Moscow: Rostelecom Cup, GPF Qualifer Short Program (1.08)

[yuri_plisetsky]

The Rostelecom Cup is the last event of the 2014 ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating series. In the men's figure skating division, two competitors -- Otabek Altin of Kazakhstan and Christophe Giacometti of Switzerland -- have secured their places in the Grand Prix Final. The remaining four slots will be determined by the final standings of the six skaters competing in Moscow, based on their scores in previous ISU Grand Prix events:

- Michele Crispino (Italy): 3rd Place, NHK Trophy
- Yuuri Katsuki (Japan): 2nd Place, Cup of China
- Seung-gil Lee (Republic of Korea): 2nd Place, NHK Trophy
- Jean-Jacques Leroy (Canada): 1st Place, Skate Canada
- Emil Nekola (Czech Republic): 3rd Place, Skate Canada
- Yuri Plisetsky (Russian Federation): 2nd Place, Skate Canada

As the competitors arrive in Moscow, two particular skaters are the focus of much press and fan speculation. Fifteen-year-old Yuri Plisetsky is making his senior debut in his first major competitive event in his home country, after a strong showing at Skate Canada in Kelowna, British Columbia. At the same time, Japanese skater Yuuri Katsuki has arrived in Moscow with his coach, the long-reigning world champion Viktor Nikiforov, and based on his remarkable performance at the Cup of China in Shanghai...

...but all of this is only to be expected from the official press coverage.



On the ground, the reality is a little more complicated than that.

Comments

[theglassheart]

Yuri doesn't know if he's ever felt so certain of something in his life. That Victor shouldn't be here. That Victor should be there. That Maccachin had to come before all of this. Rostelecom. Him. Everything. That there was nothing that should compare. Nothing that mattered as much to Victor that he'd ever seen in all of these months, this close. Nothing that had ever been there, for as long as Yuri could remember, from both of their childhoods, even from only interviews and articles.

The way it's screaming clarity inside his thoughts, and Victor just keeps saying can't, but not even looking like he's sure he means it either. A peeking desperation that it almost frightening to see, and even more incredibly frustrating when Victor closes his eyes, and stands there. Behind his hand and his closed eyes, and his stillness, like he can use it as a wall, against even this, against even Yuri, and Yuri thinks that he might have gone crazy because he's thinking about shaking Victor.

Like maybe he doesn't understand. How bad this is. How much worse it can be.


But then Victor's eyes shoot open, to their side, and even as Yuri turns to look, Victor takes off running.
Yelling that one name, and leaving Yuri there, blinking after him as Victor all but throws himself on his old coach.

[fivetimechamp]

Yakov laughs a little, but Victor barrels past it as the world spins, spins, spins.

There's only one thing he can do. He has to go. He can't go. He has to stay with Yuri. He can't stay with Yuri.

He can't be here, but he has to be here. There's no one else he trusts to stay with Yuri, to coach him and help him and encourage him, and he knows it's asking a lot, too much, but there's no one else he has to ask.

There is only Yakov. Yakov, who, along with Maccachin, feels like he has been the whole of Victor's family for almost the last twenty years. "Can you be Yuri's coach tomorrow, for just one day?"

Maybe Yakov is frustrated with him. Probably he's still upset over Victor leaving, collecting his fifth consecutive World Champion gold medal and hopping on a plane what seemed like the very next day. He knows Yakov has every right to deny this request, but he still makes it. His fingers still dig into the solid shoulders under that old coat, still strong and steady, held straight from many years on the ice, and his voice is still a desperate, heartfelt plea.

(He didn't ask Yakov for his help for that whole year, only sank further and further into a frustrated and furious depression.

He should have asked. He's asking now.)

[yuri_plisetsky]

It takes a lot to truly surprise Yakov Feltsman, and even then his facial expressions are hard to shift from the bedrock of their settled foundation. So the visible lift of his eyebrows and the widening of his eyes might best be directly compared with the almost comical look of incredulous shock that has erupted a few feet away on Yuri's much-more-eloquent face. Left completely without words, both of them, except for the startled exhale of breath (which comes out much, much louder from Yuri).

One second ticks past, then another.

But before that third second ticks into place, Yakov's face has started to settle back into its old solid lines, eyes narrowing with intent concentration. At the same time, Yuri's mouth is trying to form a spluttering sort of sentence that might be protest or panic or anything in between. But Yakov's voice cuts through any fragments of noise that Yuri might make, as he switches from the less-familiar (and more noticeable) English to a low, firm Russian in order to demand an explanation: 'What has happened, Vitya?'

(The question he himself should have asked all those months ago, instead of mistaking his champion skater's agitation and frustration and unhappiness for mere boredom and discontent. There's plenty of blame to go around, if one were to choose to share it.)

[theglassheart]

Yuri can’t stop the startled question that comes out of his mouth, matching both Yakov and Yurio's own. He doesn’t feel it coming, and he hardly manages to more than hear it before he’s forgotten it came and happened and went, staring at the back of Victor, all bent pleading posture, and bright hair, in something deeper into baffled shock that even makes sense.

Somewhere is must make sense. (To Victor it must make sense.)
But not to Yuri, whose eyes have gone wide along with his mouth.

Yakov Feltsman? Victor wants Yakov Feltsman to take over for him tomorrow? As Yuri’s coach? The only coach he’d ever had? The man behind the best skater a decade and half? Who never once seemed to crack a smile? Yurio’s coach?

Results notwithstanding, he’d done his own last Nationals alone.




The idea is insane. It's downright horrifying.

… but if it means Victor will go already?

[fivetimechamp]

No one uses the diminutive of his name. No one aside from Yakov, who has known him longest and best and who he knew he could still count on. While the rest of the world might only see Yakov's face falling back into carved grooves of dissatisfaction, Victor knows there's a thaw of that long-held, inches-thick layer of ice beneath his features.

Yakov would never turn him away if Victor pleaded with him. If Victor needed him. "Maccachin --"

The Russian comes faster and easier, and with more than a little of the desperation of the teenager he hasn't been in a decade, but that was when he got Maccachin. Perhaps it makes sense that, as he's trying to explain to Yakov what happened, his sentences get faster with worry that is swiftly escalating into blind fear, words tumbling and tangling like branches in a flooding river. He doesn't know if they make sense -- trying to explain about leaving Maccachin behind in Hasetsu, Mari's call, the dire prediction from the vet, how far he is, how he knows he shouldn't go --

He shouldn't be doing this, either. He'd left, and Yakov has Yurio and Georgi and Mila to worry about now. It's not orthodox. It's absurd. It might even be insulting.

But his dog is (might be? is?) dying, and of everyone here, only Yakov really knows what a toll that would take. Not even Yuri -- who lost his own pet immediately before the Grand Prix Final the last time he skated, who probably knows how that would feel better than anyone -- knows just how much Maccachin means.

Ending his rushed explanation with his fingers gripping like iron into the old man's shoulders, his own only kept from slumping by nervous energy and strain, pouring into his native language like he'd been painting in black and white all this time, and only just now remembered to use color. "I don't know what to do."

If this was two years ago, he would hug Yakov and let the old man take over, tell him what to do, and he can't now, but the wish is there, to just fold against him as he had so many times, assured even in his worry that everything would be alright.

"There's no one else who can help me. Please."

[yuri_plisetsky]

Yakov listens, without interrupting or nodding or even seeming to blink, as the torrent of information washes over him in waves, Viktor's words fumbling for purchase as his fingers dig in and tighten their desperate grip on his shoulders. The dog that has been Viktor's constant companion for almost as many years as he has been under Yakov's wing -- and for the past few seasons, it has never been far from Yakov's mind that even the most beloved pets live much shorter lives than their masters, and the time would soon come when Viktor would end another long day at the rink only to return home to a silent, empty flat. He had been prepared, as a matter of course, to help Viktor deal with those cold hours of grief when that time came...but in this, as in so many other things, this season has been unlike anything that any of them could have imagined.

(An unbidden flash of memory: Bright laughter ringing out from beneath a silvery curtain of hair, falling over a wriggling, yipping mass of curly brown fur. A pair of puppies, for all that one is human, overflowing with the joy of loving and being loved.)



Yakov's focus is entirely on Viktor and his explanation, but the second Yuri gets the gist of what's going on (Viktor's dog, at the vet, might not make it) his eyes immediately flick over to the other person whose world has suddenly been turned upside-down this evening. And oddly enough, it's not the shell-shocked look on Yuuri Katsuki's face that catches Yuri's sharp, searching gaze first, but rather the phone clenched in his hand, with the riot of blue cartoon poodles all over its case.

(An unbidden flash of memory: A solitary framed photograph and a pair of thin metal tags, enshrined in a hulking wooden cabinet that dominates the space of a family room. The faint smokey-sweet scent of incense speaks of loss and remembrance in more languages than one.)



Once Viktor has exhausted his words, ending on that final heartsick plea, Yakov lets out a long, slow breath through his nose and closes his eyes for a moment. When he opens them again, there's a dark and decisive glint within, and he turns his head just enough to speak over his shoulder.

'I'll meet you back at the hotel,' he says quietly to Lilia, in Russian, and then returns his attention to Viktor and his skater. His hands come up, carefully prising himself out of Viktor's grasp, and his shift back into English is a small masterpiece of calm and control. 'Vitya. Katsuki. You will come with me, now.'

And with that, he starts walking away, down the corridor in the direction of the main event staging area -- which also happens to be the direction of the Rostelecom Cup's administrative offices.

[theglassheart]

It’s strangely like everything inverts.

As though he’d let himself slip off his seat and sink his head down under the water in the Onsen.

That’s what it becomes when every single one of Victor’s words becomes Russian, at a speed that Yuri can’t make out any word of, except Maccachin’s name. Time and again. All of it in a tone Yuri’s never heard before. Something ... desperate and afraid, sharp and rough and unconcerned with any amount of gentle affected public presentation, while he’s all but pressed to his former coach.

That.

Somehow that is worse.



He never thought he’d be this scared (about something that wasn’t skating) while standing next to Victor.


Except he’s not either, is he? He’s standing back here, watching, because he’s not the one who can do anything about this. The person Victor needs to fix whatever has to be fixed so the one thing that is breaking most can be seen to. He can’t really do anything. Setting free a helpless, painful scrabbling thing, tearing and spinning and digging with nails on the inside of his ribs, straight through his heart like it wasn’t even paper, everywhere, listening to Victor.

He just wants to make it better. Now. Somehow. Anyhow. Anyway.
(Doesn't want to see this. Doesn't want to see what happens if -- if --)



And he can’t.

(Who is he, and what are they
even pretending at this week,

if Yuri can’t do even that much
when Victor needs it most?)

The only thing he can do to help is stand there. Listening, and not understanding. Waiting, and watching. Until he's ordered, without any explanation, to follow someone he's never spoken to himself, but Victor needs. Trusts. Victor trusts him. To do what needs doing, and all Yuri can do is agree to whatever it takes to get Victor back to Maccachin. Even this. Because it's where he should be. Where he has to be. Go.

Yuri does at least take the steps to catch up with somewhere near Victor, looking over at him, while having to keep pace with the rapid movement of Yakov Feltsman dividing all the people around them in one stormy, straight forward, motion.

[fivetimechamp]

It's difficult to express the measure of relief he feels when Yakov plucks this out of his hands, but he doesn't expect the guilt that wells along after it, like the slow beading of blood after an old scab has been scraped off. Yakov will take control, but Victor is supposed to be in control. He's the coach now, and Yuri looks to him the way he used to look to Yakov.

(The way he still does, apparently.)

He should be able to take care of this without falling apart. He should be putting his skater first, even if his skater is trying to do the same for him.

But he hasn't learned how to do that, when he feels like a frightened child all over again, clutching at Yakov to help him. He doesn't know how to be the adult, here, and that's probably his own fault, more of his selfishness and thoughtlessness stamping him like ink, but it is what it is. Yuri might not even allow him to stay, might be so upset with him if he tried that his free skate could fall apart all over again.

Or not. Or perhaps Victor is just grasping for any excuse that allows him to leave his skater, alone, in an unfamiliar country.

He turns to Yuri as they move through the crowd, half about to change his mind entirely, this is crazy, he can't go --

But the look on Yuri's face makes his mouth close into a thin line, and he just reaches for Yuri's shoulder instead, barely feeling it under his palm, while they hurry after Yakov, trying to keep pace.

[yuri_plisetsky]

Throughout the entire exchange between Yakov and Viktor, Yuri has been trying to fight off the sick, unsteady feeling rising up within him, as if he's standing on a frozen river that without warning has started to develop cracks in what was once solid ice, where any movement in any direction might make the fissures spread and suddenly send him crashing down into the freezing black waters below. Viktor is all but on his knees begging for Yakov's help, pleading with him to do the unthinkable and take on a rival skater

(Katsudon)

and when Yakov actually starts to walk away, with the others hurrying to catch up with him, Yuri can't stop himself from taking a staggering step forward as well. But his legs aren't working as well as they should be -- why would they, when nothing feels solid under his feet? -- and then it doesn't matter any longer, because Lilia's hand is on his shoulder, pulling him up short before he can turn a reflexive movement into an actual chase.

'Leave them be, Yuri,' Lilia says, calm but faintly chiding. 'It's time for us to go.'

For perhaps the first and only time in their mutual acquaintance, Yuri glares up at her with fury, his lips curled back in a snarl. 'But they can't just fucking -- '

'Yuri.' The look in Lilia's eyes could corrode steel. 'That is unnecessary.'

Her reprimand makes Yuri shrink in on himself, his combativeness evaporating into a final, wavering plea. 'But Lilia....'

'Your coach knows what he is doing.' Lilia's voice is still firm, but she moves a little closer, drawing Yuri towards her. 'And you have your own responsibilities here. For now, we will focus on that.'



At the Rostelecom Cup, the main event staff offices are located in a deliberately out-of-the-way section of the complex, a private area open only to a privileged few. For the three of them, the badges around their necks give them all nominal access, with every smile and courtesy due to them as participants (though not without some confusion over their sudden appearance). Viktor Nikiforov's presence turns those smiles and courtesies into eager enthusiasm, an immediate willingness to be of service to Russia's living legend...even if it's a bit strange for them to be treating said legend as a coach and not as a competitor. But Yakov Feltsman is something of a legend in his own right -- not least, some might mutter, because in the Russian figure skating community he knows where all the proverbial bodies are buried, and may even have buried a few himself -- and so from the moment he opens his mouth to start issuing commands to the startled Rostelecom event staff there is no question that he will be obeyed.

He can demand to see Yuuri Katsuki's original completed event paperwork, checking it over with an experienced eye. He knows which new forms must be filled out in turn and signed by all parties concerned, both coaches and the skater himself. As the staff scramble to comply with his terse requests, he stands with his arms folded and the fingers of one hand drumming lightly on the top of his forearm, controlled impatience personified. Even to Viktor and Katsuki, his words are few and far between, mostly to point out where on the forms they should sign as well. And the only comment that he will make (in Russian or in English), when asked why he is taking charge of Yuuri Katsuki on such devastatingly short notice, is the phrase in light of Viktor Nikiforov's personal emergency, I have agreed to stand in as Yuuri Katsuki's coach for tomorrow's men's free skate.

His tone and facial expression convey his real message: you do not require, and will not be given, any further information on this matter.

[theglassheart]

Yuri tenses, with the smallest of bobbles, when the hand comes down on his shoulder, and he looks over, again, almost stumbling. Which only makes manifold his embarrassment and, apparent, uselessness. Victor should not be comforting him.

Except even with that thought doing it's best to imitate a wall slamming into his face repeatedly, it doesn't hold up in looking over at Victor. Victor's expression that looks not quite shattered, but dazed at least, and Yuri has to wonder if it's not for that, then. When the hand stays at his shoulder as they hurry, and it's nothing like the hug at the end of his skate, or the shoulder in the Kiss n' Cry, or the over exuberance of which Victor throws himself on Yuri sometimes.

If it's nothing like anything else he could even beginning to compare it, because nothing like this has ever happened.

If it's for something, like ... comfort? Or desperation?

Which catches hard in Yuri's chest.
Harder than the wall of his thoughts.

Makes him dizzy for a second with uncertainty and a need he has no clear words or thoughts to, it's just a sharp stab of a thing. That makes him want to hug Victor. Or take his hand. Or. Or something. He doesn't even know what. Any of those things on the list of inappropriate gestures Yuri wasn't even freely to doing in private. When things were calm. When the day had been good. When there was no reason not to, and there was no one watching.

That felt like a thick plate of glass. In front of him, and inside of him.

The not knowing what to do almost as damning as the number of people around watching them all. Whispering.

Where they're going isn't too far, and what he's asked to do is nothing compared to the rest. Especially with how clear it is that this is something that, apparently, happens often enough there's a very easy system for the routine of it. He can do it all well enough, whatever they need of him. No questions.

Gaze always finding its way back to Victor

(... and Yakov ... but mostly, only just short of always, Victor).

[fivetimechamp]

The Rostelecom event staff are accommodating even in their surprise, but they keep shooting furtive glances his way, and he knows it's because they expect him to be pleasant, charming, affable. Everything he has always been in the public eye, that he has no time or patience for now, because he has to sign papers, and Yuri has to sign them, and he's still not sure he's doing the right thing, but there's no space or time to take Yuri aside and talk it over with him.

If he's going to go, he has to go now. It's nearly a ten hour flight from Moscow to Tokyo, and it will be next to impossible to fly directly to Fukuoka. Even if he leaves right now, the chances of him being in Hasetsu even within the next fifteen or twenty hours is slim at best, and Maccachin ––

It doesn't kill his unsettled concerns, but it does leave him with very little choice about how to proceed from here. From the second Yakov agreed to take Yuri on, the dam was burst, and now there's nothing to do but see this through. "I have to book a flight."

That's half to Yakov, partly to Yuri, partly to himself, partly to the world at large as he runs a distracted hand up into his hair, fingers still covered in gloves. "Pack my things. Yuri ––"

Finding him nearby, always nearby, and apparently always watching Victor, which Victor is both grateful for and guilt-ridden about. "We need to go over some last notes for your free skate with Yakov."

Yuri knows what to do. This free skate is in his blood, now, and Victor has every confidence he can skate it with or without Victor there to watch on the sidelines, but that doesn't mean he isn't going to still try to give Yuri every last chance he can, and Yakov is the best coach he knows, the only coach he, personally, would ever choose. "We need to go back to the hotel ––"

If they're done here, and he's not sure if he cares one way or the other. Normally, he'd care quite a lot about appearances, about how he appears to the staff here, what they perceive and might relay down the line, but he's feeling far too shattered and distracted now to be much more than vaguely polite.

Not that Yakov will especially care, but it does, in a dull and distant way, make him feel a little bad.

[yuri_plisetsky]

The return to the hotel is a silent taxi ride. Lilia spends it texting the details of the situation to Mila and Georgi and issuing instructions to them in response to their replies. Yuri stares out the window, chin propped on his hand, as the Moscow streets slip by in the night.

(He won't forget his responsibilities. No matter what may be happening back at the arena right now, nothing will alter his point score from this evening, or the third-place position he currently occupies. No matter what things will be like tomorrow morning, he has only one chance to redeem himself: to burn away the weakness that he can still feel at the point of impact in his hip, and the danger of that thick, hot, suffocating feeling in his chest.)




The event staff are putting the finishing touches on the paperwork, but Yakov hasn't let his guard down in the slightest. In the old days, they would have had a pack of chekist handlers breathing down their necks; today, it's the media that poses the real threat, and the sponsors can't be trusted to keep them in line. Even now, over in the corner there's a furtive-looking young man bent over his fancy phone, thumbs moving rapidly as he sends a message to someone -- almost certainly a press contact, if Yakov's guess is correct. It's been a long day for the reporters and camera crews, but this sort of news will spread like wildfire within the hour.

Scowling faintly, he glances at his watch. The ice dancers should be almost finished with their performances, which means that Viktor and his Japanese skater have only this short window of opportunity to make a break for it. Unless they are out the door in the next five minutes, there's no guarantee that they won't be stopped by someone eager for a scoop. Give it half an hour, and the reporters will be hunting them down at the hotel as well. And considering how anxious and upset they both clearly are, he would not trust either of them to hold up under any degree of questioning, let alone make a suitably neutral public comment on the situation.

All of this is at the forefront of his mind when he moves over to Viktor, who is rapidly losing control of his own decision-making abilities in a way that is viscerally painful for his old coach to see. 'Vitya,' he says, low but penetrating, using their native language in an effort to ground those wildly flying thoughts. 'Go now. Get to the airport. I'll hold off the inquiries here.' A small pause, before he concludes, with all the assurance he can put behind his words, 'Trust your skater to do what you have taught him.'

(Whatever he may have said, and in truth to some extent still thinks, in this moment he is speaking as one coach to another.)

That said, he looks over at Yuuri Katsuki, giving him a top-to-toe once-over before drawing whatever impenetrable conclusion lies in the back of his mind. 'Katsuki,' he says, picking up the thread in English once more. 'You will go back to the hotel with Vitya, and meet us in the lobby tomorrow morning. 7.30, no later. Is that clear?'

[theglassheart]

It's disjointing (for all that everything seems very clear and very distant, or very now and stuck like sludge) that it takes so little time. That somehow the physically binding legal line between Victor and him, in this small closed room, is nothing more than the mouthed words of explanations that aren't clear, the double printing of some papers, and the signing of them.

Is it strange that it's so easy? Is it strange that it really seems like so little of a hassle?
Is it strange that it takes no time at all to be removed from Victor's hands and put someone else's?

Yuri doesn't want to think about that. This isn't about him. This is about Victor. And Maccachin. He pushes it back, pushes it down (later, tonight, tomorrow, if he's lucky never). Blinks back to attention and Victor's voice somewhere just before his name, and absently kicks himself for anything he might have missed before that. It's all the things left. The plane. Victor's luggage. His -- his free skate? Victor wants them, him, to talk about the free skate, with Yakov?

Somewhere that's logical. The rest of it is just a sort of horrification that has his eyes go wide. Right before Yakov starts talking to Victor in Russian, again, and it feels like having a door slammed right in his face. Between him and both of them, again. (Not about him.) When that's a conscious choice. (Not about him.) When Yuri can only make out one word of the entire torrent of those Russian sentences. (Not about him.)

( But the too distant-too close
voice in his head says

it probably is, too.
This time.)

When the consciousness of that choice seems even clearer when Yuri's eyes snap up when his name was said, like an icicle had cracked. But he's simply being ordered where to go now (as though Victor was already gone, already done with that, since signing his name) and where to be tomorrow. Unwanted or unneeded for Victor's suggestion, maybe, but Yuri's as relieved as he is unnerved by the absolution of no response to it.

Or one he was excluded from hearing. Makes himself dig through cold for, "Yes."

Something cold, and hard, and aching building in the center of his chest. But he won't look at it. It can't have him. Not yet. Not when he lets his gaze slide toward Victor, and there, in the reverse of everywhere else, where he has to make himself look at people, with Victor he can't stop himself from it. (Not yet. Not here. Not about him.)

There's the urge to fidget, but he just digs his toes into his shoes, into the floor. Yuri tries not to look away at the thought anything he says might have already been said, or that Victor might already have been given an order for everything, too, and anything he might say still just useless. Feeling impossibly smaller and hating that he's the one who is going to be heard by more than Victor.

"We should get a cab back, so you can start looking for flights now. I can update Mari and my parents."

Simple steps. Find a plane. Pack his things. Leave on the plane. Hopefully, get there in time.

[fivetimechamp]

His thoughts are going everywhere, like someone opened a door leading out to a hurricane onto a room full of down feathers. He can't seem to catch any of them with any sort of fastness, now fearful about Maccachin, now uncertain what to tell Yakov, now worried about Yuri, now fighting back the urge to call the airlines this second and get a ticket, now frozen with the cold wash of certainty that he shouldn't be going anywhere.

Yakov's firm voice makes him blink, and focus. He's trained to that voice for years, and it must be how a retired soldier feels when he hears an officer barking orders. Everything narrows into a single task: to listen to Yakov and obey whatever it is he's saying. It's a reflex developed from over a decade of his life being determined by, shaped by, guided by that voice, and he can feel the trust like bedrock beneath his feet. It's an easy enough order to follow -- leave now, before the vultures descend, let Yakov fend them off as he has so many times before -- and though his hand goes to Yuri's shoulder when he agrees (unknowingly enough, he's just barely able to recognize; Yuri doesn't speak Russian), he doesn't take his eyes off Yakov.

Nods, before his hand leaves Yuri's shoulder so he can put his arms around the old man's bull neck and hug him, all too aware that the last time he did this, he was leaving suddenly, too.

(That he'd been a disappointment. That in chasing what he needed, wanted, he'd given nothing but pain to someone who had given him everything for years.)

So when he whispers "thank you" in their shared language close to Yakov's ear, it feels like the apology he never gave. He's not –– couldn't be, won't ever be –– sorry for going to find Yuri. He isn't sorry for trying something new, discovering how far Yuri can go, what it's like choreographing for someone else, everything he's learned and gained and loved in these last eight months.

He is sorry for never considering what his leaving might do to Yakov, or Russia, or even Yurio. He's sorry for causing pain to the person who has known him longest and best and had no reason to think he'd suddenly be gone.

But there's no time for anything further, so he pulls away and finds Yuri with a nod. "You're right. Let's go."

[yuri_plisetsky]

The weight of Viktor's arms around his neck all but surprises a grunt out of Yakov, but the whispered thanks -- and the unspoken apology beneath it -- makes him reach up and give the young man a rough pat on the back, just long enough to press him close for a moment. And there's an apology in that, too. For not truly seeing how unhappy Viktor had been. For whatever aspect of his own personality, or their working or personal relationship, or both, had made Viktor so reluctant to come to him with his frustrations all those months ago. A coach must trust his skater, but a skater must trust his coach as well. To know that their mutual trust had been badly strained, but not broken entirely, is a small source of comfort in all this.

Yet perhaps there's also something of a farewell, a letting-go, in that returned embrace. Because he's by no means ignorant of what all of this might mean, of why Viktor chose to reach out to him in desperation instead of simply trusting that his skater could handle the second day of the Rostelecom Cup on his own. (Yuuri Katsuki would be a quivering mess if he were to learn exactly how closely Yakov Feltsman has been observing him, ever since not one but two of his skaters had gone haring off to Japan without warning in the space of a few weeks...and quite a number of interesting observations have been made between the start of the China Cup and this moment in Moscow.) Nothing in this world is certain, but it may be time for an old man to accept that his Vitya will never return to him, not in the same way as before, and to make peace with it as best he can.

But all of that is at the back of his mind, where it should be. There are other priorities now, and the moment that Yakov is certain that Viktor and Katsuki are ready to head out, he immediately turns around and barks at the young man he'd spotted texting a few moments before. 'You there, with the phone in your hand!' There's a certain grim satisfaction to be had in the way that the startled culprit bolts upright and nearly drops the offending electronic device, and he presses his advantage. 'Are you going to tell me who you were contacting just now? Or will I need to start making some calls of my own?'

He's got the attention of everyone in the room, which is exactly what he wants. To stay on the attack, deflecting all threats, until the coast is clear. Do what you have to do, Vitya.



Up on the eighth floor of the Star Hotel, the disciplined evening routine of stretches, costume and skate checks, and other preparations for the morning still has to be done regardless of whatever is happening elsewhere. And Yuri lets himself fall into it like he's going under hypnosis, to the point where he is as focused on the feel of Lilia's hands on his back or arms as he is on the strain and pull of his muscles under her touch. She pays extra attention to his lower back and spine, in case the soreness has affected his gait and put additional tension on his legs and feet. When they are finished, and Yuri has taken care of everything he will need for the free skate, Lilia has him sit on his bed and gives him a freshly-prepared plastic bag of ice for his hip.

'Keep that on there for five more minutes, and then repeat the last set of stretches you were doing.' The rest of her guidance, drinking enough water and limiting his phone time and not listening to loud music, comes as a matter of course...but instead of asking him if he needs anything else, her final question is slightly different, and phrased a little more carefully. 'Would you rather do the final stretches on your own? Or would you prefer it if I stayed here to assist?'

Yuri blinks, surprised at first -- but as her words sink in, he sits up a little straighter on the bed. 'No, thank you, Lilia,' he replies quietly, if a bit stiffly. 'I can manage it.' He draws another breath, holding her gaze as if it's the only thing keeping his courage in place, and then adds, 'And I...I'm sorry. For earlier. For being nekulturny, in speaking to you like that. I won't let it happen again.'

[theglassheart]

There's still music playing, the din of cheers and applause, echoing through the hallways and the walls. In the middle of this building, dancers at their mark, fighting for their chance, on the first competition day. The show still going on, with everyone's eyes on it, for however much longer it has to go.

For how close it is, it feels so far away. Another world. (Was Victor kissing his skate in the Kiss and Cry so very little time ago?) It feels like another day, another year, maybe a whole other person. Divided by one phone call. He remembers that. He remembers that too well. Maybe he hadn't remember that the last few months. But he does now. It bites at the back of his throat and soft top of it inside, sick in his stomach, spinning his thoughts for any crack, every time he swallows.

Every time he glances toward Victor.

But what to do is clear enough.

Get through the hallways and outside, and flag down a cab. All things Yuri can at least do, so Victor can focus on the only thing he should. His phone, his plane ticket, getting to Maccachin as soon as possible. The drive wouldn't be short -- hadn't been that morning, when it was his bunching nerves and Victor pointing out things for the second day in a row; which made it seem interminable to contemplate now, gallingly in the way -- but maybe that will just mean it's more likely Victor can finish his arrangements by the time they get there.

When the side door of the Luzhniki opens, to where there are already a line of cabs waiting, Yuri has to blink himself from surprised back to the recognition. That it does actually makes sense. There are thousands on thousands of people in this building about to be done for the night, all of whom will need to be taken back to places.

"Well-" It's quiet, but something of an attempt at sound. "At least we won't have to wait."

[fivetimechamp]

He can hear Yakov barking at that hapless event staffer until nearly halfway down the corridor, and though it isn't as amusing tonight as it would be at any other time, it almost makes him tuck a wry shadow of a smile into one far corner of his mouth. It isn't far, from here to the exit, but it feels that way, feels like the corridor floor is unrolling beneath his feet, gaining length, yawning out before him as if he were stuck in a bad horror movie, and maybe he is. The suspense, at least, certainly makes him wish he were watching this happen to someone else.

But they get there in the end, and Yuri's right: there are plenty of cabs, so they make for the one at the front of the line, and Victor pulls the door open for Yuri before sliding in himself, only pausing long enough to give the driver directions in rapid Russian before his hand is going for his phone, there in his pocket.

He meets Yuri's eyes across the seat, as he's saying: "I'm sorry, Yuri, this will go faster if I ––"

Before his call is picked up and he reverts to the Russian he'd been about to apologize for. Moscow scrolls by, and it's both too long of a car ride and not long enough: if he's going to go, he needs to go now, but he also has to be sure he can catch the next flight out, or there won't have been a reason to ask Yakov to take over for him, after all, because he wouldn't be able to go until morning, and that would make leaving before the free skate pointless.

It's when he's put on hold that his eyes track back to Yuri, who looks as pale and reserved (but determined, certain) as Victor has ever seen him and it isn't fair. None of this is.

It's not fair that he has to go. Not fair that he can't stay. Not fair that he had to make sure there was someone for Yuri still here, instead of trusting that Yuri could do it himself. (He's come such a long way, but...)

But he reaches for the Yuri's near hand, even as he's being taken off hold, and told there's a ticket available on a flight to Tokyo, that he could be routed from there, and even as he's agreeing, paying to leave Yuri all alone, his hand gives Yuri's a squeeze, before he has to take it back to go searching for his wallet and the credit cards inside.

[yuri_plisetsky]

Something about Yuri's phrasing of his apology makes Lilia pause. Not I won't do it again, but I won't let it happen again. That same struggle for mastery and control that she has seen over the past months of their training...but here combined with the look she had seen in his eyes when Yakov had told Yuri that his grandfather would not be there to watch his short program. Trying so hard to not appear vulnerable or weak -- or afraid.

(And Lilia Baranovskaya has made a few interesting observations of her own today, not all of which she intends to discuss fully with her ex-husband. In particular, while Yakov had been focused on Viktor's explanation for why he needed to fly back to Japan, Lilia had seen how Yuri's gaze had remained completely fixed on Viktor's Japanese skater, that Yuuri Katsuki. And without drawing any immediate conclusions, she will be paying very close attention to how her Yuri acts and reacts tomorrow, when Katsuki will be part of their group for the duration of the free skate.)

In the end, she rests a hand on his shoulder, feeling the muscle tense and then relax under her light touch. 'I'll be up for a while yet,' she says. 'And our doors are always open to you, Yuri -- mine and Yakov's. If you need anything else tonight, let us know.'

The too-old eyes in a too-young face look up at her for a long moment before Yuri nods once, still determined but a little less stiff than he had been earlier. 'Thank you, Lilia,' he says. 'I'll probably just go to bed, but...but thanks.'

It's as much of an answer as she had expected. So Lilia lets go, wishing him a quiet goodnight before leaving the room. And Yuri responds in kind, waiting until the door closes behind her before flopping back on the bed with a long sigh, sprawled out with the ice bag tucked against his hip and with one arm over his eyes. Even with only the bedside light turned on, it's a little too bright in the room.

He's tired. He ought to get some sleep. But sleep isn't going to come easily tonight.

[theglassheart]

It’s a quiet sort of descension. Door, car seat, window. Fingers on his lap on his warmup pants — the lagging realization that he’s still suited up under it and everything else is inside, behind them — only long enough to remember he’s supposed to be doing something. It gives him some movement. Digging into his pocket for his phone and pulling it out to send a quick, short text to his family that Victor will be coming as soon as he can, while directions are being given in the background.

It’s only a few words and it leaves him already looking up, just holding the phone in his hand, as Victor starts apologizing, and Yuri can’t for his life in that second come up with anything that Victor should be apologizing for. The surprise of it, and wash of denial against the idea of that being needed now of all time, takes longer in his head than getting to even understanding what the apology is was supposed to be for.

His phone call. The one Yuri, himself, has pointed out should be had in here. As soon as possible. It doesn’t matter. Victor’s voice permeates the small vehicle and Yuri leans back in his seat, trying to look out the window and not stare at Victor. He’s not sure he sees any of it, and yet some of it still looks familiar, from it being pointed out. Something about that high rise, or something about that food place. Voices from half a day and a day ago, like the faintest echoes. People talking somewhere else, on the other side of a wall.

The fragile foolishness of those people who seemed recklessly carefree now.

The pressure on his hand is still somehow a surprise, when his is moved suddenly, and he looks down to his hand, before he’s looking up to Victor’s pale, troubled expression, while those fingers squeeze his. That faint pressure registering even just as Victor lets go and goes digging for something of his own. Yuri gives up on his window without trying a second time, staying just slightly canted toward Victor, leaving his hand where it had been as the sensation of that touch evaporates too soon. Staring at some amalgamation of Victor’s hands and his knees, or, maybe it’s the car door on that side.

It doesn’t sound like bad news at least. (And. Good. That's good.) Not if Victor needs his wallet. His money. (The sooner he can get to Maccachin the better.) Last step and first (and he’s actually going, he’s actually leaving). There’s a line cutting itself somewhere right on the inside of his breast bone. A strange sort of sharp chill radiating into the bones right around it.

Yuri does wait until Victor is finished and hanging up, before asking, quietly, “How soon?”

[fivetimechamp]

"Seven."

He's really going to have to run, if he's going to make it, but it was the only non-stop flight he could get. Sliding his wallet and phone into his coat pocket, he runs a gloved hand up into his hair and sighs. "I'm going to have to change and pack as quickly as possible."

Maybe fifteen minutes at the hotel. A cab to the airport. A rush to get on the plane at all.

All that, to hurry up and wait on the nine-plus hour flight back to Japan, when he won't even be able to fly straight to Fukuoka. "I have to go through Tokyo, and then the Kamamoto. I'll take the train to Fukuoka and call Mari or Misato to come get me."

It's so roundabout. It might not even be enough. Might still be too long, too far, too slow, but even if he's the five time reigning world champion, he can't make the distance between Russia and Japan any less than what it is. (He knows. He would have done it before, if he could.)

The Star Hotel is beginning to loom in the distance, and he's gathering himself, even as he turns to look at Yuri, who seems ... quiet, but not dangerously so. He's tense, but not in the way he was last week, when everything was cracked glass threatening to shatter at any given second. "It's not the best possible flight, but it'll get me there around midday tomorrow."

He says it because he's not sure he can say everything else he wants to say right now: that's he's sorry for leaving, that he wants Yuri to get some sleep tonight, that he knows Yuri will be fine tomorrow, even without him. Everything throwing itself on the creaking glass of his thoughts, as the cab pulls up and Victor exchanges a few brief words with the driver and hands over the fare. Even getting out onto the sidewalk feels like he's going too slowly, taking too much time, but he waits for Yuri, even if his steps heading into the lobby are swift ones.

He'll call for another cab from the room, and have it waiting when he comes back down here in less than twenty minutes. "I guess it's a good thing we packed light."

Relatively speaking, anyway.

[yuri_plisetsky]

The cold, hard lumps of ice against his hip are keeping the ache to a minimum, though perhaps the radiating cold itself is another kind of ache that overrides the one inside him. Regardless, it's not particularly comfortable to sit on directly, so Yuri rolls over a little, enough to keep the ice bag in place but still reach for his mostly charged phone. He'd had it turned off ever since the start of the short program, but it's better to get the worst of everything over with now -- and that includes clearing out his personal notifications and doing a quick round of his usual sites.

(Don't think about tomorrow. Not yet.)

Even as he opens up Instagram, scrolls through Twitter, skims the various forums and news round-up sites he's bookmarked, he knows that none of this is a good idea. He knows this. Reading the various comments on his Skate Canada performances, seeing how they'd been dissected in real time, had been uncomfortable enough. And that had been the English commentators, who naturally preferred their homegrown asshole to the ones who'd been challenging him for a spot on the podium. Yuri is well aware that the Russian commentators, here at home, aren't likely to be any kinder to him for his performance today; if anything, they'll actually delight in picking him apart. And whatever they say, good or bad, will set off his fans, until the forum postings and website comments sections look like someone had taken napalm to them. But seeing what they have said is better than imagining what they might have said --

Or so he thinks, until an unlucky click to a Russian skating news aggregator makes him sit straight up on the bed, gripping his phone so tightly that the case feels like it might crack in his hand, as a word emblazons itself across his brain: Figurist-uzurpator.

Usurper skater.

Yuri Plisetsky, the usurper skater.



For once, his usually colourful vocabulary completely deserts him.

[theglassheart]

Seven, Victor says, and Victor keeps talking, but Yuri’s head keeps repeating that number (Seven Seven Seven), while his hand shifts so he look at the time on his phone (Seven Seven Seven). If it was any other time, he’s not possible anyone would believe they’d make it.

But Victor has to.

Victor will.

Which makes it confusing why blinking at his phone and then Victor paying is making it feel strange, at the inside corners of his eyes. Like they’ve gone too dry and he has to blink too many times. His eyes and his throat, and maybe it’s good he doesn’t need to say anything, because he’s not sure he’d know what to say or if his body would even work to let him say it if he knew what to say, what to do besides stay out of the way, besides follow beside or right behind Victor in motion.

Which he’s been doing for months.

He can do that even at dawn in his sleep.

Across the lobby and into an elevator, everything feeling, backwardly, like the faster and closer it gets suddenly the slower the world seems and the tighter everything inside of Yuri. He makes his mouth do … something. A curve or a press, he’s not certain when Victor is making some relieved comment about not having to pack much. Which is good. It’s good for getting to Maccachin. It’s good for the plane. It’s good for Victor.

That’s what Victor needs.

That’s what Yuri wants for all of this.

So why does it feel like it’s just the beginning of a second act
in the show of just how easy it would be under any circumstances
for Victor to disentangle himself from all of this?

A few minutes and everything legally binding is changed.
A few minutes here, of light packing, and
every physical proof could be, too.

Which makes everything so confusing when he’s still impatient outside the door to the room, caught in the necessary forward momentum to do whatever it takes to keep the worse from coming. No key, no backpack, no roller bag. He doesn’t even have his jeans or his winter jacket, so he definitely doesn’t have his room key, stored with everything else that would have been waiting in the locker room for after the whole day on finish. None of it matters. It'll be there tomorrow. Maccachin might not be (and Victor won't either way).

[fivetimechamp]

He's already shucking the jacket from his shoulders as he heads into the room and flips on the first lamp he comes across, trying not to think about the way the jacket puddles at the foot of both of their beds because he'd pushed them together earlier. He focuses instead on what he needs to do: pull out some casual traveling clothes, pack his suit and the gray one still hanging in the closet, along with his toiletries and all the various items that have been thrown around this room because he expected to be here for at least one more day, and probably two, or even three. Apologies bubbling up in his throat, only to be swallowed, hard, while he's slipping the knot of his tie loose and tugging it over his head, fingers going to the buttons of his shirt and waistcoat even as he's sifting with his other hand through his suitcase for trousers, a loose collarless shirt, his traveling coat and scarf.

There's so much to say, and not enough time to say it in, and if he starts saying anything, he might wind up saying something he shouldn't. Something about how he won't go, after all, how he's being crazy, he can't abandon Yuri.

(Each time met with a memory of Maccachin so clear and immediate it slices a pang of exquisite pain into his chest.)

"I'll have to call down for a cab."

Thinking out loud, because he can't stand the silence, but he can't say anything of substance, either, as he's pulling off his shirt and waistcoat and replacing them with the soft top he'd pulled from his luggage, toeing out of his black patent dress shoes to switch trousers, dig out the more comfortable brown loafers he wears on the plane. "It's a little over nine hours, so it'll be in the middle of the night here when I land. I'll call once I get on the train, it should be late enough by then. Go to bed early tonight, so you can get some sleep before you meet Yakov."

He'll know if Yuri's tired, if Yuri hadn't slept, even if he barely knows Yuri. He has a sense for these things that must come with decades of doing the job, decoding and interpreting skaters in all their myriad moods and idiosyncracies.

It's probably for the best that he's too busy to really look at Yuri, as he's packing, his travel clothes hung on him without any of his usual polish. "And you still need to get dinner tonight. Don't eat too late, or you won't be able to sleep."

[yuri_plisetsky]

Of all the things he'd expected to be called

(quit acting like you're still the top Russian figure skater)

this one had never entered his thoughts

(​they'd probably let you walk right into the Kremlin and crown yourself in the Dormition Cathedral)

and yet really, isn't it the one that makes the most sense?

Yuri has to set his phone down before he does something he'll regret with it. And as he leans forward, propping his elbows on his knees so he can bury his hands in his hair and rest his forehead on his palms, he tries to slow his breathing in order to get his pulse rate under control.

The usurper. The imposter. The fake. Is that what people -- his people, the Russian people -- think of him? That he'll never compare to the real thing, the legend they'd spent more than a decade building up into something almost like a national folk hero? He'd heard the cheers in the arena today, seen the reporters flock around that familiar figure. If that's what they think of Viktor Nikiforov now, after he went and fucking abandoned them all at the glittering height of his career, how much harder is he, Yuri Plisetsky, going to have to work to even remotely come close to being more than just a pretender to Russia's empty throne?

And the worst part of it is, he can't even find the rage to fire him up and give him the push he needs to overcome this sick, helpless feeling in the pit of his stomach. Because every time he tries to conjure up a suitable focal point for his anger -- that faux-friendly embrace and blandly dismissive smile in the hotel lobby yesterday afternoon, that absolutely disgusting display in the kiss-and-cry a few hours ago -- it's overshadowed by the memory of a halting, frightened voice pleading for Yakov Feltsman's help. No posturing for the cameras, no posing for an adoring audience of one or a hundred or a hundred thousand....no other thought in the man's mind but finding someone who he could trust to look after his skater so he could fly halfway around the world to be there for his deathly sick pet.

'Fuck this,' Yuri whispers to his knees, closing his eyes against the burning feeling at the back of his eyelids. Beside his hip, the bag of ice shifts, melting slowly with his body heat.

[theglassheart]

Walking into the room feels like walking into another world. Victor is all movement toward the middle of it, and Yuri stands there holding the door for long moment as the realization strikes him (again? for the first time?) that Victor won’t walk back into this room again. The door closing sounds more finite than Yuri knows what to do with, never saw coming, like all of this. Steps slow, while Victor is already starting to undress in the middle of the room, dropping things around him in his haste, and Yuri has to swallow hard.

Except for the first time, there’s no other feeling like there’s ever been with it before. No warmth. No swell of embarrassment. If anything, just for the briefest second he feels sick. Everything is different, and he just looks down and to one side, toward the bathroom, knowing he needs to snap out of his thoughts. This isn’t the time. This isn’t the place. Victor’s talking about the cab, the plane, his time, his train, all sensible details, all forward direction, and Yuri needs to focus. Focus. Focus. Focus. Help with whatever he can.

Instead of walking forward, he turns and flicks on the bathroom light. As much as he can avoids the mirror entirely, and starts putting Victor’s things into his case. While Victor’s voice continues to come from the room proper as he scoops everything from the counter into it. Then, takes the bottles from the shower area and adds them in, too.

Having to give the counter a last look, to be sure he has everything, but all that’s left is his stuff, and this stinging bite at how it all looks like so little in the vista of endless empty space around it. The little he has, has ever had, ever brought, with nothing thrown around it in use. But even as it tries to crawl upward, Yuri shoves it back, making himself turn, hit the switch and come out after that voice.

“Okay.” Because he doesn’t know what else to say, doesn’t know what the not-so-slowly spreading sore ache turning into a pressing wave in his chest will let him say. It doesn’t matter. He doesn’t need to say anything. He just needs to help. He just needs to make sure he’s not in the way, and that Victor can catch his cab, and his plane, and get to Maccachin. That’s what’s important.

He hears himself (more than feels like he chooses himself to) add, “Here.”

He sets Victor’s toiletry case on the end of the bed beside Victor’s suitcase. Then, turns, without looking up, to look over the tops of everything in the room. Table, and dresser, and bed tables, and chairs, for any of the small things that shouldn’t be forgotten.