Considering how Viktor and Yuuri's rivalry began, this was bound to occur.
Until My Feet Bleed and My Heart Aches
- Yuuri and Viktor's first meeting in the very first chapter, where Yuuri, who had been so excited to finally meet Viktor who he admired and wanted to skate on the same ice as someday, has his heart broken by the same man."You might need to drop some weight before you can think about being a skater свинка," he laughed, ruffling Yuuri's hair as he handed the picture back into Yuuri's frozen hands. "But I look forward to seeing you out on a rink someday да?"
- Yuuri ripping down all of his posters of Viktor after their first meeting and the intense hatred he develops for Viktor.
- Yuuri's breakdown when he performs badly in the Worlds due to his head injury. When he has just finally achieved the impossible by beating Viktor, he gets knocked down hard right after.
- When Yuuri reveals their real first meeting to Viktor in Chapter 12. Viktor is heartbroken when he finds out and can't believe he wouldn't remember Yuuri, while Yuuri buries his feelings about it to avoid talking about it further.Yuuri: You insulted me and you belittled me. You didn't believe in me. I worshiped you and you broke my heart.
- Chapter 13. After Yuuri decides to find a good time to tell Viktor his feelings, they sleep together and it finally seems as if they will be together. But then, on the day of the free skate, Vikor mistakes Yuuri's anxiety medication for performance-enhancing drugs. Yakov walks in on this scene, leading to Yuuri panicking and fleeing. Yuuri gets reported to the ISU, and although he is cleared, the scandal is leaked to the public as well as Yuuri's private medical information. This leaves both Viktor and Yuuri so emotionally destroyed that both of them skate extremely poorly and neither win a medal. Viktor runs towards Yuuri afterwards, but Yuuri turns away and heads back to Hasetsu to escape everything that happened.
Of Bright Stars and Burning Hearts
- The entirety of Viktor's perspective on the events in this fic definitely counts. Although Yuuri having his multitude of issues is fully justified (for the most part) with his side of the story in UMHB&FB, when his actions are viewed from another point of view like Viktor's — who's the one getting the brunt of Yuuri's callousness and hatred — it's a lot harder to stomach everything, considering just how much pain Yuuri's actions cause him.
- It is mentioned at the beginning of Chapter 1 that Viktor completely forgot about his first meeting with Yuuri. Even after Yuuri told him every detail about the meeting after they got together, Viktor tries over and over again to remember, but he never does. What had been a meeting that was such a massive turning point in Yuuri's life had been so small and insignificant from a younger Victor's point of view at the time that Viktor had no reason to ever dwell on it, resulting in him never having the memory of the interaction he regretted so much.
- Chapter 2. Good GOD. Viktor and Yuuri have sex for the first time after sneaking out of the banquet. Viktor seems to be over the moon about finally having Yuuri in his arms, only for the latter to deliver the infamous Wham Line of Chapter 8 ("I hate you. Now, fuck me.") and then leave with barely so much as a goodbye the next morning.
- Chapter 3 seems to be even more heartbreaking than the last.
- After winning gold again, Viktor is supposed to meet with Yakov downstairs to celebrate, only for Yuuri to suddenly jump him in the corridor. Despite the warnings from others and despite Yuuri giving him the option to say no, he doesn't want to lose what precious moments he has with Yuuri so he shuts up and sleeps with him again; only for Yuuri to leave him once it was all over.
- After the many, many warnings, it seems like Viktor has finally decided to forget about Yuuri... only for him to crash against him and knock him over while they were in the middle of practice, inadvertently causing Yuuri to give such a poor performance later when he goes out on the ice. He was at such a loss on what to do to make up for it since he blames himself for the crash that parapraxis kicks in and he asks Yuuri out to dinner; something that he'd like to call a date but can't despite the fact that by principle, it was.
- Yuuri finally calling Viktor by his first name; something that — which Viktor was quick to internally point out — has never happened before, which in turn makes him giddy and forget all about letting go of Yuuri. Despite everything that Yuuri has done to him, Viktor is still so enamored by him to the point that he cherishes every single, maybe even mundane detail about Yuuri because that is all that he has.
- Chapter 4 has Viktor resigning himself to having a strictly physical relationship with Yuuri despite wanting more than that... because having something is ultimately better than nothing, even as Christophe repeatedly warns him that he'll be left brokenhearted in the end.
- Chapters 5 and 6 might have been filled with fluff and is considerably less angsty than the previous chapters, but Viktor is still under the impression he can never have the cute and domestic fantasy that he wants to have with Yuuri since he still believes Yuuri is only with him for sex. In fact, he thinks that Yuuri does know of Viktor's feelings but doesn't reciprocate them, as he can tell from Yuuri's shy, skittish movements during their time at Viktor's apartment and their opposing themes for the season: desire (for Yuuri) and devotion (for Viktor).
- The worst part is that while Viktor thinks all this, Yuuri's opinion of Viktor finally begins to soften as he enjoys their time together in Moscow. As quoted by
the author herself:
Their feelings start changing at the worst possible moment. Yuuri in Moscow was at his most happy and open and starting to fall in love, just after Viktor had decided to protect his own heart by not expecting anything more.- What's doubly worse is that Viktor even thinks that he's just one person among a long line of suitors that he thinks Yuuri has (when the reality is really quite the opposite).
- The worst part is that while Viktor thinks all this, Yuuri's opinion of Viktor finally begins to soften as he enjoys their time together in Moscow. As quoted by
- Chapter 7 features the awaited moment of Viktor finally finding out what made Yuuri resent him so much and how he's still hurting all this time. He's so horrified to know that he broke Yuuri's heart as a child; a young boy who worshiped him and loved him enough to even have his heart broken at all — all because of his own teenage carelessness. He finally understands that Yuuri's hatred for him was his own undoing from way back then, and believes — even more than before — that Yuuri will never love him back because of what he had done.
- Given that Chapter 8 covers the doping scandal, this is to be expected. The most heartwrenching scene may be when Viktor tries to catch up to Yuuri and apologize, but fails to find him and consequently breaks down into tears in the hallway, all the while blaming himself for everything that happened. It doesn't help that the chapter ends with Viktor sobbing once again while holding onto Makkachin for comfort.
- It's very hard to stomach Viktor's point of view of his depression in the wake of the doping scandal in Chapter 9. After months of shutting himself out, he comes to the realization that although he loves Yuuri, he understands now that he can't keep clinging to just whatever Yuuri gives him because it's not healthy for him to pine after someone whom he thinks can never love him the way he does. Viktor even tells himself that once he's certain that Yuuri doesn't return his feelings, he'll learn to let him go and move on, even though it hurts and he truly he does and always will love Yuuri.
- Fortunately, they do make it official but the fact that they could have really never gotten back together could have been a possibility. Word of God, however, reassured her readers that it will have a happy ending and it did.
- The author stated at one point that in the scenario that they decided to break it off instead, Viktor could have never been able to let go of Yuuri, even if he tried and tried. The upside is that they still end up together eventually, but it would take a lot longer for them to patch things up because this time, they would have to be more careful to avoid any more misunderstandings.
