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tfw-no-tennis · 4 years ago

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mtmte liveblog issue 19

it’s 2021 now!! time for more transformers

we start off w/a flashback showing tyrest retrieving ultra magnus’s body from the ship - and we get a look at magnus’s spark, which is the green color of a 0.1%er [eyes emoji]

tyrest punching magnus..... grrrrr leave my dad alone bastard man

‘the divided self’ what a good title

rodimus is like listen man this is a lot for my poor thot brain to take in

in flashback land, we see tyrest immediately launch into a crazy person spiel about how he can and will edit the law as he sees fit to conform to the situation, because that doesn't seem like a blatant abuse of power or a huge conflict of interest or anything

oooh the screen in the corner that says ‘thought warfare,’ I see that

oof, poor magnus. its gotta be rough to hear your boss rant about how bad at your job you are....especially bc this is right after overlord called magnus a joke and nearly killed him

its especially brutal bc as magnus says, his job is his life

augh, I love the panel where the armor is falling off around minimus, and then the one where he’s holding the ultra magnus head...poetic

its fascinating that there was an ‘original’ magnus who was an actual guy, and then tyrest chose to make him into this legacy symbol - I'm assuming the OG magnus had no say in this, and probably didn't even know that he was gonna become this lawman legacy figure

I do wanna know though - obviously everyone thought that ultra magnus was one dude, but how did the different guys wearing the armor deal w/that? like, did minimus have people coming up to him like ‘hey ultra magnus old buddy! remember when we fought those guys in that one place? good times!’ like, do they have to study up on the lives of the past armor wearers to prepare for the role of ultra magnus?

augh poor minimus, of course he’s been wondering about what happened with overlord after he was KO’d

oof, drift...I feel like minimus looks surprised and a little skeptical at the idea that drift was the one behind the entire overlord thing - which is interesting bc as we saw at the beginning of the story, he doesn't exactly trust drift, but it’s still pretty far-fetched that one person orchestrated the entire thing

tailgate :(

the concept of a load-bearer is SUPER cool, I love it so much

it also puts a much-needed limit on things - as in, there IS a limit to how much weight/mass a normal cybertronian frame can carry, which is why you don't see everybody upgrading to be Massive - bc they actually CANT

oof, the worst part is that tyrest is RIGHT, minimus essentially DID have a nervous breakdown after the war ended bc of the rigid way he views the world

mental health support is clearly in shambles for cybertronians, yikes. they literally have 1 therapist for their entire race, and he’s not even licensed anymore due to hipaa violations. what a mess

the ‘attention deflectors’ thing is so cool and clever and also a great explanation as to why ratchet or anyone else never said ‘hey wait a minute, you're actually a much smaller dude in a trench coat’

I love tailgate knowing all the stuff about the autobot code bc of magnus...my BOY

and THATS why minimus was asking about skids specifically earlier!

oh minimus, please don't put so much stock in tyrest being stable and resonable...

aaaand there's skids and swerve! brainstorm says it best - ‘because something unexpected hasn't happened for at least nine seconds.’ lmao ily brainstorm

finally checking in w/whirl and cyclonus - god I love that. whirl asking cyclonus how many cons he killed and cyc is like psh I wasn't keeping count....................ok it was six

hhhhh cyclonus IS looking for a cure for tailgate, even though he told tg that there wasn’t anything to hope for....excuse me as I go be emo

and now we flash over to the unethical medical conduct hell zone, where pharma is being weird and horny and ratchet is appropriately horrified

I seriously love how unhinged pharma looks, the art & colors do such a good job conveying his feral energy

ratchet has some massive dick energy for taunting pharma when he’s currently just a head and pharma has dual chainsaws for hands

ugh, I love whirls speech about anger...and I feel like he really does see cyclonus as a peer, despite cyclonus wanting to kill him, which is why he tells cyclonus all of this

I fuckgin love that cyclonus’s reaction to very suddenly getting stabbed thru the abdomen is to just glance down at the sword, looking mildly inconvenienced

back over to ratchet - and at first its like oh wow I can’t believe pharma was stupid enough to let ratchet goad him into this contest....but then you see first aid and ambulon and its like UH OH this is gonna be BAD

the idea that getting sliced in half is no big deal for a cybertronian is wild

‘you're gonna let doctor djd cut us in half?’ yeahhhh that's an appropriate reaction, yikes

FUCKING LENGTHWAYS GOD

pharma you piece of shit

poor ambulon :( :( :( that's fucking brutal. amazing panel but....jesus

and like, to further my point from last issue’s liveblog - the fact that this very gore-y panel is okay, but swearing isn't...that's really funny honestly. I guess robo-gore is acceptable, while I'm guessing regular ole run of the mill human gore wouldn't be

then back to cyclonus, who is still looking only vaguely put out by the sword stuck right thru him

and then cyclonus just pulls it right out, which is a very bad idea for humans but probably not as big of a deal for big near-immortal alien robots

circle of light stuck in capitalistic urban hellscape cubicals

poor skids, being asked to stand trial while having no idea what his crime is due to Big Amnesia

OH SHITTTT I totally forgot that getaway shows up here

that is super clever though, with chromedome confusing the name ‘getaway’ with the concept ‘needing to escape’

cant believe tyrest is really dumb enough to tell minimus all his evil plans

BUT that means its time for some very important forged vs constructed cold lore

jro spelling ‘program’ as ‘programme’ made me remember when he said that he considers everyone on the lost light to be british, which is perhaps the least valid thing he’s ever said vhbghjsdbfjkhasbjk

the idea that they used the matrix - which is portrayed as kind of a holy object - in reproductive experiments is really interesting

AUGHHHHH this is all so good and interesting...im really fascinated w/this particular brand of like, alien robot racism/constructism/whatever you wanna call it - I feel like it does such a good job as a plot device, where many other ‘fantasy racism’ concepts from other franchises fail, bc there's not really a ‘human metaphor’ being used here (as far as I know/can tell) - as in, this isn't a thinly veiled metaphor for something that happened/could happen in human history

in fact, this type of bigotry (or w/e you wanna call it) isn't something that is even really possible in humans - I guess if there was a stigma against being born via ivf or something...? but there isn't, so there's no obvious real-world equivalent, which I take as a sign of good writing and worldbuilding - it makes the cybertronians feel more Real, bc of course they would have their own types of bigotry based off of completely different things than humans

additionally - and this is crucial - tyrest is wrong: there’s no like, inherent moral corruption in cold constructed bots. there's no difference at all, other than method of construction. fantasy racism plotlines often flounder here, with the oppressors having a ‘valid reason’ for oppressing the oppressed, but tyrest is just operated on religious zealot bs and some biased science

like, dude, did you ever think that maybe there are other reasons why your trials only condemned cold constructed bots? like, maybe the trial itself was biased? or societal conditions were to blame? correlation is not causation, my dude, especially when the conclusion is ‘cold constructed bots are inherently SINNERS’ lmao

like, tyrest rlly said ‘FUCK separation of church and state,’ huh

anyways I just think the whole cold construction vs forged thing is really interesting and well-done, and serves as a good precursor to the more fleshed-out functionism stuff we see later

so tyrest is clearly off his rockers w/the whole drilling thing - dude, you accidentally gave yourself a lobotomy, okay - but I find it kinda funny that he’s right about a lot of that stuff he said at the end, about primus and the guiding hand and stuff being real

cyclonus saying ‘tailgate and the others’...I see you, man, I see you

also cyclonus looks fine now??? didn't he just get stabbed???

ah, tyrest sprinkling a little light genocide onto his plan to find salvation. nice, dude!

MINIMUS NOOOOOOOOO

‘fully deserved’ SHUT UP BIIIIITCH

poor minimus is taking a lot of Ls this arc, geez

oof, great issue! again, as usual....I loved the lore we got this issue, its so interesting...and some good character stuff too. I love minimus, I feel like he’s gonna be my fav this readthru; my first read my fav was brainstorm, second readthru was whirl, and I feel like its minimus/magnus this time. I just love his character arc...

hype af for more B)

#lj rereads mtmte

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plotmaster · 8 years ago

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the death of a bachelor (5/?)

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | read on ao3

Contrary to popular belief, Victor does not hate the police. Even if their job is enforce the law and thus put people like Victor in jail, they’re quite easy to bribe. And really, they’re just doing their job.

Just because he doesn’t hate them doesn’t mean he doesn’t dislike them though. He’d never go out of his way to deal with one, is all. Most of his family doesn’t understand this viewpoint — Mila is the closest, but otherwise they hold a burning distaste for the police, as the rest of organized crime tends to.

Anzwei Naiyin is actually the most tolerable person Victor has ever had to deal with in the police force. Dedicated to their job, but logical and unbiased. Emotionless, and thus never holding an irrational hatred for Victor or any other member of organized crime. In short, Victor doesn’t hate Naiyin, and vice versa, though part of it is possibly because Naiyin literally cannot feel hate, but...

Right now, Victor does hate them. Or well, their timing. “Impeccable timing,” he comments, eyes trained on Anzwei. He cradles Yuuri closer.

“I like being on time,” they say. “So, what happened here, Nikiforov?”

He looks at Yuri and Mila; he knows exactly how bad his situation is looking right now. There’s banging in the distance, a door being flung open, and for a moment Victor hopes that Georgi and the rest would be able to distract the police chief long enough to get away.

Anzwei stares at the bodies on the ground, a black and silver pressure on everyone. “I should very much like it if you didn’t try to attack me,” they say, sidestepping just in time for Georgi’s fist to miss. “I’m not on shift right now, so I have no authority, so I really don’t see what your problem is.”

“You’re police,” Yuri spits, fingertips on his knives, “Of course there’s a goddamn problem.” And the tension in the room ratchets up to an unbearable degree. Anzwei is the police chief — while Victor could have them killed, their disappearance would be noticed very fast, and some of the more overenthusiastic police types could take up Anzwei’s mantle and try to purge the City of crime via violent methods. So he really would rather not kill them, but at the same time it’s starting to look like that’s the only option.

Georgi and his men balk on the other side of the door, watching the police chief, who simply stands there, drinking from their coffee cup. Something tugs at Victor’s sleeve — Yuuri, his eyes fluttering weakly. “Vitya,” he croaks, “His eyes.”

“Not a man,” Anzwei says reflexively.

Victor ignores them, used to this. “Yeah, weird eyes, I know.” He barks for someone to get Yuuri water, praying that whatever happened to Yuuri hasn’t sent him into delirium from either drugs or torture.

“No,” Yuuri struggles to sit on his own, Victor still keeping his arms braced on his back to support him. “The man that brought me here had strange eyes too,” he explains. “They were blue and brown.”

“Oh?” Anzwei brings their attention to Yuuri, and the corner of their mouth turning up in mockery of a smile for a moment.

Victor’s thought process grinds to a halt as Yuuri forges on. “He said I was here to help him prepare a gift.”

Anzwei’s head turns to Victor, a sort of mechanical-looking swivel, their ponytail sliding off their shoulder with the movement. “A gift indeed.”

The first time Victor met Anzwei, his hair was long and theirs was short.

“You’re a monster,” the man on the ground spat at Victor’s feet, defiant even with a gun inches away from his forehead. “I have a family-”

Victor pulls the trigger, and the traitor’s brains became intimately familiar with the concrete, his voice falling silent and his skull cracking against the ground in a manner he no longer thinks sickening. He remains cool even as he toes the corpse to roll him over, checking for vital signs. “Good job, Vitya,” Yakov says gruffly. “You don’t even flinch anymore. Let’s go, we have other places to be.”

He follows after Yakov obediently as they leave the basement, signalling the cleaners to get to work with the body. No words pass between them even as they get in a car and the driver heads out towards the city center.

“New authority has come to town,” Yakov begins abruptly, “I got a tip-off that the police chief is being replaced. It was out of our hands.”

“So we’re meeting them to bribe them like we did the old one?” it’s easy to figure out.

A heavy sigh. “Unfortunately, yes. And if negotiations don’t go well, we’ll have them... replaced.” Yakov looks at Victor from under the brim of his hat, and his frown becomes more prominent. “You’re thinking about something. Out with it, boy.”

Victor is twenty, the next in line for boss once Yakov passes, but Yakov never fails to make him feel like a chastised child on occasion. “Are we monsters, Yakov?” he blurts, the dying words of the traitor earlier echoing in his mind.

“You foolish boy.” The older man shakes his head. “We’re not monsters, we’re human. Don’t let the words of a dead man haunt you, or you won’t last long.”

Victor winces at that, because Yakov has a point, but still— “What would a monster be, then?”

Yakov peers at him, letting the noise of the car engine fill the air between them for a moment. “A monster is something that doesn’t care about its actions.” Victor is filled with slight surprise at actually getting an answer. “A real monster, Vitya, would not care about its actions or the repercussions of its actions. Don’t forget that.”

“We’re here, Boss,” the driver cuts in before Victor can say anything, and Yakov grunts in acknowledgement as he and Victor get out of the car, the back entrance of the police station in front of them. Yakov takes out a key and gains entrance easily.

The central police station is in a frenzy, papers flying and harried workers running everywhere as they organize things under the new management. People avert their eyes when they see Yakov and Victor, and no one dares to try to stop them as they head for the chief’s office. The door is slightly ajar, but Yakov stops just outside it for a moment. “Do you remember the last time we came here?” he asks Victor.

“Yes, of course,” Victor answers. The last time they had done this was only three years ago, after all.

Yakov grunts and steps to the side. “I’ll be waiting right here,” he says, the words sounding more like an order than reassurance of any sort.

Oh. Victor swallows. “You want me to-”

“Yes.” And with that Yakov opens the door and unceremoniously shoves Victor inside.

His first impression of the new chief is that he’s young. He sits in a chair behind the desk like it’s too big for him — the previous one had been a much fatter man, and his chair sized to accommodate such. His second impression as the chief looks up at him from signing papers is He has weird eyes. Black in the right, a strange silver in the left, it’s almost jarring to look at. “Who are you?” The voice is flat, bored-sounding, and dreadfully at odds with his delicate appearance.

“I’m a representative of certain special interests in the City,” Victor replies, tilting his head for a cheery disarming smile. “And you are the new police chief, Mister-?”

“Not a mister,” he- she(?) says immediately. If Victor squints, it’s hard to tell, honestly. “I know what you’re thinking. Not a woman either.” It’s hard to decipher anything from their voice as well, as it’s neither high nor low and there’s not a single change in pitch or inflection at all.

“I- ah,” he winces, mentally berating himself for being caught off-guard like this. “Well, that doesn’t matter-”

“My name is Anzwei Naiyin, and you’re from one of the many organized crime groups that exist in the City.” Naiyin doesn’t give him a chance to speak, setting down the pen they’d been signing with, folding their hands together, looking Victor dead in the eye. “You’re here to bribe me like you did my predecessor.”

“... Yes.” This is not how the last negotiation had went. Victor mentally winces, and gauges Naiyin.

They’re blank. Relaxed rather than wary, mouth in a flat line, hands folded, posture straight and entire body still. It’s a little like... looking at a marble statue, Victor realizes, except their hair is black and their shirt a dreadful yellow color. He can’t read any sort of emotion from them.

Naiyin stares back, obviously trying to get a read on Victor as well. “Leave this place,” they say suddenly, leaning back in the oversized chair. “There is no logical reason for me to take your money.”

Victor opens his mouth to persuade them, but they continue speaking. “I will not arrest you for trying to bribe a member of the police force as the office is still undergoing severe re-organizing efforts.” Every word is flat. Flat like their expression, like the papers scattered around them. “As you are trying to bribe me in order to turn a blind eye to your activities, it is best advised that you refrain, as giving me money will not hold me back from upholding the law.”

“We can give things other than money,” Victor counters.

“And I have no need for any of it.” When they speak, their body remains still and only their mouth moves. It’s a little horrifying to watch. “I intend to live life decently, and remain on the right side of the law. Taking bribes would be against that.”

They’ve gone off-script completely now, and Victor is at a loss on what to say. He flounders a little, considers going back outside to tell Yakov that negotiations failed, but — there’s something... strange about those words. “What do you mean by that?” Victor asks quietly, trying to fight the urge to look away from Naiyin and their uncanny manner of speech and uncanny eyes.

Naiyin stares at him long and hard. “I don’t see the harm in explaining,” they muse. And then they smile.

Victor fights the urge to balk, because that is not how smiles work. Their lips are spread to show too much teeth, and they lean forward just the slightest, cheeks dimpling too much. It’s all teeth and sharp edges, like smiling is an awkward, unnatural action for them.

Their eyes, now that Victor looks more closely, aren’t flat and bored-looking. They’re dead.

Victor is twenty when he meets an actual monster.

“What do you mean!?” Victor roars, Anzwei’s words registering to his ears finally. “This was a plot to-”

“Nikiforov, please.” The police chief pulls away from the door to approach them, not batting an eyelash when Yurio gets in their way, knives in hand and looking ready to kill. “I’m not going to do anything,” they say. “Logically speaking, if you are suspicious of me due to possible associations with the instigator of this incident, you should leave me unharmed or I may not be forthcoming with information.”

“Stand down, Yura.” Victor grit his teeth as Yuri sidesteps, keeping his eyes on Anzwei as they come closer. They crouch in front of Yuuri, and Victor can only be glad that they haven’t tried smiling yet. “What do you know?”

“Did you get his name?” they ignore him, zeroing in on Yuuri. “Did he had light brown hair?”

Yuuri purses his lips. “Someone called him... it ended with -nim. And yes.”

Anzwei nods. “Hyungnim probably. A form of respectful address from where he’s from. Did you get anyone’s names?”

“He called one man Seung-gil.”

Another nod, and Anzwei gets to their feet, going over to one of the bodies on the ground instead, the one Yuri had knifed. “Seung-gil Lee, I’m guessing. The one who set this up in the first is a... friend of mine.”

“You have friends?” Victor can’t help the words that slip out of his mouth.

That gets them to pause, cocking their head to the side. “I don’t,” they amend. “But Yonghwa calls me his friend anyways. Aha.” They turn the body so it’s facing up, and yank down the collar. “It was Yonghwa.”

Mila comes over and looks down at the corpse. “Is that a fan?” she asks. Victor frowns and reaches for the closest body, the one that he had shot himself. Yuuri flinches at the sightless eyes, turning away and fixing his gaze to the ground instead while Victor pulls down the man’s shirt-collar.

At the base of his neck, on his right side, is a tattooed folding fan, spread wide. It’s small, only the size of a quarter. “I don’t know any groups that have tattooed fans,” he murmurs.

“Yonghwa would be very bad at his job if you did,” Anzwei says. They stand up again, and fix Victor a look. “He meant for you to be my gift, I suppose. Kidnap your...” Anzwei’s lips quirk downwards approximately ten degrees, which is their version of a frown. “Your... lover?” Yuuri twitches at the word, but says nothing in protest. “... Someone that he thought that would be good to lure you in and set up a situation which I would walk on the scene with ample evidence to arrest you.”

Arrest. Victor’s heart sinks, and he’s filled with an urge to damn the consequences- kill Anzwei and take Yuuri and run. He’s been in prison before, and it was certainly not a pleasant experience. If word got out that he was in prison, people would take it as a signal of his weakness; to kill him behind bars, or start testing the strength of his clan. But it’s just not that.

Prison is not kind to men like Victor, but it would be close to hell for a man like Yuuri. He squares his shoulders and looks directly at Anzwei, remaining firm no matter how uncanny the monster is. “You can’t arrest Yu-”

“I wasn’t planning on arresting anyone,” Anzwei interrupts.

Behind their back, Mila and Yuri and the rest of Victor’s people exchange Looks that are dubious, confused, and most likely questioning the validity of the police chief’s words, which is very much how Victor himself is feeling right now. “... You’re not?”

They shrug. “For one, I’m not on shift. For two, this was a set-up. For three, I see no logical reason to arrest you, as doing so would increase crime by approximately thirty percent due to criminal groups scrambling to undermine your power.”

“What the fuck,” Yuri says, unwittingly expressing the feelings of everyone in the room. “Are you for real?”

“Well, I’m certainly not imagined.”

“You-”

“Yura, everyone, let’s go,” Victor orders. He’s not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Yuri bites his words down, giving Anzwei a deeply suspicious look. They all obey though, filtering out of the warehouse, a few men picking up the bodies for examination. “Yuuri, are you okay?” he asks, voice gentle. “Do you want to come back to my place, or your home?”

“I-” Yuuri flinches a little, and it makes a part of Victor die a swift and sudden death. “I’d like to go home,” he whispers.

Victor reaches for him slowly, offering his hand for Yuuri to take. Yuuri hesitates for a moment before allowing Victor to pull him up, and he moves so that Victor is between him and Anzwei, who is regarding Victor in a way that might be puzzled on another person. “Aren’t you going to ask me why?” they ask, following Victor out of the warehouse.

“Would you even tell me?” Victor retorts. Anzwei’s lips peel back, the beginnings of a smile, and he’s forced to look away. “Why then, did this Yonghwa person you mention, kidnap Yuuri and try to get me arrested. Who is he?” he asks anyway. “And how did you know to come here?”

Anzwei hums, a tuneless little thing. “I received a call to my office as I was preparing to leave for the day, to go to this warehouse at precisely seven. As for Yonghwa... he is a... former associate of mine. We don’t talk much these days. He runs an assassination group.”

“A what?” Victor’s heart stops for a momentary second, and his grip on Yuuri’s hand tightens.

“He runs an assassination squad,” Anzwei repeats. “It’s called the Color Fans. Very secretive, he recruits Korean immigrants to work under him. I’m sure there’s a cover business somewhere, but I don’t know what it is.” Victor can only gape. Looking back, the movements of the hooded figures earlier made sense with the knowledge that they were assassins. “As for why he set you up to be arrested by me, I can only guess.”

Victor swallows and bites the bullet. “Guess?”

“He said, a long time ago, that he loves me.” They amble along the rows of warehouses to where Victor’s cars are.

“Aren’t you incapable of love?” Victor snaps. He remembers a conversation long ago, with a person that has no emotions and became a police officer to stay on the right side of the law. It had scarred him, back then, to meet a monster. It’s been seven years, and Anzwei still scares him a little, but most times they run into each other, Victor can focus on the polite mask rather than the blankness underneath.

(There’s a one-letter difference between a monster and mobster, but that one letter means a lot between Anzwei and Victor.)

“I am,” Anzwei says like it’s the simplest thing. To them, it probably is. “He said that he loves me anyway. I don’t know how love works, so I can only assume that that is his motive. I don’t see any other reason for him to have set up the situation as he did.”

“He did this because he loves you?” Yuuri’s voice breaks into the conversation, filled with incredulity. “That’s not love.”

Victor looks at him in alarm, and Anzwei turns to him with their head tilted in a facsimile of curiousity. “If it’s not love, what is it?” they ask.

Yuuri bites his lip, and he grasps Victor’s hand tighter for a second. “It’s obsession,” he murmurs, ducking his head. “Doing things like... kidnapping other people — hurting other people because of love — that’s obsession.”

“What’s the difference between love and obsession?” Anzwei stares at Yuuri like they think he’s fascinating, and while Victor agrees with the sentiment, he wants nothing more than to get Yuuri away from them.

“If you love someone you do what you can to make them happy,” Yuuri explains, his eyes fixed on the path. “You don’t do something that could hurt them directly or indirectly. If you really love someone, you’d only hurt other people to protect them, not...” he swallows nervously, “Not do something like this. Scheme a setup like a gift, like people are things. He’s obsessed with you.”

Anzwei stops walking as the cars come into sight, the rest of Victor’s family staring at the three of them. “I don’t know of love, or obsession, so I shall take your word for it, Yuuri Katsuki.” Victor must have slipped his poker face, because they look at him with a carefully arched brow. “What? Of course I know his name. Three informants came to us last night and this morning saying that you have a weakness that could be exploited.”

This close to Yuuri, and Victor can feel the tremor in his arms. He feels like falling a little, darkness gnawing at the back of his mind that he fucked up. “I see,” Victor says. And then, “Have a good night, Anzwei.”

Yuuri’s quiet plea to go to his home weighs on his shoulders as he ushers Yuuri towards his car. Yuuri is reluctant to let go of him, hand lingering in the air as Victor takes a moment to wipe his face with a handkerchief in the glove compartment, but it drops as he closes the door. He turns to signal everyone to head back, but the figure of the police chief drifts next to him, left eye like a moon on water, any emotion in it merely an illusion like the reflection.

“Do you love him?” Anzwei asks.

Victor doesn’t even think twice before answering, “Yes.”

They blink owlishly. “Is it love, or is it obsession?”

Everything grinds to a halt, his hands clenching into fists, nearly grabbing the person by the collar of their hideous green shirt instead. “I would never,” Victor hisses, words slow and deliberate. “I would never hurt Yuuri like that. I would never do anything that could indirectly or directly hurt him under some misguided perception of love.” He steps closer to Anzwei, rage the only thing in him now. “Don’t you dare question my emotions.”

Anzwei only blinks where most people would wilt in fear. “I see,” they say. “I hope your love goes well for you, then.” They turn on their heel and make to walk away, but stops mid-step. “By the way, don’t try to deal with Yonghwa.”

“Why not?” Victor fires back. “He hurt Yuuri, and it’s not like you care about him.”

“I am fully aware that you think I’m distasteful, Nikiforov,” Anzwei drawls, not bothering to turn around. “I see it in your eyes every time. But I am capable of care, to a limited extent. I care about you enough to tell you that trying to get to Yonghwa would be a fruitless endeavor.”

“What?” Victor asks, thrown for a loop.

Anzwei smiles. It’s the same as the one seven years ago, too much teeth and ill-fitting on their face. “You’re scared of me,” Anzwei says, “But you don’t run like most people do.” A split second later and their features smooth over like there hadn’t been a single forced change of expression. “Have a good night, Nikiforov.”

They walk off into the darkness, ponytail swinging behind them like a hangman’s noose waiting to be used.

The space between them in the car is only six inches, but it feels like the gaping maw of an abyss is there instead, and Victor will fall in if he does anything to try to bridge it.

Yuuri is withdrawn like a hermit crab into its shell, his eyes unfocused and his shoulders hunched just the slightest. As much as Victor wants to fold Yuuri in his arms right now and ask him if he’s okay, he knows better. Right now, he doesn’t know if Yuuri would accept it.

Last night everything had been wonderful, but too much had happened in the last twenty-four hours for things to be the same between them, surely. Victor wants to ask Yuuri what happened, exactly, so he knows what to say — if this Yonghwa person Yuuri met really is someone that would claim to love the police chief, then Victor can only imagine what sort of monster he must be. He can only imagine what sort of conversation they had.

He doesn’t want to know, but because it’s Yuuri he wants to, so he can help him. Victor might have saved him, physically, but he knows how Yuuri’s mind works, and his anxieties, from lying together on hotel beds together for so many nights on end. He wets his lips. “Yuuri,” Victor says, “Would you like to go back to my place instead? You’ll be safe there.”

Yuuri doesn’t respond for a moment. “I want to go home, Victor.”

Victor tries not to flinch at those last two syllables, at Victor instead of Yuuri’s constant fond Vitya. But he’s already accidentally led to Yuuri being hurt once tonight; Victor knows that he’s walking on eggshells. “Of course,” he demurs, “I was just making sure.”

The rest of the drive is in silence, Victor switching between gauging Yuuri’s body language and his uncanny encounter with Anzwei. Their question of Is it love, or is it obsession? haunts Victor like their not-smile.

He knows the answer though, knows it perfectly as they come to a stop in front of Yuuri’s apartment and he tears out of the car to hug his friend, a sob audible in the air before he muffles it in Phichit’s shoulders. Victor wants to be that person Yuuri can turn to, but he can’t force Yuuri to do that, because Yuuri is his own person.

As they walk back into their apartment, things slowly click for Victor. He has so much power and authority in the City, could cover up the murder of most people that cross him, is feared by all, but — he’ll never use that influence in a way to hurt Yuuri, directly or indirectly. “I could have forced him to come home with me, because it’s safer,” Victor whispers.

The driver looks back in the mirror. “Why didn’t you, boss?”

Victor’s fingers twitch for a cigarette to start smoking on, to calm his heartbeat. “Because I love him too much to ever use my power against him like that,” he answers.

He would never.

Victor loves Yuuri too much to disrespect his boundaries like that.

Remembering now Yuuri’s silence and the way he had reached for someone other than Victor, he can only hope — hope that if this is what breaks their relationship, Yuuri will at least remember him fondly.

#yuri on ice #yoi fanfic #yuri katsuki #victor nikiforov #victuuri #fanfiction #death of a bachelor au

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