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lassieposting · 10 months

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Anyway, fucking obsessed with the implied Kirigan/Ivan friendship, so have some headcanons

- So Ivan is one of a relatively small group of survivors old enough to remember the previous Darkling - Aleksander's last identity. He's a military brat and the only Grisha in an all-otkazat'sya family, so he lost a lot of family members very young. Aleksander has always refused to have First Army emissaries coming onto Little Palace property with hostile attitudes and condescension to traumatise baby Grisha, so when a student loses a First Army family member, he tends to break the news himself; it's the least he can do given none of them asked to be forcibly enlisted in a war they didn't start. Ivan, whose family were virtually all First Army, got pulled out of classes for a sombre talk with "Kirigan Sr" a few times, and developed a lot of respect for him.

- At some point, while Ivan is still young, the old Darkling retires to the family estate, citing age-related health concerns; even Grisha get old eventually. He completes the rest of his service via correspondence, and sends "his son" Aleksander into the Second Army to train to replace him.

- This is a habit of Aleksander's - when he changes identity, he starts back at the bottom and works his way back up through the ranks. A General needs a lot of things to do his job effectively: a network of loyal, trustworthy lieutenants to delegate to, a history of proven military experience, and the trust of the monarch he serves. Changing identities essentially means he loses all that, and the best way to build it back is to rejoin the army. His old guard - who not only remain loyal to his old way of doing things but also could potentially figure out his ruse - can be respectfully grandfathered out to less strenuous positions, replaced with new underlings loyal to his new self, who served with or under him on the front lines. By the time he takes over at court again, he's gained a whole new military history, and the king has met him several times already, to pin medals on a very promising young officer. It's easier to just have a new military career than to come in unproven and deal with the consequences at court.

- When Ivan is old enough to fight, he ends up serving under then-Captain Aleksander Kirigan. He has no idea that his new CO is the same old man who patted his shoulder while he bawled into his kefta over his dead father and brothers, but Aleksander remembers Ivan, and earmarks him for future leadership roles. There's always a superior/underling professional boundary there, but over the years Ivan and Kirigan become quite close, and eventually Ivan becomes his de facto #2. As someone who has no one, this relationship is incredibly meaningful to Ivan, and he responds with the kind of gruff affection and trustworthiness that Aleksander hasn't had in a long time. So while he'd never admit it, Ivan's friendship is very important to him too.

- Ivan's period of compulsory service ends. He has options, limited though they are, to leave the Second Army; he could take a research postgraduate place at the Little Palace, or become a teacher for small Grisha, or find paid work in a noble house somewhere. He refuses all of them. What he wants - what he's always wanted - is to be a career soldier.

- So when he's medically discharged from service, he's devastated. It's battle-shock, they tell him, and it makes him a danger to himself and others on the front lines. Kirigan takes a bullet dragging him, frozen, out of the way of advancing Fjerdans with repeating rifles. He's not fit to fight.

- And suddenly, he's utterly lost. Fighting is all he's ever known, the only thing he's good at, the only future he ever saw himself having. He makes a few comments to friends that leave them seriously concerned, and one of them goes to the newly-minted General. Aleksander pulls some strings on Ivan's behalf to stave off a complete discharge. Instead of being booted out of the army completely, he's shunted sideways into a new job as Kirigan's aide-de-camp - basically a personal assistant to run his life for him while he focuses on Military Things.

- It's not what Ivan saw in his future, but he's incredibly grateful not to be sent home to rot. He throws himself into his new role with everything he's got, determined not to make Kirigan regret it. He makes sure correspondence is sent on time, he makes sure the General gets where he needs to be when he needs to be there, he manages supplies and personal requests and bodyguarding. He's still Kirigan's right hand man, just in a different sphere. And over time, as the pressure of chessmastering two wars ramps up, he takes on more and more little tasks and becomes increasingly indispensable until Aleksander really isn't sure how he used to function without Ivan. There's a kind of symbiosis there, eventually. Ivan is Pepper Potts to Kirigan's Tony Stark: he usually knows what his boss needs before Kirigan asks for it, he knows a lot more about Kirigan than he'd ever let on, and Kirigan would be far less effective and put-together without him.

- One day, Ivan meets Fedyor Kaminsky. Ivan proceeds to spend the next few years pining over Fedyor Kaminsky, because he is emotionally inept, sharp-tempered and struggles to endear himself to anyone that isn't also a gruff, hardened war veteran. Fedyor is young and idealistic and still believes in things like hope and heroism. He's still in active service, but he's thinking of maybe leaving after the compulsory term to teach. He's good with the little Grisha.

- This crush shocks fucking everyone who knows Ivan, because at this point it's basically a running joke among the Little Palace's higher-ups that he'll never marry - he's too devoted to the General to have room in his life for romance. Fedyor is not what anyone - Ivan included - expected Ivan to like, but hey, opposites attract. Kirigan tolerates several years of long-distance Yearning™ with good grace.

- Fedyor and Ivan court for quite a while, and figure out how they fit a) together and b) into each other's lives. Fedyor has a long hard think about whether he can see himself marrying a man like Ivan - he knows Ivan is pretty codependent with General Kirigan, knows how traumatised he is, knows how dedicated he is to his job, knows he's uncertain about ever wanting children, knows that their marriage would essentially be "This is my husband Ivan and Ivan's boss, General Kirigan." And eventually, he decides he can deal with that; Ivan is worth it. He stays in the army rather than leave, to be close to Ivan.

- Ivan brings up the wedding to Aleksander precisely once, to tell him that he'd be honoured if Aleksander would officiate. The way he says it is offhand, low expectations, because a General has more important things to do than go to an employee's wedding. Aleksander hmms, not even taking his eyes off the report he's reading, and says, "Give me a date when you have one and I'll see if I can spare the time."

- He makes the time. Ivan usually manages his schedule, but he damn well makes sure that day is free personally, because he knows Ivan won't prioritise his wedding over a meeting with the king, or whatever, and nope. He's unavailable for meetings that day. He has somewhere to be.

- He marries them. And wrangles a whole three weeks off for Ivan, so they can have a honeymoon.

- However. Going on a honeymoon means leaving Kirigan unattended, so Ivan coming back from his honeymoon is basically this:

- And like, it's not that Aleksander can't look after himself. It's just that Ivan has been doing so much for him for so fucking long that he's forgotten he needs to do those things. He's so used to Ivan Handling It, that it's only when it comes back to bite him in the ass that he's like oh, yeah, Ivan is on leave. Ivan has literally never seen Kirigan this openly glad to see him, please fix his calendar he has four meetings today in four different places and they're all at the same time, never leave again.

- Fedyor becomes bodyguard #2 after a brief blip in their marriage where he and Ivan spend a lot of time rowing over how little they see each other. He feels neglected, and he's second-guessing whether he can tolerate the Ivan-Kirigan codependence issue. Ivan and Aleksander are not the type to have deep conversations about their feelings - they bully each other into self-care once it starts affecting their ability to do their jobs. Ivan bullies Aleksander into eating or sleeping or getting fresh air, and Aleksander bullies Ivan into admitting he's having marital issues. His solve is to offer Fedyor a job - that way, he and Ivan will get to spend most of their time together. Sharing his duties with Fedyor also frees up a fair amount of Ivan's time, which is hard for him at first, but good for their relationship in the long run.

- Fedyor develops his own relationship with Kirigan, over time. Sometimes, his softly-softly approach can get results out of a stressed-out sleep-deprived General where Ivan's no-bullshit confrontational style would cause a row. They respect each other, and like each other as boss/underling, but there's not the friendship there that there is with Ivan. The professional barrier is a lot more pronounced - Ivan can get away with calling Aleksander "Kirigan" at times - when he's being particularly vexing, mostly - but Fedyor could not.

- By canon, they've settled nicely into their You, Me & The General Makes Three marriage. It's become an in-joke between them that Kirigan is, in turns, the third spouse, the kid, or the dog:

("Fedya, I don't know if I'll ever be ready to be a father. I have no idea how to look after a child."

"Oh, nonsense, darling, you do a wonderful job every day with General Kirigan.")

("Beloved, you should go rescue your other husband. The Kerch ambassador has him cornered by the punch fountain.")

- Genya also gets in on this vein of in-joke from time to time - but only with Fedyor, never with Ivan.

("So if you two ever divorce, who gets custody?"

"Of the General? Oh, he does. It'd be cruel to separate them, you know? They'd pine.")

- They are all under the impression that the General is completely unaware of these jokes, because they're unprofessional and he'd surely disapprove. They have no idea that when Aleksander enters a room without Ivan half a step behind him, half the time Nikolai still thinks it's funny to ask, "Where's the rest of you?"

- And despite everything, they still both refuse to admit they see each other as anything more than, basically, boss and devoted servant. The last ~150 years? Entirely professional.

But. Yeah. Nah. Friends.

#aleksander kirigan #ivan kaminsky #fedyor kaminsky #fivan #darkolai #sab headcanons #also gonna tag this as #sab d3 #because all my headcanons are d3-inspired #sab

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lassieposting · 1 year

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S&B Characters + Sleep Headcanons

Aleksander Kirigan doesn't get a lot of sleep. He claims it's because he's an incredibly busy man, and that's often true - long hours are basically part of his job description - but in truth it's just as likely to be any of a dozen other things keeping him from his bed; nightmares, occasional merzost headaches, intrusive thoughts, the ghosts of fuck-ups past, the relentless stress and worry of trying to keep Ravka's borders secure with dwindling funds and forces. Over the centuries he's learned to bury himself in his work to avoid his demons, and he's become one of those people who's perfectly functional on four hours of sleep, considers six a lie-in, and will sporadically go days at a time without sleeping when he's not doing well.

For most of his life, he's been immensely wary of falling asleep beside a lover - there are few worse ways to discover your bed partner was just out to kill you for bone jewelry than waking up mid-assassination attempt. If he's keen enough on them to not have them leave after a casual encounter - say, Zoya - he'll usually stay with them until they fall asleep, and then get up and go quietly do some work or read until morning. He's willing to adapt, though, for the right person - Nikolai and Alina can both settle him enough to stay with them all night. The trick, as it turns out, is playing on his touch starvation; on the rare occasion he finds someone he can actually trust, he likes to be held, and affectionate little gestures like playing with his hair or scritching his stubble or massaging his shoulders will melt him and flick his OFF button real fast. He's surprisingly cuddly, though he'll swear blind that he just gets cold easily and Alina and Nikolai both run hot.

Nikolai Lantsov is very tactile and affectionate in general, so when he's sharing someone's bed, he likes to cuddle. Like most soldiers - and kings who have survived more assassins than anyone should ever have to - he's a light sleeper, but he also drops off easily, the legacy of learning to get his head down wherever and whenever he can in an active warzone. He likes to sprawl out over or wrap himself around his lovers, and he does a lot of idly playing with hair or repetitive stroking up and down random stretches of skin, almost like he's self-soothing by comforting someone else.

He's been known to react to things happening around him while still asleep - pulling Alina in against his chest if he feels her shiver, or rolling over to throw an arm over Aleksander and mumble easy, Sasha if he's having a bad dream. He has nightmares of his own - he spent his military service on the front lines, not safe in an officer's tent like Vasily - and he tends to burrow into the closest warm body for comfort, burying his face in Alina's chest or Sasha's shoulder to ground himself. Aleksander will almost always wake up for this and react, reassuring and resettling Niko. Alina, not so much.

Alina Starkov sleeps like the dead. Once she is out, she is Out, and she'll sleep through pretty much anything short of a bomb being dropped on the palace. For quite a while this actually frightens her - she worries she won't wake up in time if she's attacked - but Niko is a light sleeper and Aleksander startles awake if a butterfly sneezes in Novyi Zem, so once they're all sharing a bed she's perfectly safe to conk out like a light. She's always had very vivid dreams, but she doesn't remember them for long after she wakes, so she keeps a sketchpad by the bed so she can draw any ideas or lingering impressions she wants to hang onto after she wakes - a concept for a machine Nikolai might want to build, a kefta design Aleksander would look devastatingly good in, old memories from the war she needs to exorcise, random nonsense that makes no sense outside of the context of her dream. She's usually the last to wake - Aleksander and Nikolai are both military and ridiculously busy besides, so they're often up with the Saints-forsaken sun, but Alina loves a lie-in, and would much rather stay up late than wake early.

Mal Oretsev is used to taking turns on watch with other soldiers, so he tends to sleep in short bursts of a few hours at a time. This poses a challenge once he takes over the Volkvolny - he has a lot of extra time to sleep now that he didn't have before. He spends a lot of it painstakingly working his way through the collection of books in Sturmhond's - his - stateroom. If he's to play the role, he should probably have the knowledge, and he'd rather be able to pull his weight without getting in the crew's way. He enjoys the engineering manuals and seafaring tomes, but mostly uses the ones on statecraft to make himself doze off when his brain doesn't want to shut down and be quiet.

Genya Safin is a paranoid sleeper. Her bed is positioned and angled so she can watch the thin strip of light visible beneath her closed door, waiting for the old king's loathsome shadow to block out the glow from the other side. Long after his death, she'll wake and go rigid at the sound of footsteps in the hall. It takes her a while to actually let David into her bed, but when she does, she realises she finds him comforting, actually - he's so logical and steady that he can talk her down from even the worst of her dreams. He doesn't mind getting up to prove to her that her door is locked, or reassuring her nightly that the old king really is dead.

David Kostyk is That Guy. He talks in his sleep - quadratic equations and theories of immutability and assorted Fabrikator shop-talk. He gets up and wanders around sometimes - usually to and from his desk, but occasionally down the hall. At least once he's gotten up, put on a housecoat, double-checked the lock on the door for Genya, comforted her after a nightmare, and gone back to bed himself, having never really woken up in the first place. This is a known habit at the Little Palace, and has caused plenty of entertainment and consternation - he's "caught" Nikolai sneaking out of the Black General's chambers back when he was still the spare tsarevich, he's wandered into the war room at four-thirty in the morning to explain a prototype to General Kirigan, he's been found ambling about the kitchens barefoot. Everyone who tends to stay up late - Kirigan included - has kindly escorted David back to his own rooms at least once. His saving grace is that he's really quite particular about his pyjamas - they're Durast-made to feel heavy, like a weighted blanket, and he finds it difficult to drop off without the grounding sensation - so at least he's never gone sleepwalking in his birthday suit. He wanders a little less once he starts spending his nights with Genya - if she's resting her head on his shoulder, or has an arm draped over his chest, he seems to be reluctant to move her.

Ivan Kaminsky has night terrors, the kind that wake him screaming and thrashing and completely disoriented, trapped in his own blankets - the legacy of the front lines at the Fjerdan border over a century ago. As a younger man, fresh off the front lines with nothing to his name but a medical discharge from active duty, he'd often find himself seeking out General Kirigan, stumbling into his tent or the Little Palace war room pale and shivering and still in his sleep clothes, all terribly undignified. Kirigan never seemed to mind, really. It was an understanding of sorts, between old soldiers familiar with the lingering spectre of war. He'd give Ivan a cursory once-over - "Evening, Kaminsky." - pour him a drink, and push a stack of papers across the table to give him something to do. He misses it, sometimes, the long nights spent working in companionable quiet. But now the General spends his nights with the sun summoner and the puppy king who's been making eyes at him since he was a skinny princeling, and Ivan spends his with his Fedyor, who has a truly remarkable amount of patience for being woken up at all hours by all the flailing and yelling. Ivan still hates talking about his night terrors - Fedyor is too young to have ever fought in the campaigns that got Ivan his discharge papers, and Ivan is reluctant to place extra horrors on his shoulders - but Fedya would listen, if Ivan needed him to, and in the meantime, he'll regulate Ivan's heart rate and breathing for him, deactivate the fear centre of his brain and flood him with signals telling his brain he's close to sleep, until he really is.

Inej Ghafa likes to sleep in Kaz's office. Back when he first bought out her indenture and took her from the Menagerie, that was where she felt safest. Only one door, locked firmly behind him whenever he ventured down to the rowdy Club below, where the raised voices of drunken men made her feel sick with terror. Two windows, left open at her fearful request - exits, if she needed them. A comfortable leather couch. The scratch-scratch-scratch of Kaz's quill on paper. Jesper used to try to reassure her - no harm will come to you at the Crow Club, you're Kaz's - and a small, wounded part of her took that to heart. If her connection to Kaz Brekker kept her safe, this man who showed more interest in her blades than her body, then she would rest where he could see her, where that protection would be a physical, tangible thing. And he let her. Never complained, though she knows now what he's like about his privacy. Just let her curl up on his Chesterfield. Draped a blanket over her when it was cold.

She's not that terrified girl anymore. She has her own lodgings, with her own possessions, though she still has a nighttime ritual for safety - one final sweep of the building, checking her escape routes, jamming a chair beneath her door handle. But she's quite capable of protecting herself now. All the same, when she is injured or sick or has been summoned back to the Menagerie on business, she'll still climb through his window, breathe out a sigh of relief at the inevitable, unsurprised, "Hello, Inej," and make herself comfortable on the couch for the night.

Wylan Hendriks sleeps curled into a ball. He's spent his share of time on the streets of Ketterdam and that's how he's learned to do it - hugging his meagre bagful of possessions, threadbare blanket wrapped around him and it. In Jesper's room at the Crow Club, he likes to burrow under the blankets; he'll rest his head on Jesper's belly to sleep rather than his shoulder, so even his hair is covered. It muffles the sound drifting up from the club floor or the street outside in the evenings - the shouting, the drunken arguments and bitter insults tossed around like knives, anything that might remind him of - anyway. He tends to turn in fairly early compared to the other Crows - while he loves the music of the city's bars and even enjoys the camaraderie of watching Jesper gamble, closing time in most of Ketterdam peaks at around midnight, and that's about when all the socialising starts to get a bit much for him. The Barrel stays open late, and Kaz doesn't kick out his patrons until the early hours of the morning, so most of the Crows have become night owls by necessity. Wylan uses the hours between making his exit and Jesper finally coming to bed to decompress - compose, play his flute, experiment with chemicals, look at the books Jesper got him, the ones with all the pictures to tell him the fairytales. After a few incidents where Jesper bursting in drunk and noisy left Wylan...a little out of sorts...he's learned to knock, the same pattern every time, before he lets himself in, and it's always easier to uncurl a little and relax with Jesper holding him.

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