Viktor "Krosschek" Malyenko is a former professional hockey player turned super-criminal and one of the most physically formidable threats unleashed during the events of Year Zero.

​

Recognizable by his battered metal hockey mask, crude cybernetics, tattered jersey and serrated, blood-stained hockey stick, Krosschek blends athletic brutality with post-traumatic transformation. 

​

In Year Zero, he emerges as a towering, armored force who directly confronts Kayla McAllister at the Radion School of Dance — an encounter that permanently alters the course of her life.

​

EARLY LIFE

​

Prior to his cybernetic transformation, Viktor "Krosschek" Malyenko was a professional hockey player in New Radion Bay, known for his brutal, competitive nature. 

​

Hockey was not a casual pastime — it defined him.

​

In 1935, Krosschek was aboard an international flight to an exhibition game in his homeland of Russia that crashed in the Siberian wilderness. He was the sole survivor. The Soviet Confederation government recovered his broken body; what they did to save his life remains redacted and unknown, but the aftermath is evident: cybernetics, crude and experimental, gave him a second chance. 

​

But Viktor was never the same. His psychological state deteriorated as quickly as his lust for violence grew. Soon, he found himself working as muscle for the New Radion Bay underworld.

​

He adopted a battered metal hockey mask and modified a serrated hockey stick into a lethal weapon: rusted, blood-stained, and symbolic of the sport that once gave him structure and meaning.

​

IN YEAR ZERO

​​

In Year Zero, Krosschek is released during the breach of the Ice Cube Cryogenic Detention Facility.

​

He later appears at the Radion School of Dance amid the escalating reactor crisis. Emerging through collapsing debris, he immediately identifies Kayla McAllister as John McAllister’s daughter and targets her directly.

​

Recognizing her Kanshōken stance as her father’s training, Krosschek engages her in combat, impressed. Despite Kayla’s speed and discipline, he overpowers her. With successive strikes from his bladed hockey stick, he severs her left arm and both legs.

​

He considers killing her, going against The Archivist’s request, but retreats when the structure begins collapsing, declaring, “Krosschek take game one!”

​

His attack marks the moment Kayla’s civilian life ends and sets in motion her transformation into Swanblade.

​