Intro 1-into QfsT

QftS Intro for Readers Part 1

background/ details/ some ideas , introduction Quest for the Stone

Something I have long wish to do is make my characters better people, more believable. It is all very well to have people who are happy, or melancholic, or even often rude, but no one is ever quite as simple as that. Here are some of my characters as I see them now. Actually 1. I let this get away from me haha.

Markus aretiov/ oh, maybe change it to Aslanov? I like the play with words

Son of Marie unknown last name. And Markus Aslanov. His father Americaned his name after coming over from Russia. Actually, he Canadianized his name. He met Marie in Quebec, somewhere where they were both learning English, I think. And then they moved to the United States. They have two children, William and Caroline, they decided to have English names for them. I don't know where in the States they live. Not somewhere very urban, but not back country, either.

Markus has a bad history from Russia. He was close friends with another man, Rudolph Lapinov (so I should definitely play with the last name for sure, lion, and rabbit underplays hehe). Russia was involved in the Korean War-albiet not openly, but they supported Communism, and when some of the prisoners of war disappear, Markus becomes very angry but also intrigued. He wants to learn more, but has to escape when his friend begins to find him snooping around. Their friendship becomes hatred as Lapinov turns to fully supporting Communism and Markus not believing it to be the best way for the Russian people.

He tries to forget his past but as his children grow up he wants to leanr more about the fate of the prisoners and other POW that disappeared from camps in the war. He goes back to the U.S.S.R and finds after some time a facility where many of them have been held. He helps free some of them and also finds some secret documents. So spy-like! He brings these things back to the U.S. but he decides it isn't the right time to release them-i.e. peace talks are starting , and keeps the hidden.

There are series of tragic events that set up William as well. Marie is killed in a car crash (oh, could this be, maybe Lapinov getting close to him? Dundundun). As well, Caroline, well something happened to her. But I am not sure. So far as I know is that she has disappeared. Caroline is a recent invention in this story. I want to make her disapperneace tragic, but also, not just as a victim. I need some ideas for that.

And Markus dies of a terrible cancer! He tells Willaim the secret location of the documents and tells him to only reveal them if it will aid the worlds/ states cause needs them.

Lapinov wants them for a different purpose. The documents incriminate several leaders of the U.S.S.R. he will use them as blackmail and wishes to seize power of Russia, and has the mind to conquer, not collaborate, with the United States. There is a time stamp on these, however. He must find them.

He schemes to get William into Russia, and begins to plant evidence of a Russian Truth Drug being used. The C.I.A are interested and want to send a spy into the U.S.S.R. Lapinov convinces them (how?) that it must be William. And so he finds himself on his way to the U.S.S.R.