Username: Puchiko
Character Name: Iosif Zaslavsky, although for the past ten years he was known as Viktor Ivanov.
Title: Iosif Zaslavsky the One-Eyed Sharpshooter
Describe their talent/skill/act: Iosif’s act is derivative from the likes of Annie Oakley and Lillian Smith – famous (albeit it female) sharpshooters. Iosif possesses such lethal accuracy that he can put several bullet holes through a playing card dropped from a relatively short height, – and not only that, but he can hit the card edge-on. He’ll shoot just about anything and manage to riddle it full of bullets before it touches the ground.
Iosif uses pistols, rifles, and shotguns in his act, but he’ll never use an automatic firearm or anything larger than a shotgun. (Though he is fully capable of using automatic pistols, he prefers the look and feel of antique pistols.) During an act he might fire at candles and blow out the flames by the force of the bullet, or shoot backwards using a mirror, shoot using either hand (and be equally capable with both), shoot through cards held sideways, and shoot apples (or any other fruit) off the heads of audience members. Those are just examples – just about anything the audience or ringleader wants him to hit he can put at least three bullets through.
I realize that Iosif might conform more to expectations if his skills progressed gradually; but Iosif has always been a masterful shot, and that’s that. But Iosif hasn’t picked up a gun in about ten years and will need time and practice to regain his skill, so hopefully this is acceptable.
Here's a general outline of the progression his skills might make:
Stage 1: Most likely out handing fliers, if only because he'd rather do that than lug around boxes and equipment. I'm sure he'll scare a couple of people who were on the fence into attending the circus.
Stage 2: Probably the things I listed above, plus some other tricks within the same vein.
Stage 3: Firing (and hitting, obviously) while upside down, while blindfolded, shooting a dime tossed in the air, shooting moving targets on horseback, etc. Essentially, things that require more precision, accuracy, and even acrobatics on his part.
Appearance: Iosif is a fairly daunting character when judged only by his appearance. He stands at 6’0” and weighs a solid 200 lbs, and maintains a rigid posture that somehow only makes him more intimidating. He’s well over thirty-years-old (how old he is he won’t say, but it’s commonly believed to be somewhere in his mid-forties) and thus is older than most of the other circus members, though he does his best to act his shoe size as opposed to his age.
In the past Iosif was a wildly attractive man, though perhaps not in the traditional sense. Thankfully he’s aged well, and while he’s not as good looking as he was in his prime, Iosif carries with him a rugged sort of charm that still has an effect on women vulnerable to that sort of thing. He has a square, strong jaw and a high forehead, and his eyes (eye?) are set heavily into his face. He has full lips, not uncommon among Russian men, and a prominent, wide nose with just the slightest hint of a bump on the bridge. Iosif’s smile tends to be eerily crooked, and his teeth are not perfectly straight, but there’s something bizarrely jubilant about it. His features are sharp and his nose and mouth dominate his face somewhat, although the addition of a jaunty eyepatch somehow manages to provide his face with more balance.
As mentioned in his billing, Iosif only has one eye. The other is god only knows where, although Iosif firmly believes that one of his most hated enemies, Valik Nikitin, had it floating around in a jar somewhere. (Unfortunately for Valik Nikitin, Iosif had his revenge by unloading a clip of bullets into the man’s face. Alas, he was never able to find his eye in Nikitin’s apartment.) His remaining eye is a pale blue in color, and his eye is shaped narrowly, under thick eyebrows. The other eye is long since gone, and as previously mentioned Iosif wears an eyepatch to cover it. The socket is actually covered by a nasty, jagged scar that Iosif wears like a badge of honor. He’s prone to simply “forgetting” his eyepatch and walking around with his scar in plain sight, if only because the varying reactions he receives tends to amuse him. His face is very expressive, if only because his features are so exaggerated, and Iosif always wears his emotions on his sleeve.
Iosif has a thick head of wavy, dark hair that grows to about the middle of his neck. It’s actually a medium-dark shade of brown in color, bordering on black without proper light, with streaks of gray scattered here and there throughout. He rarely styles it – the hair simply parts on the middle on its own, and is kept short in the front so that no pieces fall in front of his eyes. The back, however, is somewhat unruly; he seems to walk around with a perpetual case of bedhead.
As far as physique goes, well… Iosif is not as young as he once was. But he maintains as good a physique he can manage, and while he may not be as strapping as some of the younger men in Cirque, he’s managed to avoid the evils of beer bellies. Best described as barrel chested, Iosif has some definition in the torso, and a decent amount in his arms. He makes sure to keep in shape, if only because he takes too much pride in himself to ever allow himself to be overweight. Iosif also has a tattoo on his chest of a rose, which is a common tattoo given to those joining the Russian mafia. He also has a skull tattooed on the back of his neck, a Russian mafia tattoo signifying the fact that he has committed murders. Both tattoos are small as Iosif wanted them to be as unobtrusive as possible, since tattoos are looked down upon in the Jewish community. (Strange thing to be concerned about seeing how he killed men for a living, but that’s Iosif for you.)
Iosif manner of dress can either be abysmal or fairly sharp. He has a certain fondness for Hawaiian T-shirts, and has pretty much worn them for the past ten years in Miami. But he owns a closetful of well-tailored suits that he actually looks rather sharp in, and he mostly keeps the Hawaiian shirts for warm, humid days. Otherwise he wears simple plain T-shirts and sport jackets, and usually slacks or jeans. He doesn’t spend a lot of time in the morning getting ready, so his clothing usually looks fairly rumpled.
Personality: Iosif is an unpredictable man, which is a frightening notion seeing how he nearly always has a gun on his person. He’s notoriously easy to irritate (for example, he absolutely
hates it when people blow their nose around him) and his temper is not easy to soothe – you mostly just have to wait for it to work its course. He’ll get wildly and passionately angry about something completely inane and irrelevant, yell and curse about it for approximately forty minutes, and then settle down with a good beer and a comic book and be completely at ease with the world. Thankfully his temper is rarely ever violent, it’s simply noisy. (Iosif
can have a violet temper, but it’s a different story entirely.)
If there’s one thing to be said about Iosif, it’s that he’s ridiculously easy to please. He loves bawdy, stupid jokes with a passion - it’s not that he isn’t intelligent enough to understand sophisticated humor, he’s simply bored by it. Despite his short fuse, Iosif is a remarkably cheerful man who can be hysterical to have around. Iosif loves things as simple as “Your Mom” jokes and is easily reduced to tears of laughter by simply hearing the word “n****e” and he has a repertoire of dirty jokes (told in poorly constructed English no less) that usually get a laugh. Even his cheerfulness is a little unsettling; there’s something absolutely manic to Iosif, and the fact that he is usually either hysterical with laughter or crazed with rage makes any interaction with him hazardous. There’s very rarely a middle ground with Iosif, though he does have his moments of solemnity and quiet, usually in the absence of others. He actually loves people and social situations, and tries to avoid being alone as much as possible if only because he prefers not to be reflective or introspective. Being around others distracts him.
Iosif is also a very blunt and honest person. Lying is never something that sat well with his personality, and years of being forced to lie and cover up his tracks have had some sort of bizarre backlash on his ability to tell any falsehoods. Even if he
wanted to lie about something – telling someone he liked their shirt when he actually thought it was hideous, for example – he’d be god awful at it. As a result, Iosif has found it easier just to tell everything like it is. He never beats around the bush and his directness is actually a positive quality at times. His English isn’t very good and he stubbornly refuses to improve it, though he understands it well enough.
Iosif is fiercely protective of the things that he holds dear. This manifests itself in different forms: for example, Iosif hates sharing any of his possessions with anyone. He’ll rarely let anyone read his comic books, unless somehow the person manages to “earn the privilege.” In a similar vein, Iosif is protective and almost possessive of the people he considers friends. He’d gladly kill someone if it meant protecting someone he held dear – and under certain circumstances, be willing to lay down his life as well. Still, this intense need to protect those he loves is tempered by the fact that there are very few people that Iosif considers anything past “acquaintance.” He’ll show nearly everyone gruff affection, but it takes a while before he considers anyone a friend, or even someone he feels remotely close to.
Despite being open about certain aspects of his personality – and completely open about his history as a mafia hitman, which he takes great pride in – Iosif tends to keep other emotions and parts of his history hidden. Hardly a living soul knows of his days as a violinist, or his Jewish heritage (despite his name.) His engagement to a woman named Anya Golikova (and her subsequent death) is a well-kept secret. Additionally, people rarely see Iosif express emotions aside from anger or joy; obviously he experiences the entire spectrum of emotion, but any sadness or remorse he feels he keeps quietly to himself.
Old habits die hard, and in the past Iosif was a cold-blooded killer who, while perhaps not enjoying his work, certainly didn’t allow any of his murders to weigh heavily on his conscience. Iosif coped with committing multiple murders by simply adopting another persona to deal with them – his image of a hitman, so to speak. Before anyone gets up in arms, Iosif does not have Dissociative Identity Disorder. He just tries to diffuse his guilt over the murders by thinking “That wasn’t really me. It was someone different.” Even though he knows perfectly well that this isn’t the case. Either way, occasionally this persona will pop up – and that is when Iosif’s temper stops being noisy and starts being frightening. God forbid anyone piss him off to the point where he actually seems quiet and serious, because that usually means someone is going to have the everloving crap knocked out of them in the next few seconds – or worse.
Having been raised a musician, by musicians, Iosif loves music. He has a soft spot in his heart for opera and orchestral pieces, gospel, bluegrass and zydeco music, and reggatone (music he picked up while living on Miami Beach.) Iosif also loves comic books with an unbridled passion and spends a ridiculous amount of money on purchasing more and more comic books, though he refrains from buying anything manga-related. (He isn’t very fond of the Japanese due to a few dangerous and nigh-fatal run-ins with the Yakuza.) He also enjoys salted peanuts and pistachios, and anything flavored with mint.
World and History: (From World A, with no changes/adjustments made.)
Iosif was born to Liza Zaslavsky in the middle of the infamous Russian winter. Iosif was not the result of any loving relationship – Liza had been impregnated as a result of a rape, and thus neither son nor mother ever learned of the father’s identity because he was never caught. Liza was incredibly young at the time, being only seventeen-years-old, but she came from a loving and supportive family who helped her throughout the entire pregnancy. And when Iosif was born, the Zaslavskys promised to do whatever they could to take care of him.
Iosif was a tempermental child at best. He didn’t seem to like being held, but at the same time he was miserable if no one else was present in the room. Still, the Zaslavskys – which consisted of Liza’s father (David), her mother (Nina), and an older sister (Mariam) – all did their best to give the child as much love as he required and were successful in that respect. Liza, however, removed herself almost entirely from her child’s upbringing at this time; she couldn’t bring herself to care for him because she associated him with the rape.
The Zaslavskys were all musicians, and as a result Iosif was encouraged to pick up an instrument at a young age. He’d proven himself to be a complete troublemaker, who constantly demanded attention from his family. They hoped that an instrument would occupy some of his time and give the rest of the family a break. And so, since none of the Zaslavskys had a violinist in the family yet, they handed him a small violin they had purchased in the hopes that it would distract Iosif.
It’s worth mentioning that the Zaslavskys were fairly well off as a family. David worked as an achitect and had done several projects for the government that allowed them to live in relative ease, though they were by no means wealthy. They had enough to support them, and that was good enough.
Back on topic, Iosif took to the violin with a passion none of them had expected. Even though the small violin was still a bit big for him, he immediately began fiddling (no pun intended) around with it and, after only a day, requested a teacher. The Zaslavskys found him one in an old family friend named Gera Gari. Gera had been playing violin for well over forty years, and he was impressed by Iosif’s desire to learn at such a young age. So, Gera taught him some of the basic techniques for a violinist – how to hold the violin, use the bow, etc. – and promised to teach him more when he was older.
Time passed, as it often does, and Iosif grew. He was generally a happy child, though he was prone to tantrums when things did not go according to plan. By the time Iosif was seven he had grown into his violin, but he’d been tinkering with the thing for the past three years (nearly driving the Zaslavskys up a wall, though he did eventually get better at it.) When Gera returned to start giving Iosif real lessons, he was surprised by how much the boy had taught himself on his own. Gera then set about refining Iosif’s technique, teaching him actual songs, and a few tricks that he usually didn’t bother teaching young students. Iosif took to it all eagerly, as he loved playing the violin – and not only because he enjoyed it.
For a good portion of his childhood Liza, Iosif’s mother, was very distant from him. He received plenty of love and attention from other members of the family, but he was never told of how his mother came to be pregnant, and took her absence personally. At first he didn’t notice, but after seven years it became painfully obvious that his mother was intentionally avoiding him. At least until just before Gera began giving the boy real lessons; one day Liza wandered into Iosif’s room and asked him to play. Iosif told her that he didn’t know any real songs, and Liza said that it was all right, and again encouraged him to play. So Iosif did, and when he was done Liza actually smiled at him for the first time in his life. Although she left the room soon after, she said that she was proud that Iosif was working so hard, and that he was the handsomest violinist she had ever seen. This only motivated Iosif more in his dream of becoming a famous violinist.
It is also worth mentioning that the Zaslavskys were religious orthodox Jews, which always troubled Iosif. He was always a contrary child, and he didn’t appreciate all the rules and guidelines that came with Orthodox Judaism. As he grew older he would sneak over to friend’s houses and have nonkosher meals, or would sneak out of temple when he thought that no one was looking. Iosif had no particular reason for disliking his heritage, as he was not exposed to anti-Semitism at the time since the Jews in his village were on fairly friendly terms with everyone else, but as he grew older Iosif attributed his early dislike to the fact that he never really believed in God.
Iosif grew and entered the Soviet education system, where he achieved minor success. He was not a good student but he was by no means a bad one – he wavered mostly on the “good” end of average. Mostly he ignored his schoolwork and practiced only violin, as he had it set in his mind that if he could just become a talented violinist, his mother would finally love him. True, Liza would only visit and speak with Iosif when he played violin, and at all other times avoided her son as though he were cursed. Still, he was a fairly popular boy at school due to his outgoing and friendly nature, and while teachers were frustrated with his tendency to not turn in any homework, they were happy Iosif made up for it somewhat by participating actively in the class.
School allowed for Iosif to garner attention in completely new ways. As he came to be older, he was always the boy that the girls giggled and blushed about when they thought he wasn’t looking. Even though he was not the best student, teachers enjoyed his company nonetheless if only because he was a remarkably chipper presence. And still at home Iosif practiced his violin and received weekly lessons from Gera, and it was becoming apparent that he had quite a gift for the instrument. By age fifteen Iosif had already surpassed Gera in ability, and Liza had actually taken to talking to him at meals. Iosif attributed it to his abilities with his instrument, and was ridiculously proud of himself – he loved his mother and held her very dear, and finally gaining her approval was a feeling like nothing else.
But when Iosif was sixteen Liza became very ill. She had caught pneumonia and had to be quarantined to a different room in the house, and Iosif was not allowed to visit otherwise he might get sick. The entire family was worried – Liza had always been a pale and moon-eyed girl, who got sick easily, and was never known for taking good care of herself. Still, it came as a shock to the entire family when Liza passed away due to complications with the disease, and none took the information harder than Iosif. After sixteen years with hardly any interaction with his mother, despite living under the same roof, he had finally gained her approval! It seemed cruel to him, and it around that time that whatever faith Iosif had maintained until that point completely snapped. He grew resentful of his family and their insistence that this had to happen, and that Liza was in a better place now.
Iosif was miserable. His family, also mourning, did their best to comfort him but Iosif would not allow himself to be consoled. He stopped going to school – a surprise to the entire Zaslavsky family, as he had constantly brought up the fact that he wanted to be an architect just like his grandfather – and did nothing but sit in his room and either be lethargic, or play violin. Finally, near his seventeenth birthday, Iosif left home. He packed a few things, got his violin, and walked out. He knew that his family would never approve of the decision that he had just made – that he would be a violinist, and make his mother proud of him even in the afterlife.
The Zaslavskys searched, heartbroken to have lost two of their number, but Iosif was fast and was already on a train to Moscow. He was determined to join a symphony or, somehow, become renowned as a violinist. He had a little money set aside as an inheritance from his mother, and from gifts from his family, and so he set about finding a place. He finally found a family that would let him board in their house for a relatively small fee, and moved in there. He then set about auditioning for whatever orchestras, symphonies, or musical productions he could find; and he was a fine violinist, but he was too young. They told him that while he was talented he didn’t have enough experience in the field, and they sent him packing.
Iosif’s money and patience were dwindling fast. He played violin on the street in the hopes of making a little money, and he did – but generally people pinched pennies and his income was practically nil. Desperate and frustrated, Iosif turned the man who was boarding him, Anton Malenkov, and asked for advice. Anton had long since noticed the fact that Iosif was a tall and broad teen, and had a secret passion for gambling on boxing; so he encouraged Iosif to join the underground boxing league he bet on, because winning matches usually led to fairly generous prize money.
Seeing no other means of making decent money, Iosif reluctantly put down his violin and brought up his fists. He promised himself that this was only until he had enough money to support himself without having to be worried, and soon as that happened he’d start auditioning once more. Unfortunately while Iosif was large and solidly built, he’d never fought in his life and his first match went terribly. He was beaten to the point where he was knocked unconscious, and the match was declared a complete and utter defeat on his part.
Losing, however, only made Iosif angry. Nothing was going his way, and he was sick and tired of always failing – failure was never something Iosif took well, as he was a proud individual who saw failure as a flaw or weakness on his part. So he turned, once again, to Anton. Anton proposed the following deal: he waive Iosif’s rent and give the man enough time to train decently if he allow Anton to be his manager and take 70% of his earnings in the future. Not thinking in terms of the future, Iosif willingly agreed and set about training.
Anton, who had been a boxer in his prime (albeit it a rather shoddy one), set about training Iosif. Iosif had always been light on his feet proved to be almost as adept at boxing as he was at violin, and found himself deriving satisfaction from the brutality of the sport. It felt angry, and powerful – two feelings that Iosif, still nursing hurt from a year full of grief and disappointment, welcomed. After training for half a year, and now aged eighteen, Iosif entered the novice boxing round once more, and proceeded to pummel his opponent into a bloody pulp.
As the rounds continued, Iosif only became more skilled at defeating his opponent. He now had a physique to be proud of, and despite a bump on his nose from where it had broken during a match he looked handsome and powerful. It was during one of his matches that he caught the eye of Mendel Petrov, a powerful figure in the faction of the Russian mafia called Izmailovskaya. Petrov proceeded to keep an eye on Iosif, seeing how many matches he had won, how he fought, and realized that he could use a man like that serving under him. And so Petrov approached Anton, whom he had learned was Iosif’s manager, and asked what it would take to purchase Iosif’s contract. At first Anton refused, but then he saw the simply insane amount of money Petrov was offering, and he took the offer willingly.
Now Iosif’s new “manager”, Petrov approached Iosif to fully recruit him. Iosif, who was aware that his contract had been bought, pointed out that he was not under any obligation to join Petrov, and that he had no desire to continue boxing either way. He’d made a decent amount of money, enough to afford a flat of his own, and he was older now – hopefully old enough that some symphony would hire him as a violinist. Petrov nearly had a fit of hysterics at Iosif’s logic and proceeded to tell him just how much money he would earn as a violinist, and then how much he would earn while working under Petrov.
It was a convincing argument. Iosif figured there would be time to be a violinist later, and this would only be temporary. And so Iosif agreed to work with Petrov as a bodyguard, and so became part of the Russian mafia.
His initiation consisted of a common ritual amongst the Russian mafia – they tattooed a small red rose under his collarbone and on top of his right pectoral. He was uncomfortable with the notion of tattooing, as it was very taboo amongst the orthodox Jews, and he still had some lingering beliefs left over from his upbringing. But eventually he consented, and with his tattoo came all the advantages of being part of the Russian mafia – he had a large income and was able to afford a new place to live (one much nicer than he had originally planned, though it was still rather cramped.)
Iosif was also, for the first time, given a gun. He’d never used one before in his life and was actually rather frightened by the prospect of carrying one around on his person, but Petrov maintained that in order to properly protect his “manager” it was necessary. So Iosif carried it around with absolutely not intention of using it, and obeyed Petrov loyally. If Petrov told him to beat up an individual, Iosif did not ask questions – he did as he was told. He followed every order Petrov gave, ignoring all his own doubts and inner moral conflicts to instead carry out orders with an alarming amount of efficiency and even flair. He was aware that Petrov was, essentially, trafficking drugs; still, Iosif was only required to follow Petrov around on meetings and punch when asked to. He had yet to perform anything too horrible.
It was soon to change.
Petrov was angry at a man named Vladimir Andreev, who had lied about the quality of the drugs he was selling. Petrov was desperate to get even, and so he sent his lackey after Andreev. At first Iosif assumed that it would be like any other “mission” he had been sent on, but Petrov included a new order – that he kill Andreev, and he do it fast. That essentially meant that Petrov was expecting Iosif to use that gun, which he wore mostly for show, and take out a hit on Andreev.
And so Iosif had tracked down Andreev to his apartment in Moscow, waited for him to leave, and then at approximately 2:53 in the morning – as Andreev stumbled away from a bar smelling of alcohol – put a bullet into the back of his skull. Iosif was surprised by how incredibly easy it was, and how little remorse he felt over committing such an act. It seemed almost too simple. Here there was a dead man, a man he had killed, lying at his feet and he felt nothing.
It’s possible that Iosif did in fact feel a terrible wave of guilt over his murder, but he likely ignored any such feelings. It was all forgotten when he returned to Petrov with news of a job well done and received a substantial bonus for “going out of his way.” It was around that time that Iosif was becoming a name amongst the mafia men for his unwavering loyalty and his remarkable efficiency, and other mob men began to take an interest in him.
Outside of the mafia, Iosif had continued playing violin, still hoping that he could become a violinist in the future. But the night he killed Andreev and returned home, he picked up the violin and suddenly found himself feeling ill. Indeed he felt as though he had betrayed his mother by not becoming a violinist, and suddenly realized what he had become: a cold-blooded killer. The night after he had committed his first murder was the only time he had ever cried over what he had done, and Iosif was practically hysterical with guilt and grief. Once the guilt had run its course, leaving him feeling gutted, he put the violin away. That part of his life was over. At the time he was twenty-one – Iosif is now forty-three and he still hasn’t touched his violin, though he still carries it around with him wherever he goes.
After the first murder the job became easier. Iosif expressed an interest in becoming better with pistols and Petrov, who had taken a liking to Iosif and saw him as something as a pupil, offered to take him to a firing range. It became something of a tradition with the two that the would head to the firing range once a week, and here Iosif honed his skills as a marksmen. Like most things he pursued passionately, he proved to be talented at it within a few weeks of practice. Holding a pistol felt natural to him, and brought with it a sense of power that he found enjoyable. And all the while he was getting more and more embroiled within the mafia; he was now the go-to person for quick and easy murders, though he had not been required to kill anyone important. He mostly took out those who had performed small slights against the mafia, but he felt justified in doing so – he perceived those he killed as having deserved it, which helped alleviate his guilt somewhat.
With great responsibility came greater power. Iosif was no longer just a bodyguard to Petrov – he was a second in command, and while he did not handle any of the drug deals or the like he became something of a chief of staff. He hired and trained new recruits, some of them boxers like he had been, but his main method of employ was that of a hitman. Eventually he broke away from Petrov – amiably, as the two men were on good terms – and established himself as
the man to turn to when you needed a hit taken out – didn’t matter who it was.
At age twenty-three Iosif was already remarkably skilled with a pistol and was well known for his accuracy and clean kills. He had no interest in becoming a mafia boss, or working with drug trafficking; he was happy working as a killer for hire to all the men in the mafia. He made an incredible amount of money doing every one else’s dirty work, but the Russian mafia wasn’t – and still isn’t – as flamboyant as the Italian mafia, and while he liked to do things like buy himself nice clothing, he mostly put the money into savings. To signify his position as a mafia hitman, a skull was tattooed on to the back of his neck – again, Iosif felt uncomfortable with this but went through with it anyway.
One day, Petrov approached Iosif to ask a favor. A certain man, named Valik Nikitin, was threatening to blackmail Petrov with documents he had found that implicated Petrov in several drug exchanges. Petrov could hardly turn to anyone else, as they would likely kill Petrov for allowing himself to be compromised like that, but Iosif owed Petrov for being so good to him in the past, and agreed to carry out the hit without telling anyone. So he went to Nikitin’s house, expecting another easy hit – he was wrong. As it turned out Valik was not blackmailing Petrov for money; he had used Petrov in order to get Iosif, who had murdered his father in the past. Petrov had warned Valik that Iosif was coming, and Valik had been prepared – soon as Iosif has snuck in Valik came after him with a knife. Iosif, who was not expecting an ambush, and who knew very little about fighting someone armed with a knife, found himself too surprised to react initially. Valik slashed at his face and succeeded in hitting the left side, cutting vertically across Iosif’s eye. Blinded, and in pain, Iosif literally fell backwards back out the window and landed on his back on the cement below. Thankfully Valik was only one story up, and though he was winded Iosif managed to pull himself up and stagger away. He managed to drag himself to a hospital, where some of the doctors were paid to regularly deal with mafia-related injuries, and he was treated. His eye, unfortunately, had suffered such damage that it had to be removed, and he was informed that the knife marks would leave an awful scar. Iosif was miserable – he assumed that without his other eye he wouldn’t be able to work anymore, which was probably Valik’s intention. And, for some odd reason, the removed eye had gone missing; it was Iosif’s belief that Valik had paid a nurse to smuggle it out and give it to him.
Even though he was offered a glass eye Iosif refused, and instead settled for an eyepatch. He returned home after recovering and found it originally difficult to adjust to a life without his eye. The wound still hurt, and having half of his vision cut off was unsettling to say the least. Still, he headed to the firing range in the hopes of salvaging some part of his talent. Imagine Iosif’s surprise when he found he was just an accurate a shot as ever; even with the loss of his eye, the whole process had become so automatic in his mind that he hardly even needed to think about it anymore. His mind adapted to the change and made adjustments as needed, and while Iosif was a little shaky at first he removed himself from the business for a year in order to practice with his new handicap. ((And lord, I’m gonna ask you all to suspend a little disbelief here. I figure if there’s magic and stuff I can make the very unlikely true :C.)) Iosif also declared revenge on Valik Nikitin, but the man who had taken his eye and ruined his face (though some still found him attractive) had all but disappeared. Valik wouldn’t resurface for another two years.
At age twenty-six, Iosif attended a New Year’s Party held by the mafia’s elite. The party also served as a means for Iosif to reintroduce himself to clientele, as he was attempting to get back into the business. It was here that he was introduced to Anya Golikova, a pretty girl who had just turned twenty. He found her charming, and Anya was intrigued by his jovial nature, which was so rare amongst the brooding crime lords. What followed was a relationship that they did their best to keep private – while relationships like theirs weren’t discouraged, Anya’s father was a raging anti-Semite, and would not have approved.
Iosif began taking clients again and proved to be as efficient and skilled as he was in the past, and all the while he continued to see Anya. The two saw one another for two years, still managing to keep their relationship hidden from everyone (if only because privacy is a highly valued commodity amongst the Russian mafia.) At age twenty-eight, Iosif proposed to Anya. He wanted to settle down, maybe create a family – he was now more than wealthy enough to support one, and the murder business, while lucrative, no longer held his interest. Anya happily accepted, and the two decided to elope and get married as soon as possible. Unfortunately complications arose – a drug deal in America had just gotten extremely messy due to Yakuza interference, and Iosif was called in to dispatch a few men who had been compromised.
What Iosif was not aware of was the fact that Anya’s father had informed the Yakuza of what was going on, and that was why the deal had gone sour. Another hitman was sent to eliminate her father and, in true mafia tradition, the rest of his family. (In the Russian mafia, it is common practice for not only the snitch to be killed, but every member of his immediate family as well.) Iosif returned from his work to find that Anya ,
his Anya, had been murdered. Wild with grief and desperate for revenge, Iosif decided that he had had enough for the mafia world – he approached the authorities and offered to tell them everything he knew in exchange for amnesty and protection. The government, which was eager to crack down on the crime rings in Russia, eagerly accepted.
And so the disenchanted Iosif told them every detail of mafia life as he understood, and had no issue naming names, or confessing to his own crimes. Still Iosif maintained that those he killed were gang members and crime lords themselves, and he had never harmed a civilian, which was true. Had he been asked to he likely would’ve had no problem with it, but thankfully it had never come up. His information proved to be extremely useful to the authorities, who followed through on their end of the bargain – they decided to send Iosif to America under the assumed named Viktor Ivanov, a deal which he accepted.
But first he had business to attend to. It had come up among the authorities that a man named Valik had been released by the authorities who though him related to the mafia, but they couldn’t produce anything concrete enough to keep him. The night before he was scheduled to leave the country, and before the arrests began, Iosif managed to track down Valik. I’ll let Iosif tell the rest of the story in his own words:
“He say, ‘Maybe, I unload bullet into your head and you not like that, yeah?’ and Valik Nikitin, he such a*****e, he laugh then and when he laugh he closes eyes, yes? Okay. I see eyes closed, and then I think, ‘Iosif Zaslavsky this your opportunity to make this man very dead like,’ and I pull out gun and I put maybe five bullets in his eye socket. Of course this make awful mess and I never find stinkin’ eyeball. Overall, wasted trip.”
The next day Iosif went to America to start his new life. He moved to Miami Beach and was set up in a decent apartment. He was given a job at the library, where he spent most of his time giving children frightening smiles and being as loud and irritating as possible, though he did none of these things intentionally. He did his best to push his past behind him and forget all memories of his work, of his Anya. His grief passed, and he found himself happy living in Miami. It was warm, and even with the constant threat of looming hurricanes his life was relatively stable. He didn’t have to lie, he didn’t have to kill anymore – in fact he didn’t touch a gun his entire stay in Miami.
But life was too stable. After eleven years of boring life, Iosif - now Viktor – found himself feeling restless. It wasn’t until he saw fliers for a circus coming to town that Iosif, who had always been a fan of the Russian circus, decided to cave in an indulge a part of his childhood that he still carried with him.
References: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v311/PuchikoGaia/9other.jpghttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v311/PuchikoGaia/1other.jpgGreat pictures for expression/facial structure. Except add on twenty years.
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