Q&A: Kolya Reizner

How I think how Silco’s knife clattering to the ground when first meeting powder/jinx represents and foreshadows their relationship

Thinking abt how when Silco first approaches powder he hides his knife behind his back, possibly intending to finish the job after getting the info he needs. AKA Vander’s knife, the same knife that Silco swiped and used to escape from Vander during his drowning. Which he kept all those years, and ended up ultimately killing Vander with just moments prior, a shot cuts to Vander’s blood still fresh and dripping from the blade. A knife he has used to defend himself from both danger and death, to protect himself from harm by someone he loved.

But when powder goes and hugs Silco, that knife clatters to the ground, out of his grasps. Silco’s protection, the one thing that had helped Silco escape death, the one thing he uses to defend himself. When his hand first rises, Silco’s goons make a face, most likely expecting to hurt/push away powder. But this time there is no violence, instead there are welcoming arms.

In that moment, the knife dropping to the ground not only shows powder breaking down Silco’s emotional walls that he had built up to protect himself. But also to show that when he hugs her back, Silco is quite literally and unknowingly accepting death with open arms.

In the show we see that even when Jinx is hostile towards him and purposely hurting Silco, he’s relatively calm, and doesn’t return the hostility. Or when she makes mistakes, Silco is forgiving. In their relationship, Silco “has no knife”, aka he has no defense when it comes to Jinx. Because, she is his undoing, Jinx is Silco’s weakness, and it was shown from the very start.

When powder first pulls a jinx, killing her family and vander in the process, Silco welcomes her with open arms. And in the last episode when she pulls another jinx, killing Silco, Silco only has love and reassurance to give. No knife to protect himself this time, again finding himself at death’s door because of someone he loves. But this time there’s no bitterness or hate. Only forgiveness, understanding and love, the things Vander failed to show him when Silco pulled his own jinx and ended up being the cause of Felicia’s death.

But yeah. Idk if any of this made sense. But. Is there anything so undoing…as a daughter? SOBS

Listen to that

Things two hungarian poets from the 1840s said to each other in their letters that make me crazy:

If my soul touches you and it happens to burn you I'm not to blame... it was you who lit it on fire

I swear to you on cottage cheese and tobacco

If the people rule in poetry, so will they rule in politics and that's the goal of the century! To hell with the aristocracy!

My dear buddy,

My soul, my bastard,

My golden mouthed saintly friend,

My rowdy brother,

My lovable dummy,

If you want to see a dead Pegasus, look no further than me

I am trying to learn to smile nicely ( he did not succeed)

My dear friend, you better side of my soul

I will never forgive you for NOT writing the address on the envelope yourself. A woman's handwriting... and a black seal... dear god, the devil took him! he worked himself to death writing poems, he died! ... and then i opened your letter... Never do this again. Only use black seal vax on your death, and even then, still write the address yourself!

I'm reading (your work) for the sixth time. It's really a horrible thing. I'll need to read it again to understand just how awful it is!

Sincerely, your friend whose balls are itching

It's really good that your sore throat is gone, I can finally strangle you

Leave the dedication! Veselényi is a great man but he's still a Lord, and a poet should never dedicate ANYTHING to a Lord

I'm hugging you a 1000000000000 times!

What's up with the Reizners (Kolya & Nikita)?

Better late than never: the loredump on Nikita and Kolya Reizner is finally here!

If you read my blog, you may already know some of this information. But it's always nice to have things organised.

So let's talk about them.

Childhood

Nikita and Kolya as kids.

Nikita and Kolya grew up in a small countryside town, with Nikita being older by three years. Their mother was a nurse, their father a factory worker.

Nikita was always positioned as an example for Kolya: he was the smarter one, the one that knew how to get along with people, the one that could stand up for himself. Kolya, on the other hand, was absent-minded, meek, and showed little interest in communicating with others.

This made him an easy target for bullying. Sometimes Nikita tried to ignore it, sometimes he stood up for him. Kolya would have preferred if he stuck to the former - having his brother defend and then scold him for not being assertive enough was more degrading than being picked on.

University

Kolya always enjoyed tinkering with electronics, so he went for an electrician degree. He wasn’t an exceptional student, but he enjoyed it significantly more than school. People didn’t bother him nearly as much.

Nikita enrolled in the biology department of a pedagogical university. He worked hard to get rid of his countryside accent and blend in with the more “educated” crowd.

He joined the admission committee after his first year, which is how he met Nadya: she was applying to the philology department of the university. Their relationship began shortly after.

Joining the stalker business

Kolya wanted an escape from society more than anything. And the anomalous Zone outside the city called to him, insistently so.

It was a time when the border was significantly less tight, when big stalker groups were still prevalent, but already on their way out. He met Victor Kazarin in one such group. The latter was still a young stalker, with only a couple of years behind his belt.

Still, under his guidance, Kolya’s abilities developed incredibly fast - he was a total natural. And it wasn't just his sharp talent, it was the way he walked the Zone, the way he loved it with all of his heart.

Experiencing a sense of freedom and levity isn't uncommon for stalkers. But to Kolya it went far beyond that. To him, it felt more real than anything else in the world, it was the only place that felt truly alive.

When Nikita found out about Kolya’s side gig, he was mortified. How could his slow, empty-headed brother survive in those conditions? How could he ever navigate that dark criminal business? He had to keep an eye on him.

After realising he cannot talk Kolya out of it, Nikita joined the same group. He never developed a strong sense for the Zone’s anomalies, but his biological knowledge paid off in a major way. Despite not having a medical degree, he knew more than enough to take on the rare doctor role.

After finding somewhere he finally felt complete, Kolya was once again treated as a clueless, incompetent child.

When the big group was showing signs of deterioration, Victor offered the brothers and several other stalkers to leave and form a smaller, more tightly-knit team. His connections from working in the militia (local police) created a solid basis for finding potential clients and covering things up.

Nikita's arrest

Maybe somebody snitched, maybe Kolya’s behaviour raised suspicion among his day job coworkers - whatever the reason, his house was searched and numerous artefacts were found.

But what would someone as soft and careless as him do in prison? Somebody as naive and weak could never last there, Nikita thought.

So he did what he had to: acted like the artefacts found in the younger brother’s apartment were his and then aggressively resisted arrest - just for good measure. Hell, maybe he would have managed to get away.

But he didn’t. As opposed to other stalkers having their scars bestowed by the Zone, the one on his neck was the result of a police confrontation. Nikita did not expect them to open fire when he ran. He was surprised he lived at all - the bullet grazed uncomfortably close to the carotid artery. He lucked out.

Kolya had never felt that insulted. He tried to come clean about being the real culprit. But Nikita knew how to be convincing; Kolya didn't. And Kolya felt no gratitude. 

Breakup with Nadya

The breakup in the Mill.

Nikita was given 4 years in prison, but got parole after serving just 2. He immediately returned to helping injured stalkers.

Nadya waited for him through all his prison years. Considering how their relationship was going, some part of Nikita secretly hoped she wouldn't. She was a very self-conscious person, one that was infatuated with someone who seemed so much more confident than her. To the point where she felt like without his guidance, she’d be completely lost, and useless, and stupid.

Nikita both liked it and didn’t. Who wouldn’t enjoy a beautiful girl obsessing over them? But dealing with all of that baggage was inconvenient, it was tiring. Was it even worth it? Sometimes he wasn’t sure.

Still, things looked sweet on his release. Everyone, Kolya included, seemed glad to have him back.

Then, several months later, Nadya announced she was pregnant.

Nikita didn't want a child, especially not one that would have an almost guaranteed mutation. He proposed an abortion, but the woman refused. His reasoning that she usually took as gospel did not work. And no matter how much Nadya cried or pleaded with him, no matter how much she tried to convince him it would be okay, Nikita refused to take that burden upon himself. 

There was no easy compromise. He left.

Kolya didn't have much of an opinion about Nadya. He didn't have much of an opinion about most people. And really, he didn't feel particularly bad for her.

However, hearing about what had happened made him repulsed in a quite satisfying way. The brother that always knew best, the brother that was so condescendingly self-sacrificing, had finally levelled himself with the rest of the earth's scum.

Months later Nikita would seek out the maternity hospital Nadya gave birth in. He wasn't registered as the father - he could not access any information about her. He couldn't contact her himself either.

Her acquaintances refused to talk with him. But eventually, one of them caved.

Nadya was pregnant with twins. Died while giving birth. The offspring was transferred directly to the institute. And that was it.

Raising Sergei and Sasha

It was a dumb death. A misstep. Kolya wasn’t sure what he felt when he saw Victor’s body turn to mush. It was so instant and so simple. Natural. Kolya’s breath halted, but just momentarily.

They had a plan prepared long in advance in case something like this would come to pass. Sending Sasha and Sergei to the orphanage was not an option, everyone had been well aware of the state of those systems. Instead, Victor Kazarin would live on, if only on paper.

They held a funeral of sorts: to onlookers, it was just an uncharacteristically big visit to the grave of Maria Kazarina. That was where Kolya informed Sergei about the plan. Him and Nikita would help raise the siblings until Sergei turned 18 and could become his sister’s legal guardian. Of course, they’d help him afterwards as well.

Kolya and Nikita raising Sergei and Sasha.

Sasha was fascinating to Kolya in a “child of the Zone” way, but he wasn’t very interested in her on a personal level. To her, he was the strange spaced out uncle that had cool electronics around the house and took pictures of her and Sergei. He also played the guitar like her dad used to.

Kolya and Sergei had a lot more to talk about. Kolya’s calm demeanour helped Sergei feel more at ease despite the terrible circumstances. Even with his ditzy nature, Kolya provided a certain sense of security and comfort. Kolya always considered Sergei a good kid, though he did believe his treatment of Sasha was too overbearing, especially considering his own relationship with Nikita.

The latter, on the other hand, was much closer to the girl. She liked to play with Nikita even before her father’s death, so the adoptive uncle role came to him naturally. Sasha grew very attached to him, especially since he was significantly easier to talk to than Sergei. Nikita, in turn, was happy to have Sasha around.

The Grinder incident

The group heading out to the mission in the Mill.

Beyond the Grinder lies the wishing room. At least, that’s what they say. It’s a rumour impossible to confirm or disprove. Can you really pass the whole stretch of the tunnel before your legs, your arms, your face, your whole body disintegrates? You don’t know. Do you want to find out? Probably not.

The natural human instinct for survival can only be superseded by total desperation – or apathy in equal measure. Did Kolya have enough of any? Neither Sergei, nor Olya knew. They didn’t know why he had to enter the Grinder, either. Was that what he had wanted from the start? When was “the start”? Maybe it didn’t matter.

They could not follow him. And that alone was good.  

the asexual double edged sword is that a lot of people, particularly queer discoursers(tm) online, are really really rancid about ace people who have sex, I mean like stunningly awful, so naturally sex favorable/indifferent asexuals will be very keen on making sure that they aren't erased within their own community and that people at large know they exist. at the same time, people are also Very Bad about ace people who don't have sex, and sex averse/repulsed asexuals face a lot of pressure both on societal and interpersonal scales to submit to sex that they don't want, and so naturally it'll really rub them the wrong way to constantly have "but don't worry, ace people can still conform to the societal expectation!" appended to their PSAs about their experiences of asexuality. and so everyone's just kinda upset and annoyed all the time when instead it should be peace and love on planet ace.

where is all the art that perfectly appeals specifically to my exact tastes and desires and nobody elses

My favorite (only) cousin

anticipating an exponential increase in murderbot misgendering so I drew something about it

Q&A: Lilya Beletskaya

Character interview. December 2023

Today we finally talk with Ms Beletskaya, also known as Yura and Anya's mother dearest. With her, every minute counts - so let's get talking.

This, is John, he likes french fries.