When I stepped into the classroom, Dasha was still nowhere in sight. Settling into my usual seat, I pulled out a copy of Zamyatin's We, my pencil case, and my notebook from my backpack. Despite my long absence, the others behaved surprisingly calmly. I had become old news to them as quickly as a forgotten piece of candy, which was a relief. No one stared, no one whispered behind their hands, no one pried into the events of Halloween night. When I had first arrived in Kserton, the curious stares and the irritating habit of other students eavesdropping on private conversations had felt suffocating. Perhaps now fewer people were interested in such trivialities. If only they knew the true nature of who sat beside them and the dangers lurking quietly in this town, they would have begged for homeschooling long ago.
Realistically, though, if anyone was truly watching, it would not be students. More likely, worried agents from special services, motivated by national security rather than idle curiosity, would be monitoring this place. They wouldn't just be observing the supernatural in discreet Kserton—they would want to harness it, study it, and bend it to their own purposes. The thought sent an almost physical shiver up my neck, making me feel as though I'd slept all night in a torturously awkward position.
Before the teacher could begin, Dasha appeared in the doorway. Seeing me, she stretched her lips into a warm, welcoming smile and hurried to her desk.
"Did I miss anything?" she asked.
"Nope. The teacher hasn't started yet."
"Great," she whispered, sliding into her seat. "I was going to visit you at the hospital today, but I see that's not necessary anymore."
"Dr. Smirnov finally let me go home… though I'll have to go back again today," I started automatically, then caught myself mid-sentence.
Unlike most people around me, Dasha had no idea about the mystical and dangerous residents of Kserton. I didn't want to shatter her world with truths she wasn't ready for, force her into sleepless nights as she adjusted to a reality she had never imagined. I knew from experience how relentless and exhausting that adjustment could be. The cruelest part of the new secret was that once learned, there was no going back. The hidden would become revealed, and Dasha, like me, would have to scrutinize every stranger's face, guessing which clan they belonged to. Was she in danger? And if so, what could she even do?
"…physiotherapy appointments," I finally remembered, filling in the blank in my own sentence.
"Still something hurts, huh?"
"Not exactly. It's more like recovery—I moved far too little in the hospital."
Dasha nodded with understanding. Before she could ask more, Georgy Vasilyevich stood at his desk, dragging his words lazily as he launched into Zamyatin's biography:
"Yevgeny Ivanovich Zamyatin was born in the Tambov province on February 1, 1884, according to the new calendar. His father, a priest, taught the Word of God, while his mother was a pianist. Yevgeny showed an early zeal for literature: by age four, he was already reading serious works, including Gogol. Sadly, Zamyatin's reflections from that time have not survived," Radzinsky paused, smiling gently, though few in the class seemed to catch the nuance. "In 1896, the family moved to Voronezh, where Yevgeny Ivanovich graduated from gymnasium with a gold medal—a significant honor at the time."
"Is that considered prestigious now?" a voice called from the window-side row.
The teacher shrugged ambiguously. "Depends on how you look at it. For now, though, our minds are still in the 19th century. Discussions on 21st-century charms can wait." He rubbed the back of his neck slowly. "Where was I? Ah yes. At school, Yevgeny leaned toward the humanities, while math proved difficult. In 1902, he enrolled at the Polytechnic Institute of Saint Petersburg, joined the Bolshevik faction, and participated in revolutionary activities, for which he was later arrested and exiled to Lebedyan. To complete his studies, he returned to Petersburg illegally. In 1908, Zamyatin graduated as a marine engineer and became a shipbuilding instructor at the institute. That same year, he published his first story, Alone, while also working on The Girl. His first novella, presented three years later during exile in Lakhta, tackled provincial issues so skillfully that contemporary critics noticed..."
"That doesn't sound like the biography of a dystopia writer at all," Dasha whispered.
"Of course it does! Revolutionaries are rarely happy with the status quo."
"Sure, but all those exiles and bans sound crazy. How could someone be forbidden from living in a city like Novosibirsk? How is that even possible?"
I shrugged. "Probably it was possible in the 19th century. Petrograd was the capital then."
Dasha hesitated, hand raised, then lowered it again. "Ah, never mind. I'll read about it online. This is all just… strange."
"Well, many writers were exiled for dissent. Why are you so surprised?"
"I don't know… Zamyatin's case just seems absurd. Maybe Radzinsky's telling makes it seem stranger than it is."
"And boring," I added. "Hopefully, when we actually read We, it'll get more interesting."