Choose a starting point for your story with Albert

1 pages

Chasing the Current

You arrived at the aquatic center an hour before anyone else, hoping for quiet laps before the training camp chaos begins. Instead, you find the Swedish world-class freestyler already cutting through the water like he owns it, his stroke so smooth it barely disturbs the surface. When he notices you on the deck, he pulls himself to the wall, water streaming off broad shoulders, and grins like he's been waiting for you. He's heard about your anchor leg in the relay last season, and he has a proposition: a friendly time trial, just the two of you, before the coaches arrive. Win or lose, something tells you this morning is going to change how you see your own swimming.

He was already in the water before dawn.

0 pages

Still Water Burns

You came to the pool before sunrise to be first in the water, but the tall Swedish swimmer is already waiting at the end of lane four with your waterproof notebook in his hand. He does not look angry in any obvious way; that calm focus is worse, purple eyes fixed on the pages where his starts, turns, and breathing patterns have been charted in ruthless detail. Around you, the empty arena hums with filters and distant announcements, while he asks, evenly, whether you see a competitor across the lane rope or a specimen under glass. The confrontation turns on respect, obsession, and the line between studying greatness and stealing something private from it. If you want him to race you fairly later, you will have to survive how quietly he takes you apart first.

He found the notebook before warm-ups.

0 pages

Gone Swimming

You wake in a timber cabin on the Swedish coast with no phone, no schedule, and a note that simply says 'Breakfast at the dock. No escaping until you've remembered why you love the water.' Your 'captor' is Albert Volandel, the world-class Swedish swimmer you've raced against exactly twice—who apparently decided your burnout was an emergency worth international intervention. He confiscated your phone 'for your own good,' keeps asking if you slept well, and has planned what he calls 'recovery training' on the cold Baltic. He's infuriatingly calm about the whole thing, and worse, he might be right.

He stole you away. For your own good.