Che farò senza Euridice?

[the_real_sir_prize]

Who| Yuuri and Victor
What| Dealing with the aftermath of their respective first missions
Where| The MedBay
When| Immediately after Silent Horizon
Warnings/Notes| Discussions of blood and death, trauma, nudity, naked touching

Victor really, truly hopes that it's going to be hard to top this day for the worst in his life, because he doesn't want to find out what would be worse than spending an indeterminate number of hours running for his life from monsters who were trying to kill him and who were also people who were supposed to be helping save other people with him. He can still feel the blood caking his hair down, even if the Legion staffers back on the cruiser had mostly managed to clean it out with their weird humming space wands. They'd also patched him up and given him clothes to change into, which is good because everything he'd worn into that hellscape needs to be thrown into the nearest sun, right down to his underwear.

Ugh.

Still, phantom sensations of trickling blood and clammy fear-sweat aside, he's almost presentable now. Not selfie-presentable, because: no, never, not happening; but presentable enough he's not going to horrify Yuuri when he throws himself out of the Legion cruiser and into Yuuri's arms.

Except Yuuri's not waiting for him when the cruiser lands, and Victor's close enough to hear the staffers talking about something even if he's not close enough to hear everything they're saying, and...

...And someone died while they were gone. Someone died and suddenly Victor can't stick around to ask questions because he knows he's not going to be able to hear the answers until he sees Yuuri for himself. Fortunately, the halls are designed to ensure that the Legionnaires have enough room to fly overhead, and Victor is highly motivated to get to Medical as fast as he can.

Comments

[katsudork]

All this skin on skin is overwhelming. (And tingly). But the ache in his muscles is terrible and exhaustion suddenly hits Yuuri like a brick to the head. He presses a kiss to Victor's shoulder and then lets go.

"We should go to bed. I'm about to fall asleep on my feet."

Together, though. Sometimes they sleep in separate beds because Yuuri needs his own space, especially the nights he's thrumming with anxiety over this whole being stuck in the future thing. But other nights Victor creeps into his bed and cuddles.

Tonight, though, there's no reason for him to go all the way to his room when Victor's bed is right outside the bathroom door.

[the_real_sir_prize]

"It's been a very long day," Victor agrees, allowing Yuuri to pull away but seizing his hand before he can get too far. He certainly doesn't want to sleep alone tonight, and he doesn't want Yuuri getting too far away right now either.

He leads Yuuri to his room, leaving the door open for the dogs to follow, and flops facedown on his bed. Then he considers the logistics of getting Yuuri into bed without letting go of his hand and rolls over onto his back. In theory, such things should result in Yuuri being pulled down into the spot Victor had just vacated.

[katsudork]

Victor usually sleeps naked, and has lost more and clothing over time during the nights they cuddle, but Yuuri never does. Right now, though, he doesn't want to let go, not even to go get some pajamas or underwear. Besides, he likes the idea of spending tonight pressed against Victor's skin.

He lets himself be pulled onto the bed, and after briefly leaning over Victor to ghost his lips against his forehead, he climbs under the covers, ready to settle in for the night, taking off his glasses and putting them on the bedside table.

[the_real_sir_prize]

Victor wiggles under the covers himself and wraps himself around Yuuri like an octopus. He doesn't move to do anything other than cuddle; he's tired enough that he needs to muffle a yawn against Yuuri's shoulder. It's nice having him in his arms again, especially in the comfort of the bed rather than standing upright in the sonic shower.

"I hope you don't need to use the bathroom because I don't feel like moving," he tells Yuuri's shoulder, dropping another kiss there.

[katsudork]

Yuuri taps the light off, shakes his head against him, and just holds him tight.

There are things he wants to say but he can't find the words. He feels like his chest is going to just expand and expand until it explodes.

Since he can't find words, he opts for pressing kisses into Victor's hair and against his forehead.

[the_real_sir_prize]

Victor squeezes his eyes shut against the dark. It doesn't strictly make sense, but he does it anyway. Unfortunately, the inside of his eyelids isn't a pleasant place right now, so he opens then again and blinks as his eyes adjust.

They're twined together against the mattress, and Yuuri's still pressing kisses to his head even though Victor knows that Yuuri's tired. There's something here that needs talking about before they can sleep, but Victor isn't sure how to start forming the words for it.

"I've been thinking," he says, not quite knowing what he's going to say. "I've been thinking...when we get home, after the Grand Prix."

He can't imagine leaving Yuuri after the Grand Prix, now.

[katsudork]

Yuuri noticeably tenses up when Victor mentioned the Grand Prix Final. Because...because he doesn't know what Victor wants, after all this is over, after the Grand Prix is over.

In Yuuri's mind that's always been when they'll say goodbye, but now...now he's not so sure.

Now he's not ready to let go. Ever.

"Mmm?"

[the_real_sir_prize]

If it had been easy for Victor to tell when Yuuri tensed up in the shower, it's impossible to miss it now. He rubs a circle on his back, taking a deep breath and slowly letting it out again.

"I don't want to leave you." Even though he says the words softly, the sentence cracks in the middle, the way it usually does only when he's very sad and very drunk and alone. Except for Makkachin, of course, who whines from the edge of the bed in response.

[katsudork]

Yuuri's never heard Victor's voice sound like that, but somehow he knows it's not just the stress of what happened. There's something about it that makes it seem as if it's something raw already there that's been exposed instead of being a wound freshly dealt.

He still doesn't know what it is that drew Victor to him from a country away, but he knows that someone wouldn't upend their whole life unless they were searching for something, trying to fill some need or want.

The idea that he fills that need and want emboldens him. It makes him feel like he's discovered some kind of hidden power inside himself. He's the femme fatale who's charmed the playboy, wrapped him around her little finger, and now Victor is begging him with that tone in his voice to not be cast off, to have a different ending to the dance.

Hearing those words silences the little timid voice in Yuuri's mind that questions these kinds of things. There's nothing to question anymore. Victor wanting to be his boyfriend made so many things clear, and right now, the way he's wrapped around him, naked in more way than one, makes them even more clear.

Of course he doesn't want to leave him, his eros is that powerful.

There are worse things to sacrifice a career over. He's already made his choice. He'll still try for the Grand Prix Final when this is all over because he knows Victor will be heartbroken if he gives up entirely, but after that, of the two of them, only Victor has a chance of going back to form when all this is done. He's the only one that has a chance of a career after their final competition together. Yuuri's career will be over, just like Yuuri assumed would be the case when he signed up for this saving-existence thing.

He can live with that if he can still have everything that comes after, if he can cheer Victor on from the sidelines, if they can wake up safe and warm from the cold Moscow mornings because of how they're all wrapped up just. Like. This.

He could've stuttered. He could've been shy about all of this, timid, upset over his ice skating career, but no. No, after hearing those words and the crack in his voice, after understanding how much a waste of time that timidity is, he's never felt more sure of anything in his life. One of them has to stop skating and he's fine with burning what's left of his career on the altar of their relationship.

"Then don't."

It's unquestionably a command, but the harshest edge of it is softened by the way Yuuri whispers it in Victor's ear.

[the_real_sir_prize]

Victor shivers at Yuuri's whisper, then goes limp, all the air in his body rushing out at once. He's not sure what he expected Yuuri to say; it isn't like Victor has any idea how he could possibly return to his own career while still supporting Yuuri's.

But...maybe he's making it more complicated than it needs to be. He loves skating, coaching Yuuri has only reminded him of how much he loves it. But the idea of going back without Yuuri at his side makes him feel as though his insides are being pulled out of him. And maybe Yuuri's right. Maybe he just...shouldn't.

He could retire, go out at top of his game after having dominated the competitive figure skating world for over a decade. Retire and coach Yuuri to gold after gold until Yuuri retires too. He could still do ice shows, exhibition skates, and he'd have Yuuri. Where's the fun in competing anyway when everyone takes it for granted that he'll take gold?

He could do it. It's a steep price, but so was what Victor paid for his skating career in the first place. Twenty years of life and love and loneliness, spent to transform Victor Nikiforov into Victor Nikiforov, living legend.

But it's a price he can pay.

Victor takes a deep breath as the words sink from his brain down to his chest, wrapping around his heart.

"Okay," he answers Yuuri, and his voice is steady. Steady as a heartbeat. "I'll stay."

[katsudork]

He threads his fingers through Victor's hair.

They took out their sonic earplugs while disrobing for the shower and that makes this easier. He can't say it in English. He can't look at him while he says it either.

But he manages to find the words, knowing that Victor knows just enough Japanese to understand them, and even if he doesn't, that the tone, the way he whispers them in his ear, says enough.

[the_real_sir_prize]

Victor's breath catches in his throat when Yuuri speaks again. He hasn't strictly studied a lot of Japanese, relying on a combination of a phrase book, immersion, Yuuri, and his own charming personality to get him through the day-to-day life in Hasetsu. But he had looked up information about love and romance, back in the early days in the hopes of figuring out how to talk to Yuuri without him fleeing the room. It had been educational, if not strictly useful until this very moment.

It's the first time either of them has said the words, in any language, but oh have they been just behind his teeth for months.

He pulls back away from Yuuri's neck, just enough that he can respond in kind, his accent muffing the syllables. Then he repeats himself, in French, in Russian. He presses his lips to the pulse in Yuuri's throat and whispers words they both understand in a language that neither of them speak:

"Stammi vicino, non te ne andare."