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Eero Makela is asleep in his bed, a twin-sized frame with a curving metal headboard and a thin comforter the only things that kept it from looking like a pile of discarded rubbish. Makela has the money to buy a nicer bed, but he prefers this arrangement, as a reminder of hard work and dedication.

A sound startles him awake, but he does not move. He listens, he waits. He hears two heartbeats - his own, thumping dully in his ears, and a second one, a foreign one, like the faint beat of rain on a war drum. Under the blanket, he flexes his fingers. A home invader would find no easy prey.

A floorboard squeaks, and that's all Makela needs to make his move. Like a pale shadow, the Finnish rookie is out of the bed, executing a forward roll in the floor, taking out the intruder at the knees. There's a bellow of surprise, a male voice, the splash of liquid, and the thump of a body hitting the wood. Makela comes out of his crouch, one hand moving to the intruder's throat, the other to his wrist, in case the intruder has a weapon.

In the darkness, Makela recognizes the man's face, his bead-black eyes. The strange man with the allergy medicine stares up at him, eyes wide in terror.

"I -" the man begins, then clears his throat. "I was bringing you some magic Fanta." His eyes move to the side, where a can sits overturned upon the floor.

"Get out," Makela growls, releasing the strange man and rising to his feet. Even in the shadowy night, the prone man's eyes bulge at the size of Makela's manhood, which swings like a tree bough in a hurricane. "I have no need for your foul potion, intruder. No magic will improve me."

The prone man had no choice but to agree. He had come to offer Makela the chance to cement his name in history, but even if the hard-bodied defenseman busted out of the SHL, he had another talent that would ensure his fame for generations.