Chapter Text
Shane felt sick to his stomach.
He felt Bood’s long arms wrapped around him, and he had a vague idea that he was trying to break free, to get over to Ilya, who was now strapped to a body board, seemingly still completely unconscious, as a bunch of paramedics swarmed around him. He could hear Bood’s slight accent in the back of his head but it wasn’t grounding him, wasn’t bringing him back into his own body even as he wrangled around in his tight grip.
He couldn't really see now, but the image of Ilya, out cold on the ice, was seared into his retinas. It hadn't even seemed like a bad hit, he just fell weird. Shane shook his head. This had to be a bad dream.
Troy skated in front of Shane, placing his gloved hand on his shoulder.
“Roz’s tough, he’ll be ok,” Hayes was next to him, nodding along. Shane knew somewhere in the back of his panicked mind that Hayes’s wife was a doctor or surgeon or something? So maybe he should listen to him. He probably knew what he was talking about more than these other idiots, most of whom, including him, didn’t even go to college, let alone medical school.
The crowd around the stadium was still completely silent. It was almost eerie. The season was brand new, coming off their cup last year, so it was completely full too. Shane tried not to think about his parents up in the stands somewhere and how worried they must be.
“Can I- Can I go in the ambulance?” Shane’s voice sounded far away and tinny to his own ears.
Troy skated over to the assistant trainer, standing next to his coach who was a bit removed from the chaos and asked her. She shook her head slowly, a grimace on her face.
Before he even skated back over Shane knew it was an answer he wasn’t going to like.
Troy shook his head now too.
“I’m sorry Hollzy, she said for ICU cases they can’t take any non-medical personnel.” Troy looked like it pained him to deliver this news.
Shane tried to say something, knew he should respond, but he just wanted to scream. He didn’t know what that meant but he knew it was worse than whatever normal concussion or x-ray situation that normally warranted an ambulance ride.
All of a sudden there was a lot of commotion near where the medical staff and EMTs were huddled around Ilya. They seemed to be frantically cutting his pads and taking his skates off.
Bood shuffled, using his body weight to turn Shane away from the chaos and led him back over toward the bench while Troy and Hayes flanked either side of him. Shane tried to crane his neck and see what was going on but Bood had him held tight.
He could still hear the chaos though. That someone was yelling ‘clear.’ It was sickeningly silent now. There was less yelling from the medical staff, and Shane couldn’t decide if that was good or bad.
The faces of his teammates on the bench looked white as ghosts, and Shane was sure his looked the same. Some of their eyes were rimmed with red.
Shortly thereafter, or he thought, Shane had lost his grasp on time, they took Ilya off the ice on a stretcher. He hoped that was good, that they were moving towards a hospital now. It had to be good. Shane wouldn’t survive anything else. He could vaguely hear the crowd offering hushed applause in support.
The coaches and trainers from both teams, as well as the referees gathered near the scoring table. Wiebe walked with the trainers slowly back over towards his team, for obviously none of them had skates on. Shane was focused on this fact, how slowly he walked over. Shane was sure he was going to tell them something horrible.
“The rest of the game will be cancelled. Both coaches and the refs agreed, so it will be up to the league from here whether we make it up or finish it later.” He said matter-of-factly. Shane still wasn’t processing much over the whirring in his ears but he could hear a loud speaker announcement, presumably about the game being over, because all of a sudden there was a lot of movement out of the corners of his blurry eyes in the stands.
Shane pressed his eyes shut and dug the heels of his hands, still in his gloves into his eye sockets. He felt like he was having a bad dream and maybe if he pinched himself he would wake up.
Haas, who when Shane opened his eyes to see him noticed tear tracks streaked on his pale cheeks, nudged Shane gently with his shoulder.
“Those are your parents right?” And sure enough, they had made their way from the high up seats with a good view to right next to the team bench. Shane shuffled down towards the end of the bench to them.
“We will wait for you to change out of your skates?” His mom asked. Shane shook his head.
“No - I- I will take too long. I want someone to be there as soon as possible in case-” Shane didn’t want to even verbalize the dark places his mind was spiraling towards.
“We both have you listed as our other emergency contacts so they should be able to tell you any updates-” Shane and Ilya had done this in case of this exact scenario, they knew there was a situation in a game in which one of the others still would have to be at the rink. Of course, in Shane’s worst anxious nightmares he didn’t imagine it being this bad.
Yuna just nodded tightly. David had his arm on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze.
“Please get someone else to drive?” Shane just nodded, agreeing that he was in no state to do so himself. He was barely in a state to be standing upright.
By the time he turned around, half of his team had already cleared the bench. A few of them hung back, clearly waiting for him.
“Do you want to just go straight there without showering?” Hayes asked him softly, voice gentle.
Shane shook his head as he followed his few remaining teammates to the locker room.
“No, just fast,” Shane knew himself well enough to know that he was already on the verge of a nervous breakdown and that being sticky with both hockey and nervous sweat under his clothes wouldn’t help.
“Can you uh drive me?” He asked Hayes, who offered a simple, “of course,”
Shane went through his normal motions, half as thorough as usual, and in probably a quarter of the time. He didn’t care if his hair was very clean, he was just going to immediately stuff it under a toque anyway. He left his locker in utter disarray, which was also completely unlike him, and what was more unlike him is that he couldn’t even bring himself to care.
The locker room was quieter than it had ever been, and not just because of the somber mood. There was a very clear and obvious absence. Half of his teammates were still sitting in their towels by them time he was done, the other half still in the shower. He nodded to Hayes.
“Ready?” Hayes asked, his wet hair almost dripping down onto his face. Shane just nodded. He turned to follow Hayes out of the locker room.
“We love you two Hollzy,” Said Bood’s booming voice from behind him. Soon a chorus of ‘love you, praying for you two’, and other well wishes surrounded him and it was all he could do to offer a tight nod, clutching his chest. He followed Wyatt out to his car silently. He knew Wyatt well enough by now, and they each had enough idiosyncrasies between them that Wyatt knew he was overwhelmed and would prefer silence. The drive to the hospital wasn’t a long one, but it felt to Shane as if it stretched years. When they got there, Wyatt dropped him off at the emergency entrance, saying he would go park, and be waiting in the waiting room if they needed anything.
Shane thanked him quietly, after checking his phone he saw his mom had texted him where to find them.
His mom’s eyes were bloodshot as if she had been crying, which didn’t shock Shane. He felt wrung out too. What did shock him was that his stoic dad looked as if he had been crying too.
“He’s alive, that’s all we know right now.” His mom said somberly. Shane nodded, before turning on his heel, into the nearest restroom, and promptly throwing up.
@ilynumber81: Uhhh I just got home from hockey practice and saw that the game was cancelled half way through due to Rozy’s injury??? WTF
@hollanovertime: im so fcking scared can someone tell me hes ok
@hollanovertime: wait seriously guys I didn’t know they could end a game because of injury. That’s bad right? It seems bad.
@buffalosoldier: unfortunately historically pretty bad
@oliveinottawa: I was at the game. Don’t want to speculate because obviously I don’t know, but it seemed bad. Both teams visibly upset
@ilynumber81 stoppppp I’m gonna be sick
@ESPN: Harrowing scene in Ottawa this afternoon as their star Center, Ilya Rozanov, suffers a serious injury. The game was postponed, possibly to be cancelled. Rozanov’s status is unknown, and we await further comment from the MLH or the club.
@MTLboomin: as a metros fan I hope he’s ok
@hollanovertime: you can just say you hope he’s ok
@ilynumber81: I still haven’t seen the hit (and I don’t want to so pls don’t tag me). But the clip of Bood with his arms around Hollzy is making me cry ugly tears
@hollzygirl: same ugh I hope they are continuing to take care of each other