Chapter Text
The hum of fluorescent lights in the backstage hallways of the arena did nothing to soothe Yuuri’s nerves.
Yuuri had done everything right this season.
He stayed healthy. He trained harder than ever. He kept up with Celestino’s relentless choreography, never missed conditioning sessions, survived interviews with the press, and endured the endless commentary of former skaters, former rivals, and the internet alike. Every jump, every spin, every glide was practiced until it was sharp, controlled, and precise. He had honed his stamina like a weapon, carving out the perfect combination of endurance and grace.
After over a decade of fighting for recognition, Yuuri Katsuki—twenty-three, a college student, a Japanese figure skater—was finally competing in his first Senior Grand Prix Finals.
And yet, here in the tunnel behind the dressing rooms, just minutes before he was meant to lace up for the Free Skate, he paced like a caged animal. The buzz of his nerves had overtaken him, thoughts pinging in his brain like static. His palms were damp. His throat felt tight. His stomach fluttered with a thousand tiny wings. He tried to count his breaths. He tried to center himself. Just get through the warmup. Just breathe.
It wasn’t helping.
Chris found him there.
“You’re going to dig a hole in the floor with that pacing,” Chris said, his voice teasing but gentle. He leaned casually against the wall in sweatpants and a warmup jacket, the weight of his costume beneath it to keep warm. His voice carried the kind of comfort that only someone who had seen every meltdown, every anxious spiral, could give. Chris had been there for all of Yuuri’s highs and lows in Juniors, in Seniors, in practice rinks, in interviews. He knew when to tease and when to anchor.
“Did you forget to submit an essay or something?” Chris added, a grin tugging at his lips.
“God, knowing my luck probably,” Yuuri muttered, glancing nervously at the other skaters and staff bustling around the hall. “But no. I just can’t focus.”
“You always say that.” Chris’s voice was calm, but there was a hint of insistence, a grounding quality. “You’ve done everything right. You’re here. You’re ready.”
Yuuri rubbed the heel of his palm against his forehead and closed his eyes. He imagined ice under his skates, the way the blades cut clean lines. He imagined the music, the rhythm, the control. Just get through the warmup. Just breathe.
The sound of a television being turned on nearby broke his concentration. Yuuri barely registered the words at first, the heavy accent of the anchor blending into the white noise of the hallway. Curling highlights, scores, recaps—he didn’t care. His mind refused to settle on anything but the Free Skate. One thought: maybe this time, I won’t disappoint anyone.
Then the screen flickered. The channel changed.
Yuuri caught it out of the corner of his eye.
Kyushu.
The single word tore through him.
He froze.
The anchor’s voice grew urgent, clearer now, carrying words that twisted in Yuuri’s chest.
“—A massive offshore earthquake, registered at 8.5 on the Richter scale. A tsunami has been confirmed to have made landfall in parts of southern Japan—”
Yuuri began to walk without thinking, his legs moving as if driven by some external force. His eyes were locked on the screen, drinking in images that shouldn’t exist outside of nightmares.
Footage. Real-time footage.
Helicopter views from above the coast. Waves swallowing entire villages. Boats tossed like toys. People screaming, running, trying to cling to anything solid. And then the words that would make his world crumble:
Hasetsu.
His feet stopped. His heart slammed against his ribs.
The screen shifted angles. A cliffside. A red-roofed building low on the edge of a cove. The Katsuki Inn.
He couldn’t breathe.
The wave hit. White, terrible, unstoppable. Shards of wood and debris flew into the sky. Screams were muffled by the roar of water. Yuuri’s mind refused to accept it.
Chris’s voice broke the spell.
“Yuuri?”
Yuuri’s knees buckled. He didn’t turn. His hands gripped the edges of the wall, fingers clawing at the drywall. His mind was blank, except for one repeating thought: No. No. No.
“Why…” he whispered, barely audible. “Why is my house on TV?”
Chris looked at the screen, then back at Yuuri. The realization hit him like a punch.
“Oh… oh, fuck.”
He grabbed Yuuri’s shoulder, but it was too late. Yuuri was already crumbling, sinking to the floor, unmoving. Celestino’s voice called from across the hall, sharp with worry, but it sounded like it was coming from underwater. Every word was muffled. Every sound muted.
His town. His home. The Katsuki Inn.
Gone.
Minutes blurred. Time no longer had meaning. Chris knelt beside him, trying to speak, to touch, to ground him, but Yuuri didn’t respond. He remained on the floor, eyes wide, fixed on the screen, repeating images of devastation burned into his mind. Bridges collapsed. Roads swept away. Buildings flattened. Entire neighborhoods gone.
He didn’t cry. Not at first. The feeling was too raw, too vast. It was a silence so heavy it pressed down on his chest, on his lungs, on his mind.
Then the world shifted again. Celestino had his phone out, shouting in Italian, pacing, but he couldn’t reach Yuuri. Not yet. Not while the younger man was still trapped in the tsunami, still frozen on the images of his destroyed hometown.
Chris held him tighter, murmuring words that probably made no sense, but Yuuri couldn’t hear them. He could only see. Could only imagine. Could only hope, hopelessly, that someone, anyone, had survived. That family, neighbors, anyone…
But in that moment, all Yuuri could think was that everything he had ever known, every memory tied to the inn, to the cliffs, to the sea, was gone.
And then, almost as if the world had folded itself in on him, the arena, the lights, the music, the Free Skate—all of it—faded into nothing.
An hour later, Katsuki Yuuri had withdrawn.
His name was removed from the warm-up list. From the monitors. From the arena programs. From the minds of those who had waited to see him skate his debut Senior Worlds Free Skate. He had left quietly through a back entrance, hood pulled low, baseball cap shadowing his face, boarding a flight before anyone could stop him, before anyone could even ask why.
He didn’t check his phone. Didn’t check social media. Didn’t call anyone. He simply left, carrying nothing but the weight of his world collapsing.
The skating world noticed immediately.
Within twenty minutes, #KatsukiWithdraws was trending on Twitter. Clips surfaced online: shaky footage of his skipped warm-up, Celestino speaking furiously into a phone, staff pacing. Skaters whispered in the corridors. Fans speculated, posted, panicked.
They wanted to know if their favorite skater was okay. If it had been a mistake.
But others were cruel.
“He choked again,” online users said.
“What a waste of talent,” coaches would lament.
“Guess he couldn’t handle the pressure.”
Former rivals in the Junior circle. Seniors who’d lost their chance at the Grand Prix because of Yuuri. Judges. Staff. Commentators. Everyone had something to say. It didn’t matter that no one knew the reason. They were ready to judge, to condemn, to reduce Yuuri's career to a single daming word: breakdown.
The reporters backstage whispered, speculated, questioned. The cameras rolled. Microphones hovered. Celestino tried to explain, his accent thick with urgency, but no one could understand fully. Yuuri Katsuki had vanished, and with him, every explanation, every answer, every context, every excuse.
By the time the world cared to understand why, Yuuri Katsuki had vanished into a country underwater.