Chapter Five: Yuuri vs. A Cliff: Breaking Your Face for Fun!

"Alright everyone!" Yuuko clapped her hands together, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet so hard her ponytail looked in danger of smacking her in the face. "First practice of the year! I've drawn up some new drills for the Beaters. Takeshi!"

"Yes ma'am?"

"You and Seung-gil take these." She handed over a clipboard full of moving stick-figure diagrams. Seung-gil looked at them over Takeshi's shoulder and rolled his eyes.

"Chasers!"

Guang Hong and Phichit looked at her expectantly.

"We're going to to work on the stuff we talked about over breakfast. Mitsumi!"

Mitsumi nodded in Yuuko's direction.

"Just do blocking exercises with the Auto-Quaffle for now. Did, um, did anyone get much of a chance to practice over the summer?"

The hesitant murmurs were answer enough.

"That's okay!" Yuuko said, though her smile looked a little forced and she stopped bouncing. "I mean...we can get back up to speed, right? Right. Yuuri, you're with Victor."

"Excellent," said Victor, stretching out his arms in front of him. "The first thing we're doing is going to the onsen."

"The onsen?" Yuuri repeated. What?

"To relax your muscles," Victor told him, steering him bodily out of the changing room and up the hill. "We're starting with some stretching exercises."

Yuuri took as much time as possible removing his clothes once they were safely ensconced in the onsen, hoping that by some miracle maybe lightning would strike him or a younger kid would need something and he could avoid being naked in front of Victor. It wasn't shyness—he'd soaked in there with Phichit at least a dozen times, so why was he dreading this so much? Victor was naked within seconds.

"We're not going to get in the water today," Victor told him, arms extended over his head and bending backwards. "We're just taking advantage of the steam."

Yuuri's eyes trailed down the line of Victor's body, down his chest and... nope. That way madness lies. He forced his gaze skyward as he dropped his underwear to the ground and imitated Victor's pose.

"As a Seeker, it is especially important for you to remain limber at all times," Victor told him. "Also don't forget to breathe or you'll pass out and then I won't be able to teach you anything."

Yuuri sucked in an enormous gasp of air. He hadn't even realized he'd been holding his breath. Victor chuckled.

"That advice goes for everything. You can't truly enjoy a moment if you're accidentally suffocating. People forget to breathe at the most inconvenient times—when seeing something especially beautiful, when they need to focus on an important task, during lovemaking— "

Yuuri choked on nothing and let out a sputtering cough. Victor just smiled at him, then swung his arms down to touch his toes. Once he had regained his composure, Yuuri did the same.

"Am I right in thinking that when you fell into the water last year, your lungs were empty?"

Yuuri was glad he was facing his own knees so that Victor couldn't see him cringing.

"Yes," he whispered.

"Wouldn't it have been easier to get out on your own if you'd had a breath for a spell?"

"Probably," Yuuri muttered. "But maybe not. I can normally do that spell nonverbally, I just...froze."

"Yuuri," Victor said, and his voice had suddenly drawn much closer. Yuuri stood up.

"I saw you practicing when you thought no one was watching," he said.

Yuuri's face burned. The first day of term. The figure watching him from the shore. That had been Victor!

"You saw that?" Yuuri groaned, burying his face in his hands. Victor immediately reached up and pulled Yuuri's hands away from his face.

"What I saw that day was a professional Seeker," Victor told him, staring him directly in the eye. He was so close that his forehead was almost touching Yuuri's. "If you could do that during games, you'd be as famous as I am." He still hadn't let go of Yuuri's wrists.

"You think so?" Yuuri whispered.

"Of course," Victor told him, and for a split second Yuuri was convinced Victor was going to lean in and kiss him—but then Victor took a step back. "Quidditch Quarterly said they're considering naming that move after me, so if you can manage it you can't be as hopeless as you think you are. Lift up your leg behind you."

They spent so long in the steam that by the time they were finished, there was less than ten minutes left for them to actually fly.

"Next time," Victor declared. "That's enough for you today. Is it katsudon night?"

Yuuri nodded and watched from the cliff as Seung-gil sent a Bludger soaring less than three inches away from Guang Hong's nose.

"Your aim!" Yuuko called. "You're supposed to be hitting it at Takeshi!"

"Oh man," Yuuri whimpered.

"Don't worry about them," Victor breezed. "There's nothing you can do about the rest of your team. Your job is to avoid Bludgers and catch the Snitch."

"But— "

"You're doing them a disservice by worrying," Victor interrupted. "Focusing on what's happening with the rest of your team takes your attention away from what you're supposed to be doing. If your Chasers spent the whole game looking for the Snitch, how many goals do you think they'd score?"

Victor was right—of course he was, so Yuuri just nodded. Victor put an arm around Yuuri's shoulders as the Quaffle went sailing past Yuuko's outstretched arms and plummeted into the water. Yuuko's shoulders slumped visibly and she pulled out her wand to summon the ball.

"I've never even touched a Quaffle," Victor said conversationally.

"You haven't?"

"You have?"

"LOOK OUT!" Phichit shouted. A Bludger, knocked out of the pitch by Takeshi, came hurtling toward them. Victor pulled Yuuri out of the way easily and waved back at the team.

"Sorry!" Takeshi bellowed. "Call it a dodging exercise!"

"Let's move on," Victor decided, herding Yuuri back to the safety of the changing room.

Yuuri spent the following two days vacillating between dreading and eagerly anticipating the next practice, a Saturday—when he would get back on a broomstick for the first time in nearly a month. The morning came and it was natto for breakfast again (ugh) but Yuuri was so nervous he ordered a second helping anyway. Victor caught the bowl before it could reach Yuuri's place setting.

"Phichit told me you tend to binge when something's on your mind," he said, setting the bowl next to his own. "Care to share?"

"Not really," Yuuri mumbled, dropping his head to the table.

An owl soared through the room and dropped a letter on Yuuri's head. He lifted an arm and pointed automatically toward the Mahoutokoro crow nest without looking up.

"Oh!" said Victor, and then the letter was snatched up from Yuuri's hair and he heard the sound of ripping paper. Victor had yet to open a single letter he'd received during his time at Mahoutokoro, so this took Yuuri by surprise. He lifted his head.

Victor had already discarded the envelope and was scanning a letter on pink stationary. Yuuri picked up the envelope. It was addressed to Victor Nikiforov, and the i's were dotted with hearts. The return address was—

"Christophe Giacometti," Yuuri muttered. "I met him at the World Cup."

"Mm," Victor agreed, nodding vigorously but keeping his eyes trained on the letter. "You certainly did."

"What do you mean by— "

"Okay!" Victor exclaimed, folding up the letter and placing it in his pocket. "I'm just going to write him back and then we can get started."

To Yuuri's surprise (and sort of disappointment), Victor left his Kinya 2020 in their dormitory and selected an old Firebolt IV model from the school broom shed.

"I'd leave you in the dust if I was on the Kinya," he explained, mounting the school broom once they'd finished stretching (clothed, this time). Victor kicked off, hovering as Yuuri took out his Suzume and prepared to get on. "But don't worry. I'll give you another chance on it anytime you like." He winked.

Before Yuuri could ask, Victor had sped off toward the middle of the pitch. Yuuri planted a foot squarely on either side of his broomstick and took a deep breath. Don't forget to breathe, said Victor's voice in his head.

Yuuri kicked off hard from the ground and felt the wind catch the sleeves of his shirt, blowing the cloth on his back out behind him like a balloon. He rocketed up toward the sun to bask in the glow for a moment, and then looped back down to meet Victor. He smiled to himself. It was just like last time—he forgot how much he loved flying every time he hit the ground.

Victor was lounging on his broomstick in a position Yuuri wouldn't have dared to imitate (he looked terrifyingly close to falling fifty feet into the ocean) with his hand resting on his chin.

"Done playing around?" Victor asked. Yuuri nodded.

"Okay this might be a little unconventional but I'm going to start by teaching you a move I only just perfected at the end of last season," Victor said. He took off at top speed toward the cliff, and at the very last moment—long after Yuuri was certain he was going to crash into it—he pulled up on the handle and sailed upward, looped around in the air, and landed right where he'd started in front of Yuuri. And then he gestured toward the cliff, like he expected Yuuri to do that. Yuuri thought that sounded a little more than "unconventional." Everything Victor did was unconventional—this was just insane.

"It's called the Wronski Feint," Victor said. "But I've modified it for use against a vertical barrier, like the stands, rather than the ground."

"I know," Yuuri told him. "You did that last year in the match against Novosibirsk. Georgi Popovich crashed into a billboard and spent three days in the hospital. They had to for— "

Yuuri slapped a hand over his own mouth. Not really necessary to let Victor know he'd been stalking him like a total creep since the beginning of his career. But Victor either didn't notice or care because he just nodded and gestured again toward the cliff.

Yuuri started with a bit more force than he meant to. He thought Victor had yelled something after him, and he really hoped it wasn't important, because there was no way he could hear anything over the roar of the wind in his ears. Soon there was nothing but the cliff in his vision. He imagined a rival Seeker following close behind him, thinking he had seen the Snitch.

It only occurred to him a few yards from the cliff wall that he hadn't decided in which direction he was planning to go. In a futile attempt to turn both up and down, Yuuri slowed down, only to smash headfirst into the cliff. Dazed and seeing spots, he spun slowly in half-hearted circles lower and lower.

"Well, I suppose turning is technically essential to the technique, but don't worry," Victor assured him as Yuuri rubbed the goose egg on his forehead. "You'll get the hang of it soon." Yuuri privately thought there was little chance he would learn to do a modified Wronski Feint without almost killing himself even if he lived to be a hundred and fifty, but there was no use arguing with Victor about that. He just sighed.

However, to his own astonishment, Yuuri was able to complete the motions during the next practice without smashing into the cliff once. He still wasn't convinced he'd be able to catch the Snitch during the process, and would probably fall to pieces with a crowd watching him try, but at least he didn't knock himself out.

"Better," Victor would say, "but let me show you one more time."

And then he would execute the move smoothly and perfectly on the Firebolt. Yuuri continually wondered how this was possible—it was as if the old broom flew faster with Victor on it, as though it liked him. Or maybe he was just so damn talented that he could've done it on literally anything. Yuuri kept half expecting Victor to jump off and start flying broom-less.

By the time the weekend of the first match rolled around, they still hadn't actually brought out a Snitch to practice with, but Yuuri was feeling more confident about his flying than he ever had. Under Victor's guidance, his turns were sharper, his movements surer. Tiny changes in his posture had him flying faster than ever.

The whole school was buzzing about Kirin versus Komainu in the week preceding the match, and Yuuri felt himself getting caught up in the excitement. It seemed like such a long time ago that he'd looked forward to a school game—he'd had to play both of the last games the previous year—and he found himself discussing team strategy with Victor during meals and whenever they weren't studying (Yuuri insisted they spend at least a couple of hours a day trying desperately to catch Victor up, regardless of how indifferent he seemed to Charms and Transfiguration and all the things that he actually needed to survive in the wizarding world other than Quidditch).

"Kirin had all-new brooms last year. Hayashis." Yuuri told him over a katsudon breakfast on Saturday. "It was a donation from Mr. Hayashi himself, he was in House Kirin when he went here."

Victor looked thoroughly unimpressed. "You should know by now that a broom is only as good as its rider," was his reply.

"I guess it didn't make much difference in the end," Yuuri admitted. "They came in third. And it's not like those are top-of-the-line brooms anyway. But Komainu is a different story—their strategy is usually defensive. Last year's Keeper graduated and their new Keeper is a ninth year and he's supposed to be— "

"VICTOR!"

A familiar roar filled the shokudou, quite possibly the whole school, and Yuuri whirled around to face the direction from whence it came. Stomping footsteps were approaching from the east and Yuuri waited with baited breath as they grew louder as a shadow appeared in a doorway.

The person attached to the voice was a lot smaller—both horizontally and vertically—than Yuuri had been anticipating. He couldn't have possibly been older than fourteen. He wore fur-lined red robes that Yuuri immediately recognized as a Durmstrang uniform. He was lugging a tiger-striped trunk and an obviously expensive broomstick. His mop of blond hair cast shadows over his face, making it look as though the skin around his eyes had blackened with rage.

"Privyet!" Victor greeted him from his spot next to Yuuri, waving at the boy in the doorway, whom Yuuri had now surmised could only be Yuri Plisetsky. Actual steam rose from underneath his hair.

"There you are!" Yuri declared, drawing his wand out of his robes and pointing it straight at Victor, oblivious to the whole of the Mahoutokoro student body staring at him in horror.

"Come sit with us," Victor called. "It's katsudon for breakfast. You'll love it!"

"I'm not here to eat breakfast with you," Yuri snarled. "I'm here to shove some sense into your thick head and haul your ass back to Durmstrang! Get up!"

Yuuri would've been seriously concerned that the situation was about to turn violent, except that Victor seemed so relaxed. Everyone else seemed to be taking their cues from him as well. People slowly took their hands away from their mouths and began eating again, all eyes still glued to the scene.

"Really?" Victor said, furrowing his brow in confusion. "Oh, let me guess. I forgot to do something I promised you I'd do. You know how that happens to me sometimes."

Yuri's growl was probably audible on neighboring islands. Just then, a plate of food attempted to soar through the doorway behind him, hitting him in the back of the head and knocking him flat on his face. The growling intensified.

"Well you clearly can't stand in the doorway forever," Victor reasoned. "Come have some breakfast and we'll talk about it."

Yuuri had never seen anyone sit down so angrily. It was like the floor shook with Yuri's fury. Victor tapped his wand to the table and a fresh bowl of katsudon sailed into the room.

"Eat up!" He smiled, plopping the bowl in front of Yuri. Yuri fumed for a second before picking up his chopsticks.

Yuuri had so many questions, like all the questions, so he decided to start with the most obvious one.

"How did you get here?" he asked.

Yuri raked his eyes judgmentally over Yuuri's face. It couldn't have been plainer that he was unimpressed.

"As far as you're concerned I walked here, loser," he spat. Then he took a bite of the katsudon and let out an involuntary hum of satisfaction, which he quickly stifled.

"Good, no?" Victor smirked. Yuri gave him a nasty glare, but nodded. He couldn't have replied verbally because his mouth was absolutely stuffed with food.

"Is Makkachin being a good boy?" Victor asked him, setting his elbow on the table and placing his chin in his hand. Yuri swallowed hard.

"Makkachin?" he raged incredulously. "You haven't seen Drekr House since June and you're asking about Makkachin?"

"He's my dog, I miss him," Victor replied. "I'm sure you're all taking good care of him though. How is Potya?"

Yuri hesitated. "I have pictures," he mumbled, reaching into his robes and pulling out a stack of photographs, all featuring the same cat. He spread them out between himself and Victor.

"Very nice," Victor told him. As soon as Yuri had reached the bottom of the bowl, he seemed to remember that he was not here to eat and look at pictures of cats. He snatched the photographs up and shoved them back in his robes.

"You promised me," he emphasized, "that if you won the World Cup you'd train me to be a Seeker."

"I did?"

"Yes!" Yuri threw his hands into the air in frustration. "After we won the House Cup last year and you told me they'd picked you for the Russian national team you said you'd train me during next term. And then you disappear to the middle of nowhere and don't answer any of my letters!"

Yuuri wasn't sure he'd call Japan "the middle of nowhere" but Yuri was clearly not reasonable, so he decided not to argue.

"Sorry about that," Victor shrugged. "I'm taking a year off from the nationals and the Skrzak."

"I can see that," Yuri grumbled. "What are you even doing here? Not that I care."

"Oh!" Victor smacked his forehead. "How silly of me, I forgot to introduce you! Yuri Plisetsky, meet Yuuri Katsuki. I'm finishing school here so I can train Yuuri as a Seeker."

Whatever reasoning Yuri had been expecting for Victor's disappearance, that clearly wasn't it. He looked surprised, but still angry. Mostly angry. The surprise evaporated from his face pretty quickly.

"Fine," he spat, narrowing his eyes at Yuuri and lowering his voice dangerously. "Tell you what, fatso. I challenge you to a midnight game of Catch the Snitch. Winner gets trained by Victor."

"I love Catch the Snitch!" Victor cried, clapping his hands together. "This sounds like fun!"

"If I win," Yuri continued, "you have come back to Durmstrang with me."

"Deal," Victor nodded. Just like that. Goodbye, Victor. Yuuri supposed it was only fair—he'd promised to train both of them and there was no way to do that now without a contest. He suddenly felt like someone was trying to scoop his insides out with a spoon.

Yuri's eyes snapped back to Yuuri.

"Tomorrow night," he challenged. "I'm tired and it was a bitch getting here so I need to rest."

Yuri started to leave, dragging his broomstick and trunk with him

"Wait Yurio!" Victor called. "You have to try the— "

Yuri stopped in his tracks. "Yurio?" he growled dangerously. "You'd better not be talking to me."

"Of course I am," Victor told him, "I decided two Yuris would get confusing, so you're Yurio."

"But you've known me longer than him," Yuri protested. "Why don't you give him a stupid nickname?"

"You're a guest in his school," Victor reminded him. "That's why."

There really was no arguing with him when he made up his mind, and the newly-christened Yurio seemed to know it.

"Fine," he spat. "But if you're calling me something ridiculous, I'm going to give you a nickname too." Yurio pointed viciously at Yuuri. "How about Katsudon? I saw you stuffing your face just now, it was disgusting."

Yuuri thought it was probably wise not to point out that Yurio had eaten just as much as he had, and a lot faster, so he kept his mouth shut.