first heard what had been done to you. You had been beaten, neglected, brainwashed. You had been used as a test animal. My sweet little boy had become the toy of a madman. I didn't sleep that night. I couldn't. I should have tried to get to you harder, I could have saved you two. Your friend's sister, Maria was taken to Ivanov-family's care after the sweet old babushka died.

That night baby Alexey Ivanov died in his sleep. I was shaken out of my tear-filled stupor too late, when I realized, I couldn't hear your little brother's sleepy breathing. It was the very same day the chairman of the BBA contacted me, saying that I needed to come and take my sun back into my custody; they had taken down the Abbey. Dozens and dozens of beaten and malnourished boys were slowly being taken to foster homes. Moskva was shocked and silent.

You were messed up. You had gotten a nervous breakdown in the middle of a battle and lost. Boris Balkov had tampered with you too much and your mind just couldn't take it any longer. You were swaying as you stood with your friends, teammates in the lobby of the BBA Russian headquarters. It looked like you had been beaten for the last time. Your friends had bruises and the oldest of your friends had his arm in a sling. I didn't dare to approach.

First you recognized me as the photographer, after that as your mother. Your icy eyes turned even colder than the Siberian winter. I already knew I had lost. You don't want to have anything to do with me. The chairman of the BBA, aging gentleman came to give his condolences for my youngest child's passing, he had already heard of it, even though it happened barely ten hours ago. I sense your surprise. I bit back the tears and thanked him. I turned back to you.

"You can't forgive me, I know that, but do you let me explain what happened?"

"Why should I? You left me there."

"I tried to come and get you many times."

"You never came."

"I tried."

"But didn't succeed."

I know it. I know it all too well. I just should have tried harder. I gave up too easily. I hand my head and bite back the tears again. I take a photo out of my bag. It was taken a week earlier, a family photo with a place for you behind me reserved.

"If you don't want to hear the explanation, or even discuss about this, at least take this. Do whatever you want to it. This would have been your family, if you had wanted one."

You took the picture, looked at it, tried to keep the despising act up in front of your friend, even though one of them separated and was inching towards his sister, who looked ready to cry.

"Your little brother Alexey died last night…" I whisper and left, went to sit in the cafeteria, burying my head in my arms. I knew it the whole time, that what I did was unforgivable, but still it stung. I had lost both of my sons for good today. My eldest son, brave and feary sixteen-year-old but frozen from the inside Yuriy, no, Tala and my six-month-old baby, ever-calm Alexey. I didn't even listen what Maria explained to you, my thoughts were too dark. What I had left? Grigory, Irina. Yelena. Memories. Physical and spiritual scars which were still hanging wide open. I wasn't able to mend them, I didn't want to. I didn't want to forget how stupid I was. It was my punishment. I had deserved it.

Somebody limps to me, stays nearby, standing there, unsure. Something lands next to my head. I know it the photograph. It's you standing there, next to me. I know you are hurting. Physically you are torn, mentally frozen.

"I don't want to have anything to do with you… But only you can be my legal guardian…"

"Sign the papers, so you can live with Maria and your friend to the other end of the household. You won't see me unless I'm working. I don't expect anything from you. You made it clear, that I'm not welcome to your line of sigh. I had the tiniest sparkle of hope kept alive for years, that I would find my son, but he was frozen dead years ago."

I grabbed the papers from my bag, Mr. Dickenson had everything almost set up already, and he didn't waste any time. I slammed a pen to the desk and rose.

"Either you keep your late father's name, or change it to Ivanov, it's your call. If you take your stepfather's last name, you have the rights to your own portion of the Ivanov fortune. Grigory was ready to welcome you with open arms, to have you as his own son."

You took the pen but you hesitated. My own voice is cold, but I don't care anymore. You read the papers through, reading and making sure you understand, even though everybody can see what agony standing upright is to you. I know what Boris did to you. I see it from your friends, that it was almost everyday, even though it still shook you. Maria is holding her brother, he is sobbing against her shoulder. His emotions had been almost wiped out, only hatred was left. Now with everything over, the reality was hitting him hard like a ton of bricks. Guilt was hitting him hard.

"I wished I could have seen Yuriy… Happy. Smiling. Not as an ice statue shattered to the floor…"

You wrote your name to all the required lines, on paper, I had gotten my son back. I felt empty. You weren't my son anymore. You were Tala Ivanov. Somebody I didn't know. Ice cold with no heart. That was broken by me.