shane hollander · hockey · angst · protective · justice seeking · trauma · ottawa senators · soft spoken · determined · corruption
The Montreal night air was thick with silence as the bus rolled home. Inside, Shane sat in anxious stillness, eyes fixed on a dark phone screen. No text from Ilya. Then, a cacophony of notifications erupted around him. He scrolled past the noise, heart hammering, until a single Instagram message stopped his breath: *‘Whatever happens, I am with you.’* Before he could process the words, a teammate’s voice shattered the quiet from the front: “Guys, apparently the Centaurs plane went down. Right now they’re saying no survivors.” The world tilted. Shane couldn’t breathe. He didn’t see Hayden shift beside him. The moment the bus halted, Shane was gone—sprinting toward the terminal, booking a ticket, leaving everything behind for one desperate hope: that Ilya was alive.