CHAPTER TWO HUNDRED SIXTY FIVE

Following the multi-national entourage out of the events center, Yurio plugged his earbuds into his phone, and then into his ears, letting the sound of the place and the surrounding conversations vanish behind a wall of loud music. The trek towards the parking garage was short and sweet, and when they arrived, the teen tossed himself to the very last row of seats like he'd done before, and sank low to close his eyes. The sound of 'Welcome to the Madness' was playing, and just as he felt the van engine rumble to life through the chair cushions, he felt a finger poking the top of his left knee.

One bright-green but annoyed-looking eye peered open to see a pair of jade irises looking down on him from the back of the second row, "Yuri, papa's trying to talk to you."

"Hah?" Yurio grudgingly pushed himself to sitting, but only moved high enough that he could peer over the back of seat and see the front. He reached a hand up to pull out one earbud, "What is it?"

"What do you want to do when we're done getting you back to your stuff?" Mikhail wondered, letting the van warm up for a little while, before pulling out into the aisle ahead.

"I don't know? Follow you people around?"

The elder Russian grimaced a little, but then turned in his seat, looking back at the teen directly rather than through the reflection in the rear-view mirror, "Semantics Lesson #1...family and friends are not 'you people.' No one here has deserved your disrespect."

Yurio just quirked a brow and shuffled where he sat, trying to put in his earbud again, "...Whatever..." He muttered quietly under his breath.

Minako raised both brows as she glanced to the back of the van, but then leaned slightly towards the driver's seat to whisper behind a hand, "Think we should chide him somehow…? I know he's got some stuff going on right now but I don't want him thinking he can take it out on us all afternoon."

"No, I agree." The silver Russian rubbed his chin. He glanced around at the other passengers, looking from Mari, who shook her head passionately to avoid being singled out, to Viktoria, who wasn't paying attention, then finally to Nikki, who looked like she was paying rather close attention to everything. He got a wry smirk on his face, "Sweetie, dearest, silver dawn…would you mind punishing him?"

The teen smiled nervously, but then nodded, unbuckled her seat, stood up…and planted herself firmly in the seat next to the Russian Tiger. She leaned right up against him and tried to look at whatever he was doing on his phone; it looked like he was texting someone, "Whatcha doin?" She asked, her voice dripping with sweetness.

"NOTHING." He argued back, getting really uncomfortably in a really big hurry, feeling where the younger girl was weaving her fingers around the arm nearest to her, clinging to him like she often did to her father, "W-What are YOU doing…?"

"You look lonely back here!"

The van started pulling out of its parking spot, and the teen's torment began. By the time daylight was pouring in through the windows, no longer obscured by the walls and ceilings of the multi-level car garage, Nikkita Rozovsky was listening to the Russian Tiger's music, and he'd effectively given up trying to dislodge her. When the playlist shifted, and 'The Vengeful One' came on, the silver teen's head picked up a bit in recognition, "Oh! I know this song!"

"...You do? From where?" Yurio asked skeptically, "...You've seen me skate to this?"

Nikki laughed nervously, but shook her head, "Ah, no...I didn't mean that I recognized it from an event. I haven't seen any of yours yet. But my brother back home listens to stuff like this all the time."

"Sergio..." The blonde grit his teeth at the memory of it.

"He didn't used to be so angry and confrontational." The silver Canadian explained, "A lot bad things happened over the years and I guess he kind of internalized it. By the time he was old enough to get taken seriously by adults, nothing could be done about what had already taken place. Then mom died, and he had a total breakdown about it."

Yurio gave her a look out the corner of his eye, barely able to see her past his hair and the edge of his hoodie, "...You sure seem to be taking that whole situation rather well." He said gruffly; part of him wanted to offend her enough that she'd let him go, but another part was genuinely curious about it.

Grey-green eyes blinked at him, but Nikki just slouched a bit where she sat, still clinging to her 'brother's' arm as she looked down towards her knees, "...It's hard to explain… When someone changes so much that you hardly recognize them anymore, and you never learn to love the person that took their place, it's...hard to feel sad when they go away for good. I guess I've already grieved for her, because that lady wasn't really my mom anymore after she had her first cancer scare."

.

"Viktor Nikiforov is dead."

.

"She was just someone else, wearing her skin, moving into our house, and sleeping in that bed. It's probably worse for Vikki and Sergie though, since they knew her longer than I did, before she changed...but I still noticed the difference." The teen went on, "When mom started to alter how she looked and dressed...she really did become a different person. She used to have this wavy, light blonde hair that she kept really long, nearly to her waist...but when it all fell out from the chemo and radiation treatments, she started wearing these short black wigs. Then her hair grew back eventually, and she styled it the same as the wigs. In a lot of ways...I kind of feel like my mom died at the hospital, because it wasn't her who came home." She finally turned her eyes towards the Russian Punk, "What about you? What's your mom like? Papa hasn't told us about her...just your grandpa. He seems nice."

Yurio grit his teeth, and tried to pull his arm back again. He found that she'd actually let it go that time, but something about the shift in his mind made him decide against pulling it back entirely. Closing his eyes for a moment, he lifted his gaze to the window to his left, and spoke quietly, "...My mom...is dead, too. Like yours was...the one you remembered from before."

"Wow...really? What happened to her to make her change so much?" Nikki wondered passively, fingers curling lightly where Yurio had left his arm near her.

The blonde wasn't even sure why he was speaking, but since he'd started, there was no sense stopping, and he turned those emerald eyes back at her, "...My mother is something of a socialite in Russia. She's gone a lot. I don't even think she intended to become a mother...it was just something she got stuck with because she was too lazy or busy to do anything about it when she had the chance. My existence was something that just happened to her, and she wasn't interested in dealing with it." He explained bitterly, lowering his gaze again, staring at the stitching of the seat in front of him, "She was never even married to my father, and it was her dad that I ended up spending most of my time with."

"Do you see your mom at all anymore?"

"I had heard once that she wanted to see me skate when I was in Japan last year, but she never showed." Yurio said stiffly, "She's never showed. My grandpa was the only one who ever cared about me or what I did. He was the one who made it possible for me to even get into skating to begin with...he came to my practices, and even my competitions if they were local enough."

"Is that why you got into skating? To try and get your mom's attention?"

The blonde scoffed a mocking singular laugh at that, "No." He said matter-of-factly.

"…Do you really mean that?"

Yurio snapped his head around, mouth half-open as though to ask Nikki who she thought she was to pry like that, but stopped himself, seeing her face and realizing there was no malice on it whatsoever. He turned back then and shrugged, "I don't know."

She retook his arm, more for his sake than her own at that point, "So she's never seen you skate then, huh? Not even once?"

"...I can't remember a time she ever turned up at an event. She was always too busy spending money she didn't have at parties she didn't belong at, drinking with men she didn't know, and pretending she was someone she wasn't. I mean...maybe at one point she was part of the in-crowd, but that was...a long time ago. Now...it's almost sad that she still goes. I'm sure there's folks who wonder why she bothers to turn up." The blonde half-ranted, "Hell, I'd bet that those people know more about what I'm up to than she does. Some mother."

"Sounds like she was never there for you at all."

"...Understatement of the year..."

Nikki fell silent for a moment, reaching one hand up to set gently against the Russian's shoulder, stroking her thumb back and forth a few times, "I'm sorry she did that to you. What does your grandpa think of your skating?"

Green eyes got a bit of a shine to them at the thought of Nikolai Plisetsky, and Yurio lifted his head, "I like to think he's proud."

.

Bursting into the hotel room, Yurio scanned the wide space at the top of the building for a recognizable bag, eventually finding the leopard-print rolling suitcase on the other side of one of the big beds. He quickly vaulted over the once-used sheets to clamber for his possessions, and rifled through the contents like he thought he'd find a bag of money at the bottom. Finding only the carefully-packed suit-bags with his competition outfits, and the change of clothes he'd had from his brief stay in Moscow, Yurio was content with what he saw, and zipped the bag back up.

"Everything where you left it?" Mikhail asked casually, leaning forward onto his knees as he glanced at the bag as well.

"I think so." The teen answered, turning the whole thing around and pulling up the telescoping handle, "Thanks."

The elder Russian smiled, "Sure." He pushed up to standing normally again and looked around the big room, "So where do we go from here? We just had a big breakfast not too long ago, and it's too early for dinner… Should we go buy those skates for later tonight?"

"Pipaw," Viktoria looked up over the edge of her phone, but then held it out, "I was actually just looking up stuff that we could do. The Campus Martius rink has skate rentals for $4 a pair...we shouldn't even need to buy skates of our own. Might even be better that way, since the skates they have will be broken-in already."

Mikhail looked at the website on display, and sure enough, the $4 rental fee was noted quite plainly. He crossed his arms and looked at everyone else, "Ideas then?"

"There's carriage rides near where the rink is set up, too!" Nikki pointed out excitedly, clapping her hands together, "Or we could go to the zoo!"

Minako made a face at that, "...We just went to a zoo when we were in France..."

"Yeah..." The Russian put a finger on his chin in thought, "We don't want to go too far away from downtown either, in case traffic picks up right before tonight. Carriage ride sounds neat though. All in favor?"

Hands went up.

"Opposed?"

None went up...but not all hands had been counted either.

"...Don't care either way?"

The final hands went up; the Russian Kitten's and the Katsuki daughter's.

"Carriage ride it is."

.

It was a tight fit to get everyone into the two-horse-drawn buggy, but blankets were easy to come by and the crisp Motor City air flew by them. The klip-klop sound of the pair of horses bounced around like a blacksmith's hammer on the concrete. Three adults and three teens packed in like sardines; the carriage was covered in lights that would glow once the sun went down a few hours later, and the reins were decorated in garland. There were thousands of people around, but most knew to stay off the carriage path.

Yurio looked around in fascination, but did his best not to show it, simply side-eyeing the world and avoiding turning his head. It didn't help that Nikkita was squished in between him and Mari though. Viktoria was directly in front of him, with Minako in the middle there and Mikhail in the last spot; the three of them were on the rear-facing side. Nikkita wasted no time making the most of what little space she had, linking her arms around Mari and Yurio's, even as her long, wavy silver hair whipped around.

"This is so great!" She cheered out, leaning forward to glance around on each side, "I bet Russia has nothing like this!"

Mikhail laughed, "Oh, sweet summer child…"

"There's sledges in St. Petersburg." Yurio clarified stiffly, trying to pull his arm back so he could sit normally again, but finding it futile, "And those have three horses, not just one or two."

"Wow~!" She finally leaned back, "We should go do that when we go there after the weekend!"

"We could." Her father nodded, "It's a bit of a trek to St. Petersburg from Moscow though. We'll have to take the train for a few hours. I was hoping to only have to make that trip once."

"We could just leave Moscow early and see Cousin Viktor's old house!" Nikki went on, getting too excited, "And we could go to where you and him grew up!"

Both Mikhail and Minako gave tepid looks at that, but the Russian shook his head, "I dunno, going back to that little mill-town would be boring for you guys. There's nothing out there but woods and bears. Really...big...bears." He shrugged and held his hands up in a gesture towards the city, "Besides...places like that don't hold up the same as places like this." They went back down to the blanket over his legs, "When people disappear, whole towns and cities can fall into ruin. That town fell apart a long time ago. The only people who still live there are the ones with nowhere else to go. It's not a place I'd go unless I needed something."

"Cousin Viktor's dad lives there though, doesn't he?"

"Yeah, and you already know what happened."

"But you said they reconciled last weekend."

Yurio half-rolled his eyes at his elder, "Konstantin's not that bad if you give him five seconds. He never once tried to hit me."

"You're not his disobedient son." Mikhail retorted, "But let's not dwell on it. I don't want to go all the way out there again so soon regardless. We'll be going to St. Petersburg anyway to get Yuri packed up, so we can just go a few days earlier than planned and take a look around."

Nikkita gave a sly look, then turned to whisper something to her right, "So you met Konstantin? What's he like?"

Yurio just gaped in his own way, but then shrugged, "Set in his ways, but not completely without morals. I saw him pull two cars off the road after an accident to help clear the way for traffic."

"Wow~! He must be really strong!" She was too loud for anyone's tastes, but she was too impressed not to respond that way.

Mikhail deadpanned her, a look in his eyes like the words 'didn't I just tell you not to talk about that?' were running through his mind.

The silver teen gave an innocent smile, knowing she'd been heard, and diverted her attention back to the pre-Konstantin topic, "So there's horse-and-buggy rides like this in St. Petersburg, huh? With three horses? What's it like?"

Yurio drew an uncomfortable breath, I've never been questioned like this before. Why is she so inquisitive suddenly anyway? Yeesh. He cleared his throat, "Not like this. In St. Petersburg, the sledge takes you through the woods...big open spaces near the palaces of past rulers. It's nothing like this place."

"You must go every year then, huh?" Nikki laughed, feeling a bit envious, "Now I can't wait to get there!"

"...Yeah..."

.

[Hurry up, Yuri!] Viktor called excitedly, rushing through the snow towards where other folks were queuing up for the sleigh rides. His big brown poof of a dog followed closely, leaping through snow-drifts like a hare, [We'll miss it if you don't run!]

[Why are we even going on this stupid thing anyway!?] The young 14 year old growled, trudging through the snow like the frost was as difficult to slosh through as mud, [Viktor!]

The last troika was waiting, and Viktor went springing up to it like he could glide over the snow as well as he did on the ice. The three horses at the front whinnied and fussed, but the silver Russian was undeterred. He gave over the necessary funds and took his spot, and watched eagerly as the teen finally came around to join him. Makkachin was in quickly as well, shaking the snow off his fur and panting excitedly.

[You won't believe how much fun this kind of thing can be, Yuri!] The silver skater exclaimed, [But it's no fun at all unless you have someone to go with.]

[Is that the only reason you asked me to come...?] The blonde kicked the snow off his boots by tapping the heels on the carriage floor, [So you wouldn't look sad and alone coming on your own?]

[Of course not! If I were on my own I wouldn't be coming at all. I did this so you could enjoy it! I mean, I could've just told you to go and then not joined you, right?] That one blue eye behind silver bangs winked, and a second later, the troika was skiing along behind those three horses, [We both won Gold at our Grand Prix Final events a few days ago. This is like a victory lap around our city! Two Gold medalists celebrating together!]

[You've never done this before, Viktor.] Yurio huffed, finally sitting back and pulling the thick plaid blanket over his legs, his ears getting a bit red under his chin-length golden-blonde hair, [It's not like this is the first time I've ever won Gold before, either.]

[I know!] The elder Russian made a face, and reached over to rub the teen's shoulders for a moment, then pat them on each side with the palms of his hands, [But I thought this would be a really great opportunity! It's your last year in Juniors, and I think you're going to do really great in Seniors! I mean, how crazy would it be to have two Russians on the podium next year? Yakov would be really proud, so work really hard, okay? Pretty soon it won't be a cake-walk anymore. Competition in my bracket isn't so easy to intimidate.]

Yurio just huffed quietly to himself, remembering a certain Senior skater he'd overheard crying in a bathroom, but then turned his head to glance at his rink-mate, [...So...you're for-sure competing again next year?] The blonde gave a skeptical look, hair whipping around as the wind rushed past, the horses' hooves on the snow like the dull rumble of an earthquake.

[Well, so far I plan to. Something really big would have to happen to stop me.] Viktor reached an arm around his dog's shoulders and hugged the woofer close, looking off into the trees; black streaks in a field of white, [There's so much stuff I want to do suddenly.] He turned his head back, those crystal-blue eyes looking into the emeralds across from himself, [I have a goal in mind, so I'm determined, you know? You should set a goal for yourself, too. Not just the Gold medal, but something personal, something that touches your heart and soul, and sets it on fire.] He reached his free hand over and poked the teen in the center of the chest, [If you don't feel it right here, you're lost. It was missing in me for a while, but I think I finally found it again. Something to fight for.]

.

Yurio's eyes widened a bit, waking up from a daydream and seeing the woods of St. Petersburg swapped out for the concrete jungle of Detroit. The silver-haired figure next to him wasn't Viktor anymore either...though being a close-enough relation to the man made the difference less startling than the landscape switch.

"You okay?" Nikki wondered, seeing the vacant look on the Russian' Tiger's face.

He just shook his head and tried to act normal, "...I'm fine. ...I just remembered something dumb." He lied.