CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED NINETY TWO

Yurio stepped lightly, heading back into the prep area where his coach was waiting. Periodically, he'd look back just to make sure Mikhail was still following, only to turn again once the man got closer and moved on. Once around that last corner, the young skater saw Yakov sitting on the benches by the team's gear, waiting patiently on his own.

"Where'd Mila go?" The teen asked, "Changing?"

"Da." The elder answered, turning his head to meet the skater, then pushing to stand up as he saw the silver man behind him.

"I brought the little idiot like you asked. The big idiot made a scene and stormed off." Yurio went on, coming to a stop and looking at the skinny Russian warily.

"Careful. This idiot writes the checks that still pay your bills." Mikhail warned dryly, pointing at himself before putting that hand back into his coat pocket.

The blonde shrugged and sat down in one of the plastic chairs against the wall, slouching into it and putting one ankle across his knee, "The way you've already turned NHK into a massive cluster-fuck for Viktor and everyone that knows him, I'll be surprised if you're still here by the end of the weekend."

"What happened to Viktor...?" Yakov asked cautiously, "Where is he now?"

Emerald eyes moved over to the coach, "In the hall by where we met with Minako. Viktor's trying not to have a melt-down over his drama-queen father."

The elder coach's eyes went wide, but then shut, lowering his head so the brim of his hat covered them over, "Who's with him now?"

"Just Minako and the Japanese Yuri. There aren't any fans wandering the lower halls over there."

"And you said Konstantin left?"

"Da. He stormed out, screaming about how all this stuff was beneath him and that he wouldn't be back until Viktor was actually about to get on the ice."

Yakov nodded, then raised his head so one eye peeked out from under the brim of his hat, staring straight at the slightly-younger Russian standing in front of him, "I wouldn't use the same words Yuri did, but you really did make a mess of things by bringing that man here."

"I've known Konstantin my entire life. I didn-"

"You've been gone for the last 25 years." The older man cut him off, bristling, but trying not to let it get the better of him, "Viktor barely remembered you as it was, even back when he was younger and was living with me. The only reason I ever bothered giving your information to his Yuri is because Viktor never had anything bad to say about you, that I could remember, at least nothing worse than the fact that you left. You seemed decent. But this...? Bringing his father here, a man who..." The gruff old Russian's words trailed, glancing down at the teen who was all-too-obviously eaves-dropping.

"...What, who hit him?" Yurio finished, glancing up from under his hoodie, "I know."

"Stay here with Mila when she gets back." Yakov instructed, turning back to the other man, "You and I need to step outside."

Mikhail felt a pit in his gut, but he put up no argument, simply turning on his heel to follow the coach back out the way he came.

Yakov paused as they entered into the main hall that lead around the circumference of the arena, under the stands, and looked back at him, "Where did you leave them?"

The silver Russian simply pointed the way, and the coach followed down, rounding the curved hall until his eyes finally caught sight of the small group. He picked up his pace slightly to get there faster, seeing both Yuri and Minako lifting their heads to watch him coming, "Vitya!"

Yuri quickly jumped up to make room for the older man.

Red-touched eyes lifted slightly from where the skater was still sitting on the floor, "Yakov..."

The coach crouched down on one knee, reaching a rough hand out to cup around the athlete's head, then moving it forward to brush the bangs from his eyes, "You're not hurt?"

Viktor shook his head slightly, casting his eyes down again. With his hair moved away, he knew that whoever was looking could see his left eye twitching nervously.

Yakov let it go again to let those silver strands fall back in place, then sighed to himself, "I'm going to have that chat with your uncle now. Take the time you need and then go watch the show. Get your mind off of this so it doesn't haunt you later. There's still enough time before Opening Ceremonies and your SP for things to settle down."

The skater nodded quietly, rubbing his nose on the back of his sleeve before reaching out with both arms to hug the man around the chest. Viktor held there for a moment as he felt Yakov lightly patting his back, then let go again and reached for Yuri's hand instead, "Spasibo."

The older man touched his skater's shoulder again before pushing to stand upright, and turned side-face to look at where Mikhail had been quietly watching from several paces down the hall. Those grey-green eyes turned down and away at that point, hidden under the short brim of the flat-cap and a few strands of silver-grey hair. Yakov huffed quietly to himself, but then started moving back towards him, "Let's go out the back way. Fewer eyes out there."

Shoes clicked along the hard floor, fading out gradually until they were inaudible over the sound of the performances still taking place. Pairs was barely half over at that point, and then Ladies were up for pre-program warm-ups.

Yuri watched the pair go quietly, retaking his place just in front of his husband a moment later, still holding to where Viktor had taken his hand. He reached his free hand forward and gently pressed his palm to the man's face, "Let's at least get you off the floor, okay?"

The Russian tilted his face into his partner's hand, holding there a moment before nodding and twisting around to do just that. He let Yuri help pull him back up to his feet, and then pulled him close to hug him tightly, drawing in a deep, shaky breath. The shorter figure quickly returned the hug, fingers pressed down into his idol's back.

Minako watched quietly, but felt relieved to see things starting to resolve...even if only a little bit. Out of nowhere though, she felt two hands come close to grab her wrists and pull her forward, adding her to the hug without a word. Stunned at first, she blinked widely at the pair, but relaxed quickly enough, settling both of her arms over the men's shoulders and pressing her long brown hair to the mess of silver and black, "You kids have gone through too much this season already. I really hope the Final is better."

.

Outside the arena, there was a long 'tunnel' of sorts, where a set of wide stairs connected to an upper-level outdoor observation deck that spanned a good 150ft of the drop-off driveway. Yakov ignored it. He had his eyes sets for the middle of a snow-covered field on the other side of the road, which had two massive, albeit barren trees, as well as a smaller bush-like tree in the center, with two sets of park benches nearby. Dress-shoes crunched through frosty white fluff, pressing through the small field until arriving at those same benches. Yakov kicked the snow off with a foot before using his ungloved hand to get the rest, but instead of sitting down...he pointed at the cleared-off spot and glared at the skinny silver Russian that had followed him, "Sit."

Like a child that was out of his breadth, Mikhail did as told quickly, blinking up at the man who he knew was about to rip him a new one.

Yakov took in the sight of their surroundings for a moment, looking over to where spectators were still trying to get into the arena, or were loitering around for lack of all else to do. None were close enough to really be in ear-shot though, so he drew in a sharp breath, scrunched up his shoulders, and exhaled, then turned towards the Rozovsky. Small eyes narrowed at him, "I had a mind to scream at you about how big of an idiot you were for bringing Konstantin here, but I'm guessing you won't listen to that...Viktor doesn't. So I'll try something different. ...I've known that boy since he was almost 11." He started, "I found him in a little washed-up skating rink with his mother, practicing with a pair of undersized girl's skates. They weren't able to buy proper equipment because, as I learned later, his father was such a prick about skating that he wouldn't even look at a pair of blades without setting off a seismic event over it. In all those years, Viktor never once questioned it. The man's hatred for skating was just a fact of life, as natural as the changing of the seasons and the rising and setting of the sun every day. But despite Konstantin's Biblical-level disgust for the ice, or maybe because of it, Viktor Nikiforov was...at age 10...one of the most gifted youngsters that I had ever witnessed."

Mikhail wasn't sure what the man was getting at, so he stayed quiet.

"Even after hearing his mother plead for silence, refusing to tell me where they lived, refusing to give me their phone number...claiming that if her husband found out Viktor was skating, western Russia would have a second nuclear disaster, the likes of which none had seen since Chernobyl went under in '86..." Yakov went on, "...Those two would still show up at that rink." He let the words sink in a little bit, "...Do you even know whose skates Viktor was wearing back then?"

"...No." The skinny elder answered stiffly.

"His mother's, from her own childhood, from before everything went so horribly wrong with the topic." The coach answered, still glaring.

Mikhail looked aside glibly.

"Seeing the skill that kid had, even with ill-fitting skates, without ever having been coached by anyone...pressing on solely by sheer force of will and determination, in spite of the risk of apocalyptic doom...I knew I had to help him. I bought him his first pair of legitimate skates, and I coached him pro-bono for that entire winter, going right into the last freeze of late spring before that outdoor rink could no longer sustain the ice. I managed to give Tatiyana my contact information, so she could at least reach out to me if the need came." Yakov explained, feeling the tension rising in him at the memory of those strange times, "But I didn't hear one word from those two the entire rest of that year. In fact, it wasn't even until half-way through the next winter...after going back to that rink every weekend, hoping to see Vitya again, though never getting to...that I got that first call. It was barely a message at all, actually...a meager hello on my answering machine, an apology for Viktor being missing, and a phone number to call back. I did so, only to get the cold shoulder by Tatiyana...I'm guessing Konstantin was somewhere close at the time. She treated my call like a sales pitch and hung up. Thankfully, she called back again the next day, and told me about how depressed Viktor had been since Konstantin had found his skates and burned them. Do you know about that?"

The younger figure nodded quietly.

"Tatiyana asked me to come to their home and try to explain to Konstantin how important it was that Viktor be allowed to keep skating...but the man just wouldn't listen. He saw red as soon as I walked in the house, and when he found out who I even was and what I represented...he became completely irrational. Do you know what it sounds like when a child is screaming because they've just been punched in the face by a man 10 times their size?"

Mikhail refused to answer, looking at his shoes.

"Well?"

"I have kids. I've heard them scream when they've gotten hurt."

"But nothing worse than a stubbed toe, by the sound of your tone."

"...No."

"I took Viktor to a hospital in St. Petersburg after that, and it turned out he had not one, but two fractures in his small face, and a concussion, and the bloody eye. I was obligated to tell them what happened, and they were obligated to investigate it. By the end of things, I was given guardianship over him, and Viktor never had to deal with it again." The older Russian said, "You saw Viktor get hit in the same place another two times when we were there for Tatiyana's funeral. He didn't scream then. But the sound of him when he was a child...blood running down his face, thinking he was blind, crying for his mother...that sound will stay with me until the end of my days." The coach stepped close and leaned into the other man's face, speaking darkly, quietly, "You might be his uncle by blood, but Vitya is my family. He's as much an athlete of mine as he is like a son to me. I will not tolerate what you've recently put him through, not for one second longer."

"It wasn't supposed to be this way." Mikhail finally said, lifting his head, staring straight into the man's eyes, even as close as he still was, "Kon's changed. I made him watch Viktor's skating on my tablet an-"

"In the comfort of his own home, just the two of you, where he didn't even have to look if he didn't want to." Yakov stopped him, rising back up to his normal stature, "You've been coming to enough events this last year to know that watching skating on television, even a live feed of it, is vastly different than watching it in person. It's as different again to watch small clips of specific skaters, recorded and edited in advance for the best view and least filler."

Mikhail crossed his arms tightly and grumbled through grit teeth.

"What do you even do for a living?"

"What difference does it make?"

"A big difference, maybe."

"I'm an engineer." The silver Russian answered stiffly, looking off into the distance indignantly.

Yakov nodded at that, "As far away from being a figure skater as can be." He turned to look at the trees nearby, "You have a mind for putting mechanical parts together. People are not like machines though. You can't just put Viktor and his father together and expect them to sync."

"I know that. It's why I was trying to work Kon up to it with the videos."

"Are you sure you didn't hit your head when you fell off that roof?" The coach asked tersely, turning back to look at those grey-green eyes, "After everything you've seen and heard since coming back into Viktor's life, do you still not understand that those two are like oil and water? You can't change what a man has been for 20 or more years of his life. It doesn't matter if you think you've had some breakthrough with Konstantin. Every encounter they've had with each other since Viktor got back from South Korea has been traumatic. And it's not just Viktor you're putting in danger with this insane plan of yours. Yuri has been hurt. I saw that much with my own eyes. Everyone around them is suffering, too, feeling the collateral damage of their pain. I can see and feel it every time I see Viktor now...he's on edge. All the time. If not for Yuri, I think Vitya might've stepped in front of a bus by now. These guys aren't like most other men...they're artists...they can't take this constant, reckless, deliberate abuse and keep bouncing back. I've seen Viktor break twice before...I won't let Konstantin do it a third time."

"Kon really isn't as bad as everyone seems to th-"

"NO ONE CARES." Yakov finally yelled, sending a few birds flying from the naked trees, "What you claim and what we've seen are incompatible. I'm NOT going to let this misguided plot of yours continue to plague this team. For Vitya's mental and physical health, I want you to call Konstantin right now and tell him not to come back. Put him on the earliest plane back to Russia and send him back to the woods where he belongs."

"That's not fair. It's not as easy as th-"

"DO IT."

"He doesn't even have a car! How's he going to get back to the house on his own!? No taxi will drive him to the middle of nowhere, not when there's no cell service to run a GPS!"

Yakov leveled at him, "If it's that much trouble, maybe you should go back with him."

Eyes widened to hear it, "...What, so you're banning me from my own nephew? You don't have that kind of power."

"I'll do whatever it takes to protect Vitya's peace of mind. This is his life and livelihood you're tampering with. If he has a mental collapse and can't perform, and doesn't make it to the Final? I don't even want to think about how heartbroken and angry he'd be. For now, call Konstantin. We're not done until I hear you speak the words."

"He's not going to pick up. He's as mad at me right now as anyone." Mikhail said bitterly.

"Call him anyway."

"I'd feel better if Viktor were here to give his two cents."

"I'm making an executive decision on his behalf, as his coach and guardian." The gruff man said, "Why is this such an issue for you? Who are you really trying to help with all this? Viktor? Konstantin? Maybe this is all just for your sake, trying to mend bridges where the gaps are too wide now. Stop making Viktor suffer because you think you can fix things. CALL KONSTANTIN."

The younger figure huffed an angry sigh, but then pulled his phone out and clicked through his contact list until he found the bear's name, and tapped his thumb against it to send out the message. It rang a few times, and went to a generic voicemail, just as the silver Russian guessed it would. But, Yakov was staring daggers at him, so he waited for the beep to speak, [Hey, it's me. Viktor's coach doesn't want you coming back to the competition. Call me back when you get this. We'll figure out how to get you back home.] He clicked out of the call and put the device back into his coat, then looked up at the man standing ahead of him, "There. Happy?"

"No. Never happy." Yakov retorted, starting to move off, shoes crunching in the snow again as he headed back towards the arena, "But I'm satisfied for the moment. I'm going to check on Vitya." He paused and looked over his shoulder one last time, seeing as Mikhail was rising to stand, "If you love your nephew even half as much as I do, you'll follow-up on that call and make sure that man doesn't come back. Understood?"

"...Yes."