Chapter Text
They don't talk about it, which Jayce supposes is the story of their entire relationship. It’s his fault, this time at least. He avoids Viktor, waking early and leaving before he’s awake. He can’t stop remembering the three tiny kisses Viktor gave him, feeling his partner’s breath on his scalp over and over as he pieces together his smokehouse, hinging the walls and digging out a pit beneath it for the coals. He feels eyes on him as he moves through the silent streets of Piltover, feels naked as though the walls themselves can read his thoughts.
He might be going insane.
He knows that everything they’ve said and done so far can qualify as acceptable if they simply let it, if neither of them pushes they can be two men comforting each other in an empty city. Maybe they’ve both been too forward, but that can be the end of it. He’s noticed the way Viktor’s touches have changed since they’ve been in this Piltover, how easily the other man reaches out now when he hesitated before. Jayce had always been the one to initiate, and always with just the right kinds of touches that never strayed beyond plausible deniability. A hand on the shoulder, a supporting touch to the lower back, always in the context of celebration or support. Now, their touches have become comfort and kindness, and Viktor initiates as often as Jayce. He worries that Viktor also means them as affection and attraction and Jayce isn’t sure how to respond.
Attraction is a losing game when your naked body can’t keep the promises it makes clothed. He’d learned that lesson early, his own mother gently explaining the danger of his wants to him at sixteen when he’d finally worked up the courage to ask. You’re not like other people, she’d told him. People will think you’re tricking them if you don’t tell them first, mijo, and they might be angry even if you’re honest. I don’t want to see you hurt. She had pulled him into her arms then, and held him as he tearfully reconciled who he wanted to be with what was safe for people like him.
For a long time, attraction had felt unobtainable. He had tried, moving in the circles where his body was simply an oddity or even an exotic prize rather than a dangerous subversion, but even among people who found him attractive he could never quite manage to reciprocate in the way they seemed to need. He had been surrounded by beautiful, brilliant people, and while he’d seen their brilliance he had never felt the same spark they all seemed to find so easily. Affection had been easier. He could offer anyone a hand on the shoulder or a hug when needed, but it had never felt like more than friendship or kindness, even with people who so clearly wanted it to be more.
Mel had been different. She had never pushed him, had simply made her desires clear and let him respond in his own time. He had needed it, had needed her, and with hindsight he realized that she had needed him too. Alone in a city full of sharks, they had been each other’s safe haven. He had felt safe with her, had even thought he loved her, but then Viktor had collapsed and he’d had seven years of unrealized feelings slam into him like a hammer to the leg. He remembers sitting next to Viktor’s hospital bed, the smell of bleach and death in his nostrils, and realizing he would tear the world apart for the man in front of him.
The problem is, he followed through on the threat.
Now, they’re no longer partners dancing around something it seems neither of them had the sense to admit earlier. They’re a former demigod and the man who forced him to ascend. Jayce remembers his one glimpse of the raised lavender scars that stretch across Viktor’s chest, it plays on loop in his head just like the feeling of Viktor’s gentle kisses. A condemnation of both his weakness and his strength. I promised you, he’d told Viktor, and even then he’d wished he could have made a different promise far earlier.
—
He washes the sweat of the day off with a rag made from someone’s shirt, letting the water drip down the emergency shower drain in the lab across the hall. The cold water feels odd over his bad leg, like the sensation is both too close and too far all at once. His eyes trace the ruin of it, the bump of his mis-healed bones beneath his skin and the white striated scars of arcane corruption stretching out from it like concentric rings. He lets his eyes trace the rest of his body, imagining it as Viktor might see it.
His thighs and stomach have changed shape, despite his lack of calories. He’s grown softer, more curvy, years of intentional change reversed by the slow progress of his own body’s nature. He knows his face is softer too, rounded in ways that makes him feel younger and older all at once as his softer skin makes the lines in his face more obvious. He wonders when he’ll start bleeding again, when he’ll finally consume enough calories for his body to remember all its original functions. It should bother him, but the sheer inevitability of it makes him apathetic. His body has always been a poor vessel, a few more cracks is nothing new.
Even if he was brave enough, even if he could bridge the gap between who he is and who he was before, how can he offer a body like this to his partner?
—
Viktor is reading one of their counterparts’ journals by candlelight when he finishes bathing, looking like a contented academic despite their circumstances. He’s gotten a sunburn from his time spent in the garden, pink cheeks and nose slowly fading into the ghost of a tan. His moles, usually stark against his pale skin, have been joined by a constellation of freckles that make Jayce’s hand itch to trace their paths along his cheeks.
He’s definitely going insane.
“You’re back,” Viktor remarks, his tone making it half a question, as though Jayce might not have returned.
“I was–” Jayce begins, uncertain how to finish, but certain Viktor knows his tells well enough to spot a lie.
His partner closes the journal in his hands, placing it down on the table beside him as Jayce watches his face slide into a hard mask.
“Your brace is complete,” Viktor tells him, mask perfectly serene, “Do you want to try it on?”
“Alright,” Jayce replies, feeling very far from it.
Viktor rises, and Jayce takes his seat, watching as the other man sits on the floor before him, stretching his bad leg out awkwardly beneath the chair. Viktor’s nimble fingers make quick work of his current brace, letting it slide to the floor with a loud clack. Jayce realizes then that neither of them is speaking, the silence filled with uncertain electricity.
“Thank you,” he says awkwardly, as Viktor slides the new brace onto his leg.
He looks up at Jayce then, hesitating with his hands just above Jayce’s knee. His features are still locked in a mask of serenity, but his eyes are resigned, as though he’s done a dozen calculations and they’ve all come out wrong.
“There is no need to thank me,” Viktor replies finally, his hands resuming their course over his leg. “I wanted to do this.”
“I’m sorry,” Jayce responds, almost instinctual in his desire to somehow make things right between them.
“There is no need to apologize,” Viktor tells him gently, carefully cinching the straps to the brace, “and no need to— to reciprocate or feel any obligation towards me. I apologize, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”
It’s a speech, a well-prepared one despite the fact that Viktor still isn’t looking at him. Jayce can’t tell if he’s sparing his own feelings or Jayce’s but either option feels like another twist of the knife.
“You didn’t make me uncomfortable,” Jayce replies gently.
“Then why are you avoiding me?” Viktor asks, voice almost a whisper.
Because I’m afraid
Because I’m broken
Because you won’t like me anymore when you see the real me
But these are habitual responses, repeated on command as though Jayce’s body is a rosary and he can pray hard enough for them to stop feeling true. He realizes, as he looks down at the hurt and confusion Viktor struggles to hide, how far his ruminations have carried him from the truth. Viktor isn’t a god, He's just a man with a sunburn trying and failing to figure his way through a second chance he never expected. Despite all evidence his mind presents to the contrary, Jayce is no different. They poured their very souls into each other in the arcane, how is it that they still haven’t figured this out?
Viktor is staring at him, face upturned and still filled with hurt as he waits for a response. Jayce realizes he must be staring too. He reaches out, his palm cradling Viktor’s chin, and runs his thumb over the smattering of freckles on Viktor’s pink cheeks.
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” he says, as the pink of Viktor’s sunburn turns into a blush that spreads down his neck. “I’m just not used to this sort of— of affection.”
He watches as Viktor slots the information into his existing calculations, his face doing something complicated and painful before settling on an expression that’s half surprise and half sadness.
“Do you want me to stop?” Viktor asks, his eyes searching Jayce’s as though there’s some secret catch to his admission.
“No,” Jayce tells him, thumb still gently stroking his cheek, “Just— be patient with me? I’m not the person I used to be.”
“Neither am I,” Viktor says, huffing a laugh as some of the tension leaves his shoulders, “but I like this version of you.”
He reaches for Jayce’s hand, pulling it away from his face and kissing Jayce’s palm. The sensation is electric, as though Jayce has been struck by a live wire. He wants to chase it, but instead Viktor places his hand at the top of his brace.
“Hold this,” he instructs.
Jayce obeys, taking Viktor’s change in topic as an end to their unguarded honesty for the moment. He holds the top of the brace steady as Viktor carefully tightens the straps and adjusts the foot to fit over his boot. He notices all the tiny touches that Viktor has added: the more sturdy ratchet system built into the foot, the knee support that gloves his joint tightly to prevent him from twisting it, the latticed metal around his calf designed both to support it and protect it from casual bumping because Viktor has noticed it’s still sensitive. Jayce remembers forging the lattice. He had wondered its purpose, and now that he sees it employed so elegantly, he feels his chest tighten at the sheer amount of care Viktor has put into his brace. Into him.
“There,” Viktor says, tightening the last strap, “stand up, see how it fits.”
Jayce stands, taking a few experimental steps. The new brace is lighter than his old one, but somehow sturdier. Bending his knee feels like work now, the supports Viktor built in forcing the joint to align properly with each step. The lift feels like an odd weight at the end of his leg, but his balance is far better. He can feel the way the brace changes his gait, forcing him to be more conscious of how he moves while providing far more support than the brace he improvised in the ravine.
“Thank you, it’s—“ Jayce says, hesitating at the look of worry in Viktor’s eyes, “it’s lovely, Viktor”
He watches as Viktor blushes again, a victory that makes his chest feel like it's full of butterflies.
“Yes, well I am one of the Founding Fathers of Hextech,” Viktor jokes, his lips stretching into the beginning of a smile.
“The founding–” Jayce laughs at the affectation, “I’ve never heard us called that.”
“Eh,” Viktor shrugs, “I’ve heard you called all sorts of things, Man of Progress.”
“Oh Gods, don’t start,” Jayce shoots back over his shoulder as he turns on the propane and lights their tiny stove, “you want rice for dinner?”
“Is there another option?” Viktor asks, eyeing the carefully stacked bags of rice, beans, lentils and other dry goods they’ve pilfered from every abandoned grocery store they could find.
“There’s also beans,” Jayce notes, his face deadpan for only a moment before he can’t help but break into a smile.
“Perfect,” Viktor replies.
Jayce can feel Viktor isn’t quite finished with him. There’s a hesitation in the way the other man lets him cook without interruption or banter that indicates he’s ruminating on something before bringing it to Jayce’s attention.
Viktor waits until they’re both eating to broach the subject, giving Jayce the option of using his food as an excuse to avoid looking at him.
“I wanted–” Viktor begins, struggling to put his thoughts into words, “I think we should consider leaving the lab.”
“Leaving?” Jayce asks.
“We’re running out of propane,” Viktor explains. “It’s only a matter of time before we have to resort to cooking things over the fire. I can’t carry food up three flights of stairs every day, or carry water–”
“Alright,” Jayce interrupts him, aware that he doesn’t sound it, “where do you want to go?”
“Jayce, I need you to be certain,” Viktor says, suspicion in his voice. “Don’t just agree because it’s easier.”
“I’m not,” he responds, sighing hard to try and force the frustration out of his voice, “you think you’re the only one who can’t manage the stairs?”
Viktor doesn't respond, but the look he gives Jayce is one of surprise, as though he expected a fight. Jayce is as tired of being in pain as he is pretending not to feel it. The thought of leaving the lab fills him with panic, but, like his self recrimination, it’s habitual and he can ignore it if he tries hard enough.
“If you’re certain,” Viktor says, sounding less certain himself, “I think we should consider finding a freestanding building. It would make it easier to convert it from the city power grid to run off Hextech.”
“Off Hextech?” He repeats, his skin suddenly feeling too tight.
“Yes,” Viktor says, his voice purposefully soft, “there is likely no way for us to restore power using the existing grid, and solar would take too long and be too unreliable. But with the Hexgem we could power a small structure—“
He breaks off as Jayce stands up suddenly, making the dishes clatter. It takes Jayce a moment to realize he’s standing, and another to get his breathing under control.
“Jayce—,” Viktor says, voice still so gentle as he reaches out as if to comfort him.
“It’s fine,” Jayce says, forcing his body back into his chair.
Viktor can clearly tell it isn’t, but they’re both well-versed in the art of not talking about it so they continue their meal in silence. Jayce tries to think of small talk, of some way to ease the conversation back into neutral territory, but finds himself at a loss. If they were normal, maybe they could talk about how they spent their days, but he doubts I thought of you for eight hours straight and now I can’t even look you in the eye would make this better.
“I see the smokehouse is complete,” Viktor says, breaking their uneasy truce with such gentleness it makes Jayce almost flinch.
“Yeah.” He says, voice brittle.
“Have you caught any rabbits to try it with?” Viktor asks, nothing if not persistent.
“No,” Jayce sighs, “all the rabbits I’ve caught have been too young, so I have to let them go. I don’t want to kill babies.”
“No,” Viktor replies, his voice wavering just a fraction, “that would be cruel.”
Jayce wonders if he’s thinking of the children he killed as the herald, or the child Jayce admitted to killing in Zaun. They finish the meal in silence, because neither of them is brave enough to invent more small talk.
—
Jayce dreams of Viktor’s golden eyes following him, of Viktor prying his ribs open and sliding Hextech-blue hands into his chest. In the dream he watches as though the gentle slide of his partner's limbs into his chest is inevitable, but when he wakes up Viktor is clawing at him, breathing hard and whispering unintelligible pleas. Jayce holds him, wrapping himself tightly around Viktor and feeling the other man relax at the sensation, his breathing gently slowing.
He watches Viktor sleep, letting his eyes trace over his freckled cheekbones and his sun-chapped lips. He’s beautiful, Jayce thinks. His face has filled out since coming here, and he no longer has the gaunt look of a man pursued by death or forced into godhood. Jayce wonders if Viktor might actually gain weight, if he could feed him enough. The thought of Viktor, healthy and whole, fills him with the desire to make it possible at any cost. He recognizes the thought as dangerous, remembers the cost the last time he wanted Viktor alive above all else, but can’t shake the idea that the only thing he needs to fix to ensure Viktor’s happiness now is himself.
****
Viktor wakes up alone and tries not to let frustration be his first instinct. He knew it was too much to ask Jayce to consider moving, knew it was foolish to use the brace as a way to soften the blow of his proposal, but he did it anyway. His leg hurts, the cold burning of nerve, or whatever he's got now, pain never quite fading now that he takes the stairs more often to tend their garden and help Jayce with the other tasks necessary for their survival. He wonders if it would be easier to convince his partner to move if he was more honest about his pain, but he doesn’t want to remind Jayce that he’s broken, not when the other man still looks at him like he’s a god.
He knows that should make him anxious, that he should feel guilty about failing to keep his distance. He’d sworn he wouldn’t cross the line with Jayce, and then had proceeded to utterly obliterate the line because he wanted so badly to make him feel safe. He thinks there must be something broken in him to keep pushing Jayce like this, to keep finding new ways to torture him.
But, Jayce isn’t exactly keeping his distance either. Viktor can still feel the warmth of his hand against his cheek, the calloused fingers gently rubbing a line across his sun speckled face. It makes him want to scream, to tear the world into a thousand tiny pieces just so he can put them back in the right order to show Jayce how good he is, how much he deserves to be happy, and how much Viktor would do to see him happy.
No, those thoughts are too dangerous. That kind of desperation belongs to someone, to something else. He is just a man again, and all he can offer is his once-again-broken body and a willingness to reach across the gap between them.
—
He had expected Jayce to already have disappeared, but when he emerges from the supply closet it’s to the sight of his partner surrounded by paper covered in scratchy drawings. Not drawings, maps, Viktor realizes. Jayce has mapped out several sections of the city, circling those buildings he thinks are of interest.
“I figured it would help if I mapped out all the free standing houses I could remember,” Jayce says, as though they had somehow settled things last night instead of falling into bed in uneasy silence.
There’s an intensity to his actions that makes Viktor nervous.
“Jayce,” he asks gently, “do you actually want to do this?”
“No,” his partner responds bluntly, eyes carefully fixed on the map in front of him, “but I’m tired of being in pain all the time, and you’re right, the stairs are too much.”
He looks up at Viktor then, and the vulnerability of his face at the admission brings Viktor back to their first meeting. All of Jayce’s guarding, all the walls he’s built to protect himself, disappear for just a moment before he once again turns back to his maps.
“I think we should start with this house here,” Jayce says, indicating a structure perhaps six blocks from the lab. “It’s a townhouse, so it will likely be wired into the city grid, but it is technically freestanding and it’s close enough that moving will be easier.”
It’s a clear, concise, and accurate plan. Jayce is correct on every point. Yet, all Viktor wants is to gather him up in his arms and soothe the hurt he is so obviously hiding.
—
Jayce’s maps are meticulously accurate, and the first house he suggests is easy to find. Unfortunately, he neglected to mention a key drawback.
“It has stairs,” Viktor says, more bluntly than he means, at the sight of eight steep stairs at the front of the townhouse.
“Sorry,” Jayce says, “I didn’t— I don’t think I ever noticed.”
Of course, because this is new to him. Because he's never had to notice before, but some version of Viktor made certain that he will never fail to notice again.
Most of the other houses Jayce has selected have similar drawbacks. They walk through houses full of water damaged plaster and nearly caved in roofs, each one making more clear that they are woefully underprepared for the rigors of homeownership in a city without a single contractor. Despite their disappointment, Viktor finds himself easily distracted as Jayce falls into the rhythm of problem solving, suggesting ways each house might be fixed despite their varying states of disrepair.
His hands seem to constantly find their way onto Viktor. A touch on the shoulder at the sight of another too-damaged house, a hand around his elbow guiding him away from damaged floorboards, a hand against his lower back as they survey a new prospect from the street. Jayce has always been physically affectionate, always quick to touch and never upset when Viktor doesn’t reciprocate. But that was before Viktor broke their carefully-held truce, before he let the plausible deniability of their partnership crash and burn in his desire to hold Jayce just a little tighter.
Now, he wonders if Jayce is touching him to signal his own desires, or if it’s simply another mask. Perhaps Jayce thinks that, like agreeing to leave the lab, it will be easier for them both if he gives in to Viktor’s wants. Maybe Viktor has been manipulating Jayce all along, backing him into a corner where the only options available are to acquiesce to Viktor or be trapped, alone in an empty city surrounded by evidence of their sins.
“I can hear you thinking,” Jayce says, breaking his reverie as he tries to open a swollen-shut door.
They’re in another damaged house. Water stains creep along the walls beside them, the result of windows left open in the owner’s haste to flee. Viktor can smell the mildew behind the plaster and knows already that he’s going to reject this house, but he’s following Jayce anyway because despite himself the other man is enjoying the rhythm of exploration.
“That’s unlikely,” Viktor replies, automatic in his rebuttal.
“Vik—,” Jayce says.
Viktor hears the splintering of wood a split second before the floorboards give way under Jayce’s feet. He doesn’t have time to utter a sound other than a soft huff as the breath is pushed from his lungs and he’s stuck up to his shoulders in the floor.
Viktor lunges toward him without thinking, dropping his cane so he can use both hands to hold onto Jayce. His leg screams at him as he tries to brace against the floor, knee giving way and landing him painfully on his rear. Jayce shifts as Viktor falls, their change in balance causing him to sink further into the floor, but Viktor hangs onto Jayce’s hands with a death grip, nails digging in as he ignores the pain of his fall.
“Don’t let me fall,” Jayce whispers harshly, eyes filled with terror.
“If you weren’t so fucking heavy,” Viktor grunts, mild cruelty covering the way his heart hammers at Jayce’s fear.
He braces his good leg against the door frame beside Jayce, pushing against it as he pulls until his shoulders ache. Slowly, Jayce’s torso is freed from the floor. He wrenches one of his hands from Viktor’s grasp, using it to push himself up. Inch by inch, they pull him up until he has enough leverage to wriggle his way out of the hole. They both flop down onto the floor after it’s over, breathing hard. Viktor’s joints are in agony, and from the sound Jayce makes as he turns toward him he’s not in much better shape
“Fuck this house,” Jayce says.
Viktor laughs, he can’t help it. The adrenaline in his veins must be making him giddy. Beside him, Jayce lets out an answering laugh, the gap in his teeth on full display. Viktor’s eyes follow it, and when Jayce catches him looking he doesn’t hide his gaze.
“You’re beautiful,” Jayce says, and the shock of his directness makes Viktor freeze.
When he kisses Viktor it’s less of a shock and more of an inevitability. The soft press of Jayce’s lips against his feels like an admission they’ve both waited far too long to make. He melts into it, letting his eyes flutter closed. When Jayce pulls back he feels the loss keenly, but carefully avoids chasing him.
“Is this alright?” Jayce asks, his expression complicated and raw.
Viktor brings his hand to Jayce’s cheek, letting his thumb rub a gentle circle over his cheekbone.
“Yes,” he says, wrapping his hand around the back of Jayce’s head and pulling him into another kiss.
If their first kiss was an admission, this one is a declaration. Viktor can feel the electricity of Jayce’s desire, and answers it with his own. He wraps his hand around the back of Jayce’s neck, pulling him closer, kissing him deeper, running his fingers through his hair and letting his nails drag along his scalp. He feels Jayce’s tongue test the barrier of his lips and gladly lets him in, moaning into the other man’s mouth. Jayce’s hand is on his back, nails digging into his skin through the fabrics of his shirt. He smells like sweat and old houses and—
Ozone. The sharp tang of it is drowning him. The scent of Hextech, of magic, the scent of his not-flesh and the thing that is no longer a mining hammer. He can feel the destruction of his chest, the slowing of a heartbeat that was never really there, but it’s distant, unimportant. All that matters is the scent of ozone and the sight of Jayce before him, hazy like a mirage but more real than anything Viktor has seen or done since his resurrection.
“Vik?” Jayce whispers, his voice a quiet plea.
They’re on the floor, the hard floorboards digging into his hip. Jayce is lying beside him, his hand rubbing grounding circles into Viktor’s upper arm, and he looks terrified because Viktor has just initiated something they both wanted and proceeded to lose his mind in the middle of it.
“Are you with me?” Jayce asks, still whispering, as if he’ll startle Viktor if he speaks at a normal volume.
“I’m sorry,” Viktor whispers, his breathing harsh and his chest tight.
“It’s alright,” Jayce whispers.
He moves as if to embrace Viktor, but hesitates.
“May I?” He asks.
The weight of Jayce’s care feels like too much, so Viktor refuses it in the most gentle way he can.
“Will you get me my cane?” He says, “I want to go home.”
Jayce gives him a look that’s all furrowed eyebrows and sad eyes, but he recovers Viktor’s cane and helps him up from the floor. He's unsteady on his feet, head swimming and the scent of ozone still in his nostrils. It clings to him, and to Jayce, tainting everything and making him nauseous and shaky.
Jayce keeps his distance as they walk, close enough to catch Viktor if he falls but far enough that they don’t accidentally touch. He’s limping badly, but trying to hide it, as though Viktor doesn’t know all his tells. He hates that he’s hurt Jayce, that the man beside him would give anything to comfort him and he simply can’t accept it. He doesn’t have the energy to explain the way the pieces of him still tangle with the Herald, the way he would do anything to avoid tainting Jayce with all the parts of him he isn’t sure are him.
The stairs up to the lab are a special agony, as though the universe is mocking them both. Jayce goes first, still pretending at greater mobility than he truly has, and Viktor almost bumps into him when he stops in front of the door to their lab.
“What—,” Viktor starts, freezing in shock when he spots what made Jayce stop.
Come to the bridge. Noon tomorrow. the door reads in dripping neon paint. Viktor recognizes the style distantly, as though the memory isn’t fully his. Something about well-made bombs with monkey’s faces.
“Jinx,” Jayce whispers, his recall unaffected by two deaths and a stint as a God.
Powder, his brain supplies, a little girl with a toy rabbit.
“This isn’t our universe,” he points out, struggling to keep his voice even as he realizes exactly how he knows that name. “It could be someone else.”
“You really think that?” Jayce asks, already making his way down the hall towards the lab where they’ve been quietly ignoring the Hexgem.
It takes Viktor a moment to realize where he’s going, but when he puts the pieces together he’s filled with a cold dread.
“Shit,” he hears Jayce say.
Viktor follows him into the lab, surprised to find it mostly intact. The Hexgem is missing, but the apparatus is undamaged. This isn’t a grandiose and explosive theft, it was carefully calculated to avoid both their presence and any potential harm to the Hexgem.
“They would have had to watch us, to know when we wouldn’t be here,” he says quietly, almost to himself.
“I thought I was going crazy,” Jayce replies, talking fast as frustration eats at his control. “I kept feeling like I was being watched when I was out in the city.”
“They took the journals too,” Viktor notes, taking a mental inventory of the lab.
“The journals?” Jayce asks, “the ones from the other us?”
“Yes,” Viktor says, realizing Jayce doesn't fully grasp his meaning, “and my journal as well, with my notes on constructing an anomaly.”
Jayce stares at him, and Viktor can’t tell if he’s more angry or surprised. The scent of ozone fills his nostrils and he lets the cold release of dissociation turn his face into a mask.
“How much did you write down?” Jayce asks, already pacing the length of the lab.
“Enough that I could pick up the research again if I needed to,” Viktor tells him, aware that this is the wrong thing to say, but unable to stop himself.
“Why would you—“ Jayce asks, as if he’s just remembered Viktor can keep a secret.
Surely, he of all people should know better.
“Because I wanted to have it, in case you changed your mind,” Viktor says, his voice even and perfect despite how far away it sounds.
“You didn’t trust me to know what I wanted,” Jayce says. It’s not a question.
“I didn’t think this, our life here, was sustainable,” he replies, clipped and clear. “I didn’t know there were other people here or I would have—“
“What? Hidden it better?” Jayce interrupts, his voice acidic.
I would have left you with them and found the tallest building in Piltover, he doesn't say.
“You would have left me,” Jayce says, reading the truth behind his mask as easy as breathing.
“I would have spared you the trouble—,”
“And what if I want your trouble?” Jayce asks, voice raised in frustration.
“Jayce—,” Viktor starts, a plea that he doesn’t know how to finish.
“No, you don’t get to decide this for me,” Jayce interrupts, closing the distance between them. His hand is like a hot iron on Viktor’s arm, despite the fact that his grip is nowhere near tight. “When I said I wanted to stay with you I meant it, don’t you dare talk about sparing me the trouble, alright?”
He wraps his fingers gently under Viktor’s chin, pulling his head upwards until he has no choice but to look into Jayce’s eyes. His gaze is filled with an intensity Viktor hasn’t seen in a long time, a certainty that nearly makes him flinch. He had forgotten what Jayce could look like when he wasn’t afraid, and the sheer drive behind his eyes burns all Viktor’s doubt to ashes.
“Alright,” Viktor whispers, because anything else feels like too much.
“Alright,” Jayce says. “Now we just have to figure out how to keep an unstable lunatic from learning to travel between universes.”