Chapter Five

Yuri Plisetsky found it hard to forget the dead bodies on the bloodstained floor. Whenever he closed his eyes, he could see their rotten eyeballs staring back into the depths of his soul. Sleep had been elusive for the past month, and the Russian boy was absolutely exhausted. But however, when he did manage to find himself drifting off into the realm of dreams, he would wake up several hours later in the middle of the night, screaming.

Potya, his cat, didn't know what was going on, so whenever Yuri woke, she would have jumped off the bed, cowering on the armchair with fear and disdain in her eyes. Today was one of those days.

He never knew how traumatizing archaeology could be. And to think that everyone else on Yakov's elite team had already seen such horrors before that came with uncovered tombs, he was starting to think that maybe his dream of becoming an archaeologist, and studying under Victor, would be impossible at the rate this was going.

The old man had talent, more talent than anyone in the team. Victor had insurmountable amounts of knowledge and the enthusiasm for the job. He was the perfect archaeologist. The world had regarded him as that for over 8 years. And it was something that Yuri was sure he would never be.

He didn't have enough knowledge. Not yet. He didn't have that much enthusiasm either. But one thing that he has is determination. And he was determined to find out what the hell that thing in the painting was.

Over the past week, ever since Yakov's team came back from the ghost town of Kyushu, Victor has been acting strange. The man's natural smiles would be forced, and he turned down any invitations to any parties or get-togethers. When Mila and Georgi asked if they could visit his apartment personally to drop some equipment off, he adamantly refused and said he would go and collect it himself.

Yuri grimaced and sat up in his bed, too impatient to wait until the sun came up, and turned on the lights. Potya hissed at the sudden brightness and buried her furry face underneath the throw pillows on the armchair. Yuri shrugged.

"Sorry, Potya." he stroked her back gently and with a rare smile on his face. "But I need to find that old silver-haired geezer."

There was no question as to what he was going to wear. Victor wouldn't care anyway, and all of his wardrobe was either cat print or black. The fifteen-year-old grabbed his leopard print hoodie jacket, a pair of sports leggings, his red tiger print shoes, and ran to his suitcase. He unpacked the tier shirt that he had found hanging with other articles of clothing in a deserted shop. No one was going to charge him for stealing; everyone living there had gone to the next town over.

His hair was still very untidy, so he yanked a brush through it and slammed the door to his bedroom. He paced out of the apartment that he shared with his grandfather, who was currently visiting a family friend, so Yuri was left behind.

Stomping down the stairs as he usually did to the front door, he stood in the shivering midnight temperatures of St Petersburg. Even though there was no snow, the chill woke the boy up fully. So trudging all by himself on the cold pavement, he headed up to Victor's apartment fifteen minutes away.

When Yuri arrived, he was positively freezing, and his cheeks and fingers were red from the cold. He knocked impatiently, shivering slightly.

"Oi! You old geezer. OPEN THE FUCKING DOOR." he kicked the door before he heard some shuffling from inside, a murmuring voice that was most likely Victor's, before the apartment door opened.

Victor's eyes widened at the young boy standing in front of him. The twenty-seven year old man's hair had some silver strands sticking up, showing how much the man slept.

"Yuri!" he ran a hand through his hair and ushered the young boy inside. "What are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be sleeping?"

Yuri snorted and took off his jacket, flinging it onto the blue couch in the center of the stylish living space. "I'm surprised you can, after seeing those rotten things."

The apartment was just like Yuri remembered. The hanging glass lights were still there, but now they were newly tinted a blue color, and he found more blue around the place than there was before.

"Yo, what's with all the blue?" Yuri ran a finger along the blue vase of roses that sat on the coffee table. "You going through a new phase? Don't like dark monochrome colors anymore?"

Victor laughed nervously. Yuri has never seen the man nervous before. And his eyes kept darting around the room, like the man was never at rest. "Yeah, I guess you can say that."

Yuri walked around, looking at each of the new items that Viktor has added to the environment for the past two weeks. The blue vase, the blue drapes, the blue lights, and even a bouquet of blue roses on a table below a small painting with a silver frame. It was the same painting Victor had taken from the abandoned Katsuki house, the one that gave Yuri strange hallucinations, where a man was running around inside the painting.

"Victor." he called, crossing his arms and looking at the painting with speculation in his eyes.

"Yes, Yuri?" the man called from the other room. A minute ago, he had left to get ready for the day, since it was already around 5 and there was no point heading back to sleep. "What do you need?"

"What's with your new piece of decor?" Yuri pointed to the painting after the man came out, wearing a blue and white striped shirt and a pair of beige jeans. "I know you like interior design, but this old painting from that creepy house... it's weird you decided to keep it."

Victor paled and looked nervous, dashing towards the painting. "No, it's just-"

"Oh come on, Victor." Yuri grabbed the man's collar and shook it threateningly. "We all know that you're hiding something. You think I'm dumb enough not to notice how no one else has stepped foot in your apartment since we returned last week? And what's with that thing in the painting that I keep seeing? How do you explain that?"

Yuri took the painting off the hook and shook it a little. He looked with his piercing green eyes around the canvas, trying to see something. He wasn't sure what he was trying to find, but he was sure there was something absolutely wrong with the painting. A rather visible bump was on the small bed, with rising and falling motions. Yuri stared.

"How the hell is this painting moving by itself?" he murmured, but it was loud enough so Victor could hear.

Yuri flipped the painting around to check for any unusual mechanism that could have possibly attached to the front of the canvas and moved it. Nothing. Just a plain canvas back with a silver frame around the edges.

"You have some explaining to do." Yuri looked back at the older Russian man and scowled. "A fuck ton of it. So you'd better start right now."

Victor sighed through his nose and beckoned Yuri to sit down next to him on the couch. The teenager raised an eyebrow and stayed standing.

"Please get me that painting, will you?" Victor asked, holding out his hand. "And please be gentle with it."

Yuri scowled, allowing a little noise of disdain past his tongue, and passed the painting over to Victor. "What's so special about it, old man?" he asked, brushing his long blonde bangs out of the way.

Victor sighed again. He seemed to sigh an awful lot today, the blonde teenager noticed. Victor knocked gently on the framework of the painting, watching as the painted bump on the bed started to move and stir, until a head of black hair poked out from underneath. Yuri stared in horror, transfixed, as a small painted man came out of the bundle of blankets on the bed and sat down on the chair. He put on a pair of blue framed glasses and blinked owlishly with his big brown eyes. He didn't seem to notice the newcomer yet as he groggily greeted a 'good morning' to Victor.

"Yuri," Victor started. Both Yuris turned their head to look at him. The Japanese painting's eyes widened when he saw the blonde teenager with the silver-haired man. "This is Katsuki Yuuri. I found him in the painting at the site."

"What. The. Actual. Fuck." Yuri hissed. He turned to Victor with a bewildered look on his face. The boy stared backwards and forwards between the painted man and his annoying silver-haired friend, switching to Russian. "Why didn't you tell us about this sooner?"

"Because all Yakov would do is sell him off." Victor countered. "We don't know how he got in there, or what kind of strange magic - if it actually exists - the painter used to make him come to life. The poor thing is obviously traumatized; Yuuri doesn't need to be sold off."

"YUURI?!" Yuri yelled and pulled at his blonde locks. He switched to English again, seeing that it was easier to communicate with the painting that way. "Your name is also Yuri?!"

Victor had a mischievous glimmer in his sky blue eyes. He picked at his cuticles carelessly. "Well, only one can be Yuri at a time to avoid confusion, since there are two. So, Yuri!" he pointed with a grandiose gesture to the Russian. "You are now Yurio."

"Tch. I thought we agreed to no more nicknames." Yurio muttered.

"But on a serious note." Victor grabbed the green-eyed boy by his shoulders and whispered. "You're not going to tell anyone, are you?"

"Depends." the teenager shrugged. "He would cost a lot of money to those who are willing to give us the right price-"

"We are archaeologists!" said Victor exasperatedly. "Please don't tell anyone else about this, I'm begging you, Yurio."

Yurio rolled his eyes in disdain and glared at the painted Japanese man in the painting. His brown eyes were wide, pupils dilated in shock, unsure of what to do as he froze on his chair. "Fine, old man. Just don't call me Yurio! And I'm hungry, so get me some fucking pirozhki already!"