Chapter Text
Viktor felt overwhelmed.
Viktor NEVER felt overwhelmed.
Viktor knew he was holding on to something for dear life, but what exactly it was he was clinging to was anyone’s guess.
Viktor took a deep breath, then another. And another. What exactly was going on?
The first thing he realized was just how loud every thing was around him. Too many sounds assaulted him. So hard to make any sense. Slowly, everything settled, sounds calming, well, not as overwhelming as at first, but still loud. Viktor realized he was standing with his hands on his knees, taking in deep gulps of air. He tried listening to what was going on around him, but nothing made sense. Weird strings of vowels and consonants assaulted his ears first, then his brain. His brain was having none of this. Nope, unless the eyes and a few other senses agreed to join in on this party, he was on his own.
Viktor cracked an eyelid.
Viktor looked around.
His hands were technically free (other than grasping his knees so desperately he was sure there would be marks the next morning). He wasn’t sure where he was, but he sure as hell wasn’t where he was before whatever it was that happened, happened. Wasn’t there someone else with him? At this point, he didn’t really care, as he had to step out of the way of a very angry-looking woman who was barreling his way down a tight corridor. Viktor took a step backwards. His feet connected with tile. He glanced over his shoulder.
He took in the fact that there were several Asian men, all naked, in various states of scrubbing themselves, and all singing the same song…
...which Viktor realized, was coming from the direction the very angry looking woman had headed…
Viktor regained his balance, and headed off down the hallway. He knew by palming the walls and counting the steps that somehow he was headed to the public rooms at Yu-Topia. He heard a screen door bang open far ahead of him, and the singing got louder. Viktor found himself bounding down the stairs three at a time, and unable to stop, grabbed the open door frame from whence the decidedly off-key and totally in a still undecipherable language singing was coming from, and was met almost face-to-face with…
...Katsuki Toshiya, clad only in a fundoshi, with mulitple kanji on his chest in what Vikor could only guess was lipstick, singing a rousing chorus of god-only-knows-what, because between the Hasetsu accent and the drunken slurring, even a sober local would have trouble following the words to the song. Five or six other men in a similar state of dishabille were joining in just as enthusiastically in whatever it was they were singing. Mari was wading into the fray, a bar towel in each hand, swinging and swatting at the drunken chorus in aggravation and frustration. Viktor swung his arms wide, and started herding the drunks in the direction of the lounge, which seemed where Mari intended them to go.
All the drunks seemed to know the drill. Toshiya turned at the last minute, staggering up a different set of stairs to what Viktor knew was the family section of the onsen. The rest either grabbed coats and shoes, or didn’t, and all drunkenly headed out the main doors of the onsen, grabbing on to each other in pairs or triplets, continuing on with whatever verse of whatever song it was they thought they were singing. A song, “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall” leapt unbidden into Viktor’s mind, memories of a long lost trip in North America. Feeling as though he’d helped with great things, Viktor turned to Mari.
“Mari, where is Yuuri?”
Mari looked at him as though Viktor he was speaking English. Actually, he was. Viktor ran his question through his mind a second time, and then tried
“Yuri-kun, wa dokodesu ka, Mari-neechan?”
Mari’s eyes widened a bit, before a fury such as Viktor had never seen played across her features before she schooled them into something even more deadly. A harsh torrent of Japanese was unleashed in Viktor’s direction only seconds before the bar towels and then anything else loose in the area of the noren curtains was flung in his direction. Viktor lit out across the courtyard of the onsen, taking refuge by the outer wall near the street. Several geta came sailing after him, punctuating Mari’s message.
“Well, I wondered how long that would take,” Frank smirked.
Viktor took in the spectacle of Frank, leaning against the outer wall, decked out in a jinbei and geta, despite it being December. “What?” Frank exclaimed, “I thought it would be slimming! And you know how comfortable these clothes are…”
“Where is my Yuuri?” Viktor growled, snatching up the lapels of Frank’s jinbei and pulling him up to his face. “Where. Where is he?”
“Now Viktor, you know I can’t tell you that…” Frank meekly protested.
“Where...where is he…” Viktor’s face was taking on the same look that Mari’s had had just a few minutes before.
“Well...you’re not going to like it…” Frank looked down at his feet, dangling a foot above the sidewalk. Despite the immediate threat of grievous bodily harm, Frank stalled.
“WHERE. IS. MY. YUURI. TELL ME! NOW!” The sound coming out of Viktor was something primal, guttural, and totally unlike any noise that had ever issued from him ever in his lifetime, but he didn’t care.
Frank wilted in Viktors hands, almost sobbing. “He’s at the Ice Castle. He’s just closing up for the night…”
Viktor dropped Frank to the sidewalk and took off with a speed that would make any runner proud. Frank picked himself up off the sidewalk. “I hope you’re proud of yourself, this was your idea, after all,” he muttered as he dusted himself off. “No, I did NOT get to join in the party at Yu-topia, did you not see me waiting outside like a good boy?” he whined to nobody in particular, before seeming to vanish in a wisp of fog.
++ ++ ++ ++
The Hasetsu that Viktor found himself running through was familiar and totally alien to him. Over the summer months Viktor had been there, he had learned to recognize the stores and their signs around him, which streets led off to homes tucked away from main roads and which ones led to the commercial district. Were the neon signs here always so red? That corner over there seemed much brighter than Viktor remembered...bright interiors meant that was a bar, right? Viktor shook off his confusion and continued running, across the bridge (no one to shout “Ohayo gozaimass” to at this time of night, but at second glance that spot looked as if no one had ever fished from it) and down to the turn and up the steps to where he could see…
Yuuri. His Yuuri. Locking up the front entrance of Ice Castle Hasetsu and setting the alarm for the building in the panel to the left of the main doors. Viktor almost couldn’t contain himself...he couldn’t contain himself. Before he knew what he was doing, with palpable relief, Viktor shouted out Yuuri’s name and closed the gap up the stairs between himself and his beloved.
Yuuri’s reaction to Viktor’s shout was anything but someone happy to see him. At first, Yuuri went rigid with the shock of hearing his name being shouted out at that hour of the night. Then Yuuri whipped around, seeking the source of the noise. When his eyes fell on Viktor, standing there ever-so-happy at the top of the stairs to the Ice Castle, the myriad expressions…
Confusion…more confusion...trying to decide if this long tall drink of vodka in front of him was someone he knew (whether he remembered him and why he remembered him or not)...then slowly growing in fear as Yuuri decided whether or not he knew who this ice god on the steps of the castle calling his name was or not, he definitely did not want to become reacquainted with him in his home town, took hold.
Yuuri meeped in shock, dropped his skate bag, and took off in a direction away from the onsen.
Viktor followed in hot pursuit.
Yuuri ducked and feinted, twisting from one narrow street to another. Viktor’s shouts of “Wait, Yuuri!” seemed to only panic Yuuri more, and cause him to duck down what would be considered alleyways to anyone but non-locals. Too bad Yuuri had shown Viktor these very shortcuts to both Minako’s dance studio and her ‘snack’ bar. Viktor found himself lagging far behind in the crowds on the streets (was it always this crowded on a Friday night in Hasetsu? Viktor felt like he was fighting the people traffic like that time they went to Kyoto.) He managed to keep Yuuri’s head in range, and watched as Yuuri turned the corner into the bar instead of the dance studio.
Viktor rounded the corner, and could see Yuuri swimming up to the bar through the throngs of people inside. Loud music blared from cheap speaker both inside and outside the bar. Suddenly, Viktor could see that Yuuri was slightly taller than everyone else in the room. Yuuri must have stood on the rail of the bar to get Minako’s attention, which worked, also gaining the attention of a bald, sumo-type guy behind the bar as well. Viktor could see Yuuri wildly gesturing and pointing in Viktor’s direction, and not in a good way. Panicking, Viktor kept shouting and waving at Yuuri, until in desperation he shouted at the top of his lungs
“YUURI, DON’T YOU KNOW ME? I’M YOUR HUSBAND!”
Later, Viktor might try to puzzle out how he could take in so many different things in one moment, but for right now, all he could do was record and react.
Despite the blaring, fuzzy music, the bar went quiet. All heads turned towards Viktor. Including Mari (and how did she get there so fast?) And Minako. Who both had baseball bats. And who both, along with many, many, far too many people in the bar, seemed to be merging towards Viktor with evil in their eyes and anger in their hearts, while Yuuri fainted over the top of the bar.
Viktor felt a strong tug on his sleeve, perhaps he even heard “RUN” shouted in his general direction as he struggled to turn and swim back out of the throngs of bar patrons, before a sharp something hit him in the middle of his back, and suddenly things didn’t make much sense again...