Rating:

Mature

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, Hayden Pike, Rose Landry

Additional Tags:

Soulmates, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Romantic Soulmates, Emotions, emotion sharing, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Unreliable Narrator

Language:

English

Series:

Part 8 of here a fic there a fic everywhere a fic-fic

Stats:

Published: 2026-10-09 Words: 2,852 Chapters: 1/1

asleep inside

Summary

Rozanov says, "you always keep your mark covered," and Shane desperately wishes they were back to talking about women.

"Yup," he agrees and takes a drink from the ginger ale in his hand just to have something to do. He's going to have to start pretending like it's still got liquid in it soon, if this continues.

"The women I am with always want to see if we are soulmates, they do not do this with you?" Rozanov is staring at him again, right hand raised so that Shane can see the colors shift red and teal and yellow and pink and green and his left hand still down his fucking pants.

Notes

It is day 8 and I worked on five different things today before I successfully finished this. (So five other things for different days! I always tell myself this will help me finish up some WIPs but I have never actually done the math to see if I actually make more during this... not gonna check just gonna live in blissful ignorance).

Word of the day is moonlight.

Title from Come Alive from the Greatest Showman soundtrack because again, playing when I needed a title.

I love soulmate aus and I thought this was a fun one for them.

No beta because it's Fic a day month!

Please enjoy.

"Is she dead?" Pike asks and Shane's head jerks up to look around.

He'd been thinking about the most recent game — LeBarr of the Drillers had shifted forward just before his shot, he'd have to review some tape to see if he always did that or if it had been something else — and he hadn't realized the locker room had cleared out while he'd been thinking.

"What?" he asks, since he's the only person Pike could be talking to. "Who?" He starts focusing on getting his shit into his bag so he can leave. He's lucky it's a home game so no one will give him shit for holding up the bus.

"If she's dead and you show them, they'll stop hassling you about her," Pike says, like that answers the question.

Shane pauses what he's doing and stares at him blankly.

"Your soulmate, man," Pike says, gesturing at Shane's wrist. Shane's wrist that he always keeps covered.

Shane grimaces. "Oh, no, my soulmate's not dead."

Pike goes quiet and Shane finishes packing his bag.

"Then," he finally says, "why do you keep your mark covered?"

Shane stands up, pulling his duffel over his shoulder and shoves his hand in his pocket to further hide the bandage on his wrist. "I just don't like talking about it."

"They're going to keep giving you shit about it," Pike says.

Shane shrugs, "they'll stop eventually. Get used to it."

Pike makes a noise of disbelief. "If you just showed it a few times they'd get over it faster."

Shane starts walking and Pike matches him, as in step here as they're learning to be on the ice. It's only Shane's rookie year, but Pike's been good on his wing. Hopefully this doesn't send them out of sync. Sure, Pike's not as fast as him, but no one but Rozanov is. Well, Rozanov and Pedersen in San Francisco — Shane sometimes likes to imagine what the three of them could do on the same line. Idle daydreams since it'll never happen.

"Sure," Shane agrees, but without any plan to show anyone his soul mark ever. Because the thing is, it's never just showing your mark. Then people have to remark about the colors, ask you what your soulmate is feeling right then. Compare what color is happiness on their wrist versus your wrist.

And Shane can't fucking tell. He can watch his mark turn all the colors of the rainbow, hold the mark against the bare skin over his heart like they show in the romantic movies that his high school girlfriend used to force him to watch, and he still can't tell you a single fucking emotion. He can tell there are emotions, but that's just about it.

Pike opens his mouth to say something else — and Shane's phone rings.

He pulls it out of his pocket maybe a little faster than he needs to, relieved when it's his mom, and he waves the contact at Pike and says, "Sorry, gotta take this," before answering. "Hey mom," he says, and walks the rest of his way to his car listening to her outline the new sponsor she's just gotten for him.

His photo shoots always like that he's got his mark covered, they use photoshop to put whatever color they want there and are thrilled that he always approves of it. Apparently some people object to that, though he can't imagine why. It's one less thing for him to worry about.

---

Rozanov just stares at him for a minute and then looks away and Shane hopes like hell that he's done asking about women.

And then Rozanov says, "you always keep your mark covered," and Shane desperately wishes they were back to talking about women.

"Yup," he agrees and takes a drink from the ginger ale in his hand just to have something to do. He's going to have to start pretending like it's still got liquid in it soon, if this continues.

"The women I am with always want to see if we are soulmates, they do not do this with you?" Rozanov is staring at him again, right hand raised so that Shane can see the colors shift red and teal and yellow and pink and green and his left hand still down his fucking pants.

Shane wants to kill him with his mind. "That's private," he repeats, like an idiot.

Rozanov hums and looks away — looks at his wrist for a moment — there's dark brown moving in, the green getting stronger. The other colors swirl, vibrent. "None of them have been," he says, "but it has happened to some teammates."

"Yeah," Shane agrees, knowing he sounds stupid. But, well, he's not going to tell Rozanov about how Jackie had run into Hayden and their marks had touched and they'd both gasped and realized they were soulmates. And he's definitely not going to tell Rozanov how JJ had come up to him afterwards and told him that Jackie had run into him and Tyler and Johan with her mark before she'd run into Hayden. Shane had told him to never say that again and he never had.

Hayden seems to love her, and that's all that matters, after all.

"Smart of you," Rozanov says, "to avoid that."

Shane just shrugs, "yeah, well, it's private."

Rozanov grins at him and he's so fucking hot it pisses Shane off. "It does not itch, your bandage?"

"Oh, uh, no," Shane touches the patch he's wearing. "I get the like medical grade ones. They're super comfortable. I can text you the link if you want to get some?"

Rozanov hums and shifts closer — and then his phone rings and he makes a face and answers it.

---

"I'm going about this wrong," Rose says, and then makes a face and holds up her wrist. From what Shane has observed from Rose and her friends, actors either keep their marks covered all the time or almost flaunt them. Some of the women put glitter or makeup around theirs to make it match their outfits. "Have you ever thought we might be soulmates?"

"What?" Shane says, and knows immediately it's the wrong answer.

"Wow," she laughs and he relaxes a little because her smile is real and not even the fake media one she plasters on sometimes when someone starts photographing them while they walk. "Okay," she says, and then she pauses and looks at him carefully for a minute.

"Sorry," he says, because it's awkward and he doesn't know what else to do.

"No," she says slowly, "it's fine." She nods to herself and then raises a hand to signal the waiter, who comes over immediately. "I'm sorry, can we get what we just ordered to go?"

Shane is positive that this place doesn't do pick up or take away or delivery or any of that, but of course for Rose Landry and Shane Hollander they do, and in under fifteen minutes he's got their food in hand and her arm through his.

He hates how he relaxes when she gets a car for both of them back to the apartment she's renting instead of trying to go to his. It's stupid, but it's better.

And then they're sitting at her counter, and he's got a ginger ale and she's got a beer and she's changed out of her heels into slippers. And she pulls out a bottle of the same type of remover he uses to get the bandage off his wrist and starts applying it around the edges of her bandage. His skin goes hot and then cold. He didn't think this was why she was asking. He doesn't want to check because — because what if they are soulmates?

He doesn't want to be soulmates with her, but he should want that. He should want nothing more than that and now he feels like he's going to throw up.

He wants to leave, desperately, but there's no way to do that, not now. Not really.

He's sure he's making a face but she's focused down at her wrist, and he knows what a pain the medical grade bandages are, so he tries to wrestle himself back under control as she focuses on making sure the solvent has soaked through and the bandage can come off without pain.

"I hate talking about this in public, because I never know who has a camera and is trying to catch this picture but — I don't have a soulmate." She says in a rush and holds out her hand.

And sure enough, there's no color there, not even an outline.

"Is that … the same with you?" She asks, hesitant.

He shakes his head, considers the patch on his wrist. He's never shown anyone, or, well, not since he was about ten. That was when his parents let him start covering it and … He reaches for the solvent and she nods and he starts applying it to his wrist.

So he lets it soak through, the fumes rising around them, and then peels it off.

He hasn't — it's been so long since anyone but his parents have seen it. And they never ask about the colors. They know he can't tell them. They drove him to all of the specialists when he was a child to figure out if there was something wrong with his soulmate connection and — and then they'd never brought it up when everyone had just said it was a problem with Shane.

"My soulmate is normal, I think. I'm the one who's —" he pauses, takes a breath. "I can't tell what they're feeling. If I touch it it's just — doesn't mean anything to me. And people always want you to tell them what this color means or whatever. And I don't want to have to remember what I said blue was last time, you know?"

She considers him, reaches out to touch his hand with hers but doesn't touch his wrist. "You don't know who it is?"

He shakes his head.

"Is there someone you want it to be?"

His breath catches in his throat and he glances away instead of answering, but that's an answer in and of itself.

He dreads her next question.

The silence stretches.

"Do you want to be friends?" she asks, and he turn back to stare at her in disbelief, and then he laughs.

---

"You do not wear the patch in the ads," Ilya says, and his mouth is twisted, his words sharper than the previous ones.

"No," Shane objects, "I do. They just like to photoshop it. Pick whatever color they think best represents the brand or whatever. Rolex likes to go with those dark greens because they blend into the suits or something, and Tom Ford likes to go with dark red or purple for like sensuality or whatever, and Gatorade yellow for happy, I guess? I don't fucking know, man."

Ilya's mouth twitches and then he's smiling, laughing.

Shane feels like a weight has lifted off his chest and he smiles, helplessly, back.

"Do you ever take it off, the patch?" Ilya asks, later, after they've left the bed rumpled, when Shane is getting dressed, when the moonlight peaks through the curtains and leaves stripes on the ugly hotel carpet.

He kind of wants to stay, sleeping with Ilya — the actual sleeping part — in Boston had been nice. He thinks they can get back there, but they're not there yet. And he does have an early flight, and the Tampa airport doesn't have any good food options so he's going to have to eat before he goes and —

Yeah, it's best he heads out now.

"I don't wear it at my cottage," he says, honestly, because he doesn't think Ilya is asking about him taking it off briefly at night to apply a new one, but for not wearing it for any extended period of time and, well, the only time he does that is when he feels safe.

And that's the cottage.

---

"You are still wearing it," Ilya says, the first night, as they recline on the couch together.

Shane doesn't have to ask what he means. He touches his wrist, and lets out a breath. They said they were going to be honest, it's, he can be honest about this.

"It's —" he pauses, he's workshopped what to say with Rose, he's practiced in front of the mirror, but with Ilya's eyes pinning him in place it's still hard to say. "I'll take it off, and I'll leave it off, but you can't — if you ask me what my soulmate is feeling, I can't tell you. I have — I can't tell what the emotions are, at all. So."

Ilya stares at him, then he laughs, and Shane should be offended by Ilya is so joyous with it that he can't be, still he swats at him when he leans up.

"Asshole," he says, and Ilya grabs his arm and pulls him down so that he can plant a loud kiss against his cheek and then he pushes him up.

"Go on, take it off, I want to see." Ilya's smiling so wide that there are wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, around his mouth, and Shane is struck knowing where his laugh lines will become permanent and he wants nothing more than to watch them form, to be able to trace each one in ten, twenty, thirty years.

He goes off and gets the adhesive remover instead of saying that, but his heart beat is loud in his ears. He peels it off in the bathroom with the vent fan running because the remover does get kind of fume-y, and then he washes his wrist because there's always a bit of residue behind that will drive him crazy if he lets it stay.

When he goes back to the living room, Ilya is watching him like a hawk. "Let me see," he says, immediately.

Shane rolls his eyes and makes a show of sitting down where he was before, pushing his feet against Ilya's, before holding his wrist up. He doesn't bother to look to see what the colors are, it's not like they mean anything to him, after all. "I told you, it's normal."

Ilya breathes for a moment, fixated on his wrist, and Shane, feeling pinned goes to lower it but Ilya holds out a hand, "No just, a little longer." and Shane is helpless to refuse him.

But after another minute it starts to be uncomfortable and he's trying to figure out how to prop his arm up so that Ilya can still see it but it doesn't start to feel like one of those resistance exercise when suddenly Ilya is sitting up and then crawling up his body and —

The kiss is warm and wet and perfect, Ilya pinning his hands over his head and grinding down on him dirty and slow. Time goes sticky, pulls like taffy, and Shane is helpless and happy. So unbelievably happy.

Ilya pulls away and Shane tries to follow him, eyes still closed, but can't, so he opens his eyes. Ilya is looking over his head, and it takes Shane a moment to realize that he must be looking at his wrist, since that's where he's got Shane's hands pinned. "What —" Shane starts, and then Ilya shifts, grinds again, and Shane lets his eyes flutter shut for a moment and the grip on his hands changes for a moment and then there's skin pressing against his wrist, against his soulmark and —

Holy fuck. There's lightning in his veins, there's fireworks going off behind his eyes, there's a sound like Niagara Falls drowning everything out, and he's laughing and laughing and laughing and —

He looks up at Ilya. Ilya looks down at him.

Ilya says something in Russian, and then says, in English, and his eyes are wet. "I love you."

And Shane asks, "are you my soulmate?" because he feels too big for his body and he doesn't know what just happened but something just happened — and then when tears start to slip out of Ilya's eyes he realizes that he's fucking this up and he leans up to try to kiss him again even though his hands are still pinned, and says, "Holy shit I love you too," and then they're both crying.

---

"You could just make something up, Hollander. This is easy, a child could do it." Ilya says, later, when they relax on the dock. He won't stop touching Shane's wrist, and Shane still doesn't get emotions when their marks are held together but he gets something.

He doesn't care that Ilya can tell what he's feeling, it felt like he could always read it on his face anyways. "Like what, asshole?"

"Well, is obvious." Ilya says, taking on a tone like he's explaining one plus one to a two year old, or maybe a hockey player, "Yellow for happy, blue for sad, red for horny, green for horny, orange for horny, pink for —" and Shane shoves him off the deck and into the water, laughing when Ilya immediately drags him in after him.