There is a relatively straight road running from Chelyabinsk to Yekaterinburg, and I traveled alongside that, perhaps fifty or one hundred meters off of it. This is an area of plentiful water and lakes, so despite the cold it was easy to find water.
Not two days out of Chelyabinsk I had a relapse in pneumonia, which I had hoped I was over. This, and I was drawing nearer the area afftected by the nuclear contamintion. Everything felt sick and in pain, although not in the sense that people can feel it. It was like a cancerous shroud had settled over the land on the very corners of my 'vision', poisoning it. Which is probably exactly what was happening. Whatever it was, it did bad things to me and that is probably why I relapsed.
The extent of my knowledge of that day is that I got up in the morning, got on Aulim and away we went. It was cold, bitterly so, but that can be expected considering that it was winter in Siberia. After a while I began to feel a bit odd and disoriented, and then I think I got delusional. I remember thinking something about the ravens, and being horribly afraid that they would come and claw me to death if I fell asleep.
I woke up about two weeks later in Yekaterinburg hospital, which was a complete surprise, even to me. I certainly hadn't been expecting it, I was thoroughly thrown off when police started questioning me and I thought that maybe someone had caught up with me, which wasn't possible because how could a boy with heart disease and athsma travel several thousand kilometers in a few weeks, from Armenia to Chelyabinsk anyway? Besides, I'm Siberian. I look Siberian. Far East Russian, at least partially if you ignore my Spanish father and slightly European tinted features. These people knew how we look. I told them that my family lived between Viljujsk and Njurba on the other side of the Viljuj in Yakutia. They asked if I was Hodanje and I told them I was, and that was that.
Then of course, they asked me what on Earth I was doing riding an Akhal-Teke on the road between Chelyabinsk and Yekaterinburg. I told them I was trying to go home but I'd lost my money and my things and I was trying really hard to get there. So then they asked what my name was. I said Rodion Astache, because that is a safe name... and it is really my name. 'Brodie Asturias' is a well-known boy terrorist leader who recently escaped from a heavily guarded room in Yerevan Hospital. 'Rodion Astache' is a boy who was abducted at a young age by a flock of ravens and hasn't been seen since, but is presumed dead.
After that they left and I was forced to stay in hospital for another month or so while they sorted out if I was who I said I was. I found out what happened to me -- a young couple had found me on the side of the road and called for an ambulance. Aulim was put in a pasture, so to speak, at the nearest farm to be kept while I was in hospital. Apparently, I officially own him these days, which is a bonus.
They had a hard time verifying who I was. First they were terribly skeptical that I wasn't dead. In the report it even said I'd been abducted by ravens, which is a very, very bizarre occurance. No duh. But I have all the scars, and a few more, as recorded in Rodion's medical records, all the same problems, some of which were absent in Brodie.
What finally convinced them, I think, was when they dug up that I was an identical twin and that my brother, Illarion, was still alive. His passport photo was the end of it, we're identical after all.
Yesterday I was released from hospital. The police gave me a train ticket and a considerable sum of money, then put me and Aulim on the train. I'm going to Irkutsk with hardly any effort whatsoever. People actually want to help me out. Help 'the little boy that was stolen by ravens' get home. Which is the strangest sop story I've ever heard.
I can't help but wonder what they'd do if they found out I was Brodie.
It is snowing outside. Dark and snowing. My ravens are out there somewhere, following me. I think I understand them now. I don't need them anymore...
It will take several days to get to Irkutsk like this. But it is warm and snug inside the train. I'm in a compartment, wrapped up in a blanket, with a window seat. I've been fed, I'm relatively well. I've joined up with a family with two young kids who are on their way to see their relatives in Jakutsk, so they're going to look after me. For once, people are looking out for me and I don't have to do it myself.
Life is nice. And I don't mind it. I'll start my campaign to stop people from destroying the world another day. People. My people. Even though I'm not one of them, I feel like I belong. I will belong. For now.
Rylie, mama, I'll be home soon. Then I'll make everything all right again. I promise.
Brodie Asturias Community Member 
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