Something else Lumina hadn't known about Russian people was that they were as fond of tea as were the Chinese and Japanese. Dmitri had brought packages of real, crushed tea leaves from home; using hot water from the Hall's kitchenette, he made some for them both.
"M'yed?" he asked.
"What's that???"
"Sorry, that's the Russian word for 'honey.' As in, do you want honey in your tea?"
Aluminum Banshee brightened up, almost laughing. "And you were hesitant to ADDRESS ME as 'honey.' That's just adorable. Please don't think it makes me a sourpuss if I want lemon juice also."
Dmitri smiled back. "If you drink both, I'll drink both."
They sat down with their cups, and gave the tea a minute to cool.
"Please tell me more about your powers, Dmitri Leonidovich."
"In a manner of speaking, they came from my grandmother, by way of her son, my father. My father Leonid was born early in the Brezhnev era. During his childhood, Grandmother often secretly sang to him songs which represented defiance to tyranny: anything from jazz to punk rock to Baptist hymns. Later, as a young man, before I was born, Papa stood in the Living Circle on that fateful day in Moscow, the day when soldiers refused to fire on the anti-Communist demonstrators. This happened before Superdude grew into his powers, and before the infant Superhottie even came to Urth at all; so there were no invincible Tonkrypians to require the Politburo to grant the people justice.
"There was a Green Flashlight for Urth back then, an Indonesian woman named Nurul Bagaskoro; but she had thirty-three other planets to protect, and she feared that short-term interventions on Earth would do no good if she couldn't be around to follow through. There was a reasonably strong hero in Canada named Captain Excess, but he wasn't powerful enough to give orders to a nation. Thus we were on our own in Russia.
"My father played for life-and-death stakes, as did Boris Yeltsin. Mere hours after the turning point in Moscow, Papa sang Grandmother's songs openly to my mother and elder sisters, to celebrate the passing of Bolshevik oppression.
"I first heard the songs with some comprehension when I was six. That was when I first felt it: music making me physically stronger. But I think the tea is ready to drink now."
An impulse came to the ex-villainess, one that she ventured to hope would not seem TOO forward. "May I show you a way that..... friends.... sometimes drink together?" He nodded, so she continued: "Hold your cup a little away from you, as if you were going to pass it to me, but keep it in your hand. Good. Now, I move my hand to the far side of yours, so each of us has our cup close to the other one's face."
"And each drinks from the other's cup?"
"Some people may do it that way, but the way I mean is that we each drink from our own cup, only like this." She hooked her own elbow completely around the Cossack's elbow, and pulled, so that they both leaned closer together. "Do the same with your arm, then we drink."
Normally, this emotionally intimate gesture would be maintained only long enough to swallow a little of the beverage. But Dmitri didn't know this; or, if he did know it, he was prepared to pretend he didn't know. Feeling deliciously naughty, and delighted that she could feel deliciously naughty about something benign, Lumina kept their arms linked while she spoke again. "So that experience from your youth is connected with your immunity to noise damage, right?"
"So it is." Dmitri took his second swallow of tea, making no move to withdraw his arm from hers. "Only music (vocal or instrumental, recorded or live) positively empowers me, but no sound vibration can ever injure me. This immunity even extends to anything like hypnotism: no SPOKEN WORD can succeed in maliciously deceiving me, or in controlling my mind against my will."
Lumina emptied her cup. Then, still not releasing their elbow-clasp, she asked for a refill. Catching the spirit of her action, Dmitri first drained his own cup also; then he demonstrated his manual dexterity by refilling each cup WHILE their arms remained linked. "Remember the honey and lemon," Lumina half-teased. He even managed this, and she was truly impressed.
"Further about my powers, krasavitsa. In my default state, my physical ability is equal to six men-- if one of these men is an Olympic boxer, one is an Olympic wrestler, one is an Olympic long-distance runner, another is an Olympic swimmer, another is an Olympic gymnast, and the sixth is a Cossack. The Cossack part adds horsemanship, sword and dagger fighting, DIRTY fighting, rifle marksmanship, and of course dancing to balalaika music. Hearing music doubles my ability while it continues, and for about half a minute after it stops. I have determined that percussion instruments by themselves, if played with musical intent, are sufficient to strengthen me."
Feeling that she was being wildly bold, Lumina lightly rubbed her snub nose against his bare, well-muscled forearm. "Awesome, Dmitri, AWE-some. Is there anything else to tell?"
"There is: the most unusual element of my empowerment. When I dance-- especially in Cossack style, though I find it also works when I do tap dance, ballroom swing or interpretive jazz dance-- it makes other people want to dance also, and gives them greater skill in dancing than they ever had before. This effect is not unlimited; people in the very midst of a fight to the death, for instance, won't be distracted by my influence. But there've been times when I started dancing soon enough to PREVENT people from getting into fights."
"You strike me as a well rounded man, Dmitri."
"And you, krasavitsa, though not Russian, seem to me like the embodiment of Russia's hope. What I mean is that my homeland was long sunk in depths of evil, but my own lifetime has witnessed my people striving toward freedom. The sight of you, knowing how you have been liberated, is like a vision of Mother Russia cleansed from all evil. Not that you would be any less attractive to me if there were no Russian analogy to be drawn. You have it in you to-- you have more possibilities for good than you may realize."
Lumina could not remember when she had felt her heart pounding so eagerly. And there was no vagueness anymore about what she wanted. All the aching emptiness of wasted years hung in contrast with what this newly-met hero seemed to offer her.
The tea was finished, so they had to unlink their arms to put the cups down. Two seconds later, however, Aluminum Banshee seized Tapper Cossack's hands in hers. "Please show me how your dancing works. Pretend that I'm close to getting into a needless fight with someone, and you want to make peace."
Dmitri's smile, and his eyes, became warmer still. He stood up, drawing her with him. "One thing I know you have plenty of is aerobic endurance. Therefore, you can easily sing a song for us to dance TO, even while we're doing it."
Lumina's eyes gleamed-- with joyful tears; because even if Dmitri wasn't feeling as romantic as she urgently hoped he was feeling, just this much male attention was already more than she had believed she would ever get. She began to sing a song which was very similar in mood to ABBA's song "Take a Chance on Me" from Original Earth.
And before she knew it, he lifted her high above his head as if she weighed only ounces. She didn't stop singing. When her feet found the floor again, she was dancing with the Russian hero, dancing as expertly as a Russian ballerina. They whirled and swooped, leaped and leaned, swayed and hopped; came together, moved apart, came closer together, moved less far apart, came together for longer, moved apart for less time; separated only very slightly, and then what-the-heck, went into an outright embrace, caressing and squeezing each other. They stayed in this clinch for as long as Lumina could manage to keep singing. Though possessing less muscular strength than his, she was strong enough that his holding her very very tight caused her no distress. Far from it.
They were half a centimeter away from kissing, when Dmitri leaned away just a little bit. "Yes, God witness it, I do want to; but I don't want to be taking advantage of emotional vulnerability on your part. If we pause this right now, you can consider whether you genuinely want to proceed."
Lumina breathed hard, then murmured, "You really are a superhero! I believe that I'll still want this tomorrow, next week, and next decade; but I'll try to be an adult."
The scientists were still in the next room with Black Parakeet, so Dmitri and Lumina decided to join them. That they held hands the whole time till the conference was completed was an unconscious action for both of them... but Black Parakeet was fully aware of it, and wanted to do some singing and dancing for their sakes. When they told her they simply were trying not to go too fast, this only made Parakeet more optimistic about the end result.
