Summary: If you want to hurt a bear, hurt her cubs. If you want to hurt yourself, try to keep them.
Any sailor will tell you to be wary of calm seas. The more you enjoy them, the more you expect them, the worse the storm will be that follows.
Yuuri feels numb. He stares down at the note clutched between black-gloved fingers, eyes scouring the page for any tiny piece of information he's missed. Any clue, any tell.
Beside him, Snowcap is much less calm. Ice cracks with every pacing step, forming and breaking as he turns rapid circles on the roof. "How could we let this happen? How- This is my fault. I should have- I-"
The paper is white. Slightly damp from the rain, but the black letters etched on it are perfectly legible.
If you ever want to see your little kitten again, it says, you will come to the docks at midnight. No police. Your lives for his.
Why is it always midnight, some distant part of Yuuri muses. No villain ever plots a nefarious rendezvous at ten-past when they can have it at midnight instead.
"We'll get him back," he reassures Snowcap.
When Snowcap turns to look at him, his eyes are full of a kind of desperate rage Yuuri has never seen there before.
"Yes," he says, and his voice is so low Yuuri can feel it in the pit of his stomach. "We will."
Cold rolls off of Snowcap like a glacial wind. Yuuri has never known him to be quiet, but as they slip unnoticed past the men guarding the main building the Russian hero doesn't make a sound. They pass the armed gunmen in haunting silence, unable to think of anything but the young man-the boy-held captive somewhere inside.
Of course their stealth can't last forever. Sooner or later a guard notices them moving like shadows along a dimly-lit corridor, and he sounds the alarm. They spring into action a moment too late to stop him, Snowcap's fist slamming into the side of his head to knock him unconscious.
Gunfire and screams. Running footsteps. Yuuri and Snowcap don't stop until they reach the central room.
There is a shape huddled on the floor. Costume torn, skin bruised, head lowered. Yuuri only breathes himself when he sees Polecat's back rising and falling with rough, ragged inhalations. He's alive.
"Good of you to come," drawls the man standing over him, a long-barreled rifle held almost lazily in his hands. "I'm afraid this is where your little misadventure ends."
"Polecat," Snowcap says, his voice low and even, ignoring the man entirely. "It's all right. I'm going to get you out of here."
On the floor, Polecat shifts slightly. "Пожалуйста," he murmurs, and his voice is soft and hoarse. "Пожалуйста, не раз…"
Yuuri feels rage burning in the pit of his stomach. Flinging out his hand, he summons up the Thrall. It comes when it's called, drifting out toward the kingpin in rolling waves.
The man tenses, but doesn't lower the gun. "A very pretty trick," he says through gritted teeth. "But you'll find my will is made of stronger stuff."
His mistake, in the end, is his penchant for drama. He lifts the barrel of the gun into the air to cock it, and that's all the opening Snowcap needs.
There's no dramatic flourish. No turn of his hands, or sweep of his arms. His fingers twitch, just once, and the man staggers. He stares at his fingers, motionless on the trigger. Tries to fire. Can't.
"What have you done to me?" he snarls.
"I've frozen the blood in your hands," Snowcap explains softly. "You'll never use them again."
Screaming in agony and rage, the man lifts his arms. The gun is still clutched between his frozen fingers, and he seems about to bring it down on Polecat's unmoving head.
Then he goes still. Collapses. Doesn't move again. His heart, Yuuri will later learn, frozen solid in his chest.
Snowcap is moving before the man hits the ground. He kneels at Polecat's side, gentle hands grasping his shoulders. "Polecat. Come on, look at me."
"я думал…" Yuuri misses some of the words, spoken into Snowcap's chest. "-тор. Я думал, что они снова у меня…"
Yuuri's eyes flash to the corridor. "Snowcap, we've got incoming." He knocks a silver arrow.
Behind him, Snowcap is bundling Polecat into his arms. "I've got you," he says softly. "You're safe."
The arrows are enough to hinder the advancing men, but Yuuri can't hold them off for long. He backs toward Snowcap and his charge, jerking his head to the side. "That way," he says hastily. "Looks like a garage. I'll slow them down and catch up with you."
Snowcap doesn't wait for him to elaborate, doesn't make any gallant argument. He freezes the lock and cracks it, throwing the door wide and rushing through it without a backward glance.
When Yuuri catches up with Snowcap, he's revving the engine on a pickup truck that's clearly seen better days. Yuuri dives into the bed, slapping the cab window once as he does. Snowcap barely spares him a glance before he's tearing out of the garage, one hand on the wheel and the other on Polecat's shoulder.
The sounds of pursuit are brief and faint. That man probably wasn't the head of Hasetsu's criminal snake, but he was a very important fang. His underlings, confused and lacking leadership, make little effort to avenge him. The night turns quiet.
The three of them drive for a little over an hour. Some of it is distance, some assurance that they haven't been followed. They finally pull over outside of town, near a field that would be full of corn during the on-season. Snowcap kills the ignition but makes no attempt to get out of the car.
Beside him in the passenger's seat, Polecat has fallen asleep.
"Snowcap?" Yuuri says softly, his back to the open cab window. "Is he all right?"
"Yes."
"Are you?"
A long, miserable silence follows.
"…No."
A/N: I won't be working with Russian for many other chapters, because I don't really trust Google Translate and I hella don't speak Russian. But in this chapter I thought it was important to make Yuri's disorientation clear, and slipping back into his native language works well for that.
Translations:
"Пожалуйста," "Please,"
"Пожалуйста, не раз…" "Please, not again..."
"я думал..." "I thought..."
"-тор. Я думал, что они снова у меня…" "-tor. I thought, they had me again..."
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