No anxiety here

This photo is known as The Pale Blue Dot. It was taken by Voyager 1, a space probe meant to explore the outer reaches of the solar system. Far from dying, she's still out there doing her job and is the furthest human made object from Earth.

In the mid 80's, they knew Voyager 1 would soon pass beyond where her cameras would matter and she needed to save power, so the question became: what's the last thing she should take a picture of?

Carl Sagan and Carolyn Porco both independently had the same thought: take a picture of Earth. Us. Yes, it would be essentially just one pixel. It wouldn't be scientifically useful. It might even damage the camera because of how intense the sun is, even forty times as far from Earth as Earth is from the Sun. But they got it sorted because it's NASA.

3.7 million (not billion) miles away, that's Earth. Caught in bands of light, artifacts of the Sun's incredible power even 4 million miles away. We are an island in a sea of radiation and vacuum and it's all we have.

I can't say it better than Sagan did, so I'll let you alone with his words:

From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar", every "supreme leader", every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

— Carl Sagan

“i don’t know, probably that i can have ilya’s photos on my phone now :).”

He makes an offhanded comment to Shane about it during dinner one night and Shane says something like "Oh I didn't even know it said that. You can submit a correction and edit it to delete that sentence if you care so much since you're so whiny and jealous" and Ilya is like "I'm not whining, I'm just making boring conversation about boring people on boring website." Then promptly excuses himself and whips his phone out to do the very thing that Shane has just inadvertently taught him.

And Ilya is getting more and more frustrated that it keeps getting edited back to say Shane dated Rose. He can never mention this to Shane because then Shane will know that Ilya is still jealous AND still checking his Wikipedia page.

This goes on for weeks. Wikipedia eventually restricts Ilya. He makes a second account and the same thing happens. He eventually takes the L.

GOD

yuna and david were supposed to go to this game but thought they would have to cancel because they'd already agreed to going out to dinner with some friends who canceled last minute and then david had to work late, so yuna decided to drive up to montreal after all, and SHANE! WHO THOUGHT THIS PLAN WAS ALREADY CANCELED! THUS DIDN'T CHECK HIS PHONE WHEN HE AGREED TO LET ROZANOV COME OVER THE DAY BEFORE THE GAME, WHICH THEY DON'T ALWAYS DO.

which means yuna lets herself into shane's apartment (because why wouldn't she? shane's not texting back, which is strange, but maybe he's sick? it is flu season. and she has his key anyway.) ONLY TO FIND! SHANE AND ILYA ROZANOV SHIRTLESS ON SHANE'S COUCH AND ALMOST GIVING EACH OTHER BLACK EYES WITH THE SPEED WITH WHICH THEY SCRAMBLE OFF OF EACH OTHER.

and like??? really only ONE FUCKING THING they could have been doing!! very obvious what she just interrupted!!!

and oh...OH. all of this talk about how it's complicated and how shane can't openly be with his partner and yeah. yeah she gets it now. (yuna, oh my god). it ALL makes sense now. (yuna, please.) and yeah, kind of a mindfuck that her son's partner is the man?? who is supposed to be his greatest rival?? but she's already had a year of knowing shane was seeing SOMEONE. sooooo uh. hello, i'm yuna, we've met before but not under these circumstances, it's so nice to meet you finally for real, and-

and meanwhile ilya?? no fucking idea what's going on. kind of having a heart attack because jesus FUCK does he have a lot to lose if this gets out, but also?? she's shane's mom?? so she can't out him without outing shane and he's pretty sure she's not going to do that-

and then he registers that shane is Fully Freaking The Fuck Out. like straight up looks like he's about to pass out. and he doesn't know what's going on, but he knows shane looks like there is nothing happening in his head but aol dial-up noises and car wreck noises. and like. listen. ilya is also thrown for a loop, but he's not actually an asshole. he can tell shane is fucking TERRIFIED, so he's going to try and do what he can.

and what's the easiest answer to give when he doesn't know what's happening? agreeing with everything yuna is telling him.

yep. he is indeed shane's partner. he doesn't FULLY know that he understands exactly what that is, but he can figure that out when hollander doesn't actively look like he's going to pass tf out on him.

it's also at this point that yuna clocks back in enough (listen, sue her, okay, she has been DYING to know for a year now, so yeah she got excited and single mind tracked for a bit) to realize that her son and her son's partner are both still shirtless and she CLEARLY just interrupted Adult Alone Time, so she 180s and is like, "i'm going to go get some coffee, honey, you two can...*vague handwave* and oh! actually! your dad might miss the game, but he can still drive up tonight and we can have dinner here and-" and she is full Yuna Hollander Full Steam Ahead.

and then yuna is gone and it's shane and ilya.

and shane just. slooooowly curls up on his knees on the floor because What The Fucking Fuck Just Fucking Happened.

and ilya is also still a little ???? but puts a pin in that to talk hollander down from the ledge because man looks Bad.

and now they've got like. MAYBE 30 minutes to try and come up with a fake ass story for this dinner they're apparently going to have.

AND THEY STILL HAVE TO PLAY A FUCKING GAME BEFORE THEN.

and shane is just, "i know this is so weird. i am so sorry. trust me, i would willingly walk into traffic if i thought that would fix this. please just go along with it and i will explain whatever i can explain later-"

so they end up having dinner and managing to pull this act out of their ASSES. and they nearly fumble when shane starts to call him rozanov, but he can't do that with his partner, can he? that feels weird. so he calls him ilya, and ilya feels a little !!! zip inside him because oh!! that's!! new!! and oddly nice!! so calls him shane back.

so now they've broken the seal on first names. apparently. some fucking how.

and because yuna is yuna and DID HER FUCKING WAITING, she is inviting ilya to come to ottawa for the easter long weekend since they'll have time and it's not a couple's holiday anyway and he won't be going back to russia with such a short turnaround time-

and. listen. does shane feel great about this? no.

but it still feels better than having to look his mother in the face and say his partner is actually just a guy he fucks sometimes with no strings attached (jesus christ, shane.)

and ilya...is kind of just. going along. this is weird and also potentially complicated, but now gets to put his arm around shane? and call him shane? and he gets to pretend to play boyfriends because they have the understanding that This Is Fake? tbh? kind of ideal. the fun of playing boyfriend without having to admit ANYTHING to himself.

Level 2: We shouldn't treat mental health facilities as objects of horror because it stigmatises mental illness.

imagine being on your lunch break, and your supervisor comes over to your table, tells you to stand up in front of everyone. they draw everyone's attention to your thighs. they tell you that you have broken the dress code because of the length of your shorts. they tell you to go change (so you do not get the rest of your lunch break). they do this every single day at lunch. every day. so you read the whole dress code front and back, and you choose your clothing carefully to not break it. you bring a cloth tape measure with you to work because they will not believe you. this time when your supervisor tells you that you're breaking dress code, you pull out your tape measure and show that you are within the limit. your supervisor says "I bet you wouldn't want me to bring you to the boss and let him measure it, would you?" it's clearly a threat: if you don't obey then you will be put alone in a room with your boss and he will touch your thighs. you don't know how to respond. you're taken out of lunch again.

Yuna Hollander is actually a member of the Japanese Imperial Family. For context, the Japanese Royal line is strictly male only so no women can inherit the throne and any females of the family who marry normal people, have to give up their titles. (Princess Mako famously did this in real life)

So what if Yuna was a Japanese princess?

She went to McGill as a foreign exchange student to study in a place where she could have a few years as a normal person before starting royal duties but fell for the handsome hockey player David while there. Since she is a woman, she isn't going to inherit and although she only has sisters, one of them can have a son to carry the bloodline so she decided to give up her place in the family to marry David and become a commoner.

She is perfectly happy with this outcome and makes a life for herself in Canada. She and David have Shane and although they did occasionally visit some members of her family when Shane was small so Shane could meet his granddad (who happens to be the Emperor), because she gave up her claim, Shane is also technically excluded from the throne and the visits were so low key that people outside Japan forgot she even existed.

Besides, they stopped visiting after a while because Shane's hockey career was taking off.

Unfortunately, the Japanese Imperial Family is facing a succession crisis due to the lack of males in the family line, and inside Japan, Shane is starting to look like a good candidate for the next Crown Prince.

Shane, and the wider Western World, have no idea about any of this. Ilya eventually learns and almost loses his mind.

Yuna Hollander is actually a member of the Japanese Imperial Family. For context, the Japanese Royal line is strictly male only so no women can inherit the throne and any females of the family who marry normal people, have to give up their titles. (Princess Mako famously did this in real life)

So what if Yuna was a Japanese princess?

She went to McGill as a foreign exchange student to study in a place where she could have a few years as a normal person before starting royal duties but fell for the handsome hockey player David while there. Since she is a woman, she isn't going to inherit and although she only has sisters, one of them can have a son to carry the bloodline so she decided to give up her place in the family to marry David and become a commoner.

She is perfectly happy with this outcome and makes a life for herself in Canada. She and David have Shane and although they did occasionally visit some members of her family when Shane was small so Shane could meet his granddad (who happens to be the Emperor), because she gave up her claim, Shane is also technically excluded from the throne and the visits were so low key that people outside Japan forgot she even existed.

Besides, they stopped visiting after a while because Shane's hockey career was taking off.

Unfortunately, the Japanese Imperial Family is facing a succession crisis due to the lack of males in the family line, and inside Japan, Shane is starting to look like a good candidate for the next Crown Prince.

Shane, and the wider Western World, have no idea about any of this. Ilya eventually learns and almost loses his mind.

Shane doesn't understand just how important his family is. Yuna is the oldest daughter of the Emperor but since she became a commoner to marry David, the media and people agreed to leave her alone and in Japan, that wish is respected so Yuna and Shane are not approached by the general public.

Obviously, she bought Shane to meet his family when he was a baby but with the commoner status, they couldn't take part in anything in any ceremonial capacity, so it was all just meetings in private, where everything was more normal. Still very formal but Shane, brought up in a western culture and only seeing this part of his Asian heritage, thinks its normal and he knows that his family was important but not that important.

Shane adores his grandfather and was spoilt rotten whenever he came to Japan and some people even referred to him as a Prince, but it was never taken seriously. Back in Canada, with his anglicized name and habits, it didn't even register to him that he was being treated differently. He is fluent in Japanese but since English and French are the languages of his home, he never paid attention to the honorifics being said to him when he was in Japan. It also helps that he has a Japanese name as well so many people don't connect the Japanese Royal with a white bread name like Shane. Yuna and David, while not keeping things from him, didn't advertise it as they didn't want Shane growing up with an ego or being resentful because he was not in the line to inherit.

As he grew, Shane stopped going to Japan often and although he talked to his Grandparents, aunts and cousins over the phone, he didn't see them in person anymore.

All plans to go back to Japan went out the window when he began preparing for the Prospect Cup, since he was balancing Schoolwork with the possibility of getting drafted (although he does remember one call with his grandfather who told him if Shane wanted to join the AIHL, he had contacts. It didn't occur to Shane at the time that it was odd his grandfather basically offered to get him into the Asian League)

After Shane got drafted, he did plan one trip during his rookie season but it fell apart before he could go. One of his aunts and his cousins came to Canada and America and he did plan to catch up with them but had to pull out due to being on the road for a game (He was a bit annoyed they didn't offer to change the date of their meeting, not realising that it was a state visit and those can't just be changed at random)

After that, a lot of his down time was taken up with growing his career and his friendships with Hayden and JJ (and later, with Ilya) He manages some video calls now since his grandfather is very tech savvy and his parents still go to Japan occasionally and when they do, they bring him back lavish gifts from his grandparents and aunts.

These gifts are so expensive that one time, he showed something he got to JJ and the Pikes and JJ asked if Shane was sure his grandfather wasn't in the Yakuza. It was a joke but Shane definitely put two and two together and got the completely wrong number. He remembered his grandfather's offer to get him into the AIHL and it gives Shane mixed feelings but he eventually decides plausible deniability is the best. If his family is involved in organise crime, he doesn't want to know. So he ignores it.

Things do get a little weird during the Sochi Olympics, especially when Canada vs. Japan. The Japanese players are very weird around Shane, especially when he introduces himself to them using his Japanese name (sans Title) as a gesture of good will, but Shane had chalked it up to the team being nervous to represent their country and if they insisted on bowing to him and avoiding eye contact, well, maybe his reputation as one of the best players managed to make it to Asia.

Sometimes he is approached in the streets of Montreal by Japanese tourists, but he just assumed they were fans of hockey, even if they acted confused when he offered them his autograph.

Eventually he and Ilya are outed and Shane calls his grandfather to tell him. His grandfather is upset and Shane thinks he will have to cut off contact but eventually, dear old granddad comes around (After Yuna has words with her father) What Shane doesn't know is none of his aunts had managed to produce a son meaning there is no heir for two generations and in Japan, there is a lot of talk about him. Some people want him placed back in the line of succession while others hate that he is a half white foreigner.

Even his grandfather is reassessing Shane's position in the family and him being gay is a possible problem. So his relationship with Ilya, even if he doesn't realise it, could be seen as an issue for the future. But his granddad is reasonable and doesn't want to destroy his relationship with Shane over something that might not happen. He even sends a really nice gift for the wedding.

After Shane and Ilya marry and he joins the Centaurs and they win their first Stanley Cup together, the MLH agrees to a Show Game against the AIHL. Since a Japanese team won the Asian League that year, they invited the Centaurs to Tokyo for a match between the two winning teams.

Shane hasn't seen his family in person since he was a kid, he decides he should visit while he is there. Ilya can come with him or join the rest of the Centaurs going to Disney after the game because Shane isn't certain Ilya would enjoy the formal, stuffy atmosphere he remembers from his childhood. Ilya is 1000% down to join Shane because he has also heard the Yakuza rumour from Hayden and Jackie. He is not letting Shane walk into that alone.

They travel to Japan and are surprised to learn the whole team is being housed in a grand hotel paid for by, they assume, the AIHL, and Shane and Ilya have been given the most expensive penthouse (Shane assumes they got the room because Ilya is the Captain and Shane is just there as a perc of being his husband and built in roommate)

Game day begins and the stadium is packed. It seems the whole of Tokyo came out to watch. (Shane doesn't know it but rumours the beloved Emperor's commoner grandson is playing has spread and everyone wants to see him. It's the only way they can satisfy their curiosity about him without breaching the unspoken rule to leave him alone) Shane just wants to show everyone his skills and then they can enjoy the impromptu holiday for a few days before Shane goes to visit his family.

He is surprised when it's announced to the Centaurs that the Emperor of Japan has come to watch the game.

He just about has a heart attack when he skates onto the ice and looks up to the Royal Box to see his grandfather, aunts and cousins sitting there, watching him.

And that's how Shane discovers he is a member of the oldest monarchy in existance.

Guessing this would happen, Yuna is very prepared for Shane's irate phone call and David has to talk Ilya down from a panic attack because he's been there and it's not that bad really. The in-laws are actually nice, if a little strict.

After Ilya recovers, he and the rest of the Centaurs have prime teasing material for Shane for not realising who his family is. They also have bragging rights because they have a legit Prince on their team and 'screw you, Metros, you threw away actual Royality'

Anyways, post TLG maybe once his series on the Centaurs socials gets some good feedback Shane does start looking into getting Spaghetti tattooed on his body (i know spaghetti is the first immortal corn snake), so Spaghetti is always with him. It is actually quite an involved process for Shane he goes to multiple artists (he loves Luca’s art but he just could not capture Shane’s dear friend/son in all his glory) , gets multiple sketches but nothing fits his vision or expresses the weight/importance that a friend like Spaghetti has had on Shane’s life.

When Shane brings it up in a video (not even one of his snake videos it is a “Get to know the lineup” type video for the start of the season and everyone is answering random questions and they are asked what their dream tattoo would be), his DMs are flooded with people who want to tattoo “The Shane Hollander”. However, he does get some great recommendations from the fans of his snake videos so of course Harris convinces him that maybe the people would like to come along for the ride.

The video(s) includes meeting the artist, the sketching process, them going through different placements, and of course Shane sitting like a stone statue for the tattoo. They do bring Spaghetti for the tattoo cause the little noodle is the true star of the series but Ilya has to hold Spaghetti/keep him in the traveling tank (don’t know if they exist honestly Shane is rich enough and dedicated enough to get some guy to make it) the whole time. The final instagram post is the healed tattoo and Spaghetti covering the tattoo perfectly cause obviously it is life size and how Spaghetti prefers to wrap around Shane.

the double whammy of Giant Fucking Dogs all looking at him and then a parrot strutting her way through is KILLING ME

man is trying to be a good and present and supportive new boyfriend, but GOD the odds are stacked against him rn

the dogs are pretty polite in general, but yuna is ABSOLUTELY the ultimate authority. she is the only one powerful enough to overcome zeke's cheese madness.

which leads to the EXTREMELY funny scenario of big ass hockey player ilya getting his ass beat tf up by this massive dog because he made the fatal mistake of bringing shredded cheese into the house until yuna leans in and snatches the bag away, which makes zeke immediately sit and wait

meanwhile ilya is just

her name is clara, and she is convinced she is a lapdog