"Hiding behind every thundercloud is a beautiful blue sky waiting to emerge." ~ Golovkina, to Zinoviya Marilova.
Introduction[]
Ekaterina Golovkina is a Populist affiliated with the ultra-hardline classicalist wing of the Mechanocratic Ideology. In addition to operating with the Popular Front, she also has strong connections to Narodnaya Volya, a terrorist organisation that enforces an ultra-orthodox Mechanocratic line. In the Alternative Canon, following the death of Vadim Churyumov in 2150, she becomes the group's figurehead, leading under the pseudonym 'Madam Katenka' out of the public eye.
Golovkina is most famous, however, for being the mother of legendary warrior Victor Golovkin, behind the political education of Elena Trotskaya (by request of her husband Ivan) and the orchestrator of 2137's Red Monday – the deadliest skinhead pogrom in the second quarter of the twenty-second century.
Personality[]
Golovkina is almost the epitome of the Russian babushka stereotype: she is always ready with a piece of useful advice for her peers, and her public appearance is of a friendly, almost maternal figure. Her motherly demeanour is enough to charm almost anyone, whether they are seeking ideological guidance or simply stopping by for a visit.
Behind the façade of a humble and motherly woman, however, is the mind of a gelidly-ruthless and cunning individual whose moral code lies but a footstep from crossing into the badlands of sociopathy. Golovkina will not hesitate for a femtosecond to visit death upon anyone who she considers an enemy. Those who make the dire error of crossing her on a personal level have a habit of disappearing, only to be later found dead in the woods after multiple sessions of the calibre of hideous torture that would leave Thought Reassignment impressed.
Golovkina can even be considered the very fundament of Thought Reassignment, the populist having personally instructed Elena Trotskaya in the mechanics of torture during the brief time that they spent together in 2139. Combined with her ideologically-driven determination, it is little wonder that this unassuming housewife is close to the summit of the SVB's watch-list as one of the most dangerous people in Mechanocratic Russia.
Notable appearances[]
- Golovkina first appears in A Blood Debt, giving her son Ivan's journal to help him look after Zinoviya Marilova. She is also the target of an assassination attempt by the Sixteen July Pact, which is foiled by Drakolich and Vyacheslav Drago.
- She will return in its sequel, Flight of the Polunochnaya.