Ik Shane is canonically Cosmo’s hottest man in the league and in fanon he is widely agreed to be the most attractive player by other players and fans alike. But I think Shane loses his mind a little bit over this. Like he’s by no means insecure about his looks and knows he’s attractive. But he is baffled that Ilya is not viewed as the most attractive player. He is happy to use it as chirping material against Ilya but the longer it goes on, the more ?????? he becomes.
Like this is a man who Shane gets hard from just looking at him showering or playing hockey or existing. He’s like okay so we have a Greek statue come to life and we are going to pretend he isn’t the hottest man alive. Okay. Am I being pranked? Is this a joke? Have you seen his ass? What is wrong with you people?!
I think once they are out and married, and Shane is once again voted hottest man in the league (or specifically hotter than Ilya), he crashes out about it online. He’s saying the vote was rigged and he’s telling people (who are complimenting him) to delete their account. He’s replying to his most vocal supporters, “but have you considered this” with the gif of ilya winking. He’s calling for a recount. And everyone is like wait… is Shane Hollander, most competitive man alive, mad that he won something?
Little do they know that he is competing with Ilya for who has the sexiest husband and the world is sabotaging him for some reason wtf
When #myshane retires, he doesn’t go into coaching or podcasting or whatever.
He becomes a consultant who shitty teams trying to not suck, good teams who want to last further into the playoffs, great teams who want to finally win the cup, call to Fix Them.
He is paid absolutely bonkers amounts of money to watch a team play for five minutes and immediately diagnose what’s wrong with them. He is always right.
Ok 5 minutes is probably an exaggeration. The coaches send him a bunch of tape to review in advance. They probably focus on their best players or the ones they think need the most improvement, but half the time Shane requests more, focusing on players they hadn’t paid much attention to before. Then one day at practice, the players look up into the stands and are filled with awe, terror, and wonder, because Shane Hollander is sitting there staring directly at them with a scarily thoughtful look on his face.
He meets with the coaches and gm and reports his conclusions. Who to trade and for who , how to get better results from certain players, how to run power plays and penalty kills, changes in line makeups.
Some lucky players get to meet with him. He takes about five minutes to list off or demonstrate everything they need to do to stop sucking. He has no time for chit chat or hero worship. Focus, listen, learn, and do exactly what he says and you will be good. Fail to do what he says and you will shame your entire bloodline.
I think that, if he’s not the one actually playing, this would be a dream job. It involves Knowing Things About Hockey, Judging Shitty Hockey Players, Getting Recognized As The Best at Hockey, Being Correct, and Making Hockey Better. He should get to do all these things
There's this really obscure forgotten DC hero named the Heckler, who's basically buggs bunny as a superhero, not having any powers or physically strong, but just really good at pissing people off until they accidentally deal with themselves.
Now they're interesting, but the REAL star of the show is one of his villains, John Doe the Generic Man, who's this guy in a stark white suit with flat pink unshaded, untextured skin with no features or anything who talks like chatGPT and has black text over his face that explains what he's feeling at the moment. That guy is fucking fascinating.
I’m not sure if this will be helpful to anyone, but you literally do not have to be a good writer to write and post fan fiction. Yes you will naturally get better at writing and finding your voice the more you do it but you do not have to be or become a professional level writer to enjoy writing and sharing fics. It’s common to hear people praise fic writers by saying their work is better than published books, and while I think this comes from a good place, that’s not the norm or expectation. There is also a sentiment that fic writing is “good practice” for becoming a better writer or doing something else later, but if fic is the only creative writing you ever do that is literally okay. Your technical skill does not mean you cannot have fun and build community with your writing, or that other people cannot love and find meaning in your work.
David Hollander is definitely the type of man to randomly put on a song and pull his wife up to dance with him, especially if she’s stressing about something, or worrying, or upset, or just because. She will usually lightly protest, honey, I need to finish this email, but she’ll happily go along nonetheless.
David does it for the first time in front of Ilya when the boys are visiting and Shane and Yuna are planning (arguing) about something new brand deal.
He puts a song on the record player (Yuna has given up teaching him the Alexa), and he takes Yuna’s hand without a word. She protests that they need to plan out these contract terms and how his son is being difficult about it.
Shane starts to protest at that, but doesn’t get far until Ilya pulls him up to dance, too. A very embarrassed Shane goes willingly. He’s watched his father do this for years but never thought he would be pulled up to dance one day. From the fond looks from his parents, they probably didn’t either.
Shane meets Ilya’s smile with a half-hearted glare, but can’t deny swaying to the music in his boyfriend’s arms feels much better than stressing about a brand deal. Ilya makes a note to ask David for anymore tips and tricks.
Hollanov agree to record their wedding as a personal video diary of the day.
Shane’s surprisingly quite relaxed. He’s confident in their relationship, excited to be married, and knows that even if something goes wrong, it doesn’t matter, because at the end of the day he’ll be with Ilya.
Ilya is stressed. He keeps crying. This is the best day of his life. Shane deserves better, why would the greatest man on earth want him. He’s never been happier. Something’s gonna go wrong, he knows it. Bood, Troy, and Sveta have to keep calming him down and reminding him that Shane loves him and they deserve to be happy together. He locks himself in the bathroom.
Shane’s getting dressed with Hayden, JJ, and Rose, sipping champagne, feet up as he waits for the ceremony to start.
Once they manage to coax Ilya out of the bathroom, David comes in and does his canon speech about Ilya being his second son. The waterworks start again.
David then checks on Shane. “At least you’re doing okay.” “…. i-is Ilya not doing okay?” “Don’t worry about it, have another flute.”
I love the opening of Heated Rivalry so much because it sets up the show and Shane and Ilya's dynamic so perfectly. From "not the most sociable" Shane Hollander actively going out of his way to interact (because he's already fascinated by him) to "not liked outside of his own locker room" Ilya Rozanov being a bit of a cocky shit (which we pretty quickly realise is a front) to the instant spark of attraction.
Look at this man experiencing freckles and awkward Canadian politeness and developing a fat crush.
My favourite part however is as Shane is leaving clearly uncomfortable with how their conversation went (he does a head tilt like "well, that went horribly")
Ilya notices and that's when he chirps, immediately making Shane more comfortable as he chirps back. And thus, their lovingly teasing, when they say "asshole" and "boring" they really mean "I love you" dynamic is born.
Also, yes, Ilya's lighter doesn't spark until Shane appears which is just an additional beautiful touch.
when men are like “women need to be nicer and more complimentary to men” i CRINGE! why don’t MEN get more complimentary to men. start telling your friends you want to fuck them. don’t make women pick up YOUR slack
Most players don't really like All Stars all that much, like, it's an honour being chosen but the novelty wears off after a couple of years and most guys would prefer to have the time off.
The Hollander-Rozanovs, however, fucking live for All Star weekend. It's the only chance they get to play against each other in a competitive setting after they join the same team (scrimmages during practice don't count, especially since neither one of them wants to receive yet another lecture from coach on not treating them like the Stanley Cup finals at risk of injury and lowered team morale).
Luckily, the fans and the league are almost as excited to relive the days of the rivalry so they're hardly ever on the same team for All Stars and trust that Shane and Ilya have like 10-15 different bets riding on that weekend. They're betting on the skills competition, on number of goals, number of points, faceoff percentage, corsi for percentage. They're building it up for weeks. They have arguments from months back that will finally be settled by the results of this game.
Ilya knew that what he did was dangerous. He knew it was dangerous the first time a stranger asked him if he needed to make some extra cash. He just had to hand off a backpack to someone, and not look in the bag. It was easy enough so he agreed. The issue came when he left, the police picked him up and interrogated him, trying to figure out who the bag came from and confirm what was in it. Luckily for him he got released after not giving a description of who he got it from or who he gave it to and he wasn’t lying when he said he didn’t know what was in it even though it was obviously drugs. He wasn’t stupid, why else would he have been paid so much to simply deliver a backpack.
When he was released the man that handed him the backpack found him, saying he did good and offered him a job. He had been working as a waiter at some high end restaurant and crashing on a coworkers couch. He wasn’t making much money doing it, and he couldn’t go back to his father, so a better paying job was needed, regardless of what it was he was doing.
After his mom died of an overdose, his dad kicked him out. He said that he never wanted Ilya in the first place, that he was a mistake, that his mom only wanted him to try to fix their marriage and her head and he failed at it. His dad said his older brother is all he ever wanted and he didn’t want an ungrateful mouth to feed and a constant reminder of his biggest failure.
So Ilya left, he had been crashing with friends since he was fourteen. He was now twenty four years old and in the last ten years he was able to get his own place, using the dirty money. When he was a minor he was just in charge of being nothing more than a mule, transporting the goods to wherever they were going throughout Moscow. He knew they were either guns, drugs or money. Each successful drop allowed him to get paid more and more.
Slowly he moved up not doing the drops but coordinating them, getting paid more and more, being shown how to clean his money to be able to spend it, and how to get it into the banks through assets rather than cash, and employing him at one of their not so legitimate businesses in order to allow Ilya to have easy spending money for his rent and anything else he may need or want.
Right now he’s using that money to get a cab in Canada. He stood outside in the cold, a cigarette balanced between his lips. He was meeting up with some guys at some random restaurant in Montreal to discuss business and how to get their product over.
“Chyort, where the hell is that cab?” Ilya mumbled to himself, bouncing slightly on his feet trying to keep himself warm in the frigid air. Almost as if he summoned it he watched the yellow car pull up and park in front of him.
The cab driver rolled the passenger window down and yelled out. “Cab for Rozanov?”
Ilya nodded and opened the back door, shoving his suitcase in first and following behind it. “Take me to Lueur Sombre.”
“You got it.” The cab driver set the meter and began leaving. “It’ll be about twenty minutes.”
Ilya didn’t reply, and began looking out the window. The approaching city skyline was hypnotic. Towering over a massive lake, colorful lights bleeding over it from all the signs in the city. Moscow wasn’t colorful like this. The buildings there were painted but the lights weren’t something that glowed the same way they did here.
The cab driver broke the silence again. “That’s a cool accent you got. Where are you from?”
“Moscow.” Ilya replied, again leaving it at one word. He pulled out his phone, and saw a missed call from the Pakhan. He immediately called him back. “Hello Sir.” he said in Russian, making sure that the cab driver wouldn’t be able to understand him.
“Hello Ilya, I’m assuming your travels went well?” He asked, sounding bored.
“Yes sir. They went very well, thank you.” Ilya mindlessly played with his lip, he always got nervous when talking to the Pakhan.
“That is good to hear. The people you are meeting with are three brigadiers from one of our allies. There have been words from a few of our spies that they are thinking about crossing us. If you feel it to be true, I want you to take care of them. Send them a message. Do you understand?”
“Yes sir. I will report back with what happens.”
“Thank you, Ilya. I know you won't let me down.” The Pakhan hung up the phone, leaving Ilya to finish the last of the car ride with a cab driver who kept glancing back at him in the rearview mirror, clearly itching to ask questions.
Ilya got this far by never asking questions. Trust goes a long way in his line of work. It’s what allowed him to meet the man who just gave him a possible hit. Sergei Petrov is the scariest man in the entirety of Russia. He controls the police, almost all CEO’s of the businesses in Moscow and the ones he doesn’t control pay him extraordinary prices for his protection. He is also a professional in making people conveniently go missing.
The cab driver finally pulled up to the front of the nightclub. With it being in the middle of the week, it didn’t seem too busy from the outside. He stepped out and grabbed his suitcase. Since his cab driver was so late, he didn’t get the chance to stop at the hotel he was staying at and unfortunately wasn’t able to drop anything off.
He stood outside, waiting for the others, in the agreed meeting place. Using the moment of alone time, he lit up another cigarette and leaned against the building. He knew he was looking for three guys, two brunettes and some blonde guy. They work for Emil Zakirov, who Ilya has only once met, and didn’t trust farther than he can throw the guy. He was trying to get Sergei involved in human sex trafficking but Sergei turned him down. Zakirov said he wouldn’t do it without Sergei’s approval but both he and his Pahkan know what he has been doing.
“Rozanov?” A voice a bit down the street.
Ilya turned his head at the voice, pulling the cigarette from his lips. “Yes, and who are you?” He replied in Russian.
“Do you know English?” One of the brunettes asked. In response Ilya just raised his eyebrow, feigning confusion. He knew they would talk if they thought he couldn’t understand them. “Sorry, I was asking if you spoke English. My name is Nikolai, these are my companions Mikhail and Aleksander.”
Ilya took the time to look the three of them down. They were in plain clothes, much like he was, nothing particularly shocking about any of them however the other brunette, Aleksander, had a large scar across his cheek and the blonde one, Mikhail, had a tattoo of a snake on his neck. The only one who didn’t seem extraordinary in any way was Nikolai, that was until Nikolai shook Ilya’s hand when he noticed the tattoo of a skull on the back of it.
“Hello, I’m Ilya. Shall we go inside?” He asked, gesturing his hand towards the front door.
“Yes, let’s go.” Nikolai said.
None of the men moved towards the door, waiting for Ilya to lead the way. Ilya did exactly that, making his way towards the door of the restaurant. On the short walk over to it he overheard a not so secret conversation between the three brigadiers.
“Did you see the new product that Zakirov had brought in? They have an extra bite this time around, I hope he lets us break them this time.” Nikolai began.
Ilya heard Aleksander laugh. “The last time you broke one in you nearly killed her.”
“Yeah I can’t imagine they let you do it again Nikolai. Same goes for you Aleksander, or have you stopped noticing the scar on your cheek anytime you look in the mirror?” Mikhail chimed in.
The three boys laughed, talking about the ‘product’. It was clear they were talking about girls and boys, very few of them actually could be considered men and women. It is no secret to what Zakirov gets up to. Hearing them laugh about what they wanted to do had Ilya’s blood boiling. While the three of them were talking and laughing about disgusting things, assuming still that Ilya couldn’t speak English, they asked for a table in the back away from the other patrons. The hostess placed their menus down in front of them. Nikolai walked Ilya through the menu, highlighting their tourtiere, a traditional dish of Montreal followed by the cedar plank salmon.
After a few moments their server came up to the table. The server was easily the most attractive man Ilya had ever seen. He had dark hair, wisping across his forehead, his eyes a deep brown, freckles scattered across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose, his lips looked soft, his jaw strong, and his shoulders and arms looked like they were going to burst out of his black button up, that he had closed up to his collarbones. “Hello gentlemen, my name is Shane and I will be your server tonight. Can I get you guys anything to drink? We have the most delicious house red if you’re looking for a bottle to share. Otherwise I can give you guys a moment to look over the cocktail menu?”
Nikolai was the one to answer. “The bottle of red sounds great, along with some water for the group. Thank you, Shane.” The way Nikolai said Shane made Ilya want to leap across the table and punch him as hard as he could.
Nikolai leaned over towards Aleksander, “I think Zakirov would like that one. Should we bring him in?”
Aleksander nodded. “I’ll wait for him out back when he’s done with his shift. I’ll bring him back to your place until we can get him to Zakirov.”
Nikolai let out a snakelike smile. Ilya had to clench his hands together in his lap to keep himself from smashing all of their heads into the table for thinking they could do that to Shane. “So Ilya, what was it that Petrov was trying to do? Why did he decide to send you to Canada?”
“My Pakhan would like to use Mr. Zakirov’s ports to begin smuggling in his products into the country. He mentioned the two of them have an alliance and just wanted to be given permission before beginning to do so. He is either willing to buy the ports outright or he will use them until he can finish buying his own. If Mr. Zakirov wishes to keep his ports for his own product then my Pakhan will continue to wait before bringing his own product over. He simply sees no harm in asking something from his ally.”
“Sorry for interrupting you guys,” Shane said, holding the tray of drinks. “Here are those waters, would you like me to pour the wine for you guys or would you prefer to wait until your food comes?”
Ilya felt his face begin to heat up when Shane leaned over the table to hand Mikhail his drink, looking at his strong arm that was right in front of his face. He needed to stop himself from leaning forward and sinking his teeth into the man’s bicep. The scent of Shane’s cologne made it all more desirable, the smell of something earthy with just the slightest hint of citrus. It was alluring to Ilya.
Ilya had noticed people before, he has had plenty of sex with men and women but all it was was a release, all it ever had been was sex. There was just something about Shane that drew Ilya to him. He always noticed people, he would have been dead if he didn’t, but Shane captured Ilya’s full attention. It was dangerous, it made Ilya feel the need to find out why.
Shane finished pouring the glasses of wine. One of the others, most likely Nikolai who has been speaking for the table all night, said they wanted the wine open now. Again when Shane leaned over the table, Ilya got to enjoy the sight of his arms and the smell of his cologne. “Are you guys wanting any food tonight? Just coming for drinks?”
“Food would be lovely.” Nikolai said, giving Shane his snakelike smile. Ilya watched as discomfort flashed across Shane’s face, struggling to hide it. Ilya wanted to somehow show Shane that he was in danger here but he was going to be okay. He didn’t know when Shane got off of work. He did know he was going to be waiting in the shadows by the employee entrance to make a point that Shane was going to be off limits.
Ilya knew that if they were planning on taking anyone from this restaurant he would put a stop to it. There was no question. He just felt the tug in his chest needing to know everything about the man in front of him.
The three brigadiers put in their food orders to Shane. “What can I get for you?” Shane asked, turning his full attention to Ilya.
“Ilya, he is asking what you would like to eat.” Nikolai translated for him. “Sorry, our friend Ilya there doesn’t speak English.”
“Ilya, what a wonderful name.” Shane said, smiling at him.
Ilya felt his heart skip a beat hearing Shane say his name. He wanted to actually speak to him but if the people he was dining with knew he had understood everything they had said in ‘secret’ there was no way tonight was going to end any better than it was already going to. He was already prepared for a fight, but he didn’t need to make it worse. He didn’t need to give them a reason to bring back up when he was already outnumbered. “Cedar salmon,” Ilya turned to the men at the table. “How do you say please?” Nikolai quickly answered him. “Cedar salmon, please Shane.”
Ilya noticed the red beginning to creep up from Shane’s shirt collar. “Of course, I’ll be right back with that for you guys. Would you like another bottle of wine for the table?”
“Please.” Ilya said to him. Shane nodded and walked off to put in their food order and grab another bottle of the wine.
“Going back to what we were discussing," Nikolai began, “I think it’s pointless to even ask. Sergei does not approve of what Zakirov is doing. We all know that. Zakirov would never allow Sergei access to his ports and risking him finding out about his products. It’s not about the potential issue of oversaturation of the market, but even he keeps secrets from others. We will not be bringing it up to him since we know he is simply going to turn it down. Unfortunately Sergei will just have to wait for his own ports to be finished.”
“Do you truly think he wouldn’t even allow one of his ports to be bought outright?” Ilya pressed him. He truly didn’t want him to say yes, it would make tonight harder since he would have to leave at least one of them alive to ask him if it was going to be okay to buy the port, if they declined he would be able to send the message he wants to send - don’t mess with things that are his. Shane wasn’t his yet, after tonight he will be. Ilya has gotten quite used to getting what he wanted.
“There would be too much risk involved for Zakirov to want to move the product. We simply cannot do it.”
“Cannot do it or simply won’t do it?” Ilya asked, not bothering to hide the frustration and anger growing under his skin.
“Can you believe this?” Nikolai muttered to his companions. “Can’t, won’t, what difference does it make? The answer stays no. I hope you do not let this ruin what is sure to be a wonderful meal.”
“Of course. Thank you for meeting with me. I will be sure to let my pakhan know.” Ilya finished the conversation. He will be sure to inform Sergei of the development, and he will be sure to make a statement with their bodies. He knew that Zakirov had a good hold on the police here. It wasn’t unfamiliar to him the lengths people would go for a good paycheck, and if all they had to do was look away, it was easy enough to do it. Maybe if more people looked there would be less evil in the world.
Shane had come back with the food, Ilya’s mood momentarily softened in the presence of the man that had somehow managed to cause electricity to flow under his skin by simply existing in front of him. He wasn’t ever someone who believed in love at first sight. His mom said that she felt that way about his father, and seeing the way he treated her made him feel that it was all a lie. People don’t love each other but benefit from cohabitation, whether it was a roof over their heads, money in the home, the kids only one of them really wanted. He didn’t have a better word to describe how Shane made him feel. He knew it was certainly lust but he wanted to sit down and talk with Shane. If he was here alone he would have invited Shane to sit at the table with him just to get to know him. He would give him his number. He wanted to know everything about him.
The feeling truly confused Ilya as he watched Shane put down his salmon in front of him. He wasn’t particularly hungry for food, but was hungry for something else entirely. The issue was if he would leave before dinner it would be impolite, even with the fact that he was already planning on murdering the three men he ate with. He would allow them this final meal, the final moments of bliss, the thought of accomplishment if they successfully grabbed Shane. It wouldn’t happen. Ilya doesn’t share.
While he was eating, the three men surrounded him, speaking in English trying to exclude Ilya in their plans. They were going to pretend to leave so Ilya would go back to his hotel room and then circle back, if he was alone they were going to grab him right there from the back of the building, if he wasn’t they were going to follow him back to his home and intercept him before he went inside. Shane would have to be taken over his dead body if they thought Ilya would allow this. They all spoke in confidence, convinced that Ilya was clueless. They spoke in Russian just enough so any normal person would feel included. Ilya didn’t want to be included in anything they did. That didn’t mean tonight he wouldn’t be included, he would be in a way that they really wouldn’t like.
Shane came back with their bill, it was well over two hundred dollars. Without thinking he pulled the receipt from Nikolai and placed his card down. “Please, let me, as a show of thanks for your willingness to meet with me.”
“Thank you, Ilya, we appreciate it.” Nikolai nodded his head in appreciation of the gesture.
Aleksander leaned in close to Nikolai. “Do you think we should try to take him too? He is also very attractive and I think Zakirov could get a pretty price for him.”
“It would be difficult, we would have to make sure that his boss doesn’t find out. If we take him and he finds out we’re as good as dead.” The two of them made their way out of the booth, causing Ilya to have to rise himself to let out Mikhail. “Thank you again for dinner Ilya. We will be informing Zakirov of what we discussed. I can assume you will be doing the same with Sergei.”
“Yes, I will be letting my pakhan know about what we discussed. Thank you for having this meeting with me.” Ilya bowed his head, faking his appreciation. He knew he had to be careful when he left, he didn’t want to get caught off guard and not be able to help Shane when they decided to strike against him.
If they were smart they would divide and execute both plans at the same time. The kitchen hours just ended so no more food was going to be coming out of the restaurant. He knew it would be about another hour before Shane left assuming his other tables left soon or just transferred over to the bar, then he had to do his closing duties and then he would be able to leave. An hour was generous, he needed to make sure that no one was following him when he settled into his hiding space, so no matter what he had to move quickly.
He followed them out of the restaurant, he still carried his suitcase with him which would unfortunately hinder him. He would have left it behind, there was nothing of any value to him inside of it, but it would raise too much suspicion in the others for it to be a safe idea.
The three men headed off towards the direction they arrived from, Ilya went the opposite. He said to them that he struggles too much with cabs since he can’t speak english well as they walked out the front door of the restaurant, also claiming that his hotel isn’t too far away and doesn’t mind the walk back as he went his separate way.
It wasn’t long until he heard the familiar sound of footsteps behind him. It was possible that it was just a random person, but when they had left the restaurant there wasn’t anyone behind him, it was certainly a cause for concern. To confirm his suspicions that it was one of the men he just finished having dinner with, he made a hard left into an alleyway between two closed businesses, and the footsteps continued behind him.
It was at this point he turned around. He saw Aleksander standing at the opening of the alley. Ilya stood there, watching Aleksander get closer and closer. They said that they wanted him to sell, so he wasn’t worried about Aleksander having a gun, the most he had to worry about was knives. Unfortunately, Ilya wasn’t able to bring any into Canada through the airport. “Hello Aleksander.”
“Hello, Ilya.” He said back. “I’m guessing you lied about your language skills?”
“I never outright said I don’t speak English. You guys assumed I didn’t when I simply did not respond to your question.” Ilya stared intensely at the man with the scarred face, he couldn’t wait to add to it.
“So then I suppose you know why I’m here.” Aleksander said, beginning to stretch his arms preparing for the fight that was about to ensue.
“I’m sure it’s not to pay for your part of the meal. I’m also sure that it has everything to do with making me a new ‘product’,” he added air quotes around the word, “for your boss. Along with the very attractive server we had.”
“You got it.” Aleksander reached into his pocket and pulled out a wicked looking switch blade.
“I’m sure you can understand how I simply cannot let that happen.” Ilya began picking the lint off his clothes. He did not feel as afraid as he should. He knew that he might get cut but he has learned to welcome the pain, just to prove he is alive.
Aleksander lunged at Ilya, knife in hand. Ilya quickly side-stepped him, grabbed his arm and began twisting it, the blade inches from his face. Quickly, he lurched Aleksander's hand forward, loosening the grip on the blade where Ilya was able to grab easily out of his hand, he then proceeded to push Aleksander away from him. “Awe, that was so easy, I thought you could fight,” Ilya used the knife to gesture Aleksander’s scar on his own face. “Or are you just used to women who are too weak to fight you off? Did she just get a lucky shot?”
“Fuck you, asshole!” Aleksander yelled, going in to tackle Ilya again. Much like last time Ilya was able to side step him, and he stuck his foot out causing Aleksander to trip and fall flat onto the ground.
While he was down, Ilya got on top of him, jamming his knee between Aleksander’s shoulder blades. Without hesitation Ilya grabbed Aleksander by the back of his hair and placed the blade of the knife on his throat and slid the blade across his neck. Using the back of Aleksander’s shirt to clean up the blood from the knife.
He stood up leaving Alexander to finish bleeding out. He knew this was an easy fight since he was on his own. He knew Nikolai and Mikhail would be a different situation, simply because he was outnumbered. He needed to separate them. Ilya began searching in the dead man’s pockets looking for a phone. In his search he found Aleksander’s wallet. He opened the wallet and pulled out the cash and threw it next to him. After resuming his search he found Aleksander's phone.
He almost felt defeated when he realized that there was a passcode, however he had his face identification operational. He put the phone up to Aleksander’s face and the phone opened. He took the moment while he was scrolling through his phone to smoke a cigarette.
He opened his messages looking for something from Nikolai or Mikhail so he could message him asking for help. He shared his location and sent it to Mikhail, finding him first, and sent him a message: ‘Ilya is incapacitated, I need you here with the car.’ He got a text back from him saying he’s on his way and that Nikolai was staying to stake out the building for Shane.
Ilya was surprised that it actually worked. That they were willing to separate. He flicked his cigarette butt aside and looked around for a place to conceal himself. There were plenty of places for him to go that would allow him to see Mikail when he arrived. He stepped back into a shadow of a doorway where the lights were out, completely concealing him in the darkness.
A short time later, Mikhail pulled up in the SUV they use for this. Mikail got out of the car and rushed over to where Aleksander was lying. He watched as Mikail got down on his knees and examined Aleksander. He immediately started looking around, knowing that Ilya was hiding somewhere but unsure where.
Mikail stood up and made a beeline towards the SUV, that was when Ilya jumped out and grabbed him. Ilya took the blade and jammed it into Mikhail's ribcage stabbing him directly in the lungs. Mikail went down quickly, his hands over the wound. Ilya, went over to him and much like how he did to Aleksander, ran the blade directly across his throat, then proceeded to use his shirt to wipe the blood off of it.
He left the car behind and made his way back to the restaurant where Nikolai was hiding waiting for Shane. The last thing he wanted was for him to pull up in the car and have Nikolai get inside of it. It is too hard to move around and the last thing he wants is for him to give Nikolai any sort of advantage.
When he got back to the restaurant he made sure to stay close to the wall keeping himself hidden and looking out for Nikolai. He hid behind a dumpster, the smell causing him to wrinkle his nose. He looked around and behind the garbage from the business next door he saw a phone light up. Ilya knew it had to be Nikolai, looking at his phone more than likely trying to get a hold of Mikhail and Aleksander.
Ilya was going to sprint across the sizeable alley, wanting to stop Nikolai before he could traumatize Shane, but that was when Shane exited the building. He was on his phone not paying attention to his surroundings, Ilya wanted to scream out and tell him to look out as Nikolai rushed out.
Ilya chased down Nikolai watching as he grabbed Shane from behind covering Shane’s mouth with his hand. While being at the disadvantage Ilya brought his arm back and punched Nikolai in the side of the head as hard as he could. Nikolai let go of Shane and fell to the ground.
Shane also fell to the ground and started to get away from the two sparring men. When Ilya looked over, Nikolai got a lucky hit on ilya’s cheek bone. He knew he was going to have a bruise. Ilya brought his arm back and hit Nikolai again and again, straddling him. He grabbed Nikolai by the collar of his shirt and slammed his head against the pavement. He did it over and over again until the hold Nikolai had on his arms weakened.
Ilya stood up, Nikolai not dead but bloodied and beaten, stayed on the ground not moving. Ilya took this time to lean over the man and spit in his face. “Don’t ever touch something of mine again.” He walked over to Shane, who was on the ground breathing heavily and clearly very scared. “Are you okay?” Ilya asked him, holding out his hand, offering to help him up.
“Yeah, just terrified.” Shane said, accepting the help up, his hand shaking intensely in Ilya’s. “Thank you for stopping him.”
“It’s okay, I would do it again.” Ilya said, still holding his hand. He was enjoying the feeling of it sitting in his, it felt right, like Shane’s hand was what he was meant to hold. “Shane, right?”
“Yeah, how did you know?” Shane creased his dark eyebrows together.
“You were our server tonight.” Ilya said, looking into his dark brown eyes trying not to get lost in them. He watched as Shane went to look at the bloodied man behind him. Before he could Ilya turned him around pulling him into his chest and facing away from the body. “No, don’t look at him, you don’t need to see what I did.”
“Who are you?” He felt Shane ask, not bothering to pull away.
“I can’t tell you right now. If you have questions I’ll give you my number but I can’t have my name linked to this yet. I’m sorry.” Ilya let Shane go so he could pull out his phone and handed it over to Ilya who put his number in. He named himself Rozy, a nickname he had growing up, he might connect the dots, might remember his name, but until he hears back from his pakhan the less Shane knows the better.
“Well thank you…” Ilya stood there while Shane looked down at his phone. “Can I call you if something happens or maybe to let you know I got home safe?”
“Please do.” Ilya said. He was going to follow Shane home anyways. He knew Shane must have been walking home since he was walking away from the cars and towards the sidewalk. “Be safe, please.”
“I will, thank you, Rozy.” Shane left the parking lot glancing back at Ilya standing there. Ilya grabbed his suitcase hiding behind the dumpster and made his way after Shane, staying concealed from him, making sure he didn’t scare him further, all the way back to his apartment complex, which just so happened to be on the same stretch of road of his hotel. He should have offered just to walk him home.
When he got back to the hotel, he took a long time in the shower, washing the blood and tending to his injuries. Nikolai did some damage to his face, the bruise already starting to show. He pulled on his sweatpants, not bothering with a shirt, pulled out his phone to call his pakhan.
“Hello Ilya, I assume tonight went well.” Sergei said as a greeting.
“It could have gone better, I unfortunately had to send a message. The brigadiers I met were very impolite, assuming they could call you by your first name and not addressing their pakhan with the proper title. After denying our proposal, they plotted kidnapping myself and the server we had at a restaurant. I killed two of them and rendered the third unconscious so he can go back to their pakhan and share what happened. I trust you will be able to take care of everything from here.”
“Yes, Ilya, I will take care of it. Do not worry. I hope you enjoy the rest of your time in Canada. I’m sorry that it didn’t go the way we wanted. I know we have a while for the plane ticket back, I think you should allow yourself to take a break, do not feel like you have to rush back. I know you tend to not care about yourself the way you should. You are a good man Ilya.”
“Thank you, Sergei. I will think about staying. Have a good night.” Ilya said as he hung up the phone. Before he put his phone away he saw a message sitting in his inbox.
Shane: Hey, it’s Shane, from earlier, thank you again. I just wanted to share that I made it home safe.
Rozy: I’m glad you made it home safe. You can reach out to me whenever you would like. I’ll be there for you.
learning a new instrument from a single teacher is so funny bc that's your point of reference for a while until you start branching out a little. was talking to a specialist in irish music history about my early irish harp lessons and i was like "it's a good thing i have strong fingernails so i don't have to get acrylics to play" and he was like "you're playing with your fingernails?" and i was like "yeah my teacher said that's how you play" and he was like "that's how irish harp players used to play like 1,000 years ago. i don't know anyone who plays with their fingernails now. even in the 1700s at a harp festival we have record of just one guy playing with his fingernails."
i guess he can't say no one is playing like this anymore bc at least my teacher is but this is why when ur new to something u can't walk around assuming you have all the facts. thought i was learning harp like usual meanwhile my teacher is an extremely dedicated medieval reenactor.
a phrase that kinda bothers me when talking about women's historical roles in europe is "cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the children." you hear it so often, those exact words in the same order even. and once you learn a little more you realize that the massive gaping hole in that list is fiberwork. im not an expert and have no hard numbers, but i wouldnt be surprised if fiberwork took up nearly as much time as the other three tasks combined, so it's not a trivial omission.
it's not a hot take to say that the mass amnesia about fiberwork is linked to the belittlement of women's work in geneal, but i do think there's a special kind of illusion that is cast by "cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the children." you hear that and think "well i cook and clean and take care of children (or i know someone who does) and i have a sense of how much work that is" and you know of course that cooking and cleaning were more laborious before modern technology, but still, you have a ballpark estimate you think, when in fact you are drastically underestimating the work load.
i also think that this just micharacterizes the role of women's work in livelihoods? cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the children are all sisyphean tasks that have to be repeated the next day. these are important, but not the whole picture. when we include all kinds of fiberwork—and other things, such as making candles or soap—women's work looks much more like manufacturing, a sphere we now associate more with men's work. i feel like women's connection to making and craftsmanship is often elided.
shane to harris wait you also enjoy getting violently fucked into the mattress by your big strong hockey boyfriend? and while they have nothing else in common they would connect deeply over this I think
insp. by @butimaficwriter and their very good tags
harris, stone cold sober: like it's not like i suddenly forget i have a heart condition. i know my body. i know what it can handle. and i know what i want.
shane, slightly tipsy: and you wanna get railed
harris: AND I WANNA GET RAILED IS THAT TOO MUCH TO ASK
shane: can i tell you something. you cannot tell anyone
harris: no promises
shane: eh fuck what does it matter anymore. remember that halloween party ilya threw when he wore that gladiator costume?
harris: yeah he looked so hot in that instagram picture
shane: i needed him so bad that i drove to ottawa that night even though i had a morning skate the next day
