A/N: Boy has it been a while since I've done a chaptered fanfic. Lord knows it's the last thing I need to be doing right now. First few chapters cover the events up to and including Welcome to the Madness, then who knows~

Chapter 1 - Switches

Yuri Plisetsky was a lot of things: ambitious, focused, talented. He was also a very private person. Few people had ever managed to crack the shell of a nut that was the Russian Punk.

Yakov, of course, knew he started skating via government grant, and for the benefit of his impoverished family. Yuri didn't let that fact get past those who needed to know, of course.

Yuuri knew he wasn't as tough as he made himself out to be, having witnessed the very moment he found his agape under the waterfall that early spring day.

Of course, Victor knew this too; having found him teaching the Japanese Yuuri the quad-Salchow for no reason other than to give a competitor a fair shot. All of them knew that Yuri wasn't one to shoot an unarmed enemy.

Yakov wasn't particularly perceptive when it came to Yuri's personal life, and Victor had long been too self-absorbed to notice. Lilia was nothing more than a coach, and a demanding one at that.

Mila was the one who Yuri was sure had an inkling of what was going on. With every gold medal he collected, she almost always noted his change in mood. He felt lucky, living alone so nobody could see the true inner workings of his psyche.

His grandfather knew him well, but he didn't know mental illness. It was beyond his culture and before his time.

Despite him remembering Yuri from all those years ago, despite him seeing right through him from the day they met, Yuri didn't even consider that the minute he stepped off the podium at the GPF, Otabek would immediately notice his mania.

It didn't creep in like it usually did. He didn't try to hide it like he usually did – he was used to not having to, for the most part. And Otabek caught on before they'd even left the stadium.

"You seem different," he said bluntly once they'd made it through the first wave of the press and into the change-room.

Yuri shrugged. "I just broke a world record, let me live."

Otabek raised an eyebrow. "Okay."

Yuri was too oblivious to realize his legs bouncing up and down as he dug through his bag. Otabek wasn't.

Yuri had known he was abnormal – more abnormal than was socially acceptable – since long before he could put emotions into words. Only once he was able to put words into search engines did he realize there was a reason he could go days without sleep and would do quads at age twelve with no regard for his coaches' concern. Only once he was fourteen, receiving his biannual physical did he think to mention the word "bipolar" to a doctor – prompting a steady, uncertain look from him and receiving and pill which he told Yakov was for sleeping. Not a complete lie.

When he wasn't up all night practicing, working out, dancing or – when things got really bad – drinking, he was normal. Pill worked.

And when he was manic, he couldn't blame it on the pill, right? It always came after a win or after coming home from a long stint abroad. Good things = good mood. So whenever he asked, Yuri always told the doctor he was fine. And he was. He liked it this way.

Sure, he had bad days, bad weeks. Bad months. But if Georgi and Mila, and yes, even Victor, were any indication, that was surely normal.

Yuri Plisetsky was a lot of things: ambitious, focused, talented. He was also a very good liar. So good that nobody seemed to notice his 'switches', as he called them. So good that he could fool himself into believing that's all they were, little switches in mood and behaviour. Just benign, temporary changes easily reversed over time. He was such a good liar that he'd convinced even himself that it would never be a problem.

"I've never seen you smile so much," Otabek noted as they donned their sweats and prepared to face the paparazzi that awaited them on the other side. His eyes darted down to the medal around his neck – a rarity for Yuri, who, he'd noticed, had taken to stashing them in his bag after a win.

"I'm happy, okay? Is that a crime?"

Yuri pushed past him. Otabek said nothing. 'Happy' wasn't a word he'd ever heard him use, let alone to describe himself.

Having not been the one to create world history, Otabek's interviews were short and sweet – not that he minded. It gave him time to watch Yuri, who, for the first time since his last Junior World's win, was grinning and talking so much interviewers actually cut him off. Repeatedly.

Once he was sure the press was done with him, he lingered behind, close enough to hear the other skaters. JJ being arrogant despite his rather undeserved place on the podium, Yuri Katsuki, predictably, yielding the floor to Victor announcing his comeback (Otabek was surprised this didn't overshadow Yuri's glory, but then again, men's single's history), and of course, Yuri Plisetsky's strange responses. More arrogant and grandiose than usual, if that were even possible. Turns out it was.

Otabek's eyes shot open when he made out what the reporters were going after him about next. "Can you give us any tip-offs about your exhibition skate tomorrow night?"

"Well, I know my coach will kick my ass for saying so, but I'm thinking of scrapping the whole thing. Starting from scratch." The press were just loud enough to drown out the cry Yakov had certainly let out not too far away.

Otabek tried to catch the blonde's eye, but he was far too absorbed in the splendor of being the most interesting skater in the room to pay attention to anything but which microphone was currently in front of his face. Otabek met up with his coach and headed back to the hotel. He had no doubt that, in his current state, Yuri would soon be blowing up his phone in any case. It was like his personality had almost completely switched.

A/N: I'm bipolar myself, currently in a mixed state, but I've been right at the top and the bottom. Anyway, I haven't written an outline yet, so this is a bit of a case of building a bridge as I run. We'll see where it goes!