Tyler Johnson skids to a halt inside the doorway of his team's locker room. He catches his breath, exhausted from his escape. Ondrej Palat and Nikita Kucherov rush over to him. They manage to catch him before he collapses on the ground.

"TJ, what's wrong you?"

"Johnny okay! He not hurted!" Nikita exclaims, happily before he slowly frowns. "But tire...? Why Johnny tire?"

"Tired. TireD, Kuch," Victor Hedman snaps from his stall. "How many times--"

Nikita's lip quivers and Ondrej stands TJ up and then hugs his linemate to cheer him up before he breaks out into tears. "VICTOR!" He pats Nikita, comfortingly. "It's okay man, cheer up, Victor didn't mean it. He should know you're still learning English."

Nikita nods and cracks a smile. He turns to his defenseman and says, "I forgive you, Heds."

"Anyway, TJ, what's wrong?" Ondrej turns to his line's centerman.

"Vladdy...Gallagher...Yzerchuk!" TJ gets out, still out of breath.

"What about them?" Ondrej demands.

"Gallagher has them both! He hinted that Vladdy IS Yzerchuk!" TJ blurts out. "Gally and the Habs said Yzerchuk isn't just a magical lightning bolt. Yzerchuk is actually Vladdy's hockey stick. All he has to do is shout out, 'In Yzerchuk we trust' and the stick is activated, turning into the lightning bolt. So, since he's the only one who can activate it, without him, the Lightning cannot thrive! I thought that was just a joke, but I don't think it is! Remember the Marty St. Louis Incident?"

Nikita and Ondrej share a look. Nikita shakes his head not wanting to remember it. Ondrej hugs him close.

"It was all real. Vladdy can activate Yzerchuk! And now both are in the clutches of the Montreal Canadiens!" TJ says.

Suddenly, Victor stands up from his stall and points to the door behind them. TJ spins around and spots Alex Galchenyuk in the doorway. He tenses up at the presence of the Montreal player. "Um, you can't do anything about it now--" the Canadien forward chokes out, nervously.

"What are you doing here?! Where's our teammate?" Ryan Callahan snaps, storming across the room and grabbing Galchenyuk roughly by his jersey's collar.

"Look, I know this looks bad, but I'm on your side! Hear me out, please!" Galchenyuk states, trying to calm his racing heart. All of the sudden maybe following TJ wasn't a good idea. "I want to help you guys!"

"I don't think we should listen to or trust ANY Hab, let alone you!" Callahan snarls, roughly shoving the Belarusian against the wall. "You beat up Vladdy last time! What makes you think we'd EVER give you a chance? Piss off and get out of here."

Galchenyuk frowns and smacks Callahan's arms from him. "HEAR ME OUT! I swear, I'm not against you. I tried to talk Gally out of this. The revenge is just silly. You all won and I'm sick of having to be apart of a silly revenge plot."

Ondrej looks up and cocks his head. "Palat? Silly revenge Palat?"

"PLOT!" Callahan, Victor and Galchenyuk snap.

Ondrej cowers behind Nikita, who cocks his head. Callahan spins back to the Montreal forward and raises his hand up to strike him but TJ grabs his wrist and halts him. "Stop, Cally. He's telling the truth. I believe him."

Callahan steps back as TJ releases his arm. TJ then puts an arm around Galchenyuk and guides him into the locker room. "Tell us everything. If you wanna help us, speak."

Galchenyuk nods. "The rivalry is for the ice, but what my teammates are doing is madness! I can't take it anymore and though playing with a magical lightning bolt could be seen as cheating, it's actually pretty cool and I guess you're not using it in a way that's considered cheating per-se. And Vladdy doesn't deserve to be tortured for a mistake our GM made. He's a Lightning player, not a Hab. Nor a Canadien."

TJ drops his hand and smiles at Galchenyuk. "You may be the only Hab to ever say that. Thanks Galchenyuk."

"Please, call me Chucky, we're friends now and I promise to help you all out as much as I can. You can trust me." He holds his hand out and TJ shakes it.

****

Thursday, February 11, 2016,

TJ walks into the Brandon Ice Sports' Forum, followed by the rest of the Triplets, including a bouncing Nikita Kucherov. He stops and signs some fan's gear and then walks into the locker room to get ready for the scheduled practice before the Nashville Predators game the next day. He puts on his gear and heads out onto the ice. He is joined by the rest of the Bolts for the practice.

Cooper blows his whistle as the Bolts all surround him, "Tomorrow's game is against the Predators, we need to work on the 3 on 3 and the power play." He looks over at Coburn and Victor as though scolding them.

Victor and Coburn look back over laughing, "What? What'd we do?" as the rest of the team laughs around them.

"So we're gonna do drills for the power play first, Triplet Line, Stralman, and Hedman against Stamkos, Killorn, Filppula and Sustr. That means Condra, go to the box."

Steven and TJ faceoff at the faceoff circle. TJ wins the draw, as Killorn tries to grab the puck from TJ, who passes it to Ondrej. Ondrej then skates towards Bishop. Killorn tries to block the shot and slips as one of his blades slides off his skates and he hits the boards.

"Better luck next time Killer!" Ondrej shouts out, teasingly as he scores off the failed play from his friend.

"You're lucky my blade came off, Pally! I so had you beat there!" Killorn slowly gets to his feet and glides off on his other skate as he tries to get his blade fixed back onto his skates as Callahan goes in for Killorn.

Killorn sits on the side with assistant coach Steve Thomas, as he gets new blades put on his skates and they are fastened tightly into place. After he gets his skates fixed, Killorn heads out on to the ice and Callahan soon has the same problem; one of his blades falls off his skates.

"What's going on with the skates?" Steven questions to himself, noticing all of the stumbling Lightning players and pieces of blade on the ice. He shakes his head. "Oh Yzerchuk, what's wrong with us today?"

Steven looks into the boards, deeply perplexed as TJ comes up to him and whispers, "I think it was Montreal. Those damn Habs messed with the blades of our skates. Has to be. Not only did they get away with kidnapping our friend and beating us, but they cheated again."

"Now why would they do that TJ. They are just like any other team," Steven tells him. "Are you sure you're not a little concussed still from the hit?"

"Are you sure you're not still a little hurt from the game?" TJ questions. "Look, you and I both know, it's Montreal."

Steven nods and heaves a heavy sigh. "You're right TJ. And I hope Galchenyuk has found Vladdy, we need him."

TJ leans against the boards, slowly joined by a bashfully grinning Nikita and a boastful Ondrej. "Trust me, Stammer, Chucky's got this. It's still a little weird trusting a Hab, but I know he's a good guy and I know he's on our side and wanting to help us out. He wasn't fibbing in the locker room, he's genuinely an anti-Hab."

"Well, hopefully Vladdy's okay. I promised him, I'd always be there for him and that nothing would ever happen to him. But I was wrong. I let Vladdy down, TJ and if anything happens to him, I take full blame."

TJ puts a hand on his captain's shoulder. "It's not your fault Stammer. If Vladdy once had faith that you'd all find me and even lead a rescue mission to find me, have faith we'll find him and save him in return. I owe him one, Stammer."

"Yeah, if Vladdy hadn't taken charge and gone to Montreal back in November, there wouldn't be a Tyler Johnson right now. There wouldn't be Triplets!" Ondrej pipes in.

Nikita pouts his lip. "No Triplets?"

Ondrej instantly whirls around to him. "Not what I meant Kuch. There are Triplets because of Vladdy."

"Vladdy is hero!" Nikita exclaims.

Steven chuckles. "Alright, alright, you good with being a baby now, Kuch?"

"Not baby. Just emotionally confused. Also still no understand English. I like score goals! I can go score goal?" Nikita says, smiling at his captain.

"Yeah, go ahead, Kuch." Steven laughs and shakes his head.

Nikita skates off, pulling Ondrej with him. "Pally pass me puck, I shoot, score big goal! Lightning beat Preds!"

"That Russian," Steven chuckles. "I don't know how you and Pally deal with him. He's an emotional roller coaster, but he's a good kid. You three make Tampa great and you're right, Vladdy's fine and Chucky will do his job."

TJ pats his captain and skates off, to join the overly excited Nikita and his "babysitter" Ondrej, who grabs him on either side by the arms and tries to calm the bouncing Russian down. "Kuch, focus."

"No can. Score game-winning-goal and beat Preds!"

"Nikita Kucherov, settle down man," TJ says. "And you're gonna drive poor Pally bat crap crazy."

"Had giant chocolate chip cookie for breakfast!" Nikita screams. "It was yummy!" He slowly calms down and looks at his feet, taking a total left turn once more in his emotional state. "Had to make self happy with no Vladdy. Vladdy like brother. But no Vladdy. So I eat chocolate cookie!"

"Oh, no wonder, you're bouncing off the boards today," Ondrej remarks. "Who got you the cookie? I know it wasn't you, yourself."

"Killer," Nikita mutters, biting his lip. "Killer feel bad, try make me feel better."

"Alex!" Ondrej hisses and begins to look around for the prankster.

Killorn skates by them and laughs. "That's what you get for messing with me during a postgame interview, Pally!"

In the background, Jonathan Marchessault goes to the bench for water. He goes to take a drink but the cap falls off and drenches him in water. "Dammit Killer!" The young forward growls. "That's so childish!"

"Two for two! Oh right, I got Marchy too...because, um, he's gullible...but not as gullible as the little Russian kid here...come on Kuch," Killorn jokes, grabbing Nikita and wrapping his arm around his head and giving him a playful noogie.

The whistle blows and Killorn lets Nikita go and skates off, laughing. Nikita is chuckling and TJ and Ondrej break out in laughter as well. After a good laughing fest, all the Bolts move to the next drill and they continue to practice their power play until Anton Stralman comes off the ice with the same problem.

While they continue on with the practice, Steven eventually shrugs off the problems the team is having, while TJ takes note of more skate issues. Montreal had definitely done something and had cheated but there was nothing he could say or do. Nobody could. All they could do was fix the skates and carry on, no matter the hastle. Victor, Brian Boyle, Cedric Paquette, Nikita and Ondrej come off the ice with blades falling off their skates.

TJ skates up to Steven, "I told you it's those damn Habs, they all messed with the blades of our skates. I can understand one or two of us but most of the team is coming off the ice with the same problem. All the blades are falling off their skates."

"Maybe you're right, you and I can talk with Chucky tomorrow. It's just a rivalry we shouldn't be taking things this seriously." He skates away as the team practices the 3 on 3 and finishes with shootouts on Vasilevskiy and Bishop.

One thing is certain, the Lightning had struggled to stay up and play in the game on Tuesday thanks to "more than likely" tampering of the skates and it is a full blown war between the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Montreal Canadiens.