The Assassin's Story

Authors Note

This is just a quick explanation about why I chose the athletes I chose as the three main girls.

Aliya Mustafina as Nailya:
Aliya is an extremely talented gymnast and is one of an elite group of athletes to have a major gold or silver medal in every event (team gold 2o10, all around gold 2010, vault silver 2010, bars gold 2012, beam gold 2013, floor silver 2010). I find her inspirational as a year before the 2012 Olympics she suffered an ACL tear which could have ended her career and made many doubt she'd ever make an Olympics, yet 14 months later she left the most decorated gymnast and most decorated Russian of the games.

Viktoria Komova as Yulia:
Vika is as talented as Mustafina, yet lacks the mental strength when put under pressure. This has caused her to loose two major titles to opponents who were no where near as good (the 2011 World All around and 2012 Olympic All Around title) although she is the 2011 and 2015 World bars champion. The character of Yulia has the same skill set as the character Nailya but is sidelined as she's unable to simply focus on the job and get it done, making her a risk in a bigger arena. Although both Komova and Mustafina have helped mentor younger athletes, it's Komova who really shows it during competition, encouraging younger athletes to truly give their best performance and commiserating or celebrating with them after.

Seda Tutkalyan as Phoenix:
I got the idea of Seda as Mustafina's sister as she displays many of the same strengths as Mustafina did when she was younger, yet at competitions Komova is the more encouraging teammate, as shown in the 2015 World beam event finals after Seda fell.