#ilya rozanov character study

[oathkeptroxas]

Imagine you're ilya rozanov and you bury your feelings because it's been more than a decade since anyone cared enough to ask you how you are

You throw yourself into hockey in a wholly new way at 12 years old because your mother used to watch you play, because it can get violent sometimes and you need that, you're carrying so much rage

You discover sex at 14 and it's a different kind of escape. It feels like rebellion. It's nice to feel something other than rage and sadness. You crave feeling wanted. You crave the temporary reprieve of loose limbs and heaving breaths.

You crave never having to be alone whilst simultaneously never being known. You may never be ready to talk about any of this.

And then you realize you like boys too, and that's more sex, but this time there's a dangerous edge. It's rebellion and risk and freedom and maybe some downright stupidity.

You've never wanted to die. Not really. But there have been many times you didn't want to live.

But then the momentum shifts and hockey isn't just an escape from grief but an escape route out of Russia and away from the bleeding remnants of your fucked up family

It's a good thing you're good at it. But you need to be the best. So that not a team in the world would turn you down. So you can get the fuck out.

You fuck, and you fight, and you play your way into a whole new life.

Your father calls you a traitor. He says you should be ashamed. And you're ashamed of a great many things but not the ones he wants you to be.

Your brother says they're all better off without you. That you abandoned the family. You think he doesn't understand the meaning of the word.

And then you develop a pointless little crush on a freckle faced prodigy that may be the only one in the whole world that can stand toe to toe against you.

He has a loving home and a strong sense of morality. He's in this for the love of the game. He eats, sleeps, lives, breathes hockey in a way you sometimes envy. You wished you could still love it that way, like you did when your mother was in the crowd.

And maybe if you just touch him. Just get this whole thing out of your system, get the upper hand. You want to challenge him in wholly new ways and want to rile him up because you can only imagine how he'd respond.

He sees you as a cocky, self-assured bastard who needs to chirp his way through life. That's fair. That's all you've shown him.

But you're unravelling at the seams. You fucked and fucked and fucked, and he's still there under your skin.

No one else will do.

He has somehow become your entire fucking world and you chased him straight into the arms of another. It was the one and only time you dared to get closer.

But of course he didn't want you. Who would?

[queer-sigh]

before y’all write another fic about Ilya straight up insulting other characters or squaring up to anything that moves, you need to read the books again.

Ilya Rozanov rarely gets into fights.

sure, he gets physical. he checks players hard. he runs his mouth just enough to throw his opponent off their game. but he is primarily a rage-baiter. he tricks people into penalties, he is not throwing punches.

this is crucial to understand because it makes the times when Ilya actually fights that much more impactful.

(minor spoiler for The Long Game below)

in the show, Ilya is willing to just stand there and take the hatred and abuse from his brother. but once Alexei speaks a word against Svetlana, unhinged fury is unleashed. Ilya is shaking with rage, and even Alexei looks shocked. I think Ilya very well could have killed his brother if Sveta wasn’t there to stop him.

the first time we see Ilya throw a punch in the books is in The Long Game. Ilya is annoying because he is chirpy and provocative while maintaining his idgaf composure. Kent is a misogynistic, homophobic piece of shit who spews hatred. when Kent attacks Troy—but most of all, when Kent attacks Shane—Ilya sees red. it’s jarring to Troy because it’s so out of character for Ilya to be so reactive.

the only thing that moves Ilya to fight is when someone hurts the people he loves.

if you think Ilya has no self control, watch him with his bio family again. baby was abused and traumatized into rigid decorum where every breath and blink was controlled. a strong, emotional loss of control would be exploited as weakness and punished mercilessly.

and honestly, if someone is going to pop off with violent rage, it’s Shane The Golden Boy Hollander.

[hollandersrozy]

part of me genuinely believes that Alexei and Ilya didn’t always hate each other. honestly, I think they were probably incredibly close when they were kids. protective of each other, even. people tend to look at their relationship through the lens of who they became as adults, but I don’t think that’s where the story starts. yeah, Ilya played hockey from a young age. yeah, he was good at it. yeah, it brought attention. but hockey wasn’t Alexei’s thing, so I don’t think it would’ve mattered much to him at first. they were just brothers. two boys growing up in the same house, with the same mother and father, navigating the same family.

and then Irina died. that’s the point where everything starts to go bad. because Grigori suddenly had all this anger, grief, and disappointment with nowhere to put it, and he chose Ilya as the target. the hockey prodigy. the son who could still be molded into something. and I imagine part of Alexei knew it was wrong. maybe part of him even wanted to protect Ilya from it.

but at the same time, all he could see was that their father was still paying attention to Ilya. it didn’t matter that it was cruel attention. it didn’t matter that it came in the form of criticism, pressure, and impossible expectations. to a neglected child, attention is attention. and meanwhile Alexei is standing on the outside looking in, grieving the same mother, losing the same father in a different way, and watching all of the focus continue to fall on his younger brother. that’s where I think the jealousy starts. not because Ilya did anything wrong, but because grief makes people irrational. because children don’t always understand that abuse and favoritism aren’t the same thing. because sometimes it’s easier to resent the person standing next to you than the parent who failed you both.

and then years pass. one brother becomes a hockey superstar. one brother struggles financially. one gets opportunities, money, fame, and a life beyond Russia. the other stays behind. and all those childhood wounds that never healed get layered over with adult resentment until neither of them really knows where one feeling ends and the other begins.

but even now, I still don’t think they hate each other. I think they hate what happened to them. I think they hate the years they lost. I think they hate that every conversation comes loaded with decades of jealousy, guilt, grief, and misunderstanding. I think there’s a part of both of them that wishes things could go back to before Irina died, before their father turned the house into a battleground, before they stopped being brothers and started becoming symbols of everything the other one lacked.

I think this ties into why Ilya “dislikes” Hayden so much. because Hayden is basically a brother to Shane. he’s probably the person Shane is closest to in the hockey world outside of Ilya himself. there’s trust there, loyalty, history. the kind of brotherhood that comes naturally when you’ve grown up alongside someone. and I think Ilya is deeply envious of that. not because he wants Shane and Hayden apart, but because every time he sees them together, he’s being reminded of something he lost. he’s looking at a version of brotherhood that survived adulthood, survived conflict, survived life, and he can’t relate to it anymore. so instead of acknowledging that hurt, he directs it at Hayden. it’s easier to roll his eyes, make snarky comments, and act annoyed than it is to admit that seeing Shane and Hayden together reminds him of what he and Alexei could have been if their family hadn’t fallen apart.

maybe there’s fear there, too. because the only brotherhood Ilya really knows is the one he had with Alexei. the one that started with love and ended with resentment. the one that slowly corroded under years of grief and jealousy until neither of them knew how to fix it. so maybe part of him looks at Hayden and worries that one day Shane will be hurt the way he was. that Hayden will disappoint him. betray him. resent him. because that’s the framework Ilya has for what happens to brothers. not because Hayden has ever given him a reason to think that, but because Alexei did. and when your entire understanding of family is shaped by loss, sometimes it’s hard to believe that other people get to keep theirs.

[urbanings]

soooo everyone was so nice about love takes miles (i included the link if you haven’t read it!) that i’m off to the races on ilya now. coming to an ao3 near you soon!

summary: ilya is very in love with shane. if only he knew how to tell shane that.

featuring: Ilya’s take on Shane buying him water shoes, seeing his mother in places he’s never seen her, and finding love in the little places it hides.

[dirtypuzzlewrites]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

This ending had already been written a long time ago.

Short Ilya & Alexei character study. Once again putting my shit onto my good friend Ilya Rozanov.

[all-the-fanfic]

Haunting Your City (93307 words) by mightyd0lphin Chapters: 30/30 Fandom: Game Changers Series - Rachel Reid, Heated Rivalry (TV) Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, Ilya Rozanov/Other(s), Shane Hollander/Rose Landry Characters: Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander, Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov, Montreal Voyageurs | Montreal Metros Team Ensemble (Game Changers) Summary:

“What is there to talk about?”

“What’s there to talk about?!” Hollander scoffed, shaking his head. “You’re playing for my fucking team!”

“I know.”

“Why did you have to go and get traded?! You realise we’re going to have to see each other every day from now on, and play together, and-”

“Yes,” Ilya interrupted. He didn’t want to know how long Hollander’s list was. “I know.”

Hollander took a deep breath. “Okay, listen,” he said. “Just so we’re clear - we don’t know each other outside of playing against each other, right?”

“Right.”

“And we can’t- can’t hook up anymore.”

~

OR: Ilya gets traded to Montreal in October 2014. He's lonely, and angry, and he misses Boston. He doesn't know if it helps that Hollander is there or not.

title from Buckle by Florence and the Machine