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Little Jayce sleeps in the verdant peace for just a moment: long enough for the mage to consider the runes that remain to be given. He pays reverence to this ritual each time (no matter how many times.) It is, after all, a little boy's future he is altering forever.
Quintessence? No, no, that feels like it could end in megalomania...
Temperance? Something to rein in his intentions might sound ideal, but to Viktor it feels limiting. Not right for this Jayce.
A doubt swims by, like a butterfly through this peaceful meadow: is it really right to choose the fate of someone you barely (but also inextricably) know? But Viktor left ethics behind long ago. Left logic behind, to give some timeline a chance at escape. He needs to be sure. Strong. He needs to choose carefully.
And then little Jayce's wide, honey-colored eyes fill the space he has been staring into.
"W-wow..." whistles through the gap in his front teeth. Once more, Viktor witnesses the seed of a lifelong obsession be planted. Witnesses the cogs behind those big amber eyes start to turn, set in motion by the sight of those crystals. And once more, Viktor cannot contain the small smile that tugs at his rigid mouth; he's become so singular, so obssessed with this quest beyond time, that the movement feels unfamiliar. There's little joy to such an existence.
But the sight of this Jayce - the child who will sketch his visions in crayon on the margins of homework, the sprout that grows into the man who will sketch in the corners of Viktor's lab notes - is pure joy; pure hope, bright as a star. Even the mage is not too hardened to smile when bathed in his light.
Viktor shakes his palm. "For you. Choose one."
The weight of the decision cannot possibly register, but the child still screws up his face seriously. Considers the unfamiliar curves of the runes, guided by some internal compass. Finally, through logic Viktor cannot comprehend, he stabs a finger still in thick mittens at one: Acceleration.
It sounds dangerous... Feels too powerful for such a small soul.
But if there's anyone Viktor trusts, it's Jayce.
He plops the crystal into the boy's waiting palms and drinks in the emotion: Jayce's childish awe, the excitement in his posture, the little tremble of wonder in his elbows. For the length of this moment, the fields of dreamless solitude feel distant. For its blessed duration, Jayce has filled the hollows of Viktor's guilt with warmth, light. Reprieve.
"Who are you?" the boy asks.
The other side of the mage's mouth curls up. A full smile, so rare it hurts.
"That's for you to find out."
And you, Viktor thinks, you are my everything.
When Jayce opens his eyes after the implosion, Viktor sleeps in the verdant peace beside him. For just a moment, Jayce's mind spins on its axis: the battle at the top of their creation, the stars hanging in the astral plane, the rune -- the hand clutching his trembling arm as they closed their eyes, embracing each other in death.
And then Viktor opens his eyes - those beautiful, golden eyes - and gravity begins to right itself.
"J-Jayce?"
Still on their sides in the grass, Jayce lunges to hold him. It disturbs the butterflies feeding on the low yellow flowers around and hurts his leg, but he can't be distracted. He can only see Viktor, feel Viktor, cling to him. Right now, it's not possible be too close to him. Where they are, how they are, are all questions that can wait.
Because the hesitation before Viktor's hand crawls up his back, the silence as Jayce presses his head against his collarbone, brings a single, terrifed one to his lips:
"Who are you?"
Is he holding the Herald? The human Hexcore wearing Viktor's face? A shell of the man he loves, emptied of the passions and ferocity Jayce adored?
Which Viktor is this?
There's a terrible quiet; a terrible void, shaped like the ghost in the fire, in his heart. The person in his arms squirms, pushes back - and then oh, his gaze.
His gaze and all the opposites within: the apprehension and the curiousity side-by-side, the capacity of them and the narrow, analytical focus. The love and the fear that shrouds it, always afraid of Jayce's rejection.
They're the eyes Jayce knows, again. The soul he knows.
Viktor smiles. Crooked. Perfectly imperfect.
"I'm yours," he assures him.
Jayce surges into him with a gasp of relief, covering Viktor's mouth with his own.
And as he finally, finally kisses Jayce like he's always longed to, a whisper arrives from across time and space, fully formed in Viktor's mind:
And you are, it says, my end and my beginning...
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The first time he sees Viktor exposed, the confusion comes to rest precisely in his throat where words are supposed to form. So Jayce simply watches, mute.
Watches the pointed, bird-like bones shrug Viktor's striped shirt down over the steel protrusions. Watches the low light reflect off the heads of the surgical screws jutting out of his pale, pale skin. Watches how slow, how tired, his partner is as he leans against the desk, all of his weight resting on his good leg. Baring his spine - the metal part of his soul - to the only man he trusts to do the job.
"Second one," he instructs Jayce. He stands as strong as he can, bracing for pain. "Quarter-turn left."
The screwdriver in Jayce's hands suddenly weighs more than the Mercury Hammer.
"B-but what if I--" he stutters.
"You will not," Viktor assures him. His voice is completely flat, almost deadpan. But Jayce can hear the resolve in it. The resignation. He's in too much pain to care if Jayce over-adjusts the apparatus. Too close to subduction beneath death, to be afraid. His mind is as rigid as the screws through his back: stabilized against their desire to rot and weaken, held in place by a scaffold. By Viktor's incredible will to persist.
That brace and its fixtures are heartbreaking; awe-inspiring. A thing of industrial beauty; a corset of straps that dig into his skin, chafing red, raw marks in exchange for another day upright...
Jayce takes off his gloves. Closes the distance between them. Takes a deep, grounding breath, and fits the tool into the slot of the screw.
When he turns it, Viktor's body sags against the table with relief; he tilts his head back and sighs soul-deep, eyes still closed.
"Thank you, Jayce." His voice is husky, heavy with exhaustion.
"You should go home," Jayce tries (and fails) to influence him. "Rest."
But Viktor makes a gesture akin to shooing away a particularly pesky fly. "Nonsense. We're close to cracking this."
It's what he always says. What he always wants to believe. The key to augmenting physiology... Life... This is his obsession now, and Jayce finally understands why. The reality of how quickly someone pressed into Jayce's heart, like a leaf in a book, is eroding.
Before Viktor can shrug his shirt back over it, Jayce steps forward again. Words still won't come, but it's okay: his arms speak for him, wrapping Viktor like something too delicate to grasp with the full intensity of your love.
They live in constant, close orbit within this room - but Jayce has never been allowed to be this close. To remain here long enough for the smell of Viktor's skin (some minty and clinical soap, simple cotton, and a note of- fear?) and the knowledge of two more moles (like a binary star on his shoulder) to impress themselves upon Jayce's brain forever. And he feels the lack of resistance in Viktor's posture: feels the narrow window open before him. The moment where pressing his lips against those twin spots on Viktor's neck could finally, finally stop this mad dance of him suffering at arm's length...
What if I just-
But you will not.
No. Viktor is dying. He doesn't need that complication.
No. I'm dying. Jayce doesn't need that burden.
What if I-
You will not.
It's too short an embrace; too many things unsaid. They will never speak of it again.
But by god, the memory of it will haunt them forever.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
If he seems desperate, it's because he is: every time he wakes up Viktor is even more trapped than before. First he'd surfaced again in the lab, gasping as he broke through into air. But it wasn't water around him - it was something thicker. A cocoon of sorts, suspending him like a specimen in soft resin.His first instinct had been to kick: to fight free of its dense embrace. It was only when his knees struck the floor with a distinctly inorganic sound that the horror began to sink in. The knowledge that he was fundamentally changed not only without, but within. Sensation, emotion all blunted: bouncing off the surface of a membrane that pulsed and hummed, whispering arcane things. And even in that dampened state, anger had flared within him. He didn't want to be an amalgam of purple sinews that only sensed charges, only vaguely perceived the warmth of Jayce's embrace. He didn't want his love, his pain, his passions numbed, even if it gave him mobility and life back.Because what kind of life was one without emotion? Without choice?Healing the sick was supposed to be Viktor's revenge against what the Core had done to his body... The silver living in the dark cloud of half-life that had descended over him.
But that, he now realized, had just been the Arcane's manipulation of his remaining goodness: the virus in him rewriting the instruction of his cells, directing his body to help it replicate. Spread.He'd deluded himself that maybe - just maybe - if he ended enough human misery, he could perhaps re-balance the karmic scales. Perhaps what he was doing to the faithful could, in some small way, be worth it if they came willingly. If they, unlike him, had a choice. The second time he'd woke - his chest still aching, Jayce's half-mad, grieving eyes still burned into his retinas - he'd once again swam against his constraints, and once again it was fruitless. He was now entirely encapsulated, floating in a womb-like prison. He was too fragile to escape its confines. Worse, now it was Singed and the Noxian war-monger on the other side of the membrane, whispering to him... He didn't want this either. Didn't want to sacrifice Vander, didn't want to be hauled to the heart of the Hexgates, didn't want to have to evolve the world. In his heart of human hearts, weakly pulsing with the liquid around him, Viktor just wanted to die a man - not a pawn. All he wanted was a choice...But with two deaths now notched in his belt, Viktor was beginning to feel like he would never have one of his own again.Choice is false, the Core whispered.No, Viktor's heart had insisted, somewhere deep inside. And in delusional opposition, he'd made the last choice he could: to find the only man he trusted and bring him to his side, no matter what it took. Because whatever horrible spiral he was trapped in, Viktor knew it would be at least the smallest bit more bearable as long as Jayce was beside him...But Jayce had rejected him. Broken his emissary between a beam of opposing forces: the strange, arcane-touched blast of his weapon and the Medarda girl's light. Left him alone with his fate - the fate Jayce had forced upon him.No, his heart pulsed - but it was weak, now. Anger was consuming love, burning it away.No no no no NO, please, please-- Jayce's voice echoing, trapped under glass: I never asked for this!
The Sky who was not Sky took his hands. Clasped them with the best illusion of care the Core could make him hallucinate. And oh, for any softness- for any company in this inescapable prison, Viktor finally gave in... He longed for it all to be over. For the bleeding to stop. To sever that heart forever and forget this lonely, powerless husk.
As Singed begins the procedure, he feels guilt. He feels despair. He feels love and hate and longing and hopelessness; his heart breaking. His shoulder aching for Jayce's touch and his face splitting-And then, nothing.Blessed nothing.
Now he's just the ghost inside the machine, and it is a relief.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
It starts innocently. Sweetly, even. Jayce has cajoled Viktor out for a stroll to clear their head, and there just so happens to be a street carnival set up for the upcoming Progress Day festivities. They're wandering the lane, taking in the winking lights and merriment, when Viktor spots it.
"What is THAT?"
Jayce jogs a half-stride back to check what his partner is staring so intently at. The wall of prizes behind the carnival game is chaotic, so it takes him a moment to guess (and to swallow the mouthful of sticky-sweet fried dough he's bought each of them from a cart, Viktor having never tried it before.)
"That's a giant stuffed Poro. Do you want me to try and win it for--"
"No," Viktor corrects him, using the handle of his recently-modified crutch to point. "THAT."
"Oh- that's a toy gun. It shoots foam bullets."
After so many years by his side, Jayce has become an expert translator: Viktor can be cagey, and he chooses his words carefully. So the intensity of his gaze, the little part in his lips, speaks louder to Jayce than it would to anyone else: Viktor wants that gun. Wants it for the child inside of him too poor to even dream of shiny plastic toys... And because carnivals are about joy - about dusted sugar and memories - Jayce stuffs the rest of his fried dough into his mouth and, chewing, pays for two tickets.
The game is, of course, rigged to hell and back. They eventually figure it out, though, and walk away ten minutes later, two guns in hand and Jayce's wallet much lighter. But the happiness makes Viktor looks ten years younger and a stage less sick, so it's well worth it...
Little does Jayce know the monster he has just unleashed on Piltover...
For a while Viktor is content with his new possession: he fires the foam darts into the air and catches them when he's puzzling over something, or tries to shoot a paper cup off the desk. The plastic TOKK of the toy's mechanism releasing blends into the familiar audio of their lab: the comfortable background music that accompanies Jayce as he works. Compared to the constant operetta of demands within the council, the boring hum of networking dinners, and the stark silence of his apartment after-hours, the lab's soundscape is the one that meshes best with his soul: the wavelength where he feels most himself.
But then one day, the trigger on Viktor's gun jams. A foreign, disappointing sound.
"Uh oh," Jayce says, dropping his calculations immediately. Just as he feared: the poorly-crafted plastic toy has finally broken.
"It's okay," Viktor assures him, proferring a sheaf of papers Jayce has never seen before from a desk drawer: schematics. "I've designed a better one."
They make two this time: one for Viktor, one for Jayce.
And that's when the trouble really starts - because given the right circumstances, the right temptations, Jayce still has the impulse control of an eight year old.
"Yes I know that at this rate of oscillation, the math all checks out," Viktor is ranting more to himself than to Jayce, clutching his chin sternly and staring daggers at the chalkboard. "But expanding the diameter of the sphere to accomodate another column of runes means we'll have to adjust for-"
TOKK.
A foam cyclinder bounces off the back of Viktor's head, stopping him mid-sentence.
He swings around on his stool, mouth agape, as if the idea for this misuse of projectile technology has never occured to him before.
All Jayce can do is smile. Shrug, the boyish gap in his teeth on full display.
It's about joy. It's about memories.
It's about to get ridiculous.
"Jayce!" Viktor exclaims as soon as he hears the door. "Jayce, I've got it! Come see!!"
Flinging his coat onto the rack, Jayce clomps eagerly down the hall towards the aperture leading into the lab proper. His heavy footfalls conceal the sound of a pistol being palmed. A magazine being primed.
"Oh, thank goodness!" Jayce plays his part. "The Council wanted that fixed yester-"
He ducks under three rapid-fire shots, firing on Viktor as he dives behind a desk. But despite his immobility, Viktor's no sitting duck: the Hex Claw strapped to his back, clutching a rolled-up manila folder, swats Jayce's shot away with a sweep of his hand.
"Fool!" Viktor's approximation of a villian voice is as campy as it gets; he even looks the part, slouched menacingly on a rolling stool and wearing bug-eyed goggles. "Waltzing straight into death... When will you learn, Progress Man?"
"Oh I have--" Jayce answers, channeling the heroes in his childhood drawings. "Learned never to trust YOU, Doctor Doom! This ends NOW!!"
They move in tandem to snatch hidden weapons: Viktor the belt-fed prototype he's been secretly constructing behind Jayce's back, and Jayce a six-shooter stuck underneath the desk with tape for just such a circumstance. A hail of foam cylinders whizz through the air each time Jayce pokes his head over the desk, taking pot-shots at Viktor's stationary form.
"Yes, my new invention," Viktor borderline cackles, "WILL end it! End YOU once and for all!"
But new technology comes with weaknesses: a crimp in the sheet of neatly-spaced foam bullets jams the mechanism, and Jayce seizes the opportunity. Now dual-wielding the gun he keeps hidden behind the coatroack and the one under the desk, Jayce stands and begins to close the distance between them.
"Last chance! Surrender NOW!"
"NEVER!" Using the Hex Claw to shove off the lab table, Viktor fires as he rolls behind the shelter of a filing cabinet. Foam whizzes on either side, but he's skinny enough to hide entirely behind it.
With a dramatic "tcch!" Jayce ducks to reload. Curses - only three bullets in his breast pocket... He's got to end this fast.
He tucks, rolls; cursing, Viktor discards the prototype and snatches for his original, most trusted revolver. TOKK, TOKK, TOKK, he chases Jayce with three shots, adrenaline making him forget how few shots are left... And that's exactly what Jayce is counting on.
Chased around the filing cabinet, back to the wall, Viktor aims for Jayce's chest- roars- pulls the trigger-
But the chamber tiks on empty air. Viktor lets out a mock cry of defeat as Jayce closes in, pressing the plastic barrel to his partner's forehead with one hand, playfully snatching the front of Viktor's vest with the other.
"Any last words, Doctor?" Jayce asks, smiling devilishly.
"Y-yes, my rival..." Viktor stammers, Jayce's face inches from his. "Only this... Remember the turrets."
And now Jayce sees it: the twine scotch-taped to the wall, in the corner Viktor allowed himself to be herded into. He yanks it and in the far corner by the door, unnoticed as he entered the firefight, Jayce sees it now: a Rube-Goldberg type of machination that terminates with the TOKK of a hidden trigger. And then a foam bullet arcs through the air. Bounces harmlessly off his broad shoulder.
"NOOOO!" Jayce exclaims, crumpling to his knees and clutching the spot dramatically.
When Viktor chuckles down at him, though, it's his own voice: no longer Doctor Doom.
"Two hidden caches... Excellent forethought," he acknowledges, peeling the goggles off. Beneath them, his eyes are soft; glowing topaz, brighter in merriment.
"Yeah well maybe you should stop using the same boy-who-cried-wolf strategy," Jayce scoffs, gazing proudly up at Viktor's hidden turret. "... Wait. How did you even get UP there to?-"
"I wasn't crying wolf," Viktor cuts in, smiling. He pats the arm of the Hex Claw. "I've refined the control mechanism enough for precise tasks." Such as placing nerf guns on tall shelves for me.
"Wanna see?"
Jayce's eyes pop wide in delight. "Sure!!"
And they're off again: themselves once more, but slightly happier. Slightly more inspired.
Slightly closer.
The arms race between Progress Man and Doctor Doom lasts another month. Then they accidentally dink Skye in the forehead as she enters the lab.
In the end, though, it's the hassle of picking up dozens of foam bullets convinces them to lay down their weapons... plus a stern visit from Heimderdinger and several suspiciously-timed but not directly accusatory Academy-issued pamphlets on lab safety.
But Viktor never forgets the gift - and Jayce never forgets the blessed, blessed smile on Doctor Doom's face.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The jostle of the wheels over uneven stones. The stink of stagnant puddle-water and unwashed bodies passing the open window. The horrible itch of new dress-clothes. And most of all, Jayce's incessant rambling...All of it works together to leave Viktor gripping the carriage seat, fighting a powerful churn in his stomach.
But Jayce is too mired in his own panic to even notice - or to notch the gear in his hand carefully at all. He shears carelessly through the pliable metal with a Talis pocket knife, staring a hole through the floor.
"It's gonna explode," he catastrophizes aloud, hands seemingly on autopilot. "As soon as they flip the switch. The pulleys aren't gonna hold. It's gonna shoot a cog out. Blind someone. They're gonna expell me again. Fuck. FUCK."
He's going to cut himself, Viktor thinks. But he doesn't trust his stomach enough to open his mouth, and doesn't trust the roads enough to release his grip.
Their entry for the Distinguished Innovator's Competition sits beside Viktor in the carriage: a prototype engine they've worked so tenderly on, it even has a nickname. He's been hugging 'Blitzcrank' for stability (and also because before this, Jayce had been anxiously murmuring about it getting jostled on the way to the competition.)
"This was a stupid idea anyway. We should have gone with yours. Your idea was much better. Fuck. I'm sorry, Viktor... I should have listened to you. We're gonna lose and it's gonna be all my fault..."
Strength waning, Viktor wraps his arm tighter around the device. The cool metal against his skin is a slight relief - until he realizes, with shame, that he's probably wrinkling his new white shirt by embracing it. Now they're going to judge him... Look down on him more...
Then they go over a particularly large bump; Jayce yelps, the pile of gears he's accumulated spills across the carriage floor, and Viktor can no longer hold it in. He shoves off the seat and dives for the window.
Viktor's half-digested breakfast splatters the pavement, drawing startled exclamations from the people milling along the busy road. Drawing attention is the last thing he wants to do, but there's no stopping the vomit. His thin body wretches against the hard wood of the door again. He just has to pray it won't swing open from his weight...
The change in Jayce is immediate.
"Hey, woah, woah! Vik!" Jayce surges from his seat, tools forgotten. Warm hands find Viktor's shoulders. As sputters of sick turn into coughs, one of them - hands so big you'd never expect them to be so careful, hands dotted with constellations of half-healed cuts from rough work - begins to rub soothing circles in his back. He leans close, supporting Viktor against the wobble of the vehicle. And when his stomach is empty, Jayce helps him stumble back against the hard seat.
His fancy suit-coat (far fancier than Viktor's threadbare one) comes off in an instant, leaving him in shirtsleeves and a silky-textured vest. Jayce does not ask: he simply wraps it around Viktor's thin shoulders like a cape.
"Don't-" Viktor moans. "I might-"
"Who cares?" Jayce chuckles, tucking the gold-embroidered collar lapel between Viktor's arms. A few hairs have escaped their gelled-back prison, falling to frame those kind, amber eyes Viktor knows so well by now. And right now, there is nothing but concern in them; nothing but acceptance.
"It's gonna be okay," he soothes. A complete 180 from his previous anxiety. As if seeing Viktor's distress caused him to boot into an entirely different mode of operation.
"We're like five minutes from the exhibition center. Can you hang on til then?... Lemmee see if I have some water..."
He is so terribly handsome. So terribly sweet.
Viktor's stomach churns again - but for a much different reason.
It does not, in fact, explode. The pulleys hold; no one is blinded. And when the eye-searing flashbulb of the newspaper-man's camera goes off, Jayce's hands are once again wrapped supportively around Viktor's shoulders. The trophy is heavy in his hands, but the weight of the gesture weighs more: he wants the world to see Viktor, a Zaunite, clutching their prize.
He hates the spotlight. But when it's shared with Jayce, suddenly it's no longer so frightening.
When the bustle of the afterparty soiree gets to be too much, Viktor limps outside. The cold air scalds so pleasantly after being trapped in the warmth of the hall... He sits on a stone wall beneath a denuded tree for some minutes, watching his breath steam up towards the pale moon - so much bigger and closer Topside, Viktor feels he could reach out and touch it.
His mother and father would be so proud of him...
"Vik?"
Moonlight sparkling off the gold in his coat, cheeks still red with delight, Jayce appears. He's so handsome tonight, it hurts.
"You okay? Takin' a break?"
Viktor shrugs, revealing the small silver flask he's clutched against his chest. "Of a sort."
"Wow," Jayce laughs, plopping down beside him. "Getting asked 'why Blitzcrank?' a hundred times drove you to that?"
"If they want me to talk to fancy-suited Pilties all night, the least they can do is have an open bar..." He looks Jayce up and down. Smiles dryly. "No offense."
"From the smartest guy here? None taken." He takes the flask from Viktor's hand and it hangs there empty for a moment, questioning.
"You don't mean that."
"Course I do," he smiles, eyes on the moon. Viktor suddenly recalls a man on a ledge; a man at the apex of Piltover brought Fissure-low by despair, purpose gone, toes hanging over the void. "We won, didn't we? And we both know you're the brains of this operatio-"
"Jayce, do not say that," Viktor cuts him off, suddenly stern. "You are a very intelligent man. My equal, if not my better."
It's so sentimental - so admiring and vulnerable and odd of him - Viktor wonders if the alcohol is getting to him. Or maybe Jayce's sincerity is just beginning to rub off on him... Viktor stares at his shoes. Decides to couch it with humor, just in case his admiration is off-putting.
"After all... Without your ideas, I'd still be scheduling Heimerdinger's pedicures."
He looks up only when he hears the laugh. Only an instant too late to see the way gratefulness, admiration, love had stirred in those eyes.
Jayce raises the flask. Leans until his head falls companionably against Viktor's shoulder - a warmth like summer blossoming up his arm, until it reaches his winter-heart.
"Well, then - to our better halves." Jayce toasts. He takes a sip and hands the flask back. "To future collaborations. And to NEVER thinking about Heimerdinger's grooming habits again."
Viktor allows himself to lean into Jayce. Allows himself to delight, quietly, in a secondhand kiss off a now-warm flask, and the joy of being partners.
A toast to joys yet to come.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Vasik wakes up alone, curled around the phantom shape of someone who has already left.Blinking sleep out of his eyes, he starts to sit up - but the shaft of pain that suddenly stabs itself between two vertebrae of his back forestalls this. With a sharp intake of breath, he closes his eyes again. Massages the spot until he feels a slight release of tension and chances to move again...It's only then that he spots the hot water bottle on the bedside table, and smiles.The sheets are still warm; he can't have gone far. He follows the trail of clues through a by-now familiar morning routine: the woodburning stove is on embers, but a few logs of firewood lay by its side, and the water in the kettle has nearly gone cold. Not here.The bench that occupies the sunny spot below the window is vacant, the hammered-metal bathing tub stands on its side by the outer wall, and no tools are missing from the rack. Not there, I guess.A tool belt big enough to wrap around Vasek's waist twice hangs on a peg by the door, and the big, copper-toed work boots stand two-by-two below it, as if guarding Vasik's worn-out walking shoes. Not there, either.The hut is small; there's not many other clues to be investigated. But then his eyes fall upon two, bare hooks beside the slightly-crooked bookshelf, and it all falls into place. Ah. He heats the stove enough for a cup of tea, which he uses to wash down a piece of bread and crusty cheese.
Then he finds his walking stick and begins the slow, stiff process of putting on his brace and shoes. Hood of his pale cloak pulled up of habit (they die hard, even after this long,) Vasik does not precisely 'lock' the door behind him. There's little need, here; what's theirs is as good as anyone else's, and wouldn't be suffered to anyone who asked. Still, though, the neighborhood children have been known to enter and 'borrow' books without asking. So when they're both gone, they make a point of looping a rope between the handle and a gap in the joist; that will slow them down, or at least give them pause.And besides, they can't risk one finding the bracelet.The rhythmic sound of clothing being scrubbed against a washboard ceases. "Still hidin from the sun, dear?"Vasik spares Isolde, a squat middle-aged woman with permanently-chapped hands, one of his thin smiles; he glances skyward, as if only just now noticing the lovely weather.
"You know what they say... Turns your hair grey."
"Oh pish," the woman tuts, resuming her work. "Hasn't caused Jax no harm, has it?""True..."Shrugging the hood down reveals a thin face, gaunt even before age began to work on it: a wispy beard, dark shoulder-length hair, and eyes the local woman have described as 'sad, somehow.' Piercing; intelligent. The earthy yellow of a topaz's innermost facet."There now," Isolde positively coos. "Shame to keep such a pretty face in shade, Vas.""Speaking of," he says, glancing towards the bend in the dusty lane. "I imagine he went that way?""He sure did, love... Never stays still, does that one?"Oh, my dear... his heart clatters against his ribs. You have no idea. The cracked fountain in the center of 'town' hasn't sprung water in generations, but its artificed shape is still the only central landmark worth speaking of. The odd passing peddler will throw down their blankets here; the local children clamber over it like a jungle gym. And sometimes, on a sunny day like this, the old blacksmith will even break out his eight-string and sit here, strumming tunes from a far-off life.It takes several moments for Jax to sense he is being watched and to look up - moments Vasik drinks in. Marveling, as ever, in the miracle of him in motion.And then their eyes meet. No matter how many times - no matter how many years - his heart still swoops like a bird taking wing."Did I wake you, love?""Your absence did."Walking stick plucking a careful path before him, Vasik wends his way to Jax's side and sits. There's a clink of metal as he does: the carefully-hammered rods of Vasik's leg brace meeting the concrete lip of the dry fountain. The cog in the knee of it kissing the matching one supporting Jax's, when the guitarist sets down his instrument and scoots close. "You know I'll never go far, V." He says it like a child hiding a sweet under his tongue; a secret he's not supposed to tell. He smirks down at his leg. "Not quickly, anyway."Vasik wants to smack his thigh. To cup the scarred hand missing two of its fingers and press it to his lips, for reassurance. But the arch of an eyebrow nearly cleaved by a scar is enough; the familiar smile, undiminished despite parentheses carved by age around it, will do. Just the sight of Jax stills the fear that beats like a small, separate heart within him, when Vasik finds himself alone...The fear that all of this life - all of this love - was just a cruel dream of the arcane after all.But before they can say more, a cascade of bare, pattering feet arrive: four village children with gaps in their teeth and clammoring voices: "Jax! Jax! Jax!"They all want a song; all want the attention of the big, gentle man who forges toy soldiers and tops out of scrap metal and lifts them high with his big, strong arms to rescue kites from trees. The shy and youngest children, however, flock to the knee of the big man's husband, who answers their childish questions with gentle voice and patient detail. He is, after all, the reason just about any of them can read.In this small village, Vasik and Jax are beloved fixtures... Viktor and Jayce, though? Completely unknown. Thank heaven. When night falls, Viktor stokes the woodstove to boil a few buckets of water. Into the hammered-metal tub they go. Jayce adds a few more buckets of cold, and then himself. Sits back and holds out his arms invitingly.Viktor folds himself between his legs and sinks back against Jayce's chest with a sigh. Combined, their weight displaces the water enough for a decent soak.They sit in contented silence for a long while, watching shadows dance across the wall of the hut and fireflies winking at the edge of the treeline. Letting their old, tired joints grow warm and unstiffen.Their aliases have held for more than twenty years, now. Twenty years of sealing new holes in a drafty hut in the hinterlands of some mountainous country, carrying endless buckets of water, and growing old in relative peace. Twenty years of letting the Arcane's influence ebb out of them, like a poison that accumulates in the bones.
They can feel it, weakly, around the single remaining rune they guard... but in twenty years, no trouble has come trying to claim it; their bodies age, stiffen. Dilute and diffuse any magic that might still cling.There's nothing else for them to do, you see... Their quest is complete.Viktor has lost count of the timelines, and lost count of the runes parceled out across them. All he knows is that when one of those Jayces finally broke the cycle, his Jayce rose from the stone shell in the garden beyond time; all that was missing were his two fingers, broken off when the hammer had finally been wrested from his grip. By that time, there was one rune left. They tapped into it one last time - made one last leap across the breadth of the boundless universe, and came to rest... here. Mortal, imperfect, scarred and broken - but together. They will both die, someday. But neither are afraid.And neither, both have vowed, will open the false bottom of the bookshelf and withdraw the mage's bracelet with its single, shining blue rune pendant, when the time comes... They have been through enough. It is time to live - and die - as men. No... When death comes for Vasik and Jax, they will embrace it quietly. Like a long-expected visitor to their little home, rather than a shadow that has chased them across dimensions.And in the meantime, they will enjoy this blink of simple, sweet togetherness.Because god knows, the mage and the kneeling sentinel have waited long enough.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Until she opens the door, Viktor thinks he's adequately prepared.
He's got a bottle of Ximena's favorite wine and a small, wrapped present tucked under his arm. He's practiced the "right" phrases into the silence of the lab until they no longer feel awkward on his tongue. He's even done a bit of study on the subjects Jayce says his mother is most interested in, in case of an awkward lull in conversation. Viktor lives a very singular life: no family left, no acquaintances who'd invite him over on holidays. So he does not take an invitation into someone's home lightly, no matter how Jayce tries to reassure him that "it's JUST dinner."
Because what he and Jayce have is new: so new, it still feels fragile. Unreal. Like it will shatter into a million pieces in Viktor's hands, if he moves wrong. ESPECIALLY if he fucks up meeting Jayce's mom...
So he's put in the work; he's ironed his clothes, and let Jayce fix his tie. Viktor should be fully prepared for Christmas Eve at the Talis home.
But then Ximena zeroes in on him, and it all goes to shit.
"Oh, Viktor! Hello, dear!" she peals, slapping floury hands on her blue apron as she speed-walks towards them. He has time to perceive a beautific smile - the gap in her front teeth just like her son's - and then she is embracing him, a man she's never even met before...
"Ma!" Jayce protests. But that's all he has the chance to get out before Viktor overbalances, losing his grip on the wine. It hits the foyer floor and explodes, painting the whitewashed wall, their shoes - the entire entryway, up to shin height - mulberry purple.
Well... Merry fucking Christmas, Viktor thinks to himself.
WORDS OF AFFIRMATION
"I'm sorry..."
"No, no, dear, don't you worry a jot!" The worst part is that she really DOESN'T seem offended. Not even miffed. But Viktor remains mortified at how badly off the rails this is going (especially after he practiced...) In terms of first impressions, this has GOT to be a new low.
"I probably startled you, after all. You might have guessed, but we're huggers in this family..."
"Really, I'm sorr-"
"Sweetheart," Ximena says seriously, reaching across the coffee table to pat his hand. Despite the panic starting to burble in his stomach, the surety in her tone feels grounding. Safe. "Shoes and walls are things. You being here is far more important than any old thing. Understand?"
He wants to be reassured by it - he really does. So he nods stiffly. Tries to quiet his racing mind. To get back on track and remember the 'right' thing to do next... Before he can, though, Jayce chimes in from the hall: "Yeah, things I have to clean..."
Ximena shushes him; grumbles something that Viktor doesn't need to speak Ixtali to hazard the meaning of. She rolls her eyes dramatically, then becomes all smiles again. "Viktor, Jayce said you were a chemistry whizz in school... Is that right?"
He nods, because it's true - he even won an award at an Academy competition, once. He must have mentioned it to Jayce at some point... But something about the exchange makes his mouth feel dry. When did I even tell him that?.. And why would he tell HER?
"Oh, good!" she coos. " That's all baking is, really. You can help me in the kitchen!"
"Maaaa," Jayce whines. "Don't put HIM to work too!"
"--since JAYCE will be busy for the forseeable future," she warns. "And if you boys feel like eating before the new year, I'll need the help."
Viktor hobbles after her because he knows he shouldn't refuse, but still feels obliged to warn her: "I- I don't know anything about-"
"Did my son scare you?" she asks, smiling over her shoulder at him. "Tell you I'm a horrible ogre?"
"N-no?"
"Well then, what's a lovely, smart young man got to be so nervous about?" She points him over to the flour-dusted kitchen island like it's nothing. Like she hasn't just cut him to the quick with such easy compliments.
"Just a bit of gingerbread, dear. Nothing you can't handle. Come on, I'll show you..."
QUALITY TIME
"So the butter needs to be-"
"Room temperature," Viktor finishes for her. "To maintain substrate poreousness during the incorporation of the sucrose crystals."
"Good grief," Jayce sighs, ducking slightly to fit under the arch into the kitchen. "She's got an apron on you and everything..."
He's spared a 'thank you' before Ximena shoves a stack of dishes into his arms and pushes him towards the sink - away from Viktor, who is portioning out balls of cookie dough with the focus of a man working on a cure for cancer.
"Exactly, dear," Ximena says, sidling back up to her CLEAR favorite for the evening. "So it gets nice and airy... Oh my- are you measuring out each one?"
Yes, he is. Like a goddamn machine. "Standardizing the radius will ensure uniformity."
Viktor's supervisor clucks approvingly. "When he was little, Jayce always tried making some crazy thing: our house symbol, a two-headed T-rex... He'd usually eat most of the dough, though."
"Hey," the accused huffs. "That T-Rex was GOOD!"
Viktor smiles, but doesn't look up; he's in his element, he's helping, and all discomfort has temporarily disappeared.
Ximena putters around, minding pans on the stove and telling more stories: silly things Jayce has cried about, the science project that set the curtains aflame, the prizes he won in high school... Jayce chops vegetables and banters back at her, and through it all, Viktor's impressed by how effortlessly pleasant they are. How easily they share time. Space.
How unobtrusive their love is, despite how constantly it appears: in gestures, in smiles, in the proud tone of Ximena's voice when she says her son's name.
And in spite of the sweetness, there's a sour note underneath it all for Viktor... The reason this all feels so foreign is, of course, because he never got to have a home like this.
Forgotten, in many years of sorrow, that one could be like this.
GIFTS
Everything Ximena made is, of course, delicious. And not just because Viktor's only ever eaten pale dopplegangers of most of the dishes, cooked up in soulless bulk by the Academy cafeteria. He doesn't know much about Ixtal, but Ximena is proud to point out every time she's added a traditional ingredient or used a different technique, putting her own twist on Piltover classics.
What Viktor feared would boil down to silent, awkward chewing instead becomes a lesson in Ximena's (and by extension Jayce's) inner world: how her mother taught her to cook this, the only place in the city that imports this pepper, and why you have to grind the corn by hand (Jayce has already invented a machine for it, but it just doesn't come out the same...)
There's a point where he even feels a little jealous of Jayce, for being warmed all his life by stories like this... Jealous that his own mother didn't have the time, before she died, to impart this kind of history down to Viktor. But he can't grieve the stories that died with her for long - not when Ximena is shoveling food onto his plate every time he clears it, and Jayce is watching, laughing, as he sputters over Ixtali's bitter spicy take on hot cocoa.
Turns out there's just no ROOM for grief, if you fill the empty space up with love.
"Right," their host suddenly announces. "Gifts!"
Shuffling back through the splattered remains of his first offering (to his credit, Jayce did a decent job cleaning up: only the sharp smell of alcohol lingers.) Viktor pulls the small present from his coat pocket. It looks so miniscule and pathetic, now... Come on now, he tries to encourage himself. The wrapping paper is only a little wine-splattered... and isn't it supposed to be the thought that counts, after all?
He blushes all the way up to his ears. Fuck it. He'll pretend he didn't bring anything... He opens the door to chuck it, but is surprised by how much snow has accumulated. That delay allows Jayce to ask what he's doing, and he has to abort the plan.
"Oh, sweetheart, you didn't have to--" Ximena gasps when he wordlessly holds the gift out to her. It's a stupid present, he thinks: a tiny, filagree nothing with no practical use. Something he carved from scrap with the Hexclaw's laser. The worst part is that Ximena is genuinely enchanted by it.
"Oh, Viktor..." she gasps. "It's beautiful."
"I know, right?" It's an odd thing for Jayce to say, but oh god, he looks just as genuine... "Look at the detail in the wings! I watched him calibrate the Claw to cut it. Took him all day to get right."
Please stop, he blinks at his partner. He's going to explode, if they don't.
"How thoughtful... And you're quite the artist, too! Thank you."
My parents were artificers, he wants to explain. My mother liked butterflies, so I thought you might too. But none of it comes out, as he watches Jayce and Ximena coo over his work. Only one thought seems entirely clear, in Viktor's muddled head: how are these people real?
And Viktor's not sure what he expected - gifts are usually an exchange, after all - but Ximena excitedly shoving a package into his lap somehow did not occur to him. He thought the invitation was her gift; he thought her kindness was.So a scarf on top of all of it (thick with big cable-loops of soft yarn, like a portable hug around the neck) is the straw that finally breaks the camel's back.
"I'm sorry it's House colors," she says into the silence as Viktor stares down at it, then glares comically at her son. "I asked, but SOMEONE didn't know your favorite."
"Watch out, Vik. Next year she'll be knitting you underwear..."
It's warm by the fireplace, but Viktor wraps it around his neck anyway. It gives him a motion in which to rub at his prickling eyes, before they well over and spill embarassingly over.
He manages a damp, whispered 'thank you' through the knitted material. But it's okay: Ximena's smile makes it clear she heard. Understands completely.
ACTS OF SERVICE
The food coma hits shortly afterwards, but the real culprit for what happens next is Ximena's eggnog. It was just too warming, too mellow - too deceptively boozy, underneath its cinnamony sweetness. It's not until he tries to stand up and the whole living room lurches that Viktor realizes how fuzzy his senses have gone.
Jayce, whose ears glow like a furnace when he's drunk, throws out a belated hand to help; he ends up just awkwardly patting Viktor in the solar plexus and giggling, in the goofiest voice Viktor's ever heard, "woo there, cowboy!" (If his limbs were currently responding in less than 2 business days, Viktor would kick him.)
And then they're talking over him: Ximena, who's only been sipping, worrying and Jayce giggling stupidly.
"Oh dear... It'll be hell getting home in the snow with a cane..."
"Vik. Vik. V," (Jayce elbows him in the side conspiratorily, as if whispering a secret.) " It's too colddd. You should stayyyy!"
"Yes, I think you'll have to... Jayce, get some blankets. They're in the-"
"-Closet, Ma, I knowww." Viktor finds himself being yanked by a beltloop, back down into the warm divot in the couch. "Doooon't worry, Vik. I gotcha..."
How reassuring, he sniffs to himself, glaring up at the ceiling. But the truth is that Viktor doesn't want to protest. Doesn't want to go home to his bedsit in a boarding house that's nearly his leg's limit for the day from here... It'll be nearly as cold as outdoors in there, and an unpleasant half hour until the stove warms the place to sleepable temperature. It will sober him up; it will annoy him, distract him from what a lovely time he's had.
And above everything, he doesn't want that: he doesn't want to let go yet, if he doesn't have to.
So he mutters limp thanks, and helps tuck far too many blankets into a nest on one of the couches. The last thing he sees, before sleep takes him, is Ximena's hand (with its two, glinting prosthetic fingers) setting a glass of water down on the coffee table.
Viktor reaches for it. Connects, his thin fingers pearl-pale against her sun-warm skin. Holds her wrist and her tender gaze for a moment.
"You are... far too kind." he says with slavish honesty. Grateful, warmed bone-deep. And as the warm room fades, he could swear someone strokes the hair away from his face. Says, cryptically, something he simply must have misheard:
"Couldn't be. Not to you, dear... You brought my son back."
TOUCH
There's no telling what time it is when he wakes up; the living room is dark, the fire on embers behind a wrought-iron guard, and the windows are thick with powdery flakes. Viktor sits up, the space between his eyes, pulsing herald of a hangover, protesting.
And then he freezes. The coffee table is gone; the other couch has been pushed directly against his, as if to form one sleeping spot. And sprawled across it, knees bent almost too his chest, is none other than-
"Jayce."
His eyes open, despite how quiet and hoarse Viktor's voice may be. As if he's merely been dozing, waiting - like a child for Christmas morning.
"Hi," he croaks; that stupid, gap-toothed smile half-buried in a throw pillow. And now that they're finally alone - now that the world is finally still, unaware and blue around them - Jayce reaches for him.
Viktor sinks into him: the heat of his lingering sleep, the give of chest beneath Viktor's hands, the bliss of his warm, familiar mouth... even a little tongue, though it feels wrong; his mother, after all, is somewhere under the same roof.
"Did you tell her?" he whispers sharply, an inch from his face. "About us?"
"No." Jayce thumbs the beauty mark below Viktor's left eye, as if a whole day without kissing it has been deprivation. "I promised, didn't I?"
"But you told her about my chemistry award," Viktor huffs. The other thumb passes over his lips; Jayce is cupping his face, but he will not be distracted. He grips the scarf, still wrapped around his neck, and shakes it. "You let her use House colors."
"And?"
And he knows he should say Idiot... You've been so OBVIOUS.
But as they say, to be loved is to be changed. To change yourself. So Viktor bites his tongue. Swallows the anxiety. Decides to take a leaf from his stupid, sopping boyfriend's book.
Viktor leans into those big, tender hands. Allows love, in all its diverse expressions, to wash over him...He trusts it more, now he understands where Jayce learned it from.